Richfield & Rivers Mystery Series 1 - Combust the Sun (27 page)

"Mr.
Talbot, could we talk to you a minute? I'm Teague Richfield and this is Callie
Rivers."

At
the mention of my name, Arnold Talbot's eyes widened like a horse's in a
burning stall, and he leaned up against the wall, I assumed to brace himself. I
asked if we could go inside. He moved hesitantly through the doorway and walked
around behind his desk, imposing a barrier between us. He reached for his desk
drawer.

"Is
there a gun in there?" I asked amicably. "I have one too. Why don't
we just talk? Here's the way we figure it. See if we're close. You hired South
American thugs, brought them here, where they readily fit into the Latin
population, and put them to work in the studio's landscaping and maintenance
department. Only these guys have serious criminal records in South America and
could be sent back or jailed here if anyone knew that, which is how you control
them. You sent one to Orca's—that would be Spider Eye. You had the blond-haired
boy we call Raider track us on the highway. Spider Eye and Gigante tried to kill
us at your father's estate. But after Isaacs threatened you backstage at the
stockholders' meeting, you didn't trust your guys with the Rita Smith job, so
you and your handy blowtorch accompanied them. You killed her and torched
Barrett Silvers. In fact, I think Callie rocked you to sleep on Rita Smith's
lawn."

Suddenly
the door behind us opened, nearly giving me a coronary, and there stood Hank
Caruthers, his Southern charm all but drained.

"What
timing you two have! Of all mornings! You've interrupted some very important
business. Haven't they, Arnold? You never called me, Miss Richfield. This does
change the script. Get him, Arnold." Arnold moved to the small closet on
the right side of the room, opened the door, reached down onto the floor, and
dragged out Robert Isaacs. He was hog-tied, his roped legs pulled up behind his
head and his mouth taped shut, a scene I'm sure Callie could have enjoyed more under
other circumstances.

"We
were about to give Mr. Isaacs, our former friend and associate, a new home with
an ocean view, but your arrival has changed all that." Isaacs's eyes
darted pleadingly to Callie, and for a moment I felt sorry for him.

"I'm
afraid we're going to have to make this look like a love triangle,"
Caruthers said.

"That
makes no sense." I was stalling for time.

"I
was in the process of scaling down my operation, you might say, the night my
men were at Lee Talbot's Bel-Air home. You interrupted them and then escaped.
Your friend Callie left prints in several places in Mr. Talbot's mansion, which
will allow me to prove that she was there to see Talbot and ask for his help
with Isaacs. She was distraught and furious that her ex-husband, Robert Isaacs,
with whom she was still desperately in love, was having an affair with her best
friend Teague Richfield. She came to the studio to confront Isaacs about your
affair and found him, alas, once again with you. She killed you both, and herself,
in a mad lover's rage. The stuff of which movies are made. I've always been big
on plot."

"And
how does Arnold Talbot figure into all this?" Callie asked.

"Ah,
Arnold. Imagine having a father who was head of one of Hollywood's largest
studios and he throws you the scraps by making you, his only son, head of
maintenance. We weren't sorry to see Lee Talbot die, were we, Arnold?
Unfortunately, most of Arnold's staff is now dead as well. Therefore, he's a
liability, drawing too much attention to us."

This
was apparently new and disturbing information to Arnold, who ran for the door
just as Caruthers nailed him in the back. He sagged to the floor, blood flowing
from his body. "Silencer," Caruthers said, explaining the lack of
sound.

"You
killed Frank," I said, and tried not to look at Arnold, bleeding on the
floor, a reminder we could be next.

"Frank
looked at every company as a takeover opportunity, so he couldn't be content
with just an outsider's view. While we were working out at the club, he said he
knew some pretty shady things were going on at Marathon, and he cited Barrett
Silvers's call about the bartering of controversial items and services, and of
course the money skimming. Frank wanted me to go with him to talk to his friend
at the FBI, since Marathon was a publicly held company. I couldn't let that
happen. Looking back on it, I should have skipped Frank Anthony, a good man
really, and I should have merely killed Barrett Silvers. She was the one
stirring up all the trouble." Caruthers stared at me, but his eyes
signaled a mental drift, as if his mind were having to leave his body in order
to avoid witnessing what his trigger finger was about to do.

