Read Online Talk by Laura van Wormer - Free Book Online Page B

this little problem too while I'm here" -- "You certainly don't sound like anyone Cassy would willingly know," Jessica said suspiciously.
    "I've done some work for Alexandra Waring too, in the past."
    "And how do you know Slim?"
    "He used to work in my mother's courthouse," Wendy said.
    "My mom's a D.A. in Delaware, Slim used to be a courthouse sheriff."
    "Ah. I see. Happy hands at home. You hunt the people down. Slim stomps 'em and Mama throws them in the slammer."
    "In a more perfect world, yes." Wendy laughed.
    "When I came up to New York and I met Dirk, I gave Slim's name to him."
    "Ouch!" Jessica said, looking under her desk.
    "Oh, rats. If either one of you happen to run into my stalker," she said, straightening up, "tell him I need new panty hose, will you? I keep getting holes in these." She reached ahead to grab her in-box and pull it near so she could start stuffing the papers in it into her big leather bag.
    "I'm going away for the weekend," she told Wendy.
    "Yes, I know," Wendy said.
    "To Alexandra's farm. I did some surveillance there last year. When she had that photographer problem."
    "Charming business we're in, isn't it?" Jessica muttered. She looked at Wendy.
    "So you're coming with me?"
    She nodded.
    Jessica looked at Slim.
    "And you?"
    "Yes," he said.
    "But I'm outside. Wendy's inside. She rides with you.
    I ride behind in another car. "
    "Oh, I see, upstairs downstairs, you're still indentured and she's like a nanny, elevated to the family quarters."
    "Kind of."
    Jessica finished stowing stuff in her bag and stood up.
    "Okay, I'm the Pied Piper, follow me."
    Jessica led her entourage home to her apartment, Slim riding in the front seat with Abdul, and Wendy in the seat beside her. Upstairs in her apartment she read the menu from an Indian restaurant on Columbus Avenue and took orders. Then she called in the order, showered, changed, packed, and the three of them sat down in the kitchen to eat.
    "It's awfully nice of you to give us dinner," Wendy said.
    "Yeah, well, just catch the spy and get rid of my stalker." Truth was, she'd sooner die than admit it to Dirk, but this stalker was starting to get on her nerves.
    Slim carried Jessica's weekend bag downstairs and Abdul drove them back to West End, but not before Jessica's daily neighborhood harasser came over to lean near the car window and let out a stream of vile language. Wendy tapped Slim on the shoulder, said some thing, and simultaneously they jumped out of the car. Jessica watched in astonishment as the two pushed their faces into her harasser's face, saying something Jessica couldn't hear. They didn't touch him, just surrounded him, talking at him, crowding him, and as he backed off, they got louder and more aggressive, picking up their pace. Now the creep was half running down the block and yet Wendy and Slim kept at him,
    invading his space, yelling. And then suddenly they stopped, trotted back and jumped in the car.
    Jessica smiled.
    "Hey, I like that. Are you guys going to do that every time you see him?"
    "You bet we will," Wendy promised.
    "You're my kind of guys," Jessica said happily. At West End, Jessica had Slim put her bag in her dressing room while she and Wendy took seats in the control room of Studio A to watch the newscast. She smiled at Will on her way in. He was sitting next to the director at the console, headset on, talking to someone in his mouthpiece. Still, he spotted her and waved.
    Out in the darkened studio, the newscasters were at their respective desks, bright lights glaring down on them. In the control room, rows of monitors were ablaze with cued film clips, video feeds, graphics and commercials, but Jessica focused on the "out" monitor, which showed what was actually going out over the air. For a moment the screen was utterly black. And then a blue dot appeared, growing brighter, which then started to move as a line, quickly outlining the continental United States, Hawaii and Alaska. Two hundred and six red dots then