“If you’re looking to hire me that means the man isn’t an easy target. What sort of security does he have?”
“He lives up in the mountains and has at least three guards on duty at all times, with cameras everywhere.”
“Is the place secluded?”
“It was, but the dumb-ass didn’t buy up the land around him. Some real estate developers built homes right next to him, and so now he has neighbors. There’s still a high wall around the property, and then there are the cameras.”
“What about dogs?”
“Don’t know, but hell, just shoot them if you come across any.”
“What’s the fee?”
Hoyt named a number, and Spenser shook his head.
“Double that and we have a deal.”
“Seriously, Tanner?”
“I don’t work cheap and I’ve never failed to fulfill a contract. If your people want this man dead, then they’ll have to pay to make it happen.”
Hoyt chuckled. “I have the money, but I was hoping to get you cheaper. The less you cost the more profit I make.”
Hoyt gave Spenser a sheet with information on Gregor Rossi, along with photos of the guards and the grounds. It was information obtained by the private detective who tracked down Rossi. Finally, Hoyt reached beneath the seat of his truck and came out with two envelopes, both were thick with cash.
“I was hoping to keep one of those,” Hoyt said.
“Tell your clients that Rossi will be dead within a week.”
“That will make them happy. Rossi made them look like fools when he ran off with their money.”
“Until next time, Ray.”
“Yeah,” Hoyt said, while staring at Cody and Romeo. “And leave these assholes at home.”
Spenser and the boys watched Hoyt drive off, then headed to their own vehicle. Neither boy said a thing, and Spenser assumed that they were angry he had let Hoyt drive off without questioning him further about Anna.
“I know where Hoyt lives. Once the hit is done, I’ll watch him for a few days. If he grabs a girl, I’ll kill him.”
“Thank you,” Cody said, “and I’m sorry I lost my temper.”
“You liked this girl Anna a lot, didn’t you?”
“I liked her, but it’s not that. I hate people who pick on the weak. Anna just wanted to go on a date and have a good time… and some asshole probably murdered her.”
“I’m going to murder Gregor Rossi, does that make me an asshole?”
“You’re a professional assassin doing the job he’s been hired to do, and Gregor Rossi isn’t an innocent. He’s a guy who stole from his own mob and now he’s going to pay the price.”
“Yeah,” Romeo said. “Not all killing is the same, I know that. And Spenser, you would never kill just anyone for money. You only like to kill the dirty ones.”
Spenser nodded. “You boys get it, that’s good.”
“When are you going to hit the target?” Cody asked.
“I’ll travel to the area in a couple of days. You two are coming with me, that is, if you don’t mind giving up some of your vacation time.”
“I’m in,” Romeo said.
Cody nodded in agreement, then asked a question.
“Will we be coming back to Tucson?”
“Yeah, and I’ll be checking out Hoyt to see what he’s up to.”
“Good,” Cody said. “I don’t like him.”
“There’s a good chance he had nothing to do with Anna disappearing, you know?”
“I know, Spenser, but there’s something off about him.”
“If he’s guilty, he’ll pay, Cody. If not now, then someday.”
“Are you talking about Karma?”
“Call it what you like, but yeah, I think life evens things out in the end.”
“If that’s true, then maybe someday I’ll have a family again.”
“Me too,” said Spenser, making Cody realize that he wasn’t the only one whose past might be tragic.
“You lost your family, Spenser?”
“I’ll tell you and Romeo about it someday… maybe.”
“We’re here, dude, whenever you want to talk.”
Spenser acknowledged Romeo’s offer with a smile and continued driving back toward Tucson.
26
A Long Shot
NEW YORK CITY, JANUARY 2018
Tanner discovered that Donna Hoyt was dead. She had been murdered in her home in 2016 after a burglary had gone wrong. Tanner had been hoping that she might have an idea what the last name was of the young man she had known as Cliff.
If Tanner had a first and last name, it might have been easy to track Cliff down. As it stood, he only knew that the man had been in New York City two days ago and had witnessed him leaving an office building. Cliff, if that was even his real name, might have left the city since then.
Sara had been hired during her meeting with the senior management of a downtown department store and was working a case as a private detective. She’d gone undercover as part of a night crew. Merchandise was disappearing via employee theft and the store manager was certain it was taking place at night.
Tanner had spent the last few weeks training while also honing his fencing abilities, something he hadn’t done in a while. He had also finally gotten around to taking his first flying lesson, which was a skill he was long overdue in learning.
As busy as he was, he had no contracts to fulfill, and with Sara gone at night, he might as well hunt for the phony Ray Hoyt, despite what a long shot locating him would be.
He had seen the man he believed to be Hoyt near 34th Street. He would return to that area and keep watch. With any luck, Hoyt visited the area frequently, if so, Tanner might spot him.
As he prepared to leave, Tanner debated whether he should bring along a sniper rifle. If he spotted Hoyt in a crowd, he could put the man down before he knew what hit him.
