Barely Legal

by Stuart Woods

  “Let’s take him out to dinner.”

  “Really?”

  “He’s all alone in that apartment. It can’t be good for him.”

  “Okay. Thanks, Dino. I’ll take care of it.”

  78

  HERBIE DIDN’T WANT to go out to dinner, but he couldn’t talk his way out of it. Under the circumstances, there was nothing he could say that didn’t convince Stone he needed cheering up. Still, the only reason he gave in was Stone was so insistent Herbie had the feeling they had something to tell him.

  It turned out to be true. Once they had settled with their drinks and ordered a round of steaks for all, Dino told him what he’d learned.

  Herbie couldn’t believe it. “She was working with the robber?”

  “That’s what it looks like.”

  “So why did he kill her?”

  “We don’t know.”

  “It makes no sense.”

  “It’s the answer to who drugged your drink.”

  “Are you sure my drink was drugged?”

  “I tested your blood.”

  “Did you test hers?”

  “She wasn’t drugged.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  Herbie’s cell phone rang. He jerked it out of his pocket and clicked it on. “Hello?”

  “Mr. Fisher, we have a problem. What part of ‘no cops’ didn’t you understand?”

  Herbie was aware of Stone’s and Dino’s eyes on him, as he spoke to the man he knew must work for Tommy Taperelli. He said casually, “I understand.”

  “You’re having dinner with the commissioner of police.”

  “I’m out with Stone and Dino. They’re trying to take my mind off things.”

  “I assume you spoke to the councilman. Anything he told you is strictly confidential.”

  “At the moment, I can’t even think about business.”

  “Think about this. What I told the councilman goes double for you. If you mention his daughter, you won’t be seeing his daughter. Capiche?”

  “I have to be in court tomorrow morning. I hope to be back in the office tomorrow afternoon.”

  “That’s the ticket. Play it like that and no one gets hurt.”

  The line clicked dead.

  Herbie put the phone back in his pocket.

  “Who’s that?” Dino said.

  “Bill Eggers. Wants to know when I’ll be back to work.”

  “Does he know your fiancée was just killed?” Stone said.

  “I don’t know my fiancée was just killed,” Herbie said. “According to Dino, she was a con artist. Was her name even Yvette?”

  “That part was true. Yvette Walker. It was on her rap sheet.”

  “She had a rap sheet?”

  “Yes.”

  “For ripping guys off?”

  “No. For prostitution.”

  Herbie sighed. “Oh, for Christ’s sake. I’m like a three-time loser who can’t break away. You try to go straight and get sucked back into the life.”

  “You get any more crank phone calls?” Dino said.

  Dino was really just changing the subject, but after Taperelli’s phone call, the question threw Herbie. He blinked. “Huh?”

  “I don’t think you will. That had to be Taperelli’s men trying to scare you. They hadn’t seen the news in the paper yet. Now that they have, they won’t call again.”

  “That’s more proof the burglar did it,” Stone said. “The threatening phone call proves it wasn’t them.”

  Herbie sighed deeply, rubbed his forehead.

  “Sorry,” Dino said. “I know you don’t want to talk about it.”

  “I’m okay,” Herbie said. “It’s just so much to take in.”

  The food arrived and the waiter slid the plates onto the table.

  “Eat your steak,” Stone said.

  “I’ll try,” Herbie said. He smiled gamely. “I doubt if I’ll be able to taste it.”

  Stone grinned at him over his mouthwatering mountain of meat. “I beg to differ.”

  79

  MOOKIE CALLED TAPERELLI BACK. “You spoke to him?”

  “Yeah.”

  “And?”

  “I think he’s clean. Just a case of friends taking him out to dinner. Did they react while he was on the phone?”

  “Not at all,” Mookie said. “He played it very cool. He might have been confirming a business appointment.”

  “I think it’s okay. I think he’s scared to death, particularly after what happened to his girlfriend. He’s not going to put another girl at risk.”

  “So it’s just another ordinary dinner?”