"You
shot Frank Anthony with a silencer and then removed his gun from his gym
bag," I said, trying to force him to focus on me. "But why the
torch?"

"Workers
were fixing pipes in the locker room showers and had left an acetylene torch
lying there while they took a break. I fired Frank up to kind of muddy the
trail."

"But
what about his shoes in your locker?" I persisted.

Caruthers
suppressed a laugh. "Why is it that the near dead are always so curious?
Frank had already taken off his gym shoes. I took his gun out of his gym bag
and slipped it into his shoes, storing them in my locker. In the chaos of
discovering the body, I slipped his gun and mine out of the building, but left
his shoes in the locker. An oversight on my part, of course."

"So
your men broke into the Anthony mansion after Frank's death and broke into the
antiquities looking for the real stone."

"Right
you are." He grinned with glee.

"The
trouble was always with the missing stone. I knew Frank had two. I'd seen him
buy them at Waterston Evers's. He said he carried them on him for luck, but of
course we only found one—the wrong one. Then it dawned on me that he must have
given Barrett the other one for safekeeping while we were at Evers's estate. I
pried the stone out of Frank's hand, yes. Ramona was right, Frank was clutching
the stone when he died. I sent the stone with the man you call Spider Eye to
visit Ms. Silvers to warn her that she'd better fork over the other one, but
alas, things went awry. And since you had interjected yourself, we felt you had
them both for safekeeping. Then you got very creative and began manufacturing
fakes, and well, things just got very messy."

"Look,
we know where the financial information is that implicates you. We'll take you
to it, and you'll let us go. You destroy it, and it's anyone's word against one
of the most powerful men in Hollywood."

"There's
a quicker fix. Just give me the stone." He held out his hand for it.

I
paused and Callie said quickly, "Give it to him, Teague."

I
pulled it out of my pants pocket slowly to assure him that I wasn't pulling a
gun on him. He snatched the stone out of my hand and pulled it apart, knowing
immediately how it worked. He tore the vault numbers off the bottom of the
paper, then struck a match and set the list on fire. It burned to ashes in
seconds. The list we had unknowingly, and then knowingly, risked our lives for.
The list that could bring about the downfall of Marathon Studios. The list that
would end the seedy barter system and serve as a warning to other studios about
the consequences of embezzlement now no longer existed.

"Well
now, that's all just hearsay, isn't it?" He grinned and raised his gun to
my eye level, the huge silencer staring into my face.

"I'm
a spiritualist," Callie interjected with her head bowed. "Would you
allow me one small ritual before I die?" I couldn't believe she was
actually suggesting some voodoo ceremony at a time like this. Caruthers seemed
amused and asked what it entailed. She said it would only take a second and
asked permission to reach into her purse for the cards. Caruthers kicked her
hand aside and upended her purse, tossing the cards on the floor at her feet.
She picked up the cards and with trembling hands shuffled them. I was about to
crawl out of my skin, my eyes darting to every possible escape. I could lunge
at him, but now he had the gun barrel flat up against Callie's head. I was
panic stricken that he might shoot her.

She
carefully placed the cards in a strange pattern, praying, "My life is
placed at the four corners of the earth." She stretched her hands up above
her head, her eyes closed. "To the sacred spirits who have guided my life.
I pray for guidance at this hour." She swung her arms down slowly.
"And I offer up these orbs..." Callie raised her arms up swiftly and
secured a death grip on Caruthers's crotch, at the same time trying to escape
the gun barrel at her head. I grabbed the gun, deflecting the bullet that
Caruthers fired reflexively as he writhed in pain and fell forward on top of
me. I poised my right hand in the air, forming a hook with my index and middle
finger, and brought my hand forward into his face, striking his eye. Between
his eyes and his crotch, Mr. Caruthers was pretty much in agony from head to
toe. Callie rang the guard gate, and in five minutes we had enough Marathon
people in that office to shoot a movie. I shouted at the security people to
take Caruthers into custody.

