Missouri Loves Company (Rip Lane Book 1) (13 page)

CHAPTER 45

I
T WAS TIME
to find Anna.

Ian Sanders, my friend at the United States Marshals Service’s Technical Operations Group, had determined that Anna’s car was located within a few blocks of the Gateway Arch in downtown St. Louis. I hoped it was still parked there. Otherwise I would have to contact Ian again to get updated information.

Ian had described Anna’s car as a black Infiniti sedan. There were bound to be more than one black Infiniti sedans located within a few blocks of the Gateway Arch, but only one of them would have the license plate number Ian had given me.

The fact that Anna owned a car made me wonder why she had been hitchhiking when I met her. Where was her car at the time? Was it stolen? Getting repaired?

I had a lot of questions for Anna, and I intended to get some answers.

It was eight a.m. when I mounted my motorcycle and motored out of Heaven on Wheels RV Park. Downtown St. Louis was only ten minutes away. I made it there in seven.

It was rush hour. The city streets were congested with buses and trucks and cars. Taxi drivers leaned on their horns. Pedestrians moved like ants. Hundreds of them. Scurrying across streets.

I stopped for a moment to admire the view of the Gateway Arch. It was on my list of places to visit. The list would have to wait.

I drove down Walnut Street. There were no black Infiniti sedans anywhere in sight. I drove down Market Street. No luck there either. Chestnut Street. Nothing. Pine Street, Olive Street, Locust Street. Nothing, nothing, nothing.

After a while I decided to check parking garages. The first one I went to had six levels. I parked on the street, walked into the garage, and checked each level for Anna’s car. I spotted one Infiniti sedan. It was not black.

I kept looking.

Four parking garages later I decided to try something else. The something else turned out to be lunch.

Pappy’s Smokehouse made the best barbecue sandwich in the world. Tangy with a kick. For side dishes I ordered baked beans and applesauce, though I was tempted to try the fried corn on the cob.

After lunch I hit the streets with a renewed energy. I headed back toward the Gateway Arch, my eyes scanning the streets, looking for Anna’s car.

Two hours passed. Then I finally spotted a black Infiniti sedan. It was parked on Washington Avenue. I checked the license plate. It was Anna’s car all right. But Anna was nowhere in sight.

I parked my motorcycle down the street so that she would not see it. Then I walked back to the Infiniti.

Pressing my face against the glass, cupping my hands around my eyes, I could see inside the car. On the passenger seat was a map of St. Louis. In the back were a few crumpled food wrappers. Otherwise the car was empty. I did not see a black and red duffel bag with the St. Louis Cardinals logo on it. That would have made it too easy.

What I had to do now was stake out the car and wait for Anna to show. I needed a place to hide out until then. Somewhere out of sight. My eyes darted back and forth, looking for the best spot. I found it. A narrow concrete alley.

From the alley I could see Washington Avenue and Anna’s car and some buildings across the street. Alley shadows cloaked me from view.

Time passed slowly. Three p.m. Four. Five.

Now it was time for dinner. I ran down the street to a Chinese carryout on the corner and bought a container of chicken lo mein. I ate it in the alley. An alley cat became my new best friend.

As the night wore on I began to wonder if maybe I should go look for Anna. She couldn’t have gone far. There were some hotels close by. Within walking distance. Maybe Anna was staying at one. But then why would she park on the street?

I decided to stay put. Anna would have to show up eventually.

Darkness gathered. Streetlights came on. I yawned.

There were some garbage cans in the alley. I went to them. Opened some garbage bags. Found a wire hanger. Straightened it out. Searched the bags some more. Found a putty knife.

I went to Anna’s car. Looked around. Nobody was watching me. Nobody cared. I jammed the putty knife into the space between the roof of the car and the top of the passenger door. Using the heel of my hand, I tapped the knife deeper into the space, wedging the door slightly open. I inserted the straightened wire hanger into the gap. Guided it toward the unlock button. Pressed the button.

A click.

I opened the door and got in. Nobody had seen me. I locked the door. Then I clambered over the passenger seat, stretched out on the backseat, and shut my eyes.

CHAPTER 46

T
HE SMELL OF
coffee woke me. I knuckled my eyes, stretched my arms, yawned into my fist. Daylight was breaking.

I took out my phone and checked the time. Six-fifteen. A late start for me.

When I sat up in the backseat of the car I could see where the coffee aroma was coming from. On the dash stood a big Styrofoam cup of coffee. Beside it was a white paper bag.

Somebody had brought me breakfast. Without waking me up.

I leaned over the front seat as far as I could. My hands grabbed cup and bag. A banana muffin was in the bag. A note too. The florid handwriting was familiar. I read the note.

Rip,

Sorry about everything.

