Boomer's Bucket List Read online

  *

  The rest of the day passed by in a blur. Once word got out that Jennifer Westbrook would be incommunicado for the next few weeks, every team member with a question and every client who wanted his hand held called, texted, or barged into her office demanding attention. Stacy ran out and brought back a kale salad so that Jennifer could eat at her desk during a conference call from Boston and tried to redirect the flood of people demanding to speak to Ms. Westbrook now. By the time Jennifer walked out of her office at six, she was vowing to kill anyone who stood in her way. She grabbed her purse, tossed her spare house keys on Stacy’s desk, and sprinted down the hall.

  Derek Compton was waiting for her by the elevator.

  “So, you’re leaving us,” he said.

  “Don’t make it sound so final,” Jennifer said, pressing the down button. “Unless, of course, you’ve changed your mind about firing me.”

  “Of course not. I’m just not looking forward to the next few weeks without you. Stacy tells me you won’t even be online.”

  “That’s right,” she said, wishing the elevator would hurry up.

  He nodded, working his mouth in a way that suggested he was holding back a string of expletives.

  “Well, the circumstances aren’t the greatest, of course, but I hope you and Boomer have a good time.”

  Jennifer nodded. The numbers above the elevator doors were counting down very slowly. The darned thing must be stopping at every floor.

  “Thank you.”

  “I know you said Boomer likes cars”—he reached into his breast pocket—“so I got you both a little going-away present.”

  She glanced at the envelope in Compton’s hand, and her eyes widened. It looked like a VIP ticket to the Chicagoland Speedway.

  “Is that what I think it is?”

  “Yep. Cal Daniels invited me, but when I told him about your dog, he agreed to let the two of you watch Sunday’s race from his private box. He even offered to have his limo driver take you there and back.”

  She opened the envelope and took out the ticket, watching the hologram on the front flash the letters “VIP” in gold. The speedway was right on Route 66, and Boomer would adore watching the stock cars whizz by, she thought. And if they went on Sunday instead of tomorrow like she’d planned, that’d give her an extra day to get packed up and ready. As she tucked the ticket back into the envelope, Jennifer had to fight to keep from spilling her tears. Say what you want to about Derek Compton, but the man had a good heart.

  “Thank you,” she whispered. “From both of us.”

  CHAPTER 4

  Nathan Koslow pressed his ear against the telephone receiver, straining to hear his brother’s voice. Between the lousy connection and the clamor coming from the people in the newsroom, he could barely make out what Rudy was saying.

  “Hang on a sec,” Nathan said. “There’s too much noise in here.”

  He put his hand over the mouthpiece and began searching the cavernous room for a place that offered some peace and quiet.

  The Trib’s bull pen was a hive of activity at that hour. With deadlines looming, reporters hammered out stories and barked at the interns who scurried between the rows of half-height partitions. Printers and fax machines spit out paper, ringing telephones went unanswered, and section editors paced, their faces drained of color by the fluorescent lights that buzzed overhead. It was a vibrant, hectic space, and Nathan loved it, but it was no place to hold a private conversation.

  He glanced over at his section editor’s empty office, one of six glass-walled niches that lined the walls of the bull pen, and smiled. Julia Mikulski didn’t like having reporters invading her space while she was out, but this was an emergency.

  “I’ll call you back in a minute,” he said, and hung up.

  Nathan paused at Julia’s door, knocking before he entered in case she’d snuck back in and was on the floor doing one of her stress-relieving yoga poses. Julia practiced yoga like a drunk practiced sobriety: It was something to turn to when the chips were down, but not much fun for the long haul. When no one answered, Nathan slipped into the office, turned on her computer, and picked up the phone. Rudy answered on the first ring.

  “Did you go to the Web site?”

  “Not yet.” Nathan scowled. “I have to get into the system first.”

