“Before or after roasting?”
She touched her suntanned arm. “After, clearly.”
“So what do you say we go for a walk?” Craig asked. “It’s getting dark.”
“To walk off the dinner, or did you have something else in mind?’
“Maybe both,” he said.
“Perfect.”
Hand in hand they strolled out of the restaurant and through the lobby. Not only was the restaurant and bar still busy, but so was the central area of the massive hotel. Craig figured at least a hundred people milled around in the vast wood and stone space, talking and laughing and generally enjoying the party atmosphere of the charity golf tournament. Even with the fear for the Senator, he was enjoying himself as well.
And, it seemed, Bonnie was too.
“Let’s go out this way,” Craig said, pulling Bonnie through the lobby away from the front door and down a wide hallway that led to the pro shop area. He knew there was another door there that went out toward the back nine.
Last night they had gone out the front and ended up on the second hole. When they went past the spot this morning Bonnie had pointed out to the Senator where they were sitting when they overheard the men. The Senator’s only comment was, “It looks like a nice private spot to me.”
Bonnie had blushed.
Craig was enjoying the fact that the Senator could make her blush with a simple comment.
The Pro Shop was closed, so Craig led Bonnie down the wide staircase to an outside door between the entrances to the locker rooms. Where the carts had been lined up early that morning was an empty expanse of concrete. To the left Craig could see a large, open door behind a massive boulder. It looked as if it led down into what was clearly a cart storage area under the hotel.
There was no one around. Compared to the massive number of people just a short distance away in the lobby and restaurant area, it felt odd to be alone.
Bonnie ambled toward the open door. “I wonder how many carts a place like this has?”
“They have two courses here,” he said. “It has to be a lot. A couple hundred at least.” He followed her down the ramp around the rock and into a massive, low-ceilinged garage area.
“Try four or five hundred,” Bonnie said.
Craig stood in the door beside her, amazed at the expanse of lined up carts that seemed to almost vanish into the distance in the dim light. They were in perfect rows, with cords draping from the ceiling. Each cord was plugged into a cart in the center under the seat.
To Craig it looked like each was hooked into an umbilical cord.
The carts were all empty and cleaned, waiting, the clubs clearly off in a locked storage area somewhere.
Bonnie walked slowly down one aisle. Each cart was numbered, and that number matched a number painted on the concrete. It looked like something he’d seen in a bad science fiction movie: aliens waiting to be activated. And the dim light didn’t help the image.
“I wonder what their power bill is like for all this,” Bonnie said, pointing up at all the chargers on shelves along one ceiling beam.
Craig followed, not sure that they should be in there, but not stopping either.
Bonnie glanced over at Craig. “You remember what our cart numbers were today?”
“You and the Senator had 167 and Danny and I had 168,” he said, surprised at himself for remembering. But since he and Danny had been following the Senator’s cart all day, and the number to their cart was on the back right bumper, it had pretty much stuck in his mind.
They were walking along the carts with low eighties for numbers. Bonnie kept going, deeper into the dimly-lit room. He had no idea what she had in mind, but he followed anyway.
She led him between cart 104 and 105 over to the next row. Cart 167 was backed against the concrete wall five or six carts from the back of the room. Bonnie climbed in and patted the seat beside her.
“Just what are we doing?” Craig asked, sliding into the passenger seat.
“Shhh,” she said softly. “Just listen.”
The silence seemed to suddenly get louder than his own heartbeat as they sat there in the darkness. The light from the door they had come in was the only bright area. The rest of the massive garage was illuminated by dim nightlights scattered on support pillars. There was a faint hum that filled the air, more than likely coming from the chargers above each cart.
Nothing else.
Bonnie moved her hand to his lap and squeezed. Then she whispered, “Every time you climbed in the cart today I wanted to do that.”
“Don’t stop now,” he whispered back.
Her hand worked over his crotch, rubbing him through his slacks, making him grow quickly hard.
“Nice,” he whispered. “Very nice.” He leaned into her and they kissed, long and hard, the taste of the cheesecake dessert covering her breath like a sweet mint.
He moved his hands up to her breasts, rubbing them through her blouse and bra. He felt like a high school kid again, out parking on a date, touching a girl’s breasts through her blouse. Those nights were exciting and frustrating at the same time. He had loved the feeling and had always wished he could recapture it.
Now he was and it was great.
Excitement of being in a different place combined with sexual touching, all wrapped into the fear of getting caught. This weekend was going to be memorable for a number of things.
Bonnie seemed to be enjoying it just like his dates had back then. Actually, he was enjoying it more than he had in high school, since none of his dates had ever put her hand on his crotch like Bonnie was doing now.
They kissed again, long and hard and passionately. It seemed it had been years since the two of them had felt so passionate with each other. Craig knew right then they were going to have to take vacations much more often.
Bonnie started fumbling to unzip his pants and open his belt. He broke the kiss to help, but before he could get his belt undone the sound of something metal dropping echoed through the massive empty room.
