80

Shortly after two o’clock Larry Post reached Middletown. The job that Ted had laid out for him was not easy. I’m supposed to make it look like Brittany shot the boy and then killed herself. That’s easier said than done.

Larry had not been surprised that Ted had changed his mind about driving up there and finishing them off himself. Ted was worried sick that Brittany would go to the police, and he now realized that the boy might be able to convince the cops that Zan had not taken him from the park. If that happened, Ted knew the police would eventually come to him.

Larry could understand why Ted couldn’t bring himself to kill his own son, but why was it at this point even necessary? I’m no bleeding heart, but I can’t say that I ever thought that working for Ted would ever end up like this, Larry thought. But he did point out to me that if the cops keep digging and find those cameras in Zan’s apartment, she’ll know that I was the one who installed all the lighting and set up her computer.

When Zan decided to leave Ted and take that apartment on East Eighty-sixth Street, and then again when she moved to Battery Park City after Matthew disappeared, big-hearted Ted was the one who had helped her get settled both times. He sent a plumber to check all the pipes and me to install new lighting fixtures. And the cameras. The day she moved from Eighty-sixth Street I got rid of the original cameras. I had already installed the second cameras in her new apartment.

For the first three years it was enough for Ted to just spy on her anytime he wanted. But then she was getting successful in her business and she and Matthew were such a team that he couldn’t stand it. And that was just the time when he met Brittany at a party and hatched this whole crazy plan.

Ted is right. If we don’t act now, the cops will be knocking on my door before too long. I’m not going back to prison. I’d rather be dead. And he’s going to give me the money he’s already put in Matthew’s trust fund. Let’s face it. Ted needs me and I need him.

Ted had said that Brittany had become too much of a loose cannon and was now a big threat to both of us. He said that she’s nutty enough to think that she might be able to make a deal with the police and still get the five-million-bucks reward that witch Melissa has put up in her big publicity stunt.

Larry laughed out loud. If that kid ever got home safely, Melissa would have a coronary. But that’s not going to happen. He and Ted had figured out how he would get this done.

Brittany will recognize the truck when I pull up the driveway, he thought. Hopefully she won’t panic when she sees me because she knows that I’ve been in on everything all along. When I’m near the house I’ll phone her and say that I’ve got two big boxes full of cash, six hundred thousand dollars. I’ll say that Ted wanted me to show her that he wouldn’t double-cross her about the money and give her time to send it to Texas. In case she gets suspicious and is scared to open the door, I’ll be carrying one of the boxes and she can look through the window and see the hundred-dollar bills on the top layer of the box. She won’t be able to tell that the rest of the box is stuffed with newspapers.

When she lets me in, I’ll do what I have to do. If she doesn’t let me in, I’ll blow the lock off the door. If that happens, it won’t look like a murder-suicide, but there’s nothing I can do about it. The main thing is that neither one of them will ever be able to talk.