  Julia’s desk was covered in papers, layered like sediment, that had accumulated during the years she’d been working at the Trib. The top layer consisted of handwritten notes and phone message slips; under that were the copyedited articles that the newspaper would be running that week, then ideas for stories they’d be working on in the coming months, going further into the future the deeper you went in the pile. Anything beneath that was probably best left to an archaeologist.

  He signed in to the central computer system using the username and password that Julia had helpfully left on the Post-it Note she’d stuck to the screen.

  So much for security.

  “Okay,” he said. “I missed about half of what you said before. Start from the beginning. You bought a car… .”

  “Not a car, Nate, a freakin’ Mustang GT. It’s got a 435-horsepower V-8 engine, a top-of-the-line audio system, leather seats, navigation system, the works. It was a steal, too. I don’t think the guy who owns the dealership is all that bright, to be honest, but hey, that’s not my fault.”

  “A convertible?”

  “Are you kidding? ’Course it’s a convertible. You don’t think I moved all the way to California so I could drive a sedan, do you?”

  Nathan rolled his eyes. It seemed as if everything his brother purchased these days had to be in service to his newfound West Coast lifestyle. Since moving out to La La Land, Rudy had begun directing low-budget, blood-splattered horror movies with titles like Hollywood Zombie Hookers (“They Never Eat and Run!”) and Massacre on 34th Street (“Putting the ‘Black’ in Black Friday”), and judging from the amount of money he had to throw around, movies with no redeeming social value were paying pretty well.

  The system had accepted Julia’s password. Nathan launched the browser and entered the Web site address. When he hit “return,” the screen filled with a three-quarter shot of a sapphire-blue sports car, its diamond-bright finish gleaming in the sun. He could almost see Rudy tooling along Sunset Boulevard with the top down.

  “Oh, man,” Nathan sighed. “That is one fantastic car.”

  “I know, right?” Rudy said, obviously pleased that it had made an impression. “I can’t believe I had to go all the way to Chicago to find one like it.”

  “So, why not just fly out here and drive it back yourself?”

  “I told you—I’m in preproduction for Cousin Betsy Is a Bloodsucking Vampire.”

  “Can’t the dealer ship it out there?”

  “He could,” his brother said. “But that’d cost me a few grand and he can’t even promise me when it’ll get here. If you drive it to LA, all it’ll cost me is gas money and a couple nights in cheap motels.”

  Nathan smirked. “So, you’re a big spender and a cheapskate.”

  “Come on, little brother, help me out here,” Rudy wheedled. “Besides, you’ll love driving it; the thing’s a chick magnet. If you keep your smart mouth shut for a change you might even get some action.”

  Nathan looked at the computer screen, clicking through the pictures of the Mustang that the dealer had posted on his Web site. Rudy was right; it was a beauty, and beyond anything Nathan could afford. Still, the comment about the car being a chick magnet grated. He might not have the kind of legendary love life his brother bragged about, but Nathan did all right. He was just between relationships at the moment … everybody had a dry spell once in a while. The problem was, Nathan’s dry spells seemed to be lasting longer and longer.

  He chewed his lip. It wasn’t just relationships he was between, either. Since losing his regular column, Nathan had been bottom-fishing at the Trib, and steady assignments were hard to come by. If he could sell Julia on the id
ea of a travel series he could write from the road, he’d guarantee himself a week’s worth of work and some fun in the sun.

  “Okay,” he said. “Tell the dealer I’ll pick it up tomorrow.”

  *

  Julia Mikulski’s eyes narrowed. “You want to do what?”

  Nathan’s editor had returned to her office in a foul mood, made worse by the suspicion that someone had been using her computer without permission. As she sat behind her desk, reeking of the Marlboros she’d been sucking down while huddled out on the sidewalk with the rest of the pariahs, she seemed cool to the idea of letting one of her Life & Style reporters take a week off no matter how many travel articles he promised to send her. As her glare hardened, Nathan gave her his most winning smile.

  “Drive my brother’s car out to LA. He bought it from a dealer here in Downer’s Grove and the guy won’t ship it out there.”

  Not exactly the truth, but Nathan didn’t think she’d be fact-checking his story.