Both Bonnie and Craig jerked away from each other to stare out through the carts. Craig thought his heart was going to jump right out of his chest from the shock. Across the massive garage, at least six rows over, Craig could see two men moving toward the door.
He couldn’t see their faces, since their backs were mostly turned toward them, but one had short hair, the other wore a golf cap. Both looked to be about six foot, one had wider shoulders than the other.
As the two neared the door, one spoke, clearly loud enough for Bonnie and Craig to hear. “Man, you two need to get a room.”
Then the two men were gone out the door and up the ramp.
Craig glanced at the shocked look on Bonnie’s face. Instantly he knew she thought the same thing he did. That voice was one of the voices from last night.
“Come on,” he said, jumping out of the cart and running down the aisle toward the door, making sure his zipper was up as he ran.
“We don’t have our guns,” Bonnie said from behind him.
Craig knew that. “I don’t plan on stopping them. Just following.”
At the large door he stopped and quickly peered around the corner. As he had expected, they were not in sight up the ramp. With Bonnie right behind him he ran up to the door into the clubhouse. There were two couples walking out near one of the putting greens, and a maintenance man working in the ground near a planter, but no sign of the two men.
“They must have gone inside,” Bonnie said, pointing to the double doors that led past the pro shop and up the stairs.
Craig agreed. It was the only place they could have gone that quickly.
At a run they went back up the stairs, down the hall, and into the main lobby. There seemed to be even more people up here than there had when they left a half hour before.
He and Bonnie moved to one side and stood, scanning the people. Not a sign of the two men.
They had vanished.
“Damn,” Bonnie said.
Craig
couldn’t agree more. “We need to inform Maxwell and Hagar. Let’s head up to the Senator’s floor.”
“Just don’t tell the Senator what we were doing,” Bonnie said. “I get embarrassed enough around that man.”
“Agreed,” Craig said, smiling. “But we have to tell the others what the guy said.”
“Damn, damn, damn,” Bonnie said. “Caught parking in a golf cart inside a garage. How bad is that?”
“And with a married man as well,” Craig said. “What’s your husband going to say?”
“I hope he says rain check.”
“Rain check.”
Ten minutes later, with Hagar and Maxwell and two other FBI agents with them, they did a sweep through the hotel lobby, bar, and restaurant, looking for two men who matched the vague description of what Bonnie and Craig had seen. No luck at all, which just made Craig even that much more frustrated.
They all then went back down to the cart storage area. With Bonnie’s help, they managed to figure out which row the two men had seemed to suddenly appear in. Hagar got one of the hotel security staff to turn up the lights and they searched the entire area without finding anything.
Maxwell pointed at a regular-sized door in the back wall near the end of the cart aisle they were searching. “Maybe they came out of there.” Maxwell glanced at one of the hotel security guards. “Where’s that lead?”
“Service area,” the security guard said.
“We didn’t hear a door open or close,” Craig said. He glanced at Bonnie to make sure and she nodded her agreement.
“They might have already come through it when we came in,” Bonnie said.
Maxwell nodded and moved to the door. It was locked, but the security guard quickly had it open. The door was the kind that could be opened from the inside even if locked so the two men could have easily come through it from the inside. Behind the door was a staircase leading upwards into a main floor service area of the hotel. And right across from where the staircase came out were three service elevators.
“It seems the two we are looking for know their way around this place,” Bonnie said.
“I hope you have those guarded,” Craig said, pointing at the service elevators.
“On the Senator’s floor we do,” Maxwell said. “But I’m beginning to think we may need to cover the floor below as well.”
Craig could only agree.
CHAPTER TEN
Saturday, April 8th
10:19 p.m.
CHARLES ROBINS MOVED out onto his patio toward the man standing there. Never had the man returned in the middle of an assignment before. And never had the man called him on his personal, unlisted number to set up a meeting so late.
Charles had paced for the last two hours, waiting, coming up with a dozen things that could have gone wrong. Clearly the Senator had not met with his accident yet, so something had. The question was what?
And how serious was the problem?
Finally the man in the dark suit had appeared on the patio, smoking as always.
“So what has gone wrong?” Charles demanded.
“You tell me,” the man said, his voice low and very mean. “The Senator has clearly been tipped that something might happen to him this weekend. Both the Scottsdale authorities and the FBI are staying very close to him. And he is playing with two cops from Seattle.”
Charles felt as if someone had punched him in the stomach. “How? I said nothing to anyone but you.”
“Are you sure?” the man asked, his voice seemingly on the edge of anger, barely controlled. His eyes were like two black holes in the darkness, unblinking and deadly.
“Of course I’m sure,” Charles said, disgusted. “If Senator Knight makes that vote on Monday, I’m as good as broke and in prison. It would only be a matter of time. So why the hell would I tell anyone I’m trying to stop him?”
