by Jeff Buick
“Something about all this is wrong,” Mike said. Years of experience with the police department had taught him that people didn’t commit crimes without a motive.
“You still in Frankfurt?”
“Yeah. I managed to get a ticket on Lufthansa. Bastards only had executive class left. You wouldn’t believe what the ticket cost me.”
“I’ll reimburse you,” she said.
“It doesn’t matter who pays for it. It’s robbery.”
“When are you back in Washington?”
“Ten-sixteen tomorrow morning. I’ll call you when I arrive.”
“I’ll be here.”
“You okay in the house?”
“Sure. This is fine. Thanks for the offer.”
“It’s okay. The sheets in the guest room are clean.”
“Which one is it?”
“Top of the stairs, turn right, first door on the left. The place is hardly the Taj Mahal. It won’t take you long to find it.” There was a moment of silence, then he said, “There’s a gun under the seat cushion on the couch in the living room. It’s loaded. Snap off the safety and you’re ready to go.”
“I don’t like guns,” she said. “Dad used to encourage me to shoot gophers, but I always missed on purpose.”
“If this asshole comes anywhere near you, just point and pull the trigger. Don’t miss.”
“Guns scare me.”
“Guns scare me, too. That doesn’t matter. Take it upstairs with you. Tuck it under your pillow.”
“You’re lucky your cleaning lady never shot herself when she was vacuuming the seat cushions.”
“She did. I had to get another one. Turned out to be very bad. The new gal won’t touch the windows.”
His humor hit the mark and she smiled. “See you about noon tomorrow.”
“Yu p.”
Leona walked slowly through the living room to the kitchen. Mike Anderson’s house was early-bachelor, with no sense of décor. The walls were pale green and the carpets teal. Wood paneling covered one wall, and his commendations from the time he spent on the force hung randomly against the dark wood. The kitchen was worse, with flowered wallpaper and patterned linoleum that clashed with the harvest gold appliances. She grimaced as she opened the fridge, expecting mold monsters. It was empty except for a six-pack of beer and a tub of margarine. She closed the door and sat at the kitchen table, staring at the opposite wall. A solitary picture hung in the space. It looked small, silly almost. Leona focused on the people. Mike and his ex-wife, both smiling. Better times. They were holding hands and there was a sparkle in his eyes. How could he forgive her—still love her like he did? She cheated on him, slept with another man. Yet he’d take her back in a minute.
Her father’s face drifted through her subconscious. Why couldn’t she just accept the man as he was? What stopped her from opening her heart? He was a good man, hardworking and intelligent. Funny sometimes. Not often—mostly he was businesslike and gruff. Maybe that was the key. They were different from the most basic chromosomes outward. She was creative, giving, and acted on what her heart told her was right. He was money and material things. Accepting the fundamental differences between them was the key. Could she do it? She had no idea.
Leona walked into the living room and stared at the couch. Aside from being butt ugly, it looked normal enough. She tentatively lifted the middle cushion. A section of the material was cut away and a thin wooden box jammed between the metal coils. She pulled it out and opened it, revealing a revolver. She touched it. The metal was cold. She wrapped her hand around the handle and lifted. It was heavier than she expected. The bullets were visible, each sitting in its chamber like little torpedoes loaded in their tubes and ready to fire. She placed her thumb on the hammer and cocked the gun. It made a clicking sound, a low noise in the quiet room that didn’t carry very far. She carefully released the hammer and let it settle back in its housing. The gun hung from her hand, pointing at the floor.
Is this what her life had come to? Standing in a strange house, holding a gun. Waiting for a hired killer to track her down and murder her. Even as a dream, this would be a good one. Too bad it was real.
56
Darvin hated the room. It reeked of hotel sex.
Not present-time sex, but of the hundreds of times men and women had sweated and cum all over each other on the bed. He could smell it, like a festering sore on rotting flesh. Six hours in the room and he was long past the point of thinking clearly. He closed his eyes and saw women bent over the bed, men behind them, hammering their weapons into hot, willing pussies. He forced his eyes open, hating every graphic image.