  “Looks like it.”

  “So can I knock off?”

  “If he goes home, sure. Just so he don’t go anywhere else.”

  Mookie was pissed when he hung up the phone. Herbie and his friends had just got their dinner. They’d eat it slowly, savoring every bite. They wouldn’t be done for hours. When they were, it would be late and they’d go straight home.

  Mookie was hungry just watching them.

  He jerked his notebook out of his pocket. Who did he have on tonight? Gus, Chico, and Cousin Lou were all there. Paulie would be coming on to overlap Gus, who would be leaving at midnight.

  Mookie looked up Paulie’s number and gave him a call.

  80

  DINNER BROKE UP around ten. Herbie declined a ride home, saying he’d rather walk off his meal. It was only a few blocks anyway. He set off in the opposite direction, surreptitiously glancing around him as he went.

  Herbie probably wouldn’t have spotted Mookie, who was an old hand at surveillance, but Paulie was another story. A driver first and foremost, a bodyguard second, he was as subtle as a bull in a china shop. Herbie spotted his tail within one block. He had such an easy time doing it he kept looking around for someone else, in case Paulie was the rough shadow he was supposed to spot and ditch, while the smooth shadow took over. After a couple of blocks he’d concluded there was no such thing. The guy was just bad.

  Herbie walked home. His doorman had been avoiding him ever since the murder, not knowing what to say. Herbie walked up to him and plowed through his apologies. “There’s a guy following me. I’m going to walk over to the elevator like I’m going upstairs, but I’m going to duck in the mailroom instead. Go out on the sidewalk like you’re looking for a cab, but don’t hail one. See if the guy across the street is still watching the building, or if he’s walking away. Big guy with a crew cut.”

  The doorman gulped. “Yes, sir.”

  He was back thirty seconds later. “The man you described is walking away.”

  Herbie tipped the doorman fifty bucks and went out the front door.

  Paulie was on the far side of Park Avenue. He reached the corner and took a left.

  Herbie hurried to the corner and caught the light. He crossed the street and tailed along behind.

  Paulie kept going, crossed the street, and went into a garage between Lexington and Third.

  There was a cab coming down the block. Herbie stepped out in the street and hailed it.

  The cabbie had a five-o’clock shadow and a Brooklyn twang. He half turned in his seat and said, “Where to, buddy?”

  “Right here.”

  “Huh?”

  “Pull over and put your blinkers on.”

  “We’re not going anywhere?”

  “Yeah, we are, in a minute.”

  “Where we going?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “I gotta put down a destination.”

  “Put it down when we get there.”

  “I gotta put it down now.”

  “Yeah, but we don’t know it now, so we put it down when we get there.”

  A car pulled out of the garage.

  “That’s him,” Herbie said. “Give him a head start and pull out.”

  “Give him a head start? What is this?”

  Herbie slapped a fifty-dollar bill across the back of the seat. “This is fifty dollars. There’s ano
ther fifty at the other end if you do as I say.”

  “Is this illegal?”

  “No. You have a perfect right to drive where you want.”

  “But you’re following this guy.”

  “I hope so. If you lose him, you don’t get the fifty bucks.”

  “I’m not sure I wanna do this.”

  “Okay. Drop me off next to a cabbie who does.”

  The cabbie gave him a look, but pulled out and started driving.

  The car was stopped at a light on Second Avenue.

  “Stay back. If he spots you, you don’t get the fifty bucks. And he’ll probably shoot you in the head.”

  “Are you shitting me?”

  “Yeah. I’ll still give you the fifty, even if he shoots you in the head.”

  “I don’t wanna do this.”

  “I’m kidding. It’s fine. Here’s the other fifty. There’s two more at the other end if you get me there and he hasn’t spotted us on the way.”

  The car went over the Fifty-ninth Street Bridge and drove straight to a shabby house in Queens. There was a parking space out front. The guy parked the car and went in.

  “Drive on by,” Herbie said.

  “I need the number.”

