Too bad he couldn't say that about the rest of his life. Knowing he was innocent of betrayal and murder didn't make the days of hiding any easier to endure. Hawk had long since given up looking for the magic solution that would put things back to where they'd been before that fateful night when his partner had died and he'd started running. His job with the DEA—Drug Enforcement Agency—was finished. Even if he thought they'd give it back to him, the prospect no longer appealed.
The best he could hope for now was vengeance.
By the time he arrived at the Victorian house that had long ago been divided into four separate apartments, Hawk was satisfied his trail was clean. There was a light oh in his neighbor's ground-floor window to the right, while his own apartment on the left was dark.
His footsteps were deliberately heavy as he mounted the front wooden steps, his way of letting Mrs. Avery know he was home. Not that he was in the mood for conversation, but he'd rather get it over with now than in an hour or two when she realized he was back and came over to check on him. He planned to be asleep by then.
Besides, he liked his neighbor. Her efforts to be kind without being intrusive had won her a place in his affections right next to his sister Elaine, her two kids, and a cross-eyed dog they'd saved from the pound. Since he couldn't risk contacting Elaine, not even to let her know he was alive and well, Mrs. Avery was the only person in his world with whom he didn't have to be constantly on guard.
There was also the advantage of having someone next door who would notice strangers in his absence. Nothing much escaped Mrs. Avery, and what did wasn't worth bothering about. A weary smile kicked at one corner of his mouth as he remembered the shifty-eyed insurance salesman she'd dispatched with a shove that had sent him tumbling down the steps before Hawk could lay a hand on him. Clearly, both Hawk and the salesman had underestimated the diminutive, bright-eyed widow whose pastel-shaded hair changed hue on a regular monthly schedule.
It had been a soft purple the day she'd outmatched the salesman. Hawk had admired the way she'd casually dusted off her hand, tucked a lavender curl back into place, and invited him inside for tea and cookies, the twinkle in her eyes daring him to make more of the incident than it deserved. He'd drunk her tea without referring once to her bit of exercise, but couldn't help reflecting on former colleagues who would have benefitted from imitating her classy brand of discretion.
All the same, he still paid close attention when someone visited her that he didn't know. Being careful was simply part of who he was.
Mrs. Avery's door opened as he entered the narrow hall running between their apartments. Hawk took one look at her face and knew something was wrong.
"What is it?" he demanded, his gaze hitting the dark corners of the hall as he dropped the sports bag and slid his right hand inside his jacket. He didn't worry about how they'd found him. That would come later, if there was a later. For now, it was a matter of assessing the situation and getting out of it without anyone—Mrs. Avery especially— being hurt.
"It's nothing, Bob. Really." She hesitated, clicking her tongue as she lifted a hand to primp the pink curls framing her face. She sighed, then thrust a thick envelope into his hand. "This came for you, by express. I had to sign for it."
He never got mail, not at this address. No one who knew him had any idea where he was.
His fingers closed around the butt of his Astra revolver as he took the package in his free hand and tossed it toward his door. Then he moved between Mrs. Avery and the street, because if there had been a shooter inside her apartment, she would have been a lot more upset. As it was, he knew he had to kill the lights before he got her back inside. If she would just move so he could reach the switch . . .
It suddenly dawned on him that she hadn't stopped talking, and now that he heard the words, they weren't making any sense.
". . . and I wouldn't have called that radio station, not for myself, but I was bored and thought it would be a hoot to talk to a real psychic. Although I have to admit that now that I've done it, I'm not at all convinced she's not a fraud. I mean, seriously, Bob, you should hear what she had to say about you."
He blinked twice and decided to leave his gun where it was. After all, he'd been backlit in the hall for over a minute, and if there was a shooter anywhere near, he would have done the job by now. Just to be on the safe side, he reached up and unscrewed the lightbulb in the ceiling.
"Who said what about me?" he asked, setting the hot bulb on the ledge beneath the mailboxes.
"The psychic. Why did you unscrew the bulb?"
