The Color of Death (26 page)

Scottsdale

Saturday

1:50
P.M
.

“Jason, you know we’d fall apart
without you,” Sharon said into the phone even as she skimmed her computer screen. She was—as ordered—working from her father’s suite so that she’d be available if he needed anything. Peyton was sitting six feet away, drinking beer and eating pretzels, killing time before his three o’clock appointment. “Especially now, with all the trouble. The next time Dad yells at you, think seagull, okay?”

The man at the other end of the line looked toward the ceiling of his office at Sizemore Security Consulting. He didn’t rate a window, but he didn’t resent it. Only the big boss had one.

“I’d rather think of a raise,” Jason said.

“Works for me. I’ll bring it up the next time he isn’t chewing the scenery over something.”

“I can’t wait that long.”

Sharon sighed and wondered if all men were prima donnas, or just the ones she was unlucky enough to meet. “Look, you know I’m doing everything I can for you.”

“And I’m doing the same for you. Winnowing truth from gossip
in the jewelry trade is more art than science. I’ve sent a lot of business to Sizemore, and kept a lot of bad prospects from ever getting through the front door. You know that as well as I do.”

Peyton got up and wandered over to Sharon. While he looked at the computer screen, his beer-cool fingers played with the hair curling against her cheek. She clicked to the next page of the document, reading, thinking, and listening all at once.

After a moment, Peyton realized that she was vetting her father’s e-mail. The document she was reading had been routed to SSA Patrick Kennedy and forwarded to Ted Sizemore. Something about Lee Mandel.

Peyton caressed Sharon’s cheek while he read at top speed.

“Okay,” Sharon said after Jason wound down. “I’ll talk to Dad in a few days. Right now he’s biting the head off everyone within reach, including his Bureau buddies. Asking for a raise now would be stupid.”

Jason drummed his fingers on the desk. “A week. No more. I had a really good offer from Mandel Inc.”

“I know.” Jason hadn’t waited two minutes to call her after the offer came in. Not that she blamed him. It was business, not personal. She clicked to the next page of the document she was reading on the screen and asked, “Is everything else okay?”

“My brother.” Jason sighed. “Still looking out the window, waiting for his lover to call, and wondering what the hell went wrong.”

Sharon hesitated again. Clicked to the next page. Read hard and fast, then reread to make sure.

“Sharon?”

“Still here. I’m just—”

“Multitasking as usual,” Jason cut in. “I promised Norm I wouldn’t say anything, but I’ve got to. His lover is Lee Mandel, the courier who vanished in Florida late last year.”

Sharon froze. “Mandel?
Gay?
”

“Yes. Have you heard anything that I could tell Norm? He’s really slammed by this. Waiting and not knowing is hell.”

Sharon shook her head like a dog coming out of water. “Lee is gay. Oh, my God. I interviewed Mandel and never even caught a hint.”

“Does it matter?” he asked curtly.

She shook herself again and thought hard, but all she said is, “Dad will flip.”

“Lee isn’t out of the closet, so don’t tell anyone. Especially your father.”

“Give me a few seconds.” Sharon stared at the screen, frantically piecing things together. She quickly decided that nothing had been hurt and something might even be helped. “Dad would have my head if he knew what I’m about to do.”

“He’ll have your head anyway. That’s just the way he is.”

“Don’t I know it. The Mandel file was just updated. Tell Norm to stop waiting and wondering. It wasn’t anything he did or didn’t do.”

“What does that mean?” Jason asked.

“The Bureau is looking for Lee’s body somewhere in the swamp on Sanibel Island.”

Peyton’s playful fingers stilled.

At the other end of the line, Jason closed his eyes. “Robbery or hate crime?”

“They’re assuming robbery,” Sharon said.

“This will kill Norm. He and Lee were going to be married in L.A. in two months.”

“Shit, Jason. That really sucks. I’m sorry.”

“You’re sure that Lee’s death wasn’t a hate crime?” Jason asked. “Florida isn’t what I’d call a hotbed of enlightened sexuality. When he was away from home and wouldn’t be recognized, Lee occasionally went to gay bars just to unwind. Someone could have seen him in one, followed him.”

“I’ll make sure Dad brings up that angle with the Bureau.”

“Good. Thank you,” Jason said.

“Don’t expect anything.” Sharon rubbed the back of her neck and wondered if she’d make it to fifty before the hours killed her or
she killed her father or she took everything she’d socked away and got the hell out of Dodge. “Frankly, from what I’ve seen of this case, Lee wasn’t a martyr to anything but bad luck.”

The door to the suite opened. Peyton stepped away from Sharon and went to greet Ted Sizemore. The two men loathed each other, but business was business.

“Thanks for the suggestion,” Sharon said quickly. “I’ll get back to you as fast as I can.”