Come see me when you wake up.

Anna

There was an address on the note. A St. Louis address. Not far. Just down the street.

Questions ran through my mind. Why did Anna leave the note? What was she up to? Who eats banana muffins for breakfast?

I got out of the car. Went to a garbage can. Threw the banana muffin inside. The coffee too. I figured maybe they were drugged. Or poisoned. Anna could not be trusted.

Pinching my lower lip between forefinger and thumb, I considered my options and formed a plan. First of all I needed to eat some breakfast. Then I needed to walk to the address Anna had written on the note. After that I needed to make sure I wasn’t being led into an ambush.

I breakfasted at a coffee shop. I did not order a banana muffin. I had a cup of coffee and an egg sandwich.

After breakfast I walked to the address listed on the note. The condo building looked expensive. Twelve stories of nothing but glass. Elegantly manicured landscaping. Expensive.

I circled the block once before entering. The lobby was marble. Marble floors, marble walls, marble everything. It was staffed with a security guard. He was reading the front page of the
St. Louis Post-Dispatch
.

“Good morning,” I said to him.

He gave me a disinterested look.

I took the elevator to the ninth floor.

I got out, marched down the hall. When I reached Anna’s door I took out my Glock Twenty-two and stood listening at the door. No sounds. I pounded on the door. Hard. As if a fugitive were inside.

The door opened. It was Anna.

“Rip, I’m sorry that I . . .”

I pushed past her.

I raised my gun.

One by one I checked each room. Each closet. Under the bed. Out on the balcony. Inside washer, dryer, refrigerator.

Nobody was hiding. Anna was all alone. It was not an ambush.

I holstered my gun.

When I returned to the living room I saw Anna sitting on one corner of the couch with her legs tucked under her. She was holding a black and red duffel bag with the St. Louis Cardinals logo on it.

“You looking for this?” she said, handing me the bag.

I snatched it from her hands, jerked open the zipper, yanked out the contents. A baseball bat. And a DVD.

I dropped the bag on the floor and sat down at the other end of the couch and twisted my body around to face Anna.

“A baseball bat and a DVD? You wanna tell me what the hell’s going on, Anna? You gave me that locker key and then disappeared from the bus station. You know what happened to me after that? Two goons broke into my motor home, and two cops harassed me and threw me in jail, and then the four of them harassed me in my jail cell, asking me questions about the locker key, wanting to know where the duffel bag was hidden. I told them to go stuff it. They knocked me out, threw me into the trunk of a car, drove me to a remote location, beat me like a piñata, and left me for dead. All because of that goddamn locker key you gave me. And now I find out it’s all about a baseball bat and a DVD. The hell’s going on?”

CHAPTER 47

“R
IP
,”
A
NNA SAID
, “I cannot tell you how sorry I am I caused all that trouble for you. It was not my intent, I swear it wasn’t. All I was trying to do was get away from those two guys watching us at the bus station.”

“The ones wearing Armani suits?” I said.

“Yes.”

“You know them?”

“Yes.”

“So you had lied to me about that.”

“Yes.”

“What are their names?”

“Needles and Viper.”

“You know them only by their nicknames?”

“Yes.”

“Which one’s got the scar and likes to chew on toothpicks?”

“Needles.”

“So Viper’s the one looks like a lizard.”

“I guess he does look like a lizard, now that I think about it.”

“Needles and Viper, what do they do?”

“Mobsters. In the Bruno crime family.”

“And why are they after that baseball bat and DVD?”

“It’s a long story, you want something to eat or drink?”

“Just tell me the story.”

“Okay. My brother owns an adult entertainment club in Pottsland. It’s called Bare Assets. Carlos has owned the club for three, four years. He makes good money. The club is popular.

“One day my brother gets a visit from Needles and Viper. This was about two years ago. They tell him the Bruno crime family would like to offer him protection. Carlos agrees to pay for it even though he doesn’t want it and he doesn’t need it. What else could he do? Mobsters were extorting him. If he didn’t go along, he’d have ended up in the Pottsland River. So he agrees to pay.

“And so once a week for the past two years Needles and Viper have shown up at the club to collect payment. My brother always paid them and never had any problems. Until one night when they decided to get drunk at the club. They arrived at the club around midnight, collected the protection money from Carlos, and then started to drink. They drank a lot. They got loud. Obnoxious. You know how those kind of men can get, full of bravado, acting like they own the place. Carlos wanted to throw them out but knew that he could not. Not if he wanted to keep on living. So he just kept an eye on them, to make sure nothing got out of hand.