  “No, you don’t. You’re not writing it down.”

  The cabbie looked betrayed. “You said I could write down the number.”

  “You don’t need the number. Put down the cross streets. That’s what I gave you. The cross streets. Isn’t that how you write down most addresses? Fifty-seventh and Seventh?”

  “Not outside Manhattan.”

  “Yeah, well, this time the passenger did. Drive down to the corner, turn left, and stop. You can write down the cross streets.”

  “You’re paying me off?”

  “Yeah. Here’s the hundred I promised, plus enough to cover the meter. If you want a return fare, hang out here counting your money. I should be back.”

  “How long?”

  “I don’t know. Half an hour.”

  “Half an hour?”

  “Or however long you think another hundred-dollar bonus is worth. Just don’t decide to knock on the front door and ask me if I’m going back.”

  From the terrified look in the cabbie’s eyes, there was no danger of that.

  81

  HERBIE HURRIED DOWN the block to the address. The house had a concrete walkway to the door. He hesitated, afraid of making noise that would alert whoever was inside to his presence. There was a front lawn the size of a postage stamp, but it was thick grass. Herbie walked on it, crept silently up to the door.

  There was a front window. The curtains were drawn, but there was a crack at the far right side. An open grate to the basement window just below was a hazard, but Herbie eased around it, leaned close, and peered in.

  The man he’d been following was standing in the living room, griping at two men who were sitting at a card table playing cribbage, and a third man just sitting on the couch and watching TV. He didn’t seem to be griping about anything in particular, he was the kind of guy who just liked to gripe. He said something vague about traffic, but there hadn’t been any traffic, and something about having to tail a guy first, all of which might have made sense if he were making excuses for being late, only he didn’t appear to be late because no one got up to go.

  Each one of the guys was sporting a shoulder holster with an ugly-looking gun.

  The guy he’d been following said, “So, where’s the girl?”

  The goon on the couch jerked his thumb. “Upstairs.”

  “Can I see her?”

  “No, you can’t see her. What do you think this is, your private peep show? You’re here to sit watch.”

  “What does it matter?”

  One of the card players stopped playing long enough to point his finger at the guy. “Because she’s important to someone and we don’t want to fuck it up. So you pay attention to me. You do not have any contact with the girl. If you do, I’ll know, and it will not be good. It will not be, how do they say, conducive to your health.”

  “Do we get to kill her?”

  The player laughed and shook his head. “Fucking idiot. If we gotta kill her, it’s not a ‘get to’ thing, it’s a job. And it would be done by the pros, not you. You’re just a guy. You got your gun?”

  “Yeah.”

  The guy took it out of his shoulder holster and held it up.

  “You don’t gotta show us, I’m just asking.” To the man on the couch he said, “Jesus, where did you get this dingbat?”

  “I didn’t get him. Mookie got him.”

  The card player sighed. “There’s one exception,” he said.

  “What’s that?”

  “If the cops come, you kill the girl and get out.”

  82

  BY THE TIME he got home, Herbie was a nervous wreck. He knew where Melanie was, but he couldn’t rescue her. If he went to Dino, the cops would raid the place and those jerks would kill the girl. So what could he do?

  He could go into court and throw the case. That would buy some time, but that would destroy his client’s life. It could put him in danger, too. In jail, some subhuman specimen could attack him in the shower or stab him during lunch.

  Unfortunately, it was the lesser of two evils. David’s possible demise, balanced against Melanie’s almost certain one. The gunmen he’d seen through the window weren’t subtle. They had made their intentions known. At the slightest hint of a rescue the girl was dead. That was the way they played. It might not be what the brains of the outfit wanted, but it was what the menials intended to carry out.

  Herbie had to rescue her himself. Pose as a mailman, pose as a cable TV repairman, pose as a pizza delivery boy, for Christ’s sakes, he knew that worked, all you needed was a box. He could probably talk his way in, but what did he do then? Overpower three or four armed thugs with his bare hands? The chance of that succeeding seemed awfully slim.

