Dangerous Times (29 page)

He moved to the shadowy side of the cottage
and stopped under the burned-out security bulb. From where he
watched the couple pass through the mist of the lighted pool,
wondering where Emily’s cashmere coat had come from.

• • •

Emily stood at Beverly’s door, eyes on Kirk
returning from the driveway end of the cottage. “Car gone?” she
asked him.

“It’s there,” he said, slipping the key into
the door. “Should’ve left for work by now.”

Emily grimaced. “I don’t think she’s going
to like me wearing her coat.”

“And I don’t think she’s going to like who’s
wearing it,” he said as he opened the door. “Lisa’s bark is worse
than her bite, so don’t pay any attention to what she says.”

They went inside and Emily said, “Where are
they?”

Kirk looked to the hallway and its closed
doors. “Probably napping,” he said on his way to the kitchen.
Thinking he had been right, his mother loaded on his father’s
birthday, passed-out in her bedroom. And Lisa, he guessed, could
have taken the night off from Korky’s. Maybe in his old room,
sleeping off the bottle she and Beverly had shared.

Emily took off Lisa’s cashmere coat and
dropped it on the recliner. “Nice and toasty in here,” she said,
unbuttoning the top buttons of her shop uniform.

Emily joined Kirk in the kitchen as he
closed the door to the empty oven. He went to the refrigerator,
opened it and saw the meatloaf, uncooked.

“Figures,” he said. “Looks like it’ll be ham
and cheese sandwiches.”

“Must be Judgment Day,” Frank said, “the
dead have risen.”

Kirk and Emily looked over at him: his hair
dark, dressed in Kirk’s clothes, two-day growth of beard, silenced
Russian pistol in hand. Frank saying, “Can’t wait to hear how
you’ve come back to life.”

Behind the refrigerator door Kirk’s hand lay
on its top, eyes on what he perceived to be his reflection. Kirk
lifted his hand off the door and it swung against him. He touched
his own two-day growth, half-expecting to feel the bandaged gauze
that covered Frank’s cheek.

Emily stood stunned by the resemblance.

Frank looked at her bruised face. “Two of
you been having a spat?” Then eyeing Emily’s outfit, “Smart move,”
he said, “dumping the acting career for the auto-repair
business.”

From behind the refrigerator door Kirk swung
a hand out and Staub’s Colt flashed fire.

• • •

Hicks heard the single shot and drew his
.38. He tried the locked door, then broke it open with one kick
beneath the knob. Pivoting away he backed against the wall.

“Show yourself!” came Kirk’s voice.

Hicks stayed against the wall. He pulled his
shield and held it up in the doorway.

“Okay, then,” Kirk called to him, voice
closer now. Hicks lowered his shield. Kirk’s hands appeared,
Staub’s Colt in one, Frank’s Russian pistol in the other, each
gripped by the barrel.

Chapter
98

In her blouse and jeans Beverly sat at one
end of the sofa, picking at a sliver of tape stuck to her ankle.
Lisa was at the other end of the sofa in her cashmere bathrobe,
cashmere coat on her lap. Donald sat between the two women, trying
to figure the workings of Frank’s sick mind.

In the recliner with his wrists cuffed Frank
had his eyes on Emily. She was seated on the coffee table before
him, her back to those on the sofa, cleansing the bloody graze on
his hand.

“Your new friend’s quite the marksman,”
Frank smiled.

“Lucky for you,” Emily said dryly.

Hicks stood close to the recliner. He
happened to notice the way Emily held the grazed hand. Were her
fingers trembling from her fear of the man, he asked himself, or
were they lightly stroking Frank’s palm.

Emily caught Hicks’ gaze and released the
hand. She capped the alcohol bottle, twisted toward Beverly and
raised the blood-stained dish towel.

Beverly got off the sofa and shuffled
tiredly forward in her furry mules. She pinched a clean corner of
the towel and carried it to the kitchen.

Wrapping Frank’s hand with gauze Emily heard
Lisa from behind her:

“Hey, Frank, little more gauze, you’ll look
like a mummy.”

Frank patted his bandaged cheek, leaned to
one side, looked beyond Emily and studied Lisa’s exposed legs. Lisa
closed the hem of her bathrobe, stood barefoot and said, “I’m going
to get some clothes on.”

She entered the hallway and passed Kirk
returning from his old bedroom. The two of them exchanged a vague
look. Kirk had found his scrappy marine jacket back there, carrying
it now by the collar, cuffs brushing the carpet. He tossed it onto
the arm of the sofa.

