Doing Hard Time (Stone Barrington)

by Woods, Stuart

  “I’ll get you type-rated. If you can learn the operator’s manual description of the systems, we can do it with some simulator time, a few hours of dual, and a checkride, and there’s an FAA examiner on the field.”

  “Great, Tim.”

  Teddy’s airplane arrived, and was backed into the hangar, leaving room for the Mustang. Teddy pulled his Porsche Speedster inside, too.

  • • •

  Teddy sat down in the pilot’s lounge and thought. If Majorov didn’t know where to find him, as Harry Katz had said, why would he be coming to L.A.? And if Teddy wasn’t his target, that left Peter. He looked at his watch; Majorov’s G-450 was due in shortly. He went to his airplane and got some things, including a pair of binoculars that had a built-in camera, from his equipment case and left the hangar. He found an out-of-the-way perch at one side of the Atlantic Aviation ramp and waited.

  • • •

  Majorov pulled a file from his briefcase and handed it to the man who sat across the folding desk from him. They were half an hour out of Santa Monica and descending. “Mr. Chernensky,” he began.

  “Call me Vlad, please,” the man said, in Russian.

  “This is the material I have on the people who are your targets. There is a young man named Peter Barrington and his father, Stone Barrington. Young Peter does something in the movies, I’m not sure what, but I expect he lives in his father’s house at The Arrington. Security is very tight there. His father is a New York lawyer who is very influential on the board of The Arrington and is the key to my gaining control. He is based in New York, and when his son is dead, I feel he will be much more likely to wish to sell his interest in the hotel, and at my price.

  “The third man is named William J. Burnett and is known as Billy. You should regard him as extremely dangerous.”

  “I regard all targets as extremely dangerous,” Vlad replied. “No one is a lamb if he knows he is hunted. Does Mr. Burnett know he is hunted?”

  “Yes, but it’s likely he feels that recent events have made him safe.”

  “Do you mean your leaving Las Vegas?”

  “Yes.”

  “Why should he be concerned with whether or not you are in Las Vegas, if he is in Los Angeles?”

  “I sent two men, on separate occasions, to deal with him. They both are dead. One of them was my sister’s boy. Neither of them was stupid.”

  “I see. I will keep those facts in mind. On the other hand, he does not know me, does he?”

  “Certainly not.”

  “He will not expect someone of my age and mien of being an assassin.”

  “Perhaps not—I cannot say. But you must remember, he is very wily.”

  Vlad smiled a tight little smile, revealing gray teeth. “I am pretty wily, myself.”

  • • •

  Teddy watched as the big Gulfstream set down on runway 21 and engaged its engine reversers. Shortly, it taxied to a halt on the ramp at Atlantic Aviation, guided by the chief lineman. A large Mercedes van pulled up as the airstair door was lowered by a crew member.

  Teddy trained his binoculars on the open aircraft door, focused them, and waited. A crew member came down the stairs carrying two large suitcases. He was followed by a large mustached man whom Teddy assumed was Majorov, and he took a rapid series of photographs. Then came someone Teddy had not expected.

  A small, gray man in a black suit, white shirt, black tie, and black fedora, who might have been an undertaker, came slowly down the stairs, carrying a large, apparently heavy case that he would not allow anyone to take from him. He looked to be between sixty and sixty-five.

  Intrigued, Teddy got as many shots of him as possible before he disappeared into the van with Majorov, and they drove across the ramp to the electrically operated security gate and waited for it to open. Teddy ran back into the hangar, tossed his equipment into the Speedster, and got it started. “Tim,” he called to the pilot, “if you want to meet your new boss, be here at eleven tomorrow morning.”

  Tim ran over and held out a key ring. “Here are a few keys to the place. One key works in all doors.”

  Teddy pocketed them and drove out onto the ramp. He saw the Mercedes van driving through the now-opened gate and hurried to catch the gate before it closed.