But no, he was still not a hundred percent positive that the man he’d seen was Ray Hoyt. Until he knew for certain, he’d have to be patient.
It was a temperate night for winter, so Tanner decided to travel on foot. As he was leaving the building from his private entrance, he noticed a man walking toward him. The man was his neighbor, Eric Tang. He appeared to be returning from a trip to the high-end liquor store that was near the park. The store’s bags had a distinctive gold color.
Tang was Asian and the same height as Tanner, but ten years older. He had a military bearing about him that was accentuated by close-cropped hair. He spoke with a slight British accent.
Tanner reached into an inside pocket and took out a pair of eyeglasses. The high-tech lenses weren’t for vision correction, instead, they refracted light in such a way as to change the contours of Tanner’s features. In particular, the lenses made his intense eyes appear less fierce. He wore them whenever he was around the building, and mentally chided himself for not already having them on.
Tang didn’t like Tanner, whom he knew as Thomas Myers. Tanner had essentially yanked the coveted penthouse apartment out of Tang’s hands, due to a secret arrangement between himself and mob boss Joe Pullo.
The two men came together near the corner of the avenue. Tanner was dressed all in black and wore a hoodie and sneakers. After looking Tanner over, Tang made an observation.
“You look like you’re venturing out to mug someone in the park.”
Tanner pointed to the bag Tang was holding.
“And you look like a wino walking around with that bag of booze.”
“Hardly, Myers. This bag contains a bottle of Chateau Lafite Rothschild and it cost me nearly a thousand dollars.”
“What’s wrong with beer?”
Tang made a face, as if the very thought of drinking beer repulsed him.
“See you around, Tang.”
“Myers?”
Tanner turned around, while wondering what Tang wanted.
“I ran into Miss Blake earlier and she happened to mention that you played chess.”
“That’s right.”
Tang gestured toward the building.
“None of our neighbors have any skill at the game, do you?”
“I’ve been known to win a match now and then.”
“I would like to play you sometime. I have business to attend to out of the city this week, but if you could drop in on, oh let’s say the following Sunday, that would be a good time for me.”
Tanner was surprised by the invitation. Normally, he would have refused it, but would Tom Myers decline the offer?
“I’ll be there. What’s a good time to arrive.”
Tang answered, “Eight p.m.” Then, he smirked. “I’ll tell my wife to buy beer.”
After arriving in the area where he believed he’d spotted the man he knew as Hoyt, Tanner found a good observation post. It was the recessed entrance of a store that sold souvenirs. It was located between a bank and a fast food restaurant. From his position, Tanner could see across the avenue to the building that Hoyt had exited.
Tanner had stopped at the building. The doors were locked and there seemed to be no security guard on duty.
Sara called at midnight, knowing that he was a night owl who operated well on little sleep. She was on her first break of the night, and wouldn’t have lunch until two-thirty a.m.
“My sleep pattern is going to be all screwed up if this case lasts very long.”
“Have you spotted any thieves yet?”
“Not one, and they all seem like hard workers.”
“What about the security guards?”
“There’s only one on this shift, a pudgy kid named Darren. The others told me that he sits in the security office all night and plays video games. I’ll be keeping an eye on him tomorrow. I plan to hide a camera in the security office.”
“Smart.”
Tanner told Sara what he was doing and heard the surprise in her voice.
“Are you sure it’s the same man?”
“Not yet, but the Ray Hoyt who died years ago definitely isn’t the same Ray Hoyt I remember. The man had his back turned when Romeo and I shot him, but he was dressed in jeans and a white T-shirt, same as Ray Hoyt had been.”
“If you find this man, what then?”
“You already know the answer to that.”
“I’m proud of you.”
“Excuse me?”
“You heard me right. I said I’m proud. If a man like that is in the city, getting rid of him would be a public service.”
“That’s how I look at it. They might name a cemetery after me someday, but never a prison.”
Sara laughed.
“I have to get back to stocking shelves, but hey?”
“Yeah?”
“I love you.”
“I love you too, Sara.”
By one a.m. the temperature had dipped, and Tanner had become chilled. He decided to head back home. He’d give it a week, and after that, he’d have to assume that Hoyt was in the wind.
27
Suspicious
TUCSON, ARIZONA, MARCH 1998
Cody and Romeo arrived at the girls’ basement apartment to find Monique at home, but they were told that Barbara had run to the market. She was planning to cook dinner for everyone.
“She should be back soon, Xavier.”
“Which market did she go to?”
“Barb went to that Italian market. Take a short cut through that small park a few blocks away and you’re right across the street from it.”
“I’ll go find her and walk her home,” Cody said.
Cody was moving through the park when he saw Barbara in the distance. She was crossing the street and headed his way. Barbara had only one shopping bag, but it looked full and she needed both hands to carry it.
He was about to call out to her when he spotted a man run across the road and enter the park. The man had dark hair and was wearing a long black raincoat. It was seventy-six degrees and hadn’t rained in weeks.