“Hello to my brother,” Frank said with a
slight laugh. “Dressed the same, it’s hard to tell which one of us
is the dangerous one.”

“I’m the dangerous one,” Kirk answered
him.

Frank looked at Beverly as she came out of
the kitchen. “Your two sons are an evil pair,” he said to her.

On his way to his mother Kirk paid no
attention to the remark. Beverly gave her son a droopy smile and
said, “I’m so sorry for all the trouble…” Driven to tears, she
hugged him.

“It’s okay,” Kirk told her, “this isn’t your
fault.”

“No,” Beverly said, “I mean harping about
the new screen door, dirty pool and, y’know, the rest of it.”

“And what about me,” Kirk said. “I’ve been,
I don’t know, a lousy son to you.” That hadn’t been easy for him to
admit. A touch embarrassed he glanced at Hicks. Then said to his
mother, “Thanks to Big Foot we can add the front door to your harpy
list.”

Beverly gave Kirk a light slap on the chest
and said, “Oh, you.”

Emily finished gauzing Frank’s hand. She
rose from the coffee table and went to Kirk and Beverly.

Hicks pulled the Tom Pincus phone from under
his overcoat. “If I got your phone,” he asked Frank, “who’s this
one belong to?”

Frank looked up at him. “Friend of mine,” he
answered. “It’s a backup, in case a dumb cop takes mine away from
me.”

Hicks glared down at him. “Smarter then me,
huh?”

“Then?” Frank said. “From your use of the
language, obviously I’m smarter ‘than’ you.”

Kirk, Emily and Beverly stood braced for the
punch Hicks was about to throw.

“Yeah, right,” Hicks smirked instead. “See
how smart ya are when Eddie’s boys get here, cart your wise-ass off
to the yacht.” Pincus phone in his big hands, he cracked it in two
and tossed the parts on the coffee table.

He pulled Frank’s phone out and tapped in
Ty’s number. Hicks put the phone to his ear and eyed Kirk, figuring
he was one of those rare breeds who didn’t live in this world. At
the same time sensing he was a white boy who didn’t measure others
by color.

Kirk stepped to Frank in the recliner and
put his hand out. “Key to the suitcase.” Frank placed his cuffed
wrists waist-side and maneuvered his fingers downward into the Levi
pocket. He got the key out and Kirk took it from him.

“We should open it while we’re all
together,” Emily said. “I’ll roll it in here,” and she headed for
Beverly’s bedroom.

Ty’s number ringing in his ear, Hicks’ cop
eyes flicked toward Emily. Yeah, he thought, something about
her…Ty’s voice mail picked up. Hicks shut the phone and looked
guardedly toward the broken front door. He dropped the phone into
his coat pocket and pulled Staub’s Colt. He turned the grip toward
Kirk and said, “I think we’re in trouble.”

“Where’s the scotch?” Frank asked Beverly.
“Looks like we’re about to have company.”

Kirk said to her, “Get into your bedroom and
stay there with Emily and Lisa.”

Donald watched Kirk take the Colt from
Hicks, shifted his weighty body on the sofa and got to his feet.
“Don’t want to waste my gun club lessons,” he said to Hicks. Then
with a nod toward Frank, “Let me have his.”

“Damn,” Hicks said impatiently, bringing
Frank’s silenced pistol out from under his coat.

“I’ve seen his gun club award,” Kirk told
him.

“No, it’s Ty,” Hicks said, handing the gun
to Donald. “She’s down the block an’ didn’t answer her phone. I
gotta get out there.”

“Okay, then,” Kirk said, “I’ll go with
you.”

“No,” Beverly objected from behind him.

“Told you to get into your bedroom,” Kirk
said. Beverly backed worriedly into the hallway, eyes on her
son.

Hicks put a hand on Donald and walked him
into the kitchen. “Key to the cuffs,” he rushed softly. “We don’t
get back in time, give it to Eddie’s boys when they get here. An’
you go with ‘em to collect the finder’s fee.”

“Finder’s fee?” Donald asked.

“Just do it,” Hicks said impatiently on his
way back into the living room to join Kirk.

They started out as Beverly returned. “Lisa
and Emily are gone,” she panicked, “and so’s the suitcase.”

Frank grinned and said, “Flown out the
window, I suppose.”

Hicks flashed him a look, uncertain about
the sucker’s glibness.

Tires screeched from the driveway end of the
cottage. Kirk hurriedly followed Hicks out, saying to Donald, “Stay
put and keep the gun on him.”

“Your jacket,” Beverly called after Kirk,
too late.