  Teddy pulled into the parking lot outside the gate and, after noting the license plate number, let the van get a couple hundred yards from him before following. The van made a right turn, then a left, and then turned right onto I-10. At the next exit it turned onto 405 North, and Teddy followed, always keeping two or three cars between him and the van, which was easy to follow, because it was so tall. Teddy had seen photographs of that model given the sort of interior one would expect in a corporate jet.

  Traffic was moving moderately well on I-405, and soon the van got off at the Sunset Boulevard exit and made a right. Five minutes later, at UCLA, it turned left onto Stone Canyon Road.

  Is he headed for The Arrington? Teddy asked himself, but after another five minutes, the van turned into the entrance of the Bel-Air Hotel. Teddy drove straight on, then when out of sight, made a U-turn and went back to the hotel. He saw Majorov and the older man leave the van and head toward the checkin lobby, while a bellman unloaded their luggage.

  Teddy parked on the street; he put on a blue blazer and a porkpie straw hat, then he ran across the road and the bridge into the grounds of the hotel. He saw Majorov’s back as he disappeared into the lobby. He walked around the freestanding building and saw a bench and a newspaper someone had left. He parked himself there, put on his sunglasses, and began to leaf through the paper. Ten minutes passed, then the two men left the lobby in the company of an assistant manager, who was chatting to them and getting little response.

  Teddy made a point of not lifting his eyes from the paper as they passed him. He watched them take a turn past the outdoor restaurant, then got up and stood at the corner of the building, watching as they continued up a covered walk and past the swimming pool. He kept as much distance as possible between himself and his quarry, but he still managed to see which building they entered. After the door was closed, he got close enough to read the suite number, then he walked up a service road, out of the hotel’s grounds, and back to his car.

  Teddy didn’t like the Bel-Air Hotel as an environment for killing—at least, not alone. There were two many people about, too many ends to tie together. Dealing with Majorov and/or his friend was a job for a team, not one man, and he did not work with a team.

  • • •

  Back at the airport, he drove into the hangar. Tim Peters was sitting at his desk, putting his belongings back into the drawers. Teddy went to the pilots’ lounge and went to work on the computer. He took the memory chip from his binocular-camera, inserted it into the computer, and copied the photographs of Majorov and his friend onto the hard drive, then he encrypted the file. He set up a path through half a dozen other computer sites to the CIA mainframe, and logged on to it. After another half a minute’s work he was into the Agency’s face-recognition program.

  The program identified Majorov almost immediately and brought up a file on him. Teddy read it avidly and committed the salient details to memory. Then he switched to the photographs of Majorov’s companion; the computer took much longer and it required all the photographs before the man was identified. Teddy read the file:

  Vladimir Ivanovich Chernensky, born Kiev, Ukraine, 1951, served in Soviet Army 1969–74, trained as a sniper. Tried for murdering his platoon sergeant, acquitted, but discharged. Seems to have become associated with criminal gangs in Moscow as a young man. Entered U.S. 1997 on a Polish passport, then disappeared, probably now in Brooklyn, NY. Rumors of use by the Russian Mafia as an assassin, acquiring sobriquet “the Viper.” Said to be a crack shot with rifle or handgun and good with knife and razor. Said to be inventive in his work.

  That was all, but it was more than enough to worry Teddy. He made a phone call on his cell phone.

  “Mike Freeman.”

  �
��It’s Billy Barnett.”

  “Hi, Billy, you ready to come work for us?”

  “Not yet—probably not for several months.”

  “Is something else occupying your time?”

  “Yes. Majorov landed in Santa Monica a couple of hours ago and has checked into the Bel-Air Hotel.” He gave Mike the suite number.

  “That’s interesting to know,” Mike said. “Do you think he’s an immediate threat to anyone I know?”

  “He brought with him a man from New York—write this down: Vladimir Ivanovich Chernensky, early sixties, five-seven, a hundred and thirty, gray hair. Known in Brooklyn as ‘the Viper.’”

  “I don’t like the sound of that,” Mike said.

  “There isn’t anything to like about this man. He’s an assassin, pure and simple: rifle, handgun, knife, razor—probably poison and a dozen other ways to kill. He’s not the sort of person a sane man would choose to travel with. He was carrying a heavy suitcase that he wouldn’t let anyone touch.”

