Hedging (A Smith and Wetzon Mystery)

scream. She edged away from the doughnut shop.
    Silvestri grabbed her hand, pulled her close. He scanned the crowd while Jimmy gave her a wink. Wetzon gritted her teeth.
    “He’s a good man,” Jimmy told her, giving Silvestri an elbow.
    “You’re such a kidder, Jimmy,” she said. She pinched the narrow roll of flesh above Silvestri’s belt, sending him a mental message: Let’s fucking get going.
    “Make him?” Jimmy said, smiling at Wetzon.
    “Huh?” Wetzon said.
    “Yeah,” Silvestri said, arm tight around her waist.
    “Silvestri?” Jimmy said.
    “Yeah.”
    Wetzon looked from one to the other. “What am I missing?”
    “I don’t get them,” Jimmy said, chucking Wetzon under the chin. “Don’t they know they stand out like shit on snow?”
    Finally, Silvestri asked where the lockers were, and Jimmy pointed off to the distant left and Eighth Avenue. “Near the waiting room left of the restrooms. We’re getting rid of them. Kind of stuff you could forget about till 9/11. Too easy to stash a bomb.”
    “Emptied them lately?” Silvestri asked.
    “Last month. They get cleaned out permanently tomorrow. You got something there?”
    “Les left a bag there a few weeks ago.”
    “Good thing you came today, then.”
    They exchanged handshakes again. “Stay in touch,” Jimmy called.
    “Christ,” Wetzon said.
    “Patience. Nothing’s running away.”
    “Aren’t you at all interested in what’s in the locker?” They were walking toward the waiting room.
    “Check out the crowd. Be cool. See anyone familiar?”
    Damnation. She couldn’t believe it. “We’re being followed. So that’s what all that dumb ass double talk was about.”
    “Not so dumb ass, huh?”
    Judy Blue’s cohort was checking out pantihose in the window of a shop. “The pervert. What are we going to do?”
    “You have your MetroCard?”
    “Yes.”
    “First you’re going to make a pit stop so he’ll think that’s where Jimmy was pointing. Then take the subway up to Clo’s office.”
    “What about you?”
    “I think they’ll follow you. I’ll find a men’s room and if it’s clear, I’ll check the locker.”
    She went into the ladies’ room. A matron was refilling the toilet paper in the stalls. Wetzon washed her hands and stared into the mirror over the sinks. Her chest constricted. Deja vu. A terrified woman with dark hair and crusty cheeks looked back at her. In a moment the vision was gone and Wetzon was back. It was enough to shake her. She’d been here before, recently. But the vision was all there was and it was gone.
    “I’ve been here, Silvestri,” she said when she came out. “I caught a sliver of memory when I looked in the mirror.”
    “We’ve figured that.” He’d turned them around and they were walking toward the staircase that led down to the Eighth Avenue subway line.
    “Okay.” She was disappointed not to be the one opening the locker. The act might have brought everything back.
    “Give us a passionate kiss,” he said.
    “I’ll have to psych myself,” she said, but hardly got the words out because Silvestri’s hands framed her face and there was nothing phony about his passion. Or hers.
    He let go of her and gave her a light smack on the ass. “Be careful.”
    “You, too.”
    “Don’t look around. Just go. I’ll meet you there.”
    She ran down the stairs and slid her MetroCard into the slot. She’d have to change to the IRT at Fifty-ninth Street. Her watch said eight-twenty.

45
    W ETZON’S THOUGHTS were erratic, lurching from the contents of the locker to Laura Lee, to Carolyn Dorley, back to Laura Lee, the locker, Laura Lee. At Fifty-ninth Street, where she had to switch from the Eighth Avenue line to the Broadway line, not paying attention, she climbed the wrong staircase. Reversing herself, she caught Special Agent Gelber by surprise. She nodded to him as she passed, murmuring, “Gelber.”
    Well, good. He had followed her, not stayed on Silvestri.
    When she got out at Sixty-sixth Street and Lincoln Center, curtains had already gone up, thus ending the rush to the theatres and the resulting bottleneck of cars and taxis ringing the glowing complex. Only the locals were on the street. And the wind had picked up, dropping temperatures.
    Her cell phone went off. Silvestri. “What did you—”
    “Where are you?” Smith demanded.
    “On Sixty-seventh and Columbus. Why?”
    “She’s downstairs.” Smith disconnected, leaving Wetzon seething.
    What the hell is she