by Stuart Woods
“Stone,” Felicity said, a little reprovingly, since she had lost steerage of the conversation, “I understand your big story ended in tears.”
“Not my tears,” Stone said, “nor Jamie’s. The subjects of the investigation shed a few, though. One of them committed suicide, and another was injured in an explosion that the FBI thinks may have been of his own making.”
“Sounds like there’s a film in there somewhere,” Calvert said. “I’d love to read your manuscript, Jamie.”
With his head in her lap, Stone thought.
“I’ll have my agent send you a copy,” Jamie replied. “We have to go through channels, you know.”
“Craig might be very good as the villain,” Stone said. “A very nasty character. He should be fun to play. Don’t actors all say that villains are the best parts?”
“Some do,” Calvert replied. “Is there a hero?”
“Well, there are two choices, I think,” Jamie said. “One is a nineteen-year-old computer whiz, and the other is Stone.”
Calvert’s face fell a bit.
“Oh, come now, Jamie,” Stone said. “Bystanders can’t be heroes, unless CPR or the Heimlich maneuver is involved.”
“Perhaps you should play yourself, Stone,” Felicity offered.
“I’m not an actor, Felicity,” Stone replied. “And if I tried, I’d be a very bad one. I don’t have that certain twinkle that a leading man must display.” He smiled at Calvert, who kept his dental work to himself.
Kevin entered and announced dinner, indicating a table set at the other end of the library.
“We’re not enough for the dining room,” Stone said.
“I love this room,” Felicity said, gathering herself for the trek. “I’ve spent so many lovely evenings here.” That one was aimed directly at Jamie.
“I’m sure you’ve spent lovely evenings everywhere,” Jamie replied, without quite adding on your back.
Stone seated everyone, with himself facing the door.
“The gunfighter’s seat,” Calvert said.
“Facing the butler,” Stone replied. “It saves ringing a bell.”
Jamie quickly fell into conversation with Calvert, who seemed to have rung her bell, while Felicity commandeered Stone.
Stone turned his attention to tasting the wine.
“What is it, old chap?” Calvert asked, sniffing his glass.
“A Mouton-Rothschild ’78,” Stone replied, glancing at the label. “Sir Charles left me some very nice bottles when he sold me the house.”
“Ah,” Calvert said, nodding. “One doesn’t see much of that anymore.”
“A case turns up at auction now and then,” Stone said.
“I don’t like auctions,” Calvert said. “One ends up paying what things are worth.”
“Oh, Craig,” Felicity said, “you’re a film star. You can splurge.”
“Stardom doesn’t last a lifetime,” Calvert said, “but the money must. I’ll turn forty this year, so I have to start thinking more about investing and less about drinking.”
“You’re a wise man, Craig,” Felicity said. She turned toward Stone. “So, what’s this I hear about your villain leaving hospital this morning?”
“I heard that, too,” Stone said.
“You’re not going to have people shooting up the neighborhood, are you?”
“I hope not.”
“Well, it’s happened before,” Felicity said.
“Your hearing is too sharp,” Stone said. “And your memory, too. Tell me, Felicity, how are things in the Muddle East these days?”
That diverted her long enough for Stone to breathe more easily.
* * *
• • •
Dinner finally ended, and cognacs were downed. “Oh, by the way, Stone,” Felicity said, “I wonder if Craig could make use of your gym for a few days. He has to be in top form for the new film.”
“Of course,” Stone said reluctantly. “Just present yourself to Kevin, and he’ll show you the way.”
Kevin drove them back to the dock.
3
Stone and Jamie crawled into bed, too tired to make love. Jamie, however, was not too tired to talk about it.
“You’ve fucked Felicity Devonshire, haven’t you—and often?”
Stone sighed. “I recall that, early in our relationship, you placed your past sex life out of bounds.”
“I did,” she admitted.
“Is that not a two-way street?”
“I suppose it is. I apologize.”