  Herbie wished he had a gun. He’d had one for years, got rid of it when he cleaned up his act. The gun had gone the way of everything else. Everything except his IOU. That had survived over the years, despite being paid off, and transferred, and forgotten, and remembered, and transferred again, a worthless piece of paper that might well cost him his life.

  Why hadn’t he ditched the IOU and hung on to his gun?

  83

  HERBIE GOT UP at six, rented a car, and headed for upstate New York. On the way he called Stone Barrington.

  “I’m not going to be in court.”

  “Are you sick?”

  “I’m fine. I’ve just got things to do.”

  “In the midst of a criminal trial?”

  “I know you can handle it.”

  “Herbie.”

  “You were going to be there anyway, Stone. What’s the big deal?”

  “What do you want me to do?”

  “Let the witness go.”

  “You’re kidding.”

  “The jurors are getting bored. Let him go.”

  “I can’t tell if you’re serious.”

  “I’m serious. We’ve made our point.”

  “We got an adjournment so he could get his notes.”

  “Right. I guess we have to ask him about that. What was he looking up?”

  “Herbie.”

  “Oh. How did they know David would be at the party? I’m sure he’s come up with a good answer. Let him tell it and let him go.”

  “Shouldn’t I show a little interest in the answer?”

  “Why? No one else will. Time to score some points with the jury. Throw it back in the ADA’s court. If he wants to ask him questions, there’s nothing we can do about that.”

  A speeder whizzed by on the left.

  “Are you in your car?” Stone said.

  “No, I got the TV on,” Herbie said. Lying to Stone and Dino again was getting to be a habit.

  Herbie got off the phone and concentrated on his driving.

  It had been a while since he had taken the tac
tical training course, but Herbie had no problem recognizing the entrance of Strategic Defenses, despite the unobtrusive sign at the side of the driveway. Were it not for that, it might have passed for any gated community. He announced himself and was buzzed in.

  The facility was clearly thriving. There were several new buildings Herbie didn’t recognize, including gyms, class buildings, barracks, and even a small medical unit with an ambulance parked out front.

  It was a sunny day, and men and women were practicing on the front lawn. Some were doing martial arts. Others were working with weapons, usually in pairs, with an unarmed student pitted against an armed one. The pairings were irrespective of age or sex. It was not unusual for a senior citizen to be matched up with a college student.

  Josh Hook came out of the main house as Herbie drove up. With his crew cut and chiseled features, Josh resembled nothing more than a marine drill sergeant. Herbie always had to fight the impulse to say “Sir, yes, sir” when speaking to him.

  Josh spread his arms and smiled. “So, Herbie, what do you think?”

  “I can see why you want to expand.”

  “Yeah. Everyone’s defense crazy these days. I could use another driving track and a rifle range or two.”

  “You have your own ambulance?”

  Josh grinned. “That’s mainly for show. People see it, they take care. Injuries have gone down since I bought it. It’s a great deterrent.”

  “I can imagine.”

  “The last time I spoke to you, you were being shot at. How did that work out?”

  “Not well.”

  Herbie told him about Yvette’s murder.

  Joshua’s eyes widened. “Oh, my God! You’re ‘New York Midtown lawyer’? Oh, for goodness’ sakes. I haven’t spoken to Mike in days. I was going to call him this weekend. He’d have clued me in. What’s the upshot? They thought you did it but they don’t now?”

  “More or less.”

  “So what brings you here?”

  “I need a gun.”

  “And you came all the way up here? There’s that place in the city where the cops all shop. Why didn’t you get one there?”

  “Because the cops all shop there. It would get back to Dino.”

  “Why would that be bad?”

  “Same reason you don’t announce covert operations on TV. Dino would act, and people would die. And the fact that I had a gun would be moot.”

  “Is this something I can help you with?”

  Herbie considered the offer. Josh would be a valuable ally if he just knew how to use him. “Thanks. I’ll let you know. Could you be prepared to move on a moment’s notice?”