“Around one o’clock in the morning a prominent member of the Romano crime family comes into the club. A man named Big Red. He’s wearing an expensive tailored suit, and he’s got a woman on his arm. She’s all dolled up in diamonds and a white sequin dress. Like Marilyn Monroe, you know? The two of them look like they should be standing on top of a wedding cake or something.

“So they come into the club and sit down at a table. They order drinks and talk for a while. She’s all over him, running her hands over his body, smiling at him.

“Meanwhile Viper is watching them from across the room. His fists are clenched on the table. His jaw is tight. The woman is one of his girlfriends, and Big Red is a member of a rival crime family.

“Needles is sitting beside Viper, trying to calm him down. But nothing works. Viper’s face just keeps getting redder and redder.

“Carlos is standing behind the bar, watching all this take place. He knows trouble is coming. He knows about Viper’s violent rage. But he doesn’t know what to do about it—if anything.

“After a while Big Red and the woman get up to dance. They’re out on the dance floor, bumping and grinding. The strobe light is flashing. The music is pulsing. And Viper is seething.

“He finally gets up from the table. He walks over to one of the girls who works at the club. A stripper. One of the really pretty ones. He whispers in her ear, and she shakes her head, and he whispers some more and hands her a big wad of cash, and she looks at it, looks at him again, and then she nods.

“Viper takes out a key and opens the door to the club owner’s office—my brother’s office. He steps into the office and closes the door behind him.

“Meanwhile the stripper struts over to the packed dance floor with a drink in her hand. She makes her way through the crowd, dancing as she goes, holding the drink close to her. She positions herself beside Big Red and the woman who looks like Marilyn Monroe. The stripper does a few grinds, spins around, and spills her drink all over the woman’s white sequin dress.

“The stripper apologizes profusely. She grabs napkins from a table and begins to blot the woman’s stained dress. But the woman stops her. The dress is ruined. The woman is pissed. She storms off to the ladies’ room to clean herself up.

“While she’s gone the stripper begins to dance with Big Red. She really turns on the heat, grinding her backside into him. After a few minutes of this she grabs him by the hand and leads him across the crowded dance floor and into the club owner’s office.

“A minute later the office door slams open and the stripper comes flying out. The door closes behind her, and she starts to dance on the dance floor.

“My brother is watching this from behind the bar, wondering what Viper and Big Red are doing in his office, though he’s pretty sure he knows. He keeps watching the office door, waiting for them to come out. But they never do. So finally he goes to check on them.

“He opens the office door and steps inside. Looks around. Sees nobody. But the office’s back door is open. Carlos steps out the back door, looks out into the dark alley, to the right and to the left. The alley is empty. So he shuts the door and goes over to his desk to watch the security video.

“See, my brother has a hidden security camera in his office. He had it installed after some items were stolen from his desk drawer. None of his employees know about the hidden camera.

“So Carlos sits down at his desk, turns on the monitor and the DVR, rewinds the security video, hits the
PLAY
button, and then watches what happened between Viper and Big Red.

“On the screen he sees the office door swing open and in comes Viper. Right away Viper grabs a baseball bat that my brother keeps in a corner of the office. Then Viper hides under the desk. Several minutes pass. Then the office door swings open again and in comes Big Red and the stripper. In less than thirty seconds she manages to unbuckle his belt and get his pants down around his ankles. Just when he thinks he’s about to get lucky she bolts out of the office. As soon as she’s gone Viper comes out from under the desk and in one swift motion raises the baseball bat over his head and brings it down and cracks Big Red across the skull. Big Red slumps to the floor and rolls over onto his back. Viper bashes him again. He bashes him ten, maybe twenty times. When he’s sure Big Red is dead he returns the bat to the corner where he found it. Then he drags the dead man’s body out the back door of the office.

“Now my brother hits the
STOP
button and leans back in his chair to think about what he saw on the security video. He thinks about it for a long time. Then he rattles open his desk drawer and takes out a blank DVD. He records the security video onto the DVD. After that he carries the baseball bat and the DVD out to his car. He gets in and drives home. At home he hides both items in his attic.

“He realizes he has power, he has some leverage. He has a video of the murder. He has the murder weapon, with Viper’s fingerprints on it, and Big Red’s DNA. He has proof that Viper killed Big Red. Proof that could be used to blackmail Viper into doing something. Or to stop doing something—like extorting money from the club.

“But my brother is scared of Viper. Too scared to confront him. Too scared to blackmail him. So he decides to do nothing with the evidence. Except keep it. In case he ever needs it.

“A few days after the murder Viper shows up at the club again. He comes alone. Needles is not with him. Viper walks up to my brother and tells him he wants to have a little chat with him in the club owner’s office. So Carlos steps around the bar and heads into the office with Viper.