"I could hear a crackling noise that meant it was ready to go out," he lied. "I'll replace it now and save someone tripping in the dark What psychic?"
"The one on the radio. The show's broadcast all over the country, out of the Carolinas or somewhere like that. She claimed to be able to find the perfect mate for any confirmed bachelor. I thought you fit the theme perfectly." Mrs. Avery looked at him curiously. "I didn't hear any crackling."
"My hearing is extraordinarily acute." Making sure Mrs. Avery was standing inside her door but out of range of her windows, he crossed to his own door and inserted the key before bending to pick up the package. "So this is a tape of the call you made?"
"Apparently. Fiona—that's the psychic—had someone call after I was on the program and ask for your address. It came this morning, but you weren't in."
Hawk noticed she didn't ask where he'd been, and he was, as always, grateful for her reticence. He just wished she'd used a little of it before calling the psychic.
No telling what damage she'd done with that single phone call.
"When did you make this call?" he asked.
"Yesterday afternoon. You're not angry with me, are you, Bob? You seem a little nervous."
Hawk softened his expression. The last thing he wanted to do was hurt the one person he'd relied on all these months as a touchstone with reality.
"Don't worry, Mrs. Avery. I was just surprised. I'm sure it will be, er, a hoot to listen to."
She sighed and smiled at him. "Just so you don't take it seriously. Now I suppose I'd better let you go. Mr. Tompkins is going to be down soon and I haven't set up the card table yet."
Hawk waited until she was inside and had shut her door before entering his own apartment. Although he seriously doubted anyone would be waiting—a waste of time when all they had to do was blow him away on his doorstep—he took the usual precautions. As a result, it was another five minutes before he put his gun on the coffee table and stuck the cassette tape into the machine. Moments later he'd sorted out the voices belonging to Fiona, the psychic, and Sara—he hadn't known her first name—and found himself laughing at Sara's "gorgeous not prissy" summation.
He'd just settled back in his chair and was beginning to relax when Sara mentioned the scar on his hand and the needlepoint. Hawk ignored what came after that as he moved quickly through the apartment, gathering up those essentials that weren't already in the sports bag and stuffing them inside.
The program was still running when he detoured on his way out to eject the tape from the machine and shove it into his jacket pocket. Taking care not to make any noise that would alert his neighbor, he let himself out into the dark hall.
He was on the run again, and all because a sweet old lady thought he was lonely. Hawk figured it served him right for letting her past his guard. Still, he hated leaving without saying good-bye. Or thank you for lending him a piece of sanity to hang on to during these past months. He left without saying anything, though, because those who came for him would leave her alone once they realized she knew nothing.
Winding his way through back alleys toward the street where he'd left the car, he realized it was sheer luck that he was still walking. Another five minutes or five hours, and there might have been a story about him splashed across the front page of the San Rafael Gazette. . . . RENEGADE DRUG COP DOWNED IN SHOOT-OUT, or some such nonsense.
He had to assume that someone listening to the radio
program would hear the bits about the scar and the needlepoint and figure out it was him. Even if they weren't one of the people after his head, they would eventually mention it to someone who was, and the hunters would be blowing out his windows faster than Fiona could sense anything was wrong.
He approached his car from behind, then walked past it without so much as a heartbeat's hesitation. All of the windows looked like they'd been done over with a baseball bat. The coincidence in timing worried him, though less so when he noticed two other cars with their windows bashed in. Random violence, he decided, and wished the perp had chosen another night for his rampage. Half a block down, a prowl car was double-parked beneath a streetlight and two cops were in the process of cuffing a man. One of the cops bent over and picked up a bat.
Nothing to do with him . . . maybe. To be on the safe side, Hawk kept walking until he was out of sight of the three men, then hailed a passing cab. It was only a five-minute ride to his backup vehicle, but riding was less exposed than walking when one's back trail was in question.
He sat where he could use the rearview mirror to keep watch on the road behind them and thought about the man with the bat. It wasn't that he didn't believe in coincidences.
