Emily Locke 01 - Final Approach

wall-mounted metal cube. When we were alone, Jeannie stood watch as I pulled $125,000 of thick, cash bricks from my backpack and stacked them inside. The door snapped shut and I removed a key with a cheap plastic handle from the slot and shoved it into the pocket of my Capris.
    Outside, we waited to cross the street and Jeannie turned to me and wrinkled her nose.
    “We’re sending Trish to a children’s museum?”

Chapter Thirty-six
    “I lied before,” I told Richard, once we connected via phone. “I never went to the FBI field office for an interview.”
    “I know.”
    “It’s because Trish knows where Annette is. She’ll trade her for the money. Casey too.”
    Jeannie and I were laying low in a park near the Houston Zoo. Richard was my second call. First, we’d called Vince to thank him for his help at the hospital and bring him up to speed. He wanted to help and I’d promised to keep him posted.
    “Your emotions are clouding your judgment.” My low-battery warning interrupted him but Richard’s tone came through; his words snapped with the harsh bite of concern. “What you’re planning is suicide. She’ll never let you walk out of there with those kids.”
    “I think she’s greedy enough to do it.”
    “Think. She gives you the kids. You give her the money. What’s to say she’ll let you leave? She’ll kill you, take her money, take the kids—probably sell them
again
—and be back in business before dinner.”
    I explained where I’d hidden half of her money. Richard wasn’t persuaded.
    “When’s this happening?” he asked.
    “She’ll call me. The only way she’d do it was for me to let her set it up.”
    “Jesus.” He exhaled. “You know I have to tell the FBI.”
    From my seat at a picnic table, I spotted Jeannie at the playground, surrounded by a gaggle of little girls.
    Richard continued. “By the way, I know what you did at the hospital.”
    “Look, I want to call Clement, but I’m afraid that if I do, the FBI will track me down before I get Annette.”
    “You need their help.”
    I nodded. “I know. But I’m afraid to ask for it. They might accidentally tip off Trish. Or maybe arrest me. I don’t know what to do.”
    “Clement wants Trish,” Richard said. “And you’re talking to her. That should help. Where are you?”
    “Hermann Park. We’re waiting for her instructions.”
    “
We
? You didn’t trust me or the FBI, but
Jeannie’s
competent?”
    I looked up in time to see her “shake it all about” with a group of Hoky-Pokying preschoolers.
    I shrugged. “She busted me out of the hospital.”
    “Stay put,” he said. “I’ll call Clement, see what he says.”
    Shortly after we hung up, Kurt’s phone rang. Trish was ready.
    The plan she laid out wasn’t what I expected: “Go to Neiman Marcus in the Galleria and tell them you lost a beaded red bag. Get there by 5:30. Bring the money.”
    It was 4:35 and I didn’t know how long it took to get to the Galleria, or where the Neiman Marcus was. Trish didn’t stay on the line long enough to ask her.
    “Come on!” I waved Jeannie toward the car. She trotted after me, kids waving goodbye as she hurried away. We asked a speed walker for directions. She seemed to answer in slow motion.
    We got to the Galleria in a half hour. I recognized some street names—Richmond, West Alabama, Westpark. It was the neighborhood I’d jogged my first morning in Houston.
    Traffic near the high-dollar mega mall was a problem. Cars were gridlocked around the block, turn signals blinking. I feared the wait would eat up the time I had left.
    “Go ahead,” Jeannie said at the corner of Westheimer and Post Oak. “I’ll park. Give me your phone. When you have the mysterious handbag, call me. We’ll hook up that way.”
    I pulled Kurt’s cell phone out of the bag, lighter with half its cash missing, and handed it to Jeannie.
    “No,” she said, “You need that one incase Trish calls again. Give me yours.”
    “I need mine incase Richard calls.”
    Impatient, she snatched the backpack from me and took out my phone. We saved the critical numbers—mine, Richard’s, Trish’s, Vince’s, and the new pre-paid—into all the models. Jeannie kept my cell and I took the new temporary phone along with Kurt’s. Then I let myself out of the car, waited for a Number 33 Metro bus to pass, and crossed the street toward the mall.
    At Neiman Marcus, I passed a security guard at the door and was promptly met by a dignified older