  “I’m in L.A. I’m going to talk to Stone about this and suggest putting some people on him and Peter.”

  “If you’ll forgive the suggestion, I think you should do it surreptitiously with Mr. Barrington and confine your protection of Peter to transporting him between The Arrington and Centurion Studios. I’m doing some work for him at the studio and at Santa Monica Airport, and we’ll be spending a lot of time together, so I can watch his back. I’ll e-mail you photographs of Chernensky and Majorov, and you can distribute them to your people.”

  “Maybe I can get Chernensky arrested before he has time to move.”

  “He has no criminal record in the United States and by this time probably has an ironclad identity,” Teddy said, “so it would be difficult to have him arrested. If he gets anywhere near Peter, I’ll deal with him. If he gets near Mr. Barrington, I recommend he be dealt with … informally.”

  “That’s out. We don’t do that sort of thing—too much to lose.”

  “Then tell your people not to get in my way,” Teddy said, then hung up. He e-mailed the photographs to Freeman, printed out some copies, then got into his car and drove back to Centurion Studios.

  Peter was editing when Teddy walked in.

  “I thought you were taking the day off,” Peter said.

  “I finished my work, and I’d like to talk to you.”

  Peter switched off the machine, and they moved into his office.

  Teddy placed the hangar keys on Peter’s desk. “The hangar is all yours. One key works every lock. I’d like your permission to make use of the apartment in the hangar, if you don’t need it.”

  “Of course.”

  “I hired Tim Peters, and he was very happy about it. You’ll meet him at the airport tomorrow morning at eleven, before we fly.”

  “Great! Anything else?”

  “Yes. From now until further notice, you must not go anywhere except in a vehicle driven by a Strategic Services employee. Do you own a handgun?”

  “No, I’m not much interested in guns.”

  “Do you know how to shoot?”

  “Not in any sort of serious way.”

  “Then let’s go down to the armory right now and get you familiarized.”

  “But why? I don’t have a license.”

  “I’ll have one for you tomorrow morning.”

  “You can do that?”

  “Don’t ask too many questions, Peter.”

  “Why am I in danger?”

  Teddy handed him photographs of Majorov and Chernensky. “The larger, younger of the two men is Yuri Majorov, who sent the two men to follow you in New Mexico. You are unlikely to see him, but the other man is very dangerous, and you must be on the lookout for him every time you leave this bungalow.”

  “And what if I see him?”

  “Either tell me, or if I’m not available, shoot him.”

  “Are you serious?”

  “Yes. Let’s go over to the armory and spend an hour on the range.”

  Peter turned out to have a good eye and a steady hand, and Teddy was pleased with his performance, standing, kneeling, and prone. Next he had him fire while moving left and right, and he was not so happy with his prowess in that mode. Still, he could shoot—if he could bring himself to shoot. Teddy didn’t know how to teach that.

  Teddy checked out the handgun and holster for the .380 pistol Peter had been firing, then they rode back to the bungalow in Peter’s golf cart, with Teddy on high alert.

  “Well,” Peter said, when they got back inside, “that was fun, but I’m glad it’s over.”

  “You need more work on shooting while moving,” Teddy said.

  “You know what’s scary about this?” Peter asked. “How seriously you’re taking it.”

  “You’d better take it seriously, too, until I can neutralize the Viper, or you won’t finish the film you’re working on. And by the way, when you come to the airport tomorrow morning, have the driver pull into the hangar before you get out. There’s nothing to hide behind at an airport, if shooting starts.”

  A voice came from behind him. “Shooting? What shooting?” Ben Bacchetti and Hattie Patrick stood in the doorway.

  “Ben, Hattie, you remember Billy Barnett, from New Mexico?”

  “Sure,” Ben said. “Hi, Billy. We’ve been in the recording studio. What’s going on?”

  “Well,” Peter said, “you remember the car following us on the road?”

  “Yeah, I think so.”