Cody sped up his pace, but he altered his direction so that he would be hidden by a row of bushes and could come up behind the man. Barbara had yet to notice that she was being followed and seemed to be having trouble carrying the shopping bag.
Barbara paused at a bench, where she sat the bag down for a moment to give her arms a rest. The man behind her halted as well. He leaned against a tree, while looking around to see if anyone was watching him. A group of kids were playing on swings, but they were some distance away near a small lake.
Barbara decided to take a seat for a moment. Seeing this, the man in the raincoat quit leaning on the tree and moved toward her. When Cody stepped from behind another tree and blocked his path, the man let out a gasp.
Now that he was getting a good look at the guy, Cody could see that he was about forty, too old to be the Ray that Anna had dated, but he had been up to something.
“Why are you following that girl?” Cody asked.
“What girl?”
Cody was bringing back a fist to hit the man when he heard Barbara call his name.
“Xavier? What’s going on?”
Cody turned to look at her, while keeping the man in his side vision.
“This guy was following you.”
The man turned and ran through the trees, to head toward where the children were playing. Cody ran after him as Barbara shouted his name.
28
Could It Be Him?
NEW YORK CITY, JANUARY 2018
Tanner was back at his observation post the next night and saw something suspicious within the first few minutes. There was a man in a gray hoodie following two teenage girls.
The girls were both beautiful, about eighteen, and were sparkling with jewels while dressed well and carrying designer handbags. In other words, they came from money.
The guy stayed back about twenty feet from the girls and moved along the crowded avenue with his hands tucked in his pockets. Because of the hood, Tanner was unable to get a look at the man’s face. By the way the man moved, he didn’t think it was Ray Hoyt.
Hoyt didn’t walk, he swaggered. Still, the man could be an accomplice of Hoyt’s. As the girls and the man following them moved from Tanner’s sight, he decided to trail after them and see what happened.
The girls wound up at a brownstone on Eighth Avenue where a party was taking place. Tanner had to take a cab to keep up, as did the man who was following the girls. When he told the cabbie to follow the taxi in front of them, the man asked Tanner if he was joking.
“No joke, and don’t lose him.”
“Let me guess, you’re a secret agent?”
“Just drive.”
The cabbie took his advice and was quiet the rest of the trip. Tanner considered asking the man to wait, in case he needed him again, but the cab would have stood out at night. After getting out of the taxi, Tanner walked off in the opposite direction of the hooded man who had followed the girls, then moved up the stone steps of an apartment house as if he lived there. He soon doubled back and found that the hooded man had a partner.
Someone driving a blue van drove down the street, then parked at a hydrant. The hooded man walked over and leaned in on the passenger side to speak to the driver.
Tanner moved with stealth as he crossed the street. He wanted to get in position to see who was behind the wheel of the van. If it was Hoyt, he and the hooded man could be planning to grab the girls when they left the party.
It wasn’t Hoyt. It was a guy in his thirties with blond hair and a mustache. From where he stood in the shadows of a tree, Tanner also glimpsed the face of the man wearing the gray hoodie. He was a young guy who didn’t appear to be much older than the girls he’d been following.
Tanner decided to find out what was happening and moved toward the van. Neither man noticed him until he was a few feet from the driver. They tensed up, but there was no reaching for weapons.
“Hey,” Tanner said. “I’m with the neighborhood watch. You two have a good reason to be parked out here?”
The driver s
miled as he reached for a wallet that was sitting in a cup holder. He opened it to reveal a silver badge and an I.D. card.
“Perkins Security Group, sir. We’re in the neighborhood as part of a security detail. Our client’s daughters just entered that building where the party is taking place.”
“Somebody threatened the girls?”
The man in the hoodie spoke up.
“We’re not allowed to discuss it.”
Tanner took on a worried expression.
“If some maniac is stalking girls in my neighborhood I want to know about it.”
The blond man nibbled his bottom lip while looking thoughtful. After thinking things over, he spoke.
“There’s no threat. The girls’ father is being overprotective. The guy’s niece was found murdered last week after going missing. It’s made the guy paranoid.”
“I don’t blame him,” Tanner said, “and I’ll tell the other members of the watch to stay out of your way.”
“We appreciate it,” said the driver.
Tanner walked out to the avenue and caught another cab to take him back to where he’d seen Hoyt. As he waited and watched, he used his phone to search the internet. It didn’t take him long to find the story the driver had mentioned. It was dated a week earlier.
Callie Wallace, 21, went missing from a bar on Broadway. Her body was discovered two days later inside a dumpster at the rear of a factory in the Bronx. Miss Wallace was the niece of the famed hedge fund manager, Arthur Wallace.
Someone was stalking and killing young women in the city, and Tanner was certain he knew who he was. Now, all he had to do was to find him in a city of over eight million people.
He kept watch until two a.m., then walked home, took a shower, and fell into bed.
29
Young Guns Box Set - Books 1-4: A Tanner Series (Young Gun Box Sets) Page 10
