Cold Target (43 page)

Holly liked her immediately and obviously so did Harry. There was an ease, a kind of peace, that radiated from her. So did competence. Holly liked the fact that she had brought the books.

“He's had a peanut butter and jelly sandwich,” Holly said. “He can have a cookie. I should be back in an hour or so.” She glanced at the books in the woman's hands. “He loves reading.”

“I wish more children did,” Mrs. Stevens said.

“Well, a book will make him very happy. In fact, it doesn't take much to make him happy.”

“We'll get along just fine.”

Holly knew they would and she felt better as she left.

Marty was waiting for her. “I thought we would go to the Copper Queen for lunch,” she said. “My treat.”

“I can't—”

“Yes, you can. I have a proposition for you.”

Holly wasn't sure she wanted a proposition. But she surrendered to a tide stronger than herself and walked the block to the famous old hotel. She had taken Harry inside. It was a legend. John Wayne was said to have made the hotel a second home on his trips to his ranch across the Mexico border.

But she hadn't eaten there. It was one of those luxuries she hadn't felt she could afford yet.

She would have enjoyed it if she weren't so worried about Marty's “proposition.”

Her friend didn't waste any time once they were seated.

“The tourist trade will come to a standstill this fall,” Marty said. “I've developed a website for some of the crafts in the store to even out my business. I've put several of yours on it and they've sold. I would like an assurance of a steady supply. Disappointed buyers can kill a web business.”

“How many will you need?”

“I'm not sure. But I would like to depend on at least twenty a week to start.”

“To
start
?”

Marty shrugged. “Don't let me scare you. Perhaps they won't continue to sell as well as I think they will. If they don't, I'll purchase what you've done and keep them in stock at my store, perhaps offer them to other craft stores in the Southwest.”

A waiter came for their order.

Holly was grateful. She needed these few moments to think. Twenty sculptures a week was an enormous number. She thought she could do it, but it would mean eliminating walks into the desert, her trips to the library, reading time with her son.

On the other hand, it could mean financial security, something she needed desperately. Her money was going out faster than it was coming in. She was extremely careful, but she was fast beginning to understand the phrase “quiet desperation.”

After several moments' consideration, she ordered a salad and shrimp. Marty got a salad and cheeseburger.

When the waiter left the table, Marty quickly returned to the subject. “Do you think you can do it?”

“How much?” Holly asked first. She was quickly discovering that money should always be a top priority.

“I thought I would price them at sixty dollars each, plus shipping. I'll pay you forty.”

Holly did the math. Twenty times forty was eight hundred dollars a week. With that, she could quickly build a cushion to finance going somewhere else if necessary. But twenty a week? She was doing fewer than seven a week now.

“Do you think you can do it?” Marty persisted.

“Yes,” she said. She
would
do it. It might be the only way she could really protect herself and her son. Perhaps she could buy her own computer. And computer games for Harry.

“You don't intend to leave Bisbee any time soon?” Marty said.

“No,” she said.

“Good. I'll have a photographer take some photos, and we're ready to go.” She hesitated, then added, “Is there any biographical information that might help? College art degrees? Shows?”

Breath caught in Holly's throat. Of course they would need some copy. She shook her head. “It's just always been a small hobby I did for fun,” she said. “No shows. No big sales. In fact no sales at all.”

That was a lie but a small one. Her sales in the past had been to one small craft shop in New Orleans.

“Then it's done,” Marty said with a smile. “Maybe we'll earn enough money to fix up the house. I've always had to reserve what little profit there is in the summer to tide us through the winter. This could be our salvation.”

The waiter returned with their salads.

“I want to celebrate,” Marty said. “A glass of wine?”

Holly nodded. She thought a little celebration was in order as well.

Marty ordered the wine, then regarded her cautiously. “Tell me to shut up if you want to, but how are you and Doug getting along?”

“He's very nice,” Holly said, hoping her voice didn't give her away.

“Just nice?”

“I've recently been widowed. I'm not ready to get involved again.”

Marty's gaze seemed to go straight to Holly's heart. “He's a really good person.”

“I know.”

“He's in love with you.”

“Did he tell you that?”

“No, but it's obvious when he talks about you.”

“He can't be,” Holly said with dismay.

Marty paid no attention. “I've seen you with him. You're as much in love with him as he is with you.” She paused. “I hope you forgive a meddling old woman but I like both of you.”

“I can't love him,” Holly said.

“You're in trouble, aren't you?” Marty asked outright.

Holly didn't answer. The lettuce stuck in her throat.

“I was too, once,” Marty said. “I asked for help.”

Again silence.

“You can trust me.
And
Doug. That's all I have to say.”

If only it were that simple. Whatever Marty's trouble was, it couldn't hold a candle to hers. Marty didn't stand to lose a child to a monster.

She tried to eat the rest of the meal, but her stomach was roiling. Had she been that obvious? Did Doug suspect something as well? What if he started checking?

The urge to run was strong again.

But then she looked across the table at the woman who had befriended her. The librarian, Louise, had become a friend as well. She was making a life, and now she'd been handed the pot at the end of the rainbow. Financial independence by doing something she loved.

Harry needed stability. He now had an extended family. She had a home and friends of her own.

Marty seemed to read her mind. “No one is going to force you into anything, Liz. I just wanted you to know we're here if you need us.”

She would stay. This was her home. Hers and Harry's.

She would start on the sculptures tonight.

The glasses of wine came and with them their meal.

Marty held her glass up in a toast. “To Special Things and Garden Folk.”

Holly raised her glass. “Garden Folk?”