It was simply that he didn't like them.
* * *
The parking garage where Hawk kept his other car was cut into the ground beneath a thriving business park. He had chosen it because a lot of the people who worked in the adobe-faced buildings overhead left their cars there while traveling. No one paid any attention to a vehicle that didn't move for weeks at a time, so long as the rent was paid every month. It was the third such location he'd used over the past six months, and there was nothing in writing that could tie the rental to him.
The phony papers he'd secured soon after his fall from grace were supposed to protect him from the hunters. So long as the hunters didn't know whether he was in Tampa or Tahiti, he could stay hidden for a very long time.
He really wished Mrs. Avery hadn't made that call.
Hawk kept his hand closed over the butt of his revolver as he walked through the dimly lit garage with its low-hanging steel beams and evenly spaced concrete pillars. As many as a quarter of the parking slots were still filled, but the place was empty except for a man doing something under the hood of a blue four-wheel-drive Jeep Cherokee that just happened to be blocking Hawk's car.
So as not to alert the man, Hawk didn't break his stride as he eased the sports bag onto the floor and slid his gun from its holster to rest against his thigh. He was five yards away when the man looked up and seemed to notice Hawk for the first time.
"Hi there." He sounded flustered, but Hawk ignored the verbal signals and analyzed the scene for flaws.
He was dressed appropriately for a man who actually might work in this complex—pin-striped suit coat draped through the Jeep's open window, shirtsleeves rolled up to his elbows, tie askew, and a preppie haircut that was slightly mussed from a frustrated hand. His expression was part chagrined, part relieved, and if he'd taken his hands out of the engine and held them in plain sight, Hawk might have believed he was nothing more than a man having car trouble.
Hawk stopped where he was, shielding the gun behind his thigh and waiting for the man to continue.
"I don't suppose you know anything about cars, do you?"
"Some."
"Would you mind having a look, then? It just stopped before I'd driven twenty feet." He looked away from Hawk and peered under the hood. "It probably has something to do with the fact that it's been parked for nearly a month, but I haven't a clue and my secretary forgot to renew the auto club. Silly girl, but she's usually so—"
His hands came away from the engine as he suddenly pivoted and aimed a dark-painted automatic at the spot where Hawk had been standing not two seconds earlier. Operating on instinct, Hawk had taken the opportunity of the turned back to move. Before the man could correct his aim, Hawk was beside him and landing a stunning blow to his jaw with his left fist. The automatic—a Beretta, Hawk thought—fell to the cement floor, and Hawk kicked it aside as he whipped the butt of his revolver across the man's face.
The tactic was messy but effective, a broken nose generally being as incapacitating as a half-dozen well-placed punches. There was the added bonus of the opponent remaining conscious for a question-and-answer session. Grabbing the man by the knot of his tie, Hawk was about to drag him into the deep shadows near the wall when the barest hint of sound from behind him made his blood run cold. He glanced over his shoulder. A woman was rising from the ground, her eyes round and accusing, one hand holding back a thick mane of reddish-brown hair, the other holding the Beretta.
He made his move before she used it. With his grip around the man's tie for leverage and a helping knee to his butt, Hawk literally flung the man at her, knocking her over, then followed the two down with his own body. The automatic flew from her hand and skittered across the oil-stained floor. He heard the crack of something against the cement as he landed on top of the pile, but whether it was the woman's head or the heel of a shoe, he didn't care. All that mattered was winning this encounter, and if someone got a little dead in the process, that was okay as long as it wasn't him.
The male assailant squirmed silently beneath Hawk's weight—Hawk figured he had six inches and commensurate pounds on him. He raised up enough to get an angle, then landed a knife-edged blow to the back of the man's neck. He went limp, leaving Hawk to decide between trying for the carotid artery just below the woman's ear—if he could find the ear; so far, all he could see was a mass of hair fanning out over the floor—or just letting her be smothered under the weight of two full-grown men. She wasn't a large woman, about five and a half feet tall and slender, almost fragile iooking.