  “And how long will that take?” she said.

  He shrugged. “A week? Depends on how many good stories I can scare up along the way.”

  The overhead lighting made Julia’s long face look even more haggard than usual. Working at a newspaper was stressful. Competition from the Internet and the 24-7 news cycle on TV meant that even papers like the Trib were struggling, but smoking and an indifferent attitude toward her health was making her old before her time. She sat back and gave her computer a significant look. Nathan knew she suspected him of using it, but short of having the cops come in and dust it for fingerprints, she wasn’t getting a confession. Twelve months spent feigning interest in everything from ladies’ knitting circles to galas at symphony hall had given him a heck of a poker face.

  “All right,” she said. “You can go.”

  Nathan let out the breath he’d been holding.

  “Thank you.”

  As reluctant as he’d been to sign on to his brother’s scheme, once he’d agreed to go, the prospect had become downright irresistible. A week in a sports car, feeling the wind in his hair, a beautiful blonde at his side….

  “As it happens,” Julia said, digging through the sediment on her desk, “I have an idea you can work on while you’re on the road.”

  His face fell. “You do?”

  She scrabbled through the layers for a few more seconds, then pulled a piece of paper from the depths, flourishing it like a magician extracting a rabbit from his hat.

  “Route 66,” she said, reading the note in front of her. “You can drive it from here to Santa Monica Pier. Lots of interesting things along the way, too, apparently. You should be able to find plenty of human-interest stories.”

  She tossed the paper in his direction. It made a graceful arc across the desk, then stalled just out of reach, fluttered, and landed at his feet.

  Nathan snatched it up and placed it back on her desk.

  “No.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because it doesn’t exist, for one thing, and I’d rather stick to the Interstate.”

  “What do you mean it doesn’t exist? People talk about driving Route 66 all the time. Are you telling me someone’s taken it?”

  He slumped forward, shaking his head. How could he explain this to a woman who’d never left the city she was born in, much less driven a car?

  “No, it’s still there,” he said. “But when the Interstate system was built, the old Route 66 became obsolete. Parts of it fell into disrepair. I’m not even sure you can still drive it all the way from here to the West Coast.”

  Julia snatched up the paper and studied it carefully.

  “It says here you can.”

  “Well, maybe you can, then, but I guarantee it’ll take me a lot longer to get to California that way.”

  The grin she gave him was feral.

  “Well, why not give it a try and see how it goes?”

  Nathan’s eyes narrowed. What was going on? When he walked in and asked for permission to take a week off, Julia had acted like the entire division would collapse without him, and now she was all but pushing him into an assignment that might take him away from his desk for the better part of two weeks. A note of suspicion crept into his voice.

  “I thought you couldn’t spare me for that long.”

  “That was when I thought you’d be enjoying yourself out in La La Land,” she said primly. “This way, I know you’ll be getting some work done.”

  “All right, fine,” he said, snatching the paper out of her hand. “I’ll take Route 66 and see what there is worth reporting on. Just don’t blame me if it’s a bust.”

  “Agreed,” she said. “When are you leaving?”

  “I told Rudy I’d pick the car up tomorrow, but I don’t know how much time that’ll take. Maybe tomorrow, maybe the day after.”

  “Make it the day after. Morty’s got the flu and we still need the piece he was going to do on that girl who’s driving at Chicagoland on Sunday. I’ll e-mail you his ticket.”

  Nathan smiled. He hadn’t been to the Chicago Speedway in years; it’d be fun to watch the boys in the press section turn green when they saw him drive up in the Mustang.

  “Okay. I’ll watch her race and write the piece as soon as I get back to my motel.”

  He got up and headed for the door.

  “This brother you’re going to see,” Julia said. “He’s the movie director, right?”

  Nathan nodded. “Rudy, yeah.”

  “Tell him if he’s looking for a screenplay, I’ve got a few ideas rattling around.”