“Well, they have discovered the threat to the Senator in some fashion,” the man said.
“But can you still do what needs to be done?”
The man nodded. “The Senator can still meet his date with an accident. But it will cost you a great deal more than before. And this will be our last meeting ever.”
“How much more?” Charles demanded. The man’s fee hadn’t been small before this set-back.
The man laughed. “This is not a negotiation.” He handed Charles a slip of paper.
Charles did not even give the man the satisfaction of looking down at the note.
“If the first amount specified is not in that off-shore numbered account by ten in the morning, the Senator will make his plane to Washington just fine.”
“And if I put the money in the account and you do not carry through on your end of the deal?” Charles demanded, getting angrier and angrier.
“Then you do not have to pay the second, larger payment specified.”
That made Charles glance down at the paper, but he could not read it in the dim light.
“And trust me,” the man said, “if I carry through with my end of this and you do not pay the second amount, you will meet an accident far worse than what waits for the Senator. And far more painful.”
“You are threatening me?” Charles demanded, stepping toward the man. Charles could not remember ever being so angry as to want to hit someone. But right now he was.
The man stood his ground, his dark eyes intense, his posture relaxed. “Of course I am.”
Charles just stared at the man. This man was blackmailing him and there was nothing at all he could do about it. Charles was going to lose everything and the man knew it and was using that fact to extract everything he could.
“Think it over,” the man said.
“How do I know you didn’t make up this entire story about the FBI knowing there is a threat to the Senator?”
“You don’t,” the man said. “But it is the truth and there is no way to prove it to you.”
Charles stared at the man. More than likely this guy had just been waiting for the right assignment from Charles to pull this blackmail stunt and then vanish. More than likely the man had done the same to other clients in the past and gotten away with it.
Well, he was going to get away with it again. Charles was desperate. Senator Knight had to be kept from that vote on Monday. There was no other choice.
“All right,” Charles said. “The money will be in the account in the morning.”
“It has been nice doing business with you,” the man said, turning from Charles and starting across the patio.
“Just make sure it’s done,” Charles said.
“Oh, I will be successful,” the man said without looking back. “You just make sure the payments are made and we can both live happily ever after.”
With that the man walked down the path away from the patio and vanished into the night.
Charles turned and moved back into the light so that he could read the amounts on the paper. His stomach clamped up like the guy had punched him. $250,000 by ten in the morning. $750,000 within twelve hours of completion.
“Damn, damn, damn,” he said, glancing around to see if the man was still in sight. That was a vast amount of money, yet possible. And the man he called Bill knew it. Its removal from his corporate accounts was going to be hard to hide, but better taking a chance with some missing money than having Knight vote on Monday.
He turned and headed for the office he kept here in his home. It was far past the time he would normally be in bed, but he knew without a doubt there would be no sleeping tonight. He had to figure a way to cover his tracks with the money.
And then spend the rest of the night worrying about the thousand things that might go wrong.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Saturday, April 8th
11:30 p.m.
DANNY OPENED THE door for the man and stepped back into his hotel room. All day he had been simply walking through the motions. He had managed to play decent golf, but that had been mostly because he hadn’t cared. He kept thinking about his wife. He c
ouldn’t imagine what they were doing to her, and yet he couldn’t think of anything at all to do. If he told someone, they would kill her, he had no doubt. And he couldn’t live with that.
But he was also starting to wonder if he could live with the Senator getting hurt.
“Nice to see you not bein’ guarded, kid,” the man said. “Lot of cops around here. You have anything to do with that?’
Danny suddenly felt his stomach clamp down into a tight knot. “No!” he said as firmly as he could. “I didn’t say a word to anyone.”
The guy nodded. “You sure about that?”
“You said you’d kill my wife,” Danny said, staring into the dark eyes of the man. “Why would I chance that?”
The guy looked at him for a minute, then nodded. “Smart kid. I believe you. Besides, we’ve been keepin’ an eye on you and I doubt you had a chance to tell anyone.”
Danny felt the relief flood over him. “Can I talk to Steph?”
He had insisted that before he would do anything for them, he could talk to Steph every night. The kidnappers had agreed.
“Sure thing, kid,” the guy said. He reached into his coat pocket and flipped Danny a cell phone. “Just hit redial.”
He did as the man told him to do, then listened as it rang on the other end twice before Steph answered. “Danny?”
“Steph?” he said, the relief he felt flooding through him, making his knees weak and his eyes water.
“Are you all right, Danny?” she asked, her voice barely able to sustain the question.
“I’m fine,” he managed to say. “How are they treating you?”
“They’re keeping me locked in a bathroom,” she said, “but they are feeding me and they haven’t touched me.”
“I love you,” he said.
“I love you, too,” she said.
The phone went dead.
He handed the cell phone back to the guy and he put it in his pocket. “You want to see that wonderful wife of yours again, you’ll play along tomorrow.”
“I’ll do what you asked,” Danny said.
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