Appearances were deceiving. Assassins were never as fragile as this one looked.
He turned his head and saw the Beretta had skidded out of reach. Hawk decided if the woman was still armed, it would have to be a gun or knife taped to her calf beneath her slim-fitting slacks. Possibly a gun tucked into the hollow of her back. Her cream silk blouse hadn't looked as though it was designed to conceal weapons, and unless she was armed with something really esoteric like a stiletto disguised as a hair comb, she'd have as much trouble as he would reaching for anything useful.
It occurred to him then that she wasn't moving or таking any sound whatsoever. While the lack of noise was appropriate for what he supposed was to have been a quiet, no-fuss assassination, it could also mean she was unconscious. Or she was playing possum. He thought he'd better find out which.
Shoving the man's head to the side, he braced one hand against the floor and pushed aside her thick, wavy hair. Blood from the man's broken nose was smeared across her face, and he had to wipe some of it away before he could do what he needed.
With his thumb, he checked beneath her eyelids and was satisfied by the way her eyes rolled back that she was out cold. He worried for a moment that she'd stopped breathing, but after licking his finger and holding it under her nose, he was reassured. The breaths were shallow and weak, but more or less even.
Since he'd already decided which of the two he was taking with him—the man's broken nose would make him memorable if anyone happened to see him, and because of the size and strength factor, the woman would be easier to control—he got off the pile and slid his gun back into its holster. Then he dragged the man off the woman so she could breathe more freely, wiping the blood from his hand on the man's shirt. She responded with a cough and a slight gagging noise, rolled to her side and curled into a tight ball, then subsided back into silence. Just in case she fooled him and came to a couple of hours before he expected, Hawk yanked the silk tie from the man's throat and bound her wrists together.
Feeling particularly paranoid, he tied them behind her back. Then he patted her down for weapons, his hands running over her body with a detachment that didn't allow him to take pleasure in her delicate curves, long supple limbs, and smallish but firmly rounded b
reasts. He finished his quick examination by digging his fingers into her hair, looking for hair combs that weren't there. When he was done, he left her lying on her side with her face to the cold cement.
In the time it took to haul the man over against the wall and out of sight, pick up the loose gun, and check to see that the Jeep did, in fact, start when he turned the key in the ignition, the woman didn't so much as twitch. He hoped it wasn't because she'd cracked her head against the cement and wouldn't ever regain consciousness. There were things she could tell him that just might save his life.
He decided to take the Jeep because it was a more versatile vehicle than his own and, once he'd made a couple of changes, wouldn't be traceable for a week or more. Opening the rear passenger door, he pulled out a plastic cooler and put it into the back end before returning to the woman. He checked her eyes again, then lifted and carried her over to the Jeep. Trying not to knock her around any more than necessary, he settled her on the floor of the backseat, deciding she'd travel best on her side with her back facing the rear of the vehicle. He pushed her hair from her face so she could breathe, then took out a handkerchief and wiped the blood from her forehead and cheeks. If there was a point when she had to be presentable, it was easier to get the blood off now instead of later, when it had dried and was caked on her skin.
Tossing the soiled linen aside, he checked that the tie was still tight around her wrists and slipped the high-heeled pumps from her feet. There wasn't much else he could do to make her comfortable, what with her hands tied behind her back and her body arched over the driveshaft hump. Hawk had never seen the point in casual cruelty, and he wouldn't hurt her unless he had to. Even so, he wasn't going to untie her, and letting her stretch out on the seat wasn't an option.
He spared another minute to move supplies from his trunk to the back of the Jeep. He covered the woman head to toe with a blanket, put his sports bag on the front passenger seat and dropped the Beretta inside it, then got behind the wheel and headed out. He doubted anyone would be waiting outside with a backup ambush; they'd already sent two people and that was enough manpower to expend on the chance he'd show up there. Still, he slouched low in the seat and kept a watchful eye until he was away from the business park.
Night of the Hawk (LS 767) Page 2
