Chapter 29: Contingency Plan - Lucidity

FREMMER PRESSED THE BUZZER AND WAITED A FEW SECONDS. NO ANSWER.

So he waited another few seconds and pressed the buzzer again.

Still nothing. He buzzed again, this time longer. Then one more time for good measure.

“Maybe it’s broken,” Madden said.

“I was just here a few days ago. It was working fine. He’s not answering.”

Fremmer looked up. There was a light on upstairs. Someone was home.

He hit the buzzer again, but this time he held the button down and didn’t let go.

“What are you doing?” Madden said.

“I’m trying to piss off whoever’s inside.”

He heard the inner door open, then footsteps. Mission accomplished. The main door opened and Braden appeared before them, his face flush. He was not happy.

“Stop it,” he said.

Fremmer finally let go of the buzzer. “Thanks for coming out, Victor. Now, why don’t you invite us in so we can have a friendly chat? Don’t worry, I’m not here to talk about the fifty thousand you took from me.”

“Who’s this?” Braden said.

“My private investigator, Henry.”

Braden offered his hand to Madden. “Victor Braden,” he said, shaking Madden’s hand. “I don’t know what he’s paying you, but it’s not worth it. He’s a complete lunatic.”

Fremmer watched Madden’s face as he took Braden in. They were standing a few feet apart. Madden looked him directly in the eyes. He didn’t say anything, he just stared, which made Braden uncomfortable.

“How’d you lose your arm?” Madden asked.

“Excuse me?”

“The arm, how’d you lose it?” repeated Madden.

Madden may have set a speed record for the missing hand question.

“That’s a bit personal, considering you’ve just met, don’t you think?”

“No,” Madden said.

“I’ve got visitors in town from Germany. I have to get back to them. If you touch that buzzer again, I will call the police.”

“Just answer the question,” Madden said.

Braden nodded in Fremmer’s direction. “He knows the answer, ask him.”

“I want to hear it from you.”

Braden looked at him disbelief. “A staph infection, OK? Many years ago. There, you satisfied?”

“You sure about that, Ross?”

Braden looked at him, befuddled.

“What?”

“Come on. Don’t tell me you forgot your own name?”

Braden seem genuinely bewildered.

“What are you talking about? You’re as crazy as he is, aren’t you? Both of you need to get out of here now. You understand me?”

Well, this isn’t going according to plan, Fremmer thought. Time to go to the contingency.

“We are sorry to disturb your little soirée,” Fremmer said, stalling.

“It’s not a soirée.”

Fremmer looked to his right and saw what he needed: a woman coming up the street, walking a small dog. He took a step closer to Braden. Then he got right up in his face.

“You know what, for all your highfalutin lucid dreaming crap you’re a two-bit criminal,” he said, purposely letting his saliva fly in Braden’s face.

Braden made a move to push him away, and Fremmer suddenly turned into a basketball player looking for an offensive foul, letting Braden throw him against the pavement, violently. His backpack blocked the fall a little, but he hit his hip and shoulder harder than he intended. His head touched down, too, which also hurt. He lay there for a moment. Braden looked at him, then at the would-be witness. He had a panicked look in his eyes.

“I didn’t do that,” he said to the woman with the dog, pleading his case. “I didn’t push him that hard.”

Before she had time to answer—and before Braden had time to get out of the way—Fremmer got up and slammed him in the face, square in the nose. The force of the punch didn’t immediately drop him, but his back banged up against the closed front door of his townhouse. His legs then buckled and he kind of rode the door down to a seated position, his butt on his doorstep and his knees pressed up against his chest. He held his hand up to his nose. In a matter of seconds he was bleeding profusely.

Fremmer had a handkerchief ready.

“Here,” he said, kneeling down to hand it to him. “Press it against your nose. Lift your head up.”

Braden looked up at the dog walker, who looked both startled and alarmed.

“He tried to hurt me,” Fremmer said. “You saw it.”

“You broke my nose, you son-of-a-bitch,” Braden mumbled through the handkerchief.

Fremmer let him hold it to his face a little longer. Until it was good and soaked. Then he took it away, ripping it from his grasp.

“Let’s go,” he said to Madden, who also seemed pretty astonished by what he’d just witnessed.

They walked over to Broadway, where Fremmer pulled out his Ziploc bag and put the handkerchief inside, sealed it, and handed it to Madden. Then he hailed a cab.

“So, that was your contingency plan?” Madden asked Fremmer after he’d closed the cab door.

“Yeah, you like it?”

Madden started laughing. “You know, he’s right. You are a lunatic. There’s only one problem.”

“What’s that?”

“I don’t think that’s Ross.”

“No?”

“No.”

Fremmer took a couple of seconds to consider the ramifications of Madden’s statement. “Well, it felt good anyway. And at least we now know for sure it isn’t him, don’t we?”