  “The guy who sent the car is in L.A., and Billy thinks he might send somebody else to look us up.” He handed Ben the photographs.

  “This guy is a threat?” Hattie said. “He looks like somebody’s grandfather.”

  “That’s because he has survived every encounter he has ever had with an opponent,” Teddy said. “You would be unwise to underestimate him.”

  “What do we do if we see him?” Hattie asked.

  “Run,” Teddy replied.

  “Ben shoots,” Peter said to Billy.

  “Good. You want me to get you something to shoot with?” Teddy asked.

  “I’ve got the old man’s .38 back at The Arrington,” Ben said.

  “Carry it. I’ll get you a license.”

  “What about me?” Hattie asked.

  “Do you want to walk around armed?”

  “Well, no.”

  “Then let me worry about you. Just keep a lookout for that old man in the photograph.”

  “This is playing like a movie,” Hattie said.

  “Don’t make the mistake of believing that,” Teddy replied. “Everybody needs to be wary for the next few days.”

  “What happens in a few days?” Ben asked.

  “Don’t ask.”

  • • •

  Stone left the Wilshire Boulevard office of Woodman & Weld and drove back to The Arrington. He noticed a brown SUV a couple of cars behind him that turned whenever he did.

  • • •

  He found Mike Freeman sitting by the pool with a Bloody Mary frozen to his fist.

  “Did you have a good day?” Mike asked.

  “Pretty good. I’ve been going over Peter’s contract with the studio. Our L.A. office did the dogwork, and they did a good job.”

  “God forbid a partner in a law firm should get the crease in his pants wrinkled.”

  “Mike, your people drive brown SUVs, don’t they?”

  “Brown, black, blue—whatever the dealer has when we’re shopping for cars.”

  “A brown one followed me from the Woodman & Weld offices just now. What’s going on?”

  “You remember why you came back out here?”

  “I do.”

  “Your fears were warranted. Majorov has turned up in L.A. with an assassin in tow, and I’m taking precautions.”

  “I see. What precautions have you taken with Peter?”

  “Billy Barnett.”

  “Is he enough?”

  “I believe he is.”

  The door slammed, and t
he kids came out of the house.

  “Welcome home,” Stone said. “How was your day?”

  “Extremely interesting,” Peter said. “I spent part of it learning to shoot a handgun. Billy was my instructor.”

  “How’d you do?” Stone asked.

  “Pretty good, I think. Billy seemed pleased, except I was a little wild when moving.”

  “Get better at that,” Stone said.

  “That’s what Billy said.”

  “Listen to Billy.”

  “I do.”

  “We all do,” Hattie said. “Ben and Peter are packing now, and I have instructions to run if I see this man.” She handed Stone the photograph Billy had given her. “He’s called the Viper.”

  Stone sucked his teeth. “I don’t like the sound of that.”

  “Who does?” Mike asked. “I assume you’re packing, yourself?”

  “I will be, starting tomorrow.”

  “The Viper is staying at the Bel-Air with Majorov.”

  “You’re so comforting,” Stone said. “How do you feel about the security at The Arrington?”

  “It’s excellent. Strategic Services provides it, if you recall. I had a word with our team leader this afternoon, and I circulated that photograph in your hand.”

  “Where did the photograph come from?”

  “From Billy Barnett.”

  “And how did he get it?”

  “He photographed them when they got off Majorov’s airplane at Santa Monica.”

  “How is Billy so on top of this?”

  “I don’t know, and I don’t much care, but I’ll say this: I’m glad I offered him a job, and I’ll be very pleased if and when he accepts it.”

  “Dad,” Peter said, “thank you for suggesting I hire Billy. I’m very glad I did. We’re going to start working on my instrument rating tomorrow, in his airplane. He has a JetPROP, like your old airplane, but newer and better equipped.”

  “And your Mustang will be here by dark,” Stone said. “The pilot called from his last refueling stop.”

  “And the pilot I hired is going to give me dual in the Mustang,” Peter said.

  “As far as I’m concerned,” Stone said, “the more time you spend in the air for the next week or two, the better.”