a moment. “I appreciate it, pal. I owe you one.” He hung up.
Nick Vito, Santo, Fiore and Colella were watching him.
“Haven’t you bastards got anything to do? Get the fuck out of here.” The four men hurriedly left.
Michael sat there, thinking, picturing Jennifer and Adam Warner together. Why had she never mentioned him? And Joshua’s father, who had died in the Viet Nam war. Why hadn’t Jennifer ever talked about him?
Michael Moretti began to pace the office.
Three hours later Tony Santo ushered in a timid, badly dressed man in his sixties who was obviously terrified.
“This is Wally Kawolski,” Tony said.
Michael rose and shook Kawolski’s hand. “Thanks for coming over, Wally. I appreciate it. Sit down. Can I get you anything?”
“No, no thank you, Mr. Moretti. I’m fine, sir. Thank you very much.” He was doing everything but bowing.
“Don’t be nervous. I just want to ask you a couple of questions, Wally.”
“Sure, Mr. Moretti. Anything you want to know. Anything at all.”
“Are you still working at the Belmont Towers?”
“Me? No, sir. I left there, oh, about five years ago. My mother-in-law has bad arthritis and—”
“Do you remember the tenants?”
“Yes, sir. Most of ‘em, I guess. They was kind of—”
“Do you remember a Jennifer Parker?”
Walter Kawolski’s face lit up. “Oh, sure. She was a fine lady. I even remember her apartment number. Nineteen twenty-nine. Like the year the market crashed, you know? I liked her.”
“Did Miss Parker have a lot of visitors, Wally?”
Wally slowly scratched his head. “Well, that’s hard to say, Mr. Moretti. I only saw her when she was comin’ in or goin’ out, like.”
“Did any men ever spend the night in her apartment?”
Walter Kawolski shook his head. “Oh, no, sir.”
So all this had been about nothing. He felt a sharp wave of relief. He had known all along that Jennifer would never—
“Her boyfriend might have come home and caught her.”
Michael thought he must have misunderstood. “Her boyfriend?”
“Yeah. The guy Miss Parker was livin’ with there.”
The words hit Michael in the stomach like a sledgehammer. He lost control of himself. He grabbed Walter Kawolski by the lapels and jerked him to his feet. “You stupid cocksucker! I asked you if—what was his name?”
The little man was terrified. “I don’t know, Mr. Moretti. I swear to God, I don’t know!”
Michael shoved him away. He picked up the newspaper and pushed it under Walter Kawolski’s nose.
Kawolski looked at Adam Warner’s photograph and said excitedly, “That’s him! That’s her boyfriend.”
And Michael felt the world crashing down around him. Jennifer had lied to him all this time; she had betrayed him with Adam Warner! The two of them had been sneaking behind his back, conspiring against him, making a fool of him. She had put horns on him.
The ancient juices of vengeance stirred strongly within Michael Moretti, and he knew he was going to kill them both.
54
Jennifer flew from New York to London to Singapore, with a two-hour stopover in Bahrain. The almost-new airport at the oil emirate was already a slum, filled with men, women and children in native garb, sleeping on the floors and on benches. In front of the airport liquor store was a printed warning that anyone drinking in a public place was subject to imprisonment. The atmosphere was hostile, and Jennifer was glad when her flight was called.
The 747 jet landed at Changi Airport in Singapore at four-forty in the afternoon. It was a brand new airport, fourteen miles from the center of the city, replacing the old International Airport, and as the plane taxied down the runway Jennifer could see signs of construction still going on.
The Customs building was large and airy and modern, with rows of luggage carts for the convenience of passengers. The Customs officers were efficient and polite, and in fifteen minutes Jennifer was finished and headed for the taxi stand.
Outside the entrance, a heavy middle-aged Chinese man approached her. “Miss Jennifer Parker?”
“Yes.”
“I am Chou Ling.” Moretti’s contact in Singapore. “I have a limousine waiting.”
Chou Ling supervised the storing of Jennifer’s luggage in the trunk of the limousine, and a few minutes later they were headed toward the city.
“Did you have a pleasant flight?” Chou Ling asked.
“Yes, thank you.” But Jennifer’s mind was on Stefan Bjork.
As though reading her thoughts, Chou Ling nodded to a building ahead of them. “That is Changi Prison. Bjork is in there.”
Jennifer turned to look. Changi Prison was a large building off the highway, surrounded by a green fence and electrified barbed wire. There were watchtowers at each corner, manned