Marty looked embarrassed. “We have to call your creations something. It was the best I could do at the moment. It's open to debate,” she added hurriedly.

“Garden Folk.” Holly tested it again. “I like it.”

They clinked their glasses together.

A bargain.

N
EW
O
RLEANS

Judge Matthews suggested a golf game to his son-in-law.

He'd had his house swept for listening devices. It turned up nothing. Still, he was becoming increasingly paranoid. Everything was going wrong.

Charles Rawson had been the weak link. He should have eliminated him years ago, but Rawson had been a prodigious fund-raiser for favored candidates.

Matthews had carefully constructed a huge power base with both personal and financial support. As a judge, he was careful about open support, but Charles had been his conduit, and meetings were conducted on golf courses or at private dinners. Little was accomplished in Louisiana without the approval of Judge Matthews.

He had been discussed for the U.S. Appeals Court but he had no interest in that. Federal judges were subjected to far greater scrutiny than state judges, even those on the highest state court.

He watched as Randolph approached the green. His son-in-law was not a particularly good golfer. He didn't have the patience for it. That was his problem in everything. He was thirty-eight and thought he should be president. It had been the arrogance and impatience that had turned his wife against him.

And that was a problem that simply couldn't be allowed to continue.

Matthews was prepared to take more drastic measures and concede that perhaps Randolph had been correct in suggesting that he employ more people to find Holly.

He had to admit he had underestimated his daughter. He'd been sure she would surface by now. The fact that she had not meant she had resources or friends unknown to him.

She was not his blood child. He'd bought and paid for her years ago. She had been pliable for the most part. It had been unfortunate that she had heard a certain conversation.

The more he thought about it, the more he realized that she might have been planning an escape for some time. When his detectives had not found any of the usual leads—credit card usage, Social Security number offered, phone calls to friends—they started going backward, peering into every part of Holly's life.

The sculpting tools had led them to inquire at area craft stores. They finally found one who identified Holly as the seller of a few sculptures.

Samuel had no idea how many she'd sold or how long she'd been doing it. She would eventually run out of money, though, and that probably meant going back to selling sculptures.

He was convinced they would find her. But her absence was hurting Randolph's campaign. They needed a plausible explanation, one that would garner him sympathy.

That was the reason for golf today.

After realizing that Holly had overheard a conversation, he didn't intend to ever allow another conversation to be overheard.

Randolph sank his ball for a double bogey on the tenth green.

They got back into the cart, their conversation turning to Holly. How to find her. How to eliminate the problem without harm to Randolph's career.

“Our people are checking craft shops in the Southeast. She likes the ocean and it looks as if she headed in that direction. If they find nothing, then they'll move across the country,” Samuel said.

“Isn't that a little like looking for a needle in a haystack?” Randolph asked.

“It's been explained to me that the sculptures that we found in her work area and at the craft shop are rather unique. If she's selling them, we'll find them.” He paused, then continued, “If you'd paid more attention to your wife, you would have known about this. It would have saved us one hell of a lot of trouble.” He was getting increasingly disenchanted with his son-in-law, but he had far too much invested in him to jettison him now. Randolph also knew too much.

“And when we do find her?”

“An auto accident on her way home to you,” Samuel said.

“And Michael?”

“He'll have to be a casualty, too. He knows too much.”

“I don't—”

“Do you want to go to prison for the rest of your life?” Samuel said. “That's if the death penalty isn't in play.”

They reached the tee of the next hole. The discussion ended for several minutes as Randolph hit the ball into the woods. “You're going to have to hit a hell of a lot better than that if you want to impress anyone,” Samuel said.

His shot went right to the green. Rolled a little toward the flag and came to rest two feet from the hole.

Once back in the cart, the conversation resumed.

“What about the Rawson woman and the cop? I take it your little plan to plant drugs didn't work.”

Samuel didn't at all like the note of satisfaction in Randolph's voice. “He must have found them before the raid,” Samuel said. He'd reamed out his employee for not being more imaginative in hiding the drugs. “We can't try that again. It has to be something else. I'm thinking.”

“Don't we have someone with the police department? Couldn't Gaynor be killed in the line of duty?”

“He's on suspension.”

“Get him off it. And off the Starnes case.”

“I'll do what I can,” Samuel said. “There's another problem.”

“God dammit, there's always another problem.”

“Dominic Cross was at the funeral.”

“Do you think …?”

“I now have someone watching both Meredith Rawson's home and Gaynor's home. If they link up with Cross, we'll have to take care of all three.”

“How?”

“I'm not sure. I just know I want this ended. Right now there's nothing to lead back to us. Nothing but your wife. Her DNA would connect her to the Rawson woman and unravel everything.”

“The bitch,” Randolph said viciously.

“We have to make sure they don't find each other. Holly might tell them about the night she left.”

“No one would believe her over me.”

“Either way, it would destroy your career.”

Randolph slammed his hand against the front of the cart. “How long do you think it will take to trace those sculptures?”

“We have ten people working on it. They say two or three days. If that is what she's doing.”

“That stupid little hobby,” Randolph said. “I should have ended it.”

“Then we might never have found her.”

They reached Randolph's ball. He hit it into the rough.

Samuel shook his head as he tapped his ball in for a birdie.

twenty-eight

N
EW
O
RLEANS

Meredith had woken up next to Gage. She had an emotional hangover from the day before, and he'd just held her last night.

To her surprise Gage brought her coffee in bed, along with a surprisingly good omelet.

He suggested that they meet with Dom at Gage's fishing shack on one of the bayous later in the morning.