Fear itself: a novel by Jonathan Lewis Nasaw Page A

Deedees—white Adidas cross-trainers—on the correct feet, with the tongues pulled up smooth instead of crumpled and the Velcro straps tight but not too tight. When she had finished, she slung her pink plastic purse that matched her sunglasses over her arm, picked up Tweety’s cage, and left the house via the front door, grim-faced and determined.
    “You stay here, Ganny,” she called on her way out. “I’ll go get Simon.”

2

    Alluring as she’d been in the late afternoon, Pebble Beach was somehow even more bewitching in the early morning, with the fog drifting in wisps and tatters across moss-green fairways glistening with dew. And as if to make up to Pender for her behavior the day before—or perhaps, beautiful bitch that she was, just to keep him on the hook a little longer—she showered him with favors. The damp air kept his booming drives from flying too far, the breeze blowing in from the bay kept them dry, and the dewy greens saved more than one overmuscled putt from slipping past the hole and rolling all the way to Maui.
    The fog burned off a little before ten, leaving the sky a fresh-scrubbed blue. Pender stepped up to the eighteenth tee shooting eighty-four, laid up right, reached the green in three, and twoputted for a glorious, unashamed bogey: he’d broken ninety.
     
    After their round, and an elegant lunch at Roy’s, over in Spanish Bay—a Kobe beef carpaccio carved so exquisitely thin that the slices were almost transparent—Pender and Dolitz repaired to their two-bedroom suite at the Lodge. Naptime for Sid; time to get down to business for Pender. His first call was to Linda Abruzzi.
    “Linda, it’s Pender.”
    “Hi, Ed—how’s the vacation going?”
    “Good, pretty good. Weather’s great—and I broke ninety at Pebble this morning.”
    “Is that good?”
    “It is if your handicap’s higher than the drinking age.”
    “Have you talked to Dorie Bell yet?”
    “At her house last night.”
    “MDF?”
    “Negative on that—I think this one’s for real.” He started to lay out the plan of action he’d sketched in for Dorie last night.
    Linda interrupted him to explain about Maheu and the bank records.
    “What an extraordinary asshole,” said Pender when she’d finished. “Let me try to get in touch with McDougal. Liaison Support’s been his baby from the beginning—maybe he’ll let us have this one last hurrah.”
    “I haven’t had my first hurrah yet,” said Linda.
    “Yeah, well, stick with me, kid.”
    Pender’s next call was to McDougal’s office. He was informed that the deputy director would be in conference all afternoon—with Agents Driver, Woods, Irons, and Putter, Pender suspected. He left a message, then phoned Dorie, who wasn’t there either.
    “It’s Ed Pender,” he told her machine. Not “Agent Pender”—he had made up his mind to ask her out. “Give me a ring as soon as you can.”
    He left her his room number at the Lodge along with his cell phone number. By the time he’d finished, the jet lag he’d been trying to ignore all day finally caught up with him. Quick nap, he promised himself, climbing into bed in his boxers and sleeveless wife-beater strap undershirt, and while waiting for sleep to overtake him, he thought about Dorie Bell. Smart, funny, doing her best to get through a hard time, but constitutionally incapable of cruising in neutral. Handsome woman, too, even with that busted nose. Not to mention that certain something in the way she moved.

3

    Simon Childs retired to his bedroom at dawn. Exhausted as he was from the evening’s exertions, he knew that sleep would not come easily. It never had: he’d been a fretful baby and a restless toddler even before his mother’s departure, and a full-blown insomniac afterward. His sleep disorder manifested in both multiple dyssomnias—difficulty falling asleep, difficulty staying asleep—and parasomnias—night terrors and somnambulism. Medications helped: a triurnal rotation of chloral