At six o’clock, Darvin got up and showered. His penis hung like a limp rag and he tried to make it hard by thinking of the one time he’d put it in a woman. Nothing. He finished washing and turned off the water. As he rubbed the towel over his skin he remembered slicing her neck open and watching her gasp for air. Her arms flailing about as she died, and her body going slack as he ejaculated inside her. He glanced down. His manhood was fully erect.
“Mother wouldn’t have liked her,” he said as he jerked off. “She was so dirty.” He moaned as he climaxed, then pulled on his underwear and walked back into the bedroom. The smells were still overpowering and he felt nauseous.
It took him less than five minutes to pack and leave the room. The sun was up and burning off the morning haze. He drove to the outskirts of the city before stopping at a roadside diner for breakfast. He spread the papers from Leona Hewitt’s town house on the table as he picked at his bacon and eggs. The last incoming call was from a European number. The country code indicated the call had originated in Germany, and less than twenty minutes before he pulled it off her phone. He scanned down the other nineteen numbers on the list. Seven were the same, and he checked the phone book for the number to her restaurant. It matched. He scratched them off the list. Two other entries were the same and he recognized the number—the main line to the Washington Police Department. The calls that had tied Derek Swanson to the murders of Reginald Morgan and Senator Claire Buxton. Smart girl, this Leona Hewitt.
He drew a line through another five numbers, all from her office at DC Trust. Her support staff calling her to check on things. One was from a 1–866 number—probably some telemarketing firm. That left four numbers, all different. She didn’t use her home phone all that often, and the oldest recorded number went back a full month to July 6. Darvin circled the four remaining numbers and dialed out on his cell phone. A man’s voice answered.
“Greg, it’s Darvin.”
“Oh, you,” the voice went up an octave. “Where have you been? You disappeared. Gone in the morning. I was devastated.”
“Get over it,” Darvin said icily. “Listen, I need a favor.”
“If I didn’t know better, I’d think you were using me.” There was a teasing tone to the voice.
Darvin ignored the flirting. “Can you run four numbers through your system and get me names and addresses?”
“When I get to the office. I’m at home right now.”
“Sometime today would be good.”
“Just because I work for the phone company doesn’t mean I have nothing to do.”
“How long will it take you to pull four numbers off your computer?” Darvin wanted to leap through the phone line and strangle the talker.
“I can do it today. I was just teasing. Why are you so abrupt? It doesn’t suit you.”
“Sorry. I’m busy. I don’t mean to be rude.”
“That’s okay. What are the numbers?”
Darvin recited the phone numbers and hung up. He had other things to do today. Important things. It was time to close a chapter of his life. One that should have been closed years ago. He paid the waitress and left her a decent tip for keeping his coffee topped up. A gas station was attached to one side of the diner and he pulled up to the pump and filled the car. He had a three-hour drive ahead of him. The road was familiar and the weather was nice. Perfect day for
an outing.
In fact, it was a perfect day to take care of something that had been burning inside him for over thirty years.
Leona woke and looked about the room, wondering where she was. It took a few seconds, then she remembered. Mike Anderson’s guest room. She glanced at the alarm clock on the night table. Seven-twenty. She rolled out of bed and headed for the bathroom.
The shower invigorated her and twenty minutes later she was wide-awake. At eight she called the office and asked for Anthony Halladay. The receptionist rerouted the call to his private line.
“Leona,” Halladay said. “What can I do for you?”
“I won’t be in today,” she said. “Something’s come up. I need to take a few days off.”
“What’s wrong? Is this to do with Derek Swanson—with what you told me yesterday?” the CEO asked.
“Yes. It’s related. I’d rather not say any more. I need some time off. You can mark it down as holidays.”
“Usually we get some advance notice.”
“Sorry, not this time.”
“When will you be back?”