  She smiled sweetly, and Nathan felt his stomach lurch. According to Rudy, there were more wannabe screenwriters in Hollywood than there were cars on the freeway at rush hour. Besides, did she even know what sort of movies his brother directed?

  “Sure thing,” he said, trying to sound upbeat. “I’ll be sure and tell him when I get there.”

  He’d almost made it across the threshold, when he heard Julia’s voice again.

  “Oh, and Nathan? Keep your paws off my computer.”

  CHAPTER 5

  If Nathan had harbored any illusions about impressing people with his brother’s Mustang, they were quickly dispelled when he reached the speedway. Never mind what was out on the track; every car and truck in the parking lot had been customized with aftermarket features that made a mockery of the term “street legal.” Driving to the press parking area was like maneuvering a dinghy past a group of aircraft carriers.

  He was just getting out of the car when a limo cruised by. People in the crowd cast discreet glances as it passed, hoping to catch a glimpse of the person or persons behind its darkened windows. It could be a starlet or a visiting dignitary in there, Nathan thought—maybe both in the same car—and wouldn’t that be something to write about? As he crossed the parking lot to get a closer look, he slipped a hand into his pocket and took out his iPhone, ready to take a picture in case he got lucky and it was someone famous. The limo pulled up to the VIP entrance and stopped. Then the chauffeur got out, put on his cap, and opened the rear door.

  A woman stepped out, steadied by the chauffeur’s hand. In spite of her dark sunglasses, Nathan didn’t think she was anyone famous. She was certainly good-looking, though. Her auburn hair, parted on the side and tucked behind one ear, grazed the shoulders of her fitted bomber jacket; slim-fitting jeans showed off a trim figure; and the high-heeled booties she was wearing accentuated her long legs. Nevertheless, when she straightened up, people closest to the limo began to turn away. As Nathan lowered his phone, he understood why: A golden retriever had exited the limo behind her wearing the distinctive saddle blanket and harness of a dog in service to the blind.

  A large man in a tweed blazer stepped up to greet the woman and usher her and her dog toward the VIP entrance. As the three of them passed through the gate, the dog tugged the woman forward, excited by the crowd that pressed in around them.

  The chauffeur got back behind the wheel, and the limousine drove off. No one
seemed to have given the woman or her dog a second thought. She wasn’t famous or even infamous, and although she was very attractive, there was nothing about her that had satisfied their hunger for excitement and celebrity. Perhaps it was disappointment or even pity for her disability, Nathan thought, but he’d be willing to bet that no one else who’d witnessed her arrival was as curious about the woman as he was.

  There was something about her little performance that didn’t add up.

  *

  By the time she and Boomer arrived at the luxury suite, Jennifer was ready to call off the whole charade. Rude looks from the men who felt free to ogle a blind woman were bad enough, but the pitying glances were the worst. More than once, she’d been tempted to take off the dark glasses and declare herself cured, like a suppliant at a revival meeting. She might have done it, too, but for one thing: Boomer was having the time of his life. Straining against his harness, his tail whipping like a wind sock in a gale, he’d spent the walk in from the parking lot jerking her from one side to the other as he took in his surroundings. No one who’d been watching closely would ever have mistaken Boomer for a real service dog, and she’d been half expecting someone to call her bluff, but no one said anything and the trip to the third floor had been mercifully brief. If anyone had noticed that he wasn’t as attentive or well behaved as he should have been, they’d probably attributed it to the effect of the unfamiliar surroundings.

  Of course, it didn’t hurt that she and Boomer had been shown to the suite by Cal Daniels, a man whose company logo decorated more than one of the cars down on the track that day. Cal was a big man, not just tall, but beefy, with a large head, broad shoulders, and a ruddy complexion that darkened ominously in a confrontation. That, and his solicitous attention to her, had probably deterred anyone who might otherwise have been tempted to stop a person entering the stadium with a dog. Jennifer suspected he’d also been using her supposed blindness as an excuse to take her arm on the way to his suite, a suspicion that was confirmed when he was reluctant to release her once they’d arrived.