Chapter
99

Weapons in hand, Kirk and Hicks sprinted to
the back of the cottage and halted in the driveway. From where they
saw Lisa’s red Miata at rest, idling in the street, convertible top
down to make room for the suitcase in the tight space behind Lisa
and Emily.

At the far side of the car stood Ty.
Alongside her was her cousin, one of Eddie Jones’ pretty-boy twin
sons. He was talking with Lisa and Emily while his brother trotted
off for their car.

Kirk and Hicks walked down the drive. Hicks’
eyes were on Ty. “She’s okay,” he said with relief.

The Twin looked up over the Miata and saw
their approach. His stainless gun, unseen until now, rose above
Lisa and Emily. The two women hunched themselves under it.

Caught with weapons lowered, Kirk and Hicks
froze in their tracks. “Damn,” Hicks said, “.44 Bulldog.”

“Five-shot,” Kirk added.

“Throw the weapons away and get over here!”
the Twin barked.

Surprising her cousin, Ty clutched the .44
with both hands and fought for it. Kirk and Hicks rushed forward,
unable to fire with Ty all over him.

Lisa hit the pedal. The Miata peeled and
sped up the street. The Twin finally ripped the Bulldog away from
Ty. She threw her hands together in pain. Her cousin wrapped an arm
around her and used her as a shield.

The .44 glistened under the streetlamp as
the Twin swung it toward the fleeing Miata.

“Wait!” Kirk yelled, and the blast of the
.44 shook the night.

Near a block away, Lisa and Emily ducked at
the sound. Losing control of the wheel Lisa sat upright. A second
shot followed quickly and the side of her head blew off, foot
weighted on the pedal, hands leaving the wheel. Emily grabbed it,
but not in time as the Miata swerved and smashed into a parked car,
Emily thrown forward against the windshield.

Kirk dashed up the street. Hicks and Ty
paused, Hicks giving her hands a look, skin ripped from the .44’s
barrel sight.

Kirk reached the passenger side of the Miata
and focused tightly on Emily. She sat recoiled from the cracked
windshield, gasping to the beat of her pain, face broken and
bloody.

Kirk’s eyes snapped to Lisa’s body, a
contorted heap of crimson. His shrapnel war wound threw him a
stitch of pain. No matter what kind of person she was, he thought,
Lisa didn’t deserve to end up like this.

Emily moaned. The Colt slipped from Kirk’s
grip and hit the street. He took Emily’s hands in his. “Someone
call for help!” he hollered toward the watchful neighbors who
stared out their windows.

“Kick the gun under the car toward my feet,”
the Twin said. Kirk hadn’t noticed him arriving at the driver’s
side, .44 Bulldog hovering over Lisa’s body. Kirk did as he was
told.

Ty stayed back as Hicks came up to the trunk
of the Miata, .38 aimed at the Twin’s chest.

The Twin kept his .44 on Kirk and said to
Hicks, “Shoot me and he dies. Unless you care enough about him to
throw your gun across the street.” He said, “As for my brother and
me, all we care about is the suitcase, so let’s be done with it and
you go home safe.”

They heard the distant howl of sirens. “Hold
on,” Kirk pleaded to Emily. “Please hold on…”

The Twin’s free hand grasped the suitcase
handle. Without lifting he waited for Hicks’ answer.

A taxi’s headlights brightened them. Hicks
kept his eyes and gun on the Twin, pulled his ID and held it up.
The shield glinted and the taxi continued up the street.

Hicks thinking of all that money gone in
exchange for Kirk’s life. Tim Burns leapt into his mind, the
virtuous Irishman getting Hicks to wonder if this one exchange
would free him of all the bad he had done

“Damn,” Hicks said roughly. He swallowed
hard and flung his .38 across the street.

The .44 Bulldog waved between Kirk and
Hicks. The Twin’s brother drove up in their Bentley and hopped out.
The brothers took the suitcase from the Miata and shoved it into
their back seat.

Ty joined Hicks, hands clasped in pain,
wishing she had her Smith & Wesson, dropped in Hicks’ car when
her cousin had yanked her out. “Finder fee’s ours!” she fumed at
both cousins.

“First rule of the rich,” the Twin smiled,
“keep it in the family—except for disloyal cousins,” he laughed as
they drove off.

“Lousy pair’a cheaters!” Ty hollered.

Emily said something Kirk couldn’t hear. He
bent close over the lowered passenger window. She said, “I had to
stick to Lisa,” voice atremble with pain. “Get the money from her,
for me and Frank.”

“No,” Kirk said, “you don’t know what you’re
saying, you’re in shock.”