“Next week.” It was lip service. She had no idea when it would be safe for her to return.
“Is there anything I can do?”
“No, I don’t think so. I’ve got to go. I’ll see you next Monday.”
“Okay.” He sounded hesitant, confused.
She set the phone back in its cradle and stiffened. There was a noise from the front of the house. Boards squeaking under weight. Someone was on the porch. She peeked around the door frame between the kitchen and the living room. The door handle was turning and she could see a shape outlined through the window in the upper half of the door. The gun—it was upstairs in the bedroom and impossible to retrieve in time. She raced across the kitchen to the butcher’s block on the counter and pulled out the largest knife. The blade was ten inches and the edge looked clean and recently sharpened. She moved back toward the door as the sound of footsteps echoed through the living room. The knife was at chest level, horizontal, ready to slash across the chest area. Even if he could get his hands up, she’d cut his arms, try to disarm him if he had a weapon.
Leona reached the doorway as the man entered. The knife flashed forward, then she pulled back. It sliced harmlessly through the air. He yelled and took a sluggish step back, banging into the far side of the doorjamb and tumbling to the floor. He lay there, staring wide-eyed at her.
“Sorry,” she said, letting the knife fall to her side.
“Who are you?” He was at least sixty-five, with thinning gray hair and dressed in light green work pants and a plaid shirt. He looked terrified.
“Who am I? Who are you?” Leona asked.
“John Fisher. Mike’s neighbor. I come in to check the place every day.”
“Leona. I’m Mike’s boss. Sort of.”
“Oh, the elephant charity lady.” He leaned on one hand and pushed up onto his knees, then stood up. “What’s with the knife?”
“I didn’t expect anyone. You scared me.”
“Ditto,” he said. Fisher looked around and shrugged. “Everything looks okay.”
She nodded. “It’s fine. Thanks for checking in.”
“Sure. When will Mike be back home?”
“A couple of hours.”
“Oh, he’s back today.”
“Yes. I’m killing a bit of time, waiting for him.”
“Okay.” Fisher walked to the front door. He gave her a final smile and left, closing the door behind him.
Quiet settled in again. Leona shuffled to the couch and dropped onto the cushion. She looked down at the knife, dangling from her hand. Upstairs, under the pillow she’d slept on, was a loaded gun. It was Monday morning and she had called in because a killer might be watching her office. Not exactly a normal start to a workweek.
Anthony Halladay sat at his desk, staring out the window at the surrounding buildings. Sun glinted off the reflective glass across the street. How many times had he looked at those windows, thinking of the mundane lives of the office drones who worked there? Now, that anonymity looked pretty good. He was at the top, poised to crash. There would be no stopping it now. If Leona Hewitt was too scared to show up for work, Swanson’s man was still after her. Derek hadn’t been able to reel him in.
Leona Hewitt was not going to survive.
When she died, the DC homicide police would be all over the case. His connection back to Derek Swanson would eventually be uncovered. He was ruined. Financially, he would survive, but socially, he would be a pariah. Shunned, the one left standing when the music stopped.
He thought of the gun in his home safe. The easy way out. Maybe, but not yet. He’d wait until Leona was dead and the police were at the door.
57
“Anything happen last night?” George Harvey asked.
The detective, a junior in the department, shook his head. “All quiet. Lights went out about midnight and there was no activity. The next-door neighbor went in through the front door about ten minutes after eight this morning. He had a key. Came out five minutes later.”
“Checking on the place?”
“I’d say.”
“Thanks for staking it out overnight,” Harvey said. “Submit the overtime hours. I’ll make sure it gets through.”
“Sure. I’m going home to sleep for a couple of hours. I’ll be back in after lunch.”
“See you then.”
Harvey leaned back in his chair, his hands cupped around the crown of his head, fingers interlocked. He hadn’t told Leona Hewitt a man was watching Mike Anderson’s house for good reason. He wanted her alert, not dropping her guard because she felt protected. It was impossible for one man to watch the front and rear of the house, but getting one of his detectives on short notice for an unauthorized surveillance had been tough. Two would have been impossible.