She hung up and smiled brightly at the two temperamental men in her life. She wondered how long she could balance them before her already raw nerves snapped.
I need a vacation. A long one.
But she couldn’t afford to take one now. She’d just have to suck it up and keep playing the dutiful, obedient dumb woman to a world of needy men.

“Lee Mandel’s file just came in,” Sharon said.

Sizemore looked at Peyton. “I’m sure you’ll excuse us. Business.”

“Of course.” Peyton smiled at her. “See you at seven.”

“Maybe,” Sizemore said quickly. “Maybe not. I might need her.”

“And I
know
I’ll need a break,” Sharon said. “Seven.”

Peyton shut the door behind him, leaving father and daughter to sort out who would be eating what, where, when, and with which male.

“Why don’t you ditch that mutt and find a good man?” Sizemore said. “Have kids. Be a woman.”

“Every man I know looks out for number one. Why shouldn’t I?”

“Because you’re a woman.”

“So selfishness is lodged in the balls? Or is it the dick?”

“You’re feeling bitchy. That time of the month?”

She smiled thinly. “At least my moods are predictable.” She stood up and waved her hand at the computer. “SA Groves’s summary of his CI, Lee Mandel, and the fact that Groves is still holding out for his Teflon gang as the perp for a lot of the courier hits, including Mandel.”

Sizemore scanned the report with a speed that belied the alcohol puffiness of his eyes and jawline.

“Can they track the stone from Florida to Purcell?” Sharon asked while her father was reading.

“They’re working on it. The pawnshop owner that supposedly turned down the stone has connections to L.A., where Purcell had his home base.”

“So they’re thinking this mutt sent the stone through the South American version of the old-boy network?” she asked impatiently.

Sizemore nodded.

“What about the transvestite?” she asked. “Was he local?”

“They’re showing sketches around to find out.”

“Sketches? I haven’t seen any.”

Sizemore clicked on the last page of the document. Four sketches had been scanned in. He zoomed in on them one at a time.

Sharon stared intently at each sketch in turn. The I-need-a-vacation headache behind her eyes settled in for a long stay. A drink would have helped her overstretched nerves, but Sizemore didn’t allow her to drink on the job.

“Anything?” he asked.

“No. You?”

“I’ve met a few drag queens in my life, but not this one.” Yet Sizemore kept staring at the sketches, frowning.

“Could it be Lee Mandel laying a false trail?” Sharon asked after a moment.

“Not if he was already dead,” Sizemore said. “Besides, the CI says the sketches aren’t Mandel.”

“Natalie Cutter?”

“Whose real name is Kate Chandler, who happens to be Mandel’s half sister. If anyone would recognize him, she would.”

“Well, that just adds a real gloss to this cluster,” Sharon said, shaking her head. “The half sister has been a regular fountain of false leads. How did she get back into the game?”

“She’s the CI.”

“She’s a nutcase!”

“The Bureau doesn’t think so. And neither do the DNA results. The only good news is that somebody is trying to kill her.”

“Excuse me?”

“Death threat. Mechanical distorter. Lab is working on it now.”

“Waste of taxpayer money,” Sharon said quickly. “Even if they stroke a voice out, no court will accept it. Too many choices. If you use x frequency for your template, you get x voice. If you use y, you get y. If you use a cat, you get a cat.”

Sizemore shrugged. “You never know. The lab has pulled more than one white rabbit out of a hat.”

“Nutcases, mutts, and white rabbits,” Sharon said, throwing up her hands. “I don’t believe this shit. What is Kennedy
thinking
?”

“He’s covering his ass for all he’s worth. He’s damn good at it too. He’s isolated Groves and Chandler in such a way that no matter what happens, Kennedy wins. That’s one smart son of a bitch.”

Sharon thought her father had the son of a bitch part right. “Now what?”

“The Bureau is shaking the tree to see if some Ecuadorians drop out.”

“Here?”

“L.A.”

Sharon frowned and thought fast despite the throbbing in her head. “Why L.A.? Purcell and the stone?”

“Yeah. It all comes back to the stone.” He grabbed a beer, twisted off the cap, and raised the bottle in sardonic salute. “Here’s to the color of death.”

“What?”

“Blue. Sapphire blue.”

Scottsdale

Saturday

5:15
P.M
.

Kirby sat in his locked hotel room,
staring at his palm.

A rectangular blue eye stared back at him.

“Wish you could talk,” he said. “I’d sure like to know why the Voice wanted Purcell killed and you cut up into smaller stones.”

Light shifted and shimmered over the stone as though it was alive, breathing. Blue on blue on blue, deeper than time, a well with no bottom, hypnotic.

Kirby had sold the rest of Purcell’s stones to Peyton, but not this one. He kept thinking he could use the gem as a twist on the Voice. If not, well, it was worth a lot of money in a few markets he could think of. Saudi Arabia, for one.