“In the office Viper notices that the baseball bat is missing from the corner. He looks at Carlos with suspicious eyes and he says, ‘Where’d your bat go, Carlos?’ And Carlos goes, ‘What bat?’ Viper stares at him for a moment. Then he steps closer and raises his voice. ‘The one’s always been in that corner over there,’ he shouts. My brother shrugs. Viper starts to tear the office apart, searching for the missing baseball bat. He looks everywhere. He can’t find it. So finally he gives up. He goes, ‘Where’d you hide it, you little weasel?’ My brother shrugs again, and Viper starts to smack him around.

“This continues until Carlos crashes into the bookcase and tips it over. The hidden security camera rolls out into the middle of the floor. Viper picks it up and then looks at my brother and says, ‘You been videotaping your office?’ And Carlos says, ‘Yeah, Viper, but it’s been a long time since I checked the security video.’

“Viper hurls the security camera at Carlos’s head. Misses him by inches. Then he grabs the DVR and yanks the cords free and begins to smash the electronic device against a corner of the desk.

“While Viper is busy doing that Carlos slips out the back door into the alley. He gets in his car and speeds home. He knows Viper will be out to kill him.

“At home Carlos climbs into his attic to get the baseball bat and the DVD. He brings them out to his car, drives over to my house on Bluebird Street, and pounds on my door.

“When I let him in he looks scared. He tells me what happened. He gives me the baseball bat and the DVD. He tells me, ‘Anna, hang on to these for me. Viper’s coming after me, he wants to kill me. I’m leaving town. I need some time to figure out how to get out of this mess.’

“Carlos hands me a slip of paper with a telephone number on it. He tells me it’s a telephone message center where we can leave voice messages for each other. He says it’s safer than calling each other on mobile phones or home phones, because they can be traced to our locations.

“Carlos tells me he’ll leave a voice message for me before seven o’clock each evening. If I do not receive a voice message from him, it means Viper has found him and killed him. And if that happens, then Carlos wants me to release the evidence—the baseball bat and the DVD—to the police. To the state police only. Because the police in Pottsland are corrupt, according to Carlos.

“I ask Carlos, ‘Why don’t we just release the evidence to the police right now? Why wait until you’re dead? If we give it to them now, they can arrest Viper and put him in jail. Then he can’t kill you.’ And Carlos says to me, ‘Before they can arrest him they first have to find him. Which could take a while. In the meantime Viper could find me. And if he does, I’ll need some leverage. Otherwise he’ll kill me. My leverage is the evidence. I can tell Viper I made a DVD copy of the security video. I can tell him the DVD shows him beating Big Red to death with the baseball bat. I can tell him one of my associates has the bat and the DVD, and she’ll turn both over to the cops if she doesn’t hear from me by seven o’clock each evening. That threat should keep Viper from killing me—at least until he gets his hands on the evidence. Which he may never do if I play my cards right.’

“So after Carlos tells me all this he leaves, and I hide the baseball bat and the DVD under my bed. Then I try to get some sleep but it’s impossible. All I can think about is the danger my brother is in.

“The following day I go about my usual routine, working at Munch Box during the day, taking my business class at night. At seven o’clock that evening I phone the telephone message center. I listen to Carlos’s voice message, and I know he’s safe. Though I have no idea where he is.

“I continue this same routine each day for almost a week before something happens. I’m taking a break at work, looking out the big window that overlooks the parking lot. I see this car pull up. A green Lincoln Town Car. The vanity plate says
VIPER
. Two men get out of the car. I recognize them because I saw them at the club once.

“I’m looking out the window and I’m wondering how Viper and Needles found me—my brother never told them he had a sister. I’m wondering what they plan to do to me. Hold me hostage to bring my brother out of hiding? Torture me? Kill me?

“I run out the back door of the restaurant, start my car, and peel out of the parking lot. On my way home I phone the telephone message center. There’s no voice message from Carlos. It’s not seven o’clock yet, so I’ve no reason to be worried. But I am.

“I leave a voice message for Carlos, telling him what happened, asking him what I should do. It takes a lot of effort to keep the fear out of my voice.

“As soon as I get home I change out of my work clothes. Then I hear a car pull up outside. I look out the window to see the green Lincoln Town Car parked on the street in front of my house.

“Right away I reach under my bed and drag out the baseball bat and the DVD. I stuff them into a garbage bag, sling the bag over my shoulder, and run out the back door.

“My car is parked out front, near the Lincoln Town Car, so I can’t use it to escape. I have to escape on foot.

“As I run through the neighborhood I dig out my phone and press the speed dial for my friend Sara. She’s my best friend, the only one I can trust—other than my brother. I figure maybe Sara can loan me a car so I can get out of town.

“The phone rings four times and then goes to her voice mail. I hang up without leaving a message.