Leona’s friend, the ex–New York cop, was due home today. That took some of the pressure off his department. If he were in town and close to her, the killer would have to deal with him. It was almost like having one of his men shadowing her, but without the cost.
He tipped forward, unclasped his hands and dialed the number Leona had given him. She answered on the second ring, her voice uncertain.
“It’s George Harvey,” he said. “I wanted to follow up on what we found at your house last night.”
“Anything to identify him?” she asked.
“No. No fingerprints on the upper balcony doors and no fingerprints on your telephone. Including yours. It was wiped clean. You don’t have a habit of wiping off your telephone after you use it, do you?”
“No.”
“I didn’t think so.”
“What does that mean? That he wiped off my telephone?”
“Your phone holds the last twenty incoming numbers. I suspect he touched the buttons necessary to pull those numbers off your phone, then wiped it off to erase his prints.”
“Why would he do that?”
“Anyone who called you, aside from telemarketers, know you. If he could trace their numbers, he may get your location. Has your friend where you’re staying called you recently?”
“Not in the last month. He’s been in Africa since the second week in July.” She was about to tell him that her home phone wasn’t a busy line as most of her calls came to her cell phone, but he was already talking.
“That’s good. We’re probably okay then.” He paused for a moment, then asked, “When is your friend arriving?”
“He should be here by noon.”
“Call me when he gets there. I’ll feel better knowing he’s with you.”
“Sure. Thanks, Detective Harvey. I appreciate your concern.”
“You’re welcome.”
A CSI tech entered the room as he replaced the phone. The midthirties woman was carrying a thin folder and wearing a puzzled expression. Her name was Arlene, and she worked a lot of the homicide cases. Harvey liked and respected her.
“What’s that?” h
e asked.
“Results of the two DNA samples.” She flipped open the file. “Derek Swanson’s and the blood traces in the van that Claire Buxton was driving.” She handed him two sheets of paper. “Take a look at this.”
He took the papers and scanned the contents. After twenty seconds, he looked up at her. “Are you sure this is right?”
She nodded. “When we saw the results, we ran the entire analysis again. There is no error.”
“This is incredible.”
She nodded again. “Very.”
Mike Anderson cleared customs and headed for the closest phone. He dialed his home number and waited. When Leona picked up, he breathed a quick sigh of relief.
“You made it through the night okay?”
“I did. A little glitch in the morning when John showed up. I almost ran him through with one of your knives.”
“Oh, shit, I forgot about him. He okay?”
“Yeah. What about me? I could have been killed.”
“You could have . . .” Silence, then, “Funny. Glad you’ve still got your sense of humor.”
“You at the airport?”
“Yup. I’m going to grab a cab. I’ll be at the house in about an hour.”
“See you then. Make sure you knock. I have a knife in one hand and a loaded gun in the other.”
“My kind of gal.”
“You wish.” She set the phone down and collapsed back into the armchair. Her gaze was angled up, toward the ceiling and she focused on the light fixture in the foyer. It was a chandelier-style piece with little dangly crystal balls that refracted the light and threw faded spectrums across the upper walls. Hideous was a mild word for it.
“If I get out of this alive,” Leona muttered under her breath to no one. “I’m going to redecorate this place.”
58
Darvin pulled up in front of Derek Swanson’s house mid-afternoon. Traffic was moving well and he had made good time on the 165-mile trek from Washington to Morgantown. Swanson’s Porsche sat in the driveway. That was good, although he would have waited for the man to return home from work if necessary. He pulled up beside the car and walked to the front door. A quick touch on the doorbell set the chimes in motion. He could hear them through the thick, wood door. After about thirty seconds there was a noise from inside the house, then the door swung open. Derek Swanson stood in the doorway, his cell phone attached to his ear. Shock registered on his face, then anger.