“I’d sell you and head for Rio or Aruba,” he said to the gem, “but I think that would be a fast ticket to hell if the Voice starts squeezing me. You’ve got to be good for more than money, right? I sure as hell don’t need the Voice following me into retirement.”

Or hiring some soldier to kill me.

But that was something Kirby didn’t want to say aloud, even in the privacy of his locked room. He moved his hand, making the stone flash like blue lightning.

“You know what I mean?”

Whatever the stone knew it kept to itself.

From the bedside table came the bleat of Kirby’s cell phone. He fisted his left hand around the stone and grabbed the phone with his right.

No caller ID.

The hair at the base of Kirby’s neck stirred.
Does the Voice know I’m double-crossing him?

“Yeah?” Kirby said into the phone.

Eerie mechanical tones said, “I need someone in L.A.”

“Why?”

“Some mutts from the de Santos gang are walking down the wrong streets.”

“So?”

“José de Santos. Eduardo de Santos. José launders Colombian money in the jewelry district. Eduardo takes hot gems for Peyton Hall and cuts them into cold stones.”

“How do you know?” Kirby asked.

“Why do you care?”

“I don’t,” Kirby said quickly.

“Take out the de Santos. José gets a necktie. Do whatever you want with the other one. They’re stealing from the wrong people.”

“How much is it worth for me?” Kirby asked.

“As much as you can take on the job.”

“No cut for you?”

“I’ll get mine on the other end,” the Voice said.

Kirby wondered what that meant but knew better than to ask that question.

“You have a pencil?” the Voice asked.

“Sure,” Kirby said. He stuffed the stone in his pocket, grabbed a pad and pencil from the bedside table, and started writing addresses as fast as the Voice recited them. “Are these recent?”

“Eduardo hasn’t moved in ten years. José might be more of a problem. Maybe Eduardo can help. Just do them fast.”

“Anything else?”

“Kate Chandler, Phoenix.”

Kirby wrote the address quickly.

“Make it look like rape-murder,” the Voice said.

Kirby didn’t like that. “Rape? Too many ways to leave evidence behind.”

“Wear a rubber.”

“But—”

“It’s worth a hundred big ones in your Aruba account.”

“A hundred thousand?” Kirby asked.

“You heard me. If you can’t get it up for rape, use a broomstick. Just don’t make it look like a hit.”

Kirby felt the shape of the stone in his pocket and wondered if it was time to get out. “I want that hundred thou in my account tonight.”

“You’ll get it when I see her body on the news.”

Kirby hesitated. Three murders. Boom boom boom. Then the Purcells before that, and the courier. A lot of death dirtying up what had been a fairly clean game.

It sounded like something was coming apart.

“Cash up front or find another man,” Kirby said.

The silence stretched so long that Kirby was afraid he’d misjudged. Sweat gathered under his arms.

“Agreed. Do them within twenty-four hours and you get fifty extra.”

The Voice disconnected.

Kirby pulled the sapphire out of his pocket. For a long time he sat with the gem in one hand and the cell phone in the other.

“Time to retire,” Kirby said.

But first he had some work to do.

He punched a number into the cell phone. It was picked up quickly.
Rancheria
music blared in the background. A woman’s smoke-roughened voice sang along in Spanish.

Kirby would like to have handled both ends of the job, but he couldn’t do that and collect the bonus, no matter how often there were flights between L.A. and Phoenix. So he’d give L.A. to Tex
White. That way if there was any splashback from the Colombians over their pet money launderer, White would take the heat.

“What’s up?” White asked before he bothered to say hello.

Kirby could tell from the sound of the other man’s voice that he was halfway soaring on cocaine. Or maybe just plain old meth. Whatever. It didn’t matter. White would never have any money to get out of the business. It all went up his nose. He’d gone from righteous soldier to plain old mutt.

But that wasn’t Kirby’s problem. After this one, he wasn’t going to use White again. After this one, he wasn’t going to use anyone again. He was heading south.

“Another job,” Kirby said. “You interested?”

“What’s it worth?”

“Twenty.”

“Twenty? What kind of courier carries that kind of small change, even wholesale? We talking wristwatches here?”

“Not a courier. Two mutts in L.A. Eduardo de Santos and his cousin, José de Santos. Old José gets a necktie. Do the other one any way you want.”

“Gimme the addresses.”

“Remember. José gets a necktie.”

“Yeah, yeah. I hear you. Gimme the fucking addresses.”

Kirby read off the numbers, then disconnected and began thinking about the job ahead. As he did, he pulled out the sapphire and rolled it in his palm caressingly. Blue flashed and gleamed, flashed and gleamed, an unblinking death’s eye watching everything with equal clarity.

After a long time he put the stone back in the smuggler’s pocket he’d rigged in his underwear. He’d cracked too many safes to ever trust anything valuable to one, and the sapphire was the most valuable thing Kirby had ever owned.

He suspected it was also the most deadly.