“Thank you.”
“How many times, approximately, have you fucked Felicity?” she asked, enjoying the alliteration.
“I decline to answer that, on contractual grounds.”
“‘Contractual’? We don’t have a contract.”
“Certainly we do,” Stone replied. “We have a spoken agreement limiting our areas of discussion, and you have crossed the lines of that agreement.”
“Oh, come on, Stone, this is just pillow talk.”
“It encompasses the whole bedroom, including the furniture.”
“You fucked her on the furniture?”
“I didn’t say that.”
“You implied it.”
“Do you know who Felicity would really like to fuck?”
“Craig? Who could blame her?”
“You.”
“What?”
“Felicity occasionally expresses an attraction for someone of her own gender—and you’re just her type.”
“I . . . ? ‘Her type’?”
“Ask her, if you don’t believe me.”
Jamie lay back in bed and thought about that. “I wonder if she’s my type.”
“Oh? Do you also have the occasional attraction to someone of your own gender?”
“Well, not since college, and then just once. Maybe twice.” She sat up in bed. “Wait a minute, you’re violating our contract. No judge would allow that.”
“I would tell a judge that you opened the door, making it a subject for questioning.”
“‘Opened the door’? Is that a euphemism for sex?”
“Sometimes.”
“Why do you think Felicity is attracted to me?”
“Did she place her hand on your knee at dinner?”
“I thought that was Craig.”
“That would have been your other knee.”
“There were hands on both my knees.”
“Then you are very popular.”
“I have an awful lot to think about,” Jamie said.
“Sweet dreams,” Stone replied.
* * *
• • •
Stone was already in the basement gym the following morning when Craig Calvert arrived with a short, muscular man in his fifties with a broken nose and short-cropped gray hair. “Good morning, Craig,” Stone said.
“Good morning, Stone,” Craig replied. “May I introduce Mick O’Leary?”
Stone shook his hand. “Good to meet you, Mick. Are you Craig’s trainer?”
“He’s more of my restrainer,” Craig said. “I tend to get a little too enthusiastic at times, and Mick is here to see that he can deliver me to the set, undamaged, on the day.”
“Dat’s right,” Mick said.
“You’re not Irish, are you, Mick?” Stone asked. Everybody laughed.
“Well,” Craig said, “Mick and I had better get to work. Just ignore us.” The actor stripped off his sweat suit to reveal a physique that, while trim, Stone found intimidating.
“How much time do you spend in the gym, Craig?” he asked.
“Ordinarily, two hours a day, but the month before I start a film I do four hours a day.”
“God, I’m glad I’m not an actor,” Stone muttered. He went to the weight
system and started his routine of lifts, pull-downs, curls, and sit-ups. It didn’t last very long.
Mick put Craig through a long regimen of stretching, then Craig got back into his sweat suit. “We’re going to do a little run before I start on the weights,” Craig said. “Join us?”
“Sure,” Stone said, retying his shoelaces.
They left the house and Stone pointed them toward a route away from the country hotel next door that would keep the guests from hanging out the windows, staring at Craig. Mick followed in one of the estate’s golf carts. Every couple of minutes, Craig would run a hot sprint, and then return to Stone and Mick. “I’ll have to do a lot of that in the film,” Craig said, having rejoined them. “These days, there are as many chases on foot as in cars.”
“Well, you never have to run more than thirty yards,” Mick said. “It’s in your contract. More than that, they have to bring in a stunt double.”
“For which I am grateful,” Craig said, “especially when it’s over rooftops. I’m terrified of heights.” He pointed ahead. “Is that an airstrip?”
“It is,” Stone said. “It was originally built during World War II as a testing ground and a runway for light bombers carrying explosives or Special Air Service commandos to France. The ancestral owner of the place kept it up for his airplanes after the war, and I land my own airplane there.” He pointed at the open hangar, where the nose of the Latitude could be seen.