"Touch
me and I'll have you fired!" Caruthers bellowed. The guard hesitated and
then backed away. I had underestimated the power of the studio executive. On
this lot, Hank Caruthers was one of the studio gods, and lesser folk trembled
in his presence.

"He
shot Arnold Talbot and he's a killer!" I shouted at the nervous guard, who
saw his retirement plan teetering in the balance. He stood immobilized as
Caruthers stumbled by him and out the door. I made a move to go after
Caruthers, but the guard blocked the doorway.

"We've
called the police," he said as if I were the problem.

Another
guard helped Isaacs up, untaping his mouth and untying his legs. Isaacs rubbed
his arms to bring back the circulation and managed to get Callie in a position
where he could talk to her.

"Thank
God you came here when you did," he said. "I was pretty terror
stricken."

Callie
looked at him, her eyes seeming to pierce his skin, and said coldly, "Then
you must know some of the terror my brother felt before he died." Isaacs
tried to say something, but I guess he couldn't think of anything. Truth
sometimes has a way of rendering one speechless.

Detective
White arrived on the scene, more interested this time in what we had to say. He
put out an APB on Caruthers.

Paramedics
were working on Arnold Talbot. Isaacs was dialing his attorney, and I called
Isabel Anthony in Tulsa, who promised me her story rights. And in Hollywood,
"a verbal" is as good as "a written." Like everyone in
Hollywood, we'd all hit the phones at the first break.

After
an hour of filling in Detective White and his promising to call us for more
details, we were released. We stepped out into the main parking lot into a blur
of news vans broadcasting, camera shutters clicking, and reporters screaming,
"Over here! Talk to us!"

We
got in our car, locked the doors, and drove through the crowd.

"I
can't believe while people were bleeding and being untied, you were phoning
Mrs. Anthony for her story rights."

"Isn't
that why we did all this? Make a great theatrical, and only we know the whole
story? Speaking of unbelievable, how about your final ritual with the
orbs?"

Callie
shot me a shy grin. "Well, I rarely use spiritual rituals in vain, but I
do think this was an exception. And besides, I learned it from you."

"It's
interesting that you wanted to see Isaacs dead and you ended up saving his
life," I mused.

"I
thought about that. He and I obviously had unfinished business from another
lifetime," she said, very matter-of-fact. "I have some unfinished
business with you also," she said, letting me know she had plans for our
evening. "This will be the first night since I met you that no one is
chasing you but me."

I
awoke wrapped around her, both of us naked, the sheets down around our legs,
our own body heat having kept us warm. I was so in love with her that I could
never bear to be without her. I liked the smell of her, the look of her, the
way she talked, the way she walked, the way she dressed. I was, as the
Shakespearian bard said, besotted with her. I kissed her sleepy face into
recognition of the dawn, and she opened her eyes, looking lovingly at me.
"It's possible that I could fall in love with you." Her voice had a
teasing lilt to it.

"Too
late. You already have." I grinned.

"You
are a little too cocky." She punched me. "I have to tell you something."
And almost before she said it, I caught a glimpse of a suitcase on top of the
dresser, partially packed.

"What's
that?" I asked, my heart in my throat.

"I
have to go back to Tulsa in a few days."

"Okay,
I'll go with you," I said.

"Me,
not you. I live there."

"You
live with me now," I said, and she laughed.

"Why
would I live with you? You're not tidy and you're spoiled." She smiled
lovingly at me.

"And
your point would be?"

"Seriously,
Tee, we barely know one another. In fact, I would say you really don't know me
at all yet. We have to spend time together."