They were almost at the hangar when Craig yelled and fell to one knee. Mick drove alongside and pushed him all the way down as he jumped out of the golf cart to cover Craig’s body with his own.
“Shit!” Craig yelled. “I’ve been shot!”
Stone got down on the ground, too, and looked around. “I didn’t hear anything.” Half a mile away, an unmarked van crossed a meadow and left the estate. Stone got out his phone. “I’ll call the police and an ambulance,” he said.
“You’ll call neither,” Mick said. “I’ll handle this.”
Stone took charge of the golf cart, while Mick hustled Calvert onto the rear seat.
“I don’t think we’ll be shot at again,” Stone said. “I think the shooter was in the van that just took off in such a hurry.” They got Craig into the house gym through a back door.
“I’m going to need a first-aid kit and some light,” Mick said, helping Craig onto the massage table.
Stone hurried to the office of Major Bugg, the estate manager. “Where’s your medical kit?” he asked.
The major took it from a closet and followed Stone to the gym. “What’s happened?”
“One of our guests has had a mishap.” They entered the exercise room where Mick had Calvert lying facedown on the massage table, his pants and shorts stripped off. There was a bleeding trench running across Calvert’s right buttock.
Mick opened the case and began removing things. “Lidocaine, good. Penicillin, too. And here’s a suturing kit.”
“Do you need a doctor’s help, Mick?”
“I’m a licensed physician’s assistant,” Mick replied. “I can do suturing.” He injected lidocaine around the wound and cleaned it carefully, then he trimmed the edges with scissors, threaded a suturing needle, and completed a dozen stitches. “There,” he said, “that’ll hold him. He’ll need a tetanus shot, though.” He found the vial and used a fresh syringe. “You’ll be fine, Craig, until the lidocaine wears off and you have to sit down.”
“Who the hell would want to shoot me?” Craig asked nobody in particular.
“I think the shooter was likely aiming at me,” Stone said. “You just happened to be in the way.”
“Felicity said something like this would happen, and it has.”
“For God’s sake,” Stone said, “don’t tell her she was right.”
4
Stone found Craig another pair of sweatpants and tossed his bloody ones into the trash, while Major Bugg returned the medical kit to its home.
“You’re sure you don’t want to call the police?” Stone asked.
“Don’t even think about it,” Mick said. “Somebody at the police station will leak it to a reporter and by cocktail time it will be all over the news. You’ll have two dozen photographers crawling all over your estate trying to snap a photo of Craig Calvert’s ass. And we don’t want that, do we?”
“I don’t want Felicity to know, either,” Craig said.
“Where is she today?”
“At her office. She left early this morning.”
“Go back to her place, pack your bags, and leave her a note saying you’ve been called back to London for a script conference. Then come over here, and we’ll put you up for a few days. You’re not going to want to answer anybody’s questions about why you’re limping or sitting funny.”
“Stone is right,” Mick said. “If the insurance company hears that you’ve been shot, they’ll put you in hospital for a whole new physical. That, and the resulting publicity, will screw up the shooting schedule. It will also increase the insurance premium, and your producers won’t like that.”
“Thank you for the offer, Stone,” Craig said. “I accept. Let’s go pack, Mick.” He hobbled out of the house and, with Mick’s help, headed for the dock in the golf cart.
Stone told Major Bugg to have rooms prepared for Mr. Calvert and Mr. O’Leary—but not too close to his own. Then he went upstairs and found Jamie drying her hair.
“Well,” she said, “that was a long workout.”
“Shorter than planned,” Stone replied, “and you’re going to envy me.”
“Why?”
“Because I’ve spent the last half hour gazing at Craig Calvert’s bare ass.”
“You’re right, I envy you. How did he come to expose himself to you? I may want to try myself.”
“Someone took a shot at us when we were out running—at me, very probably—and Calvert’s ass got in the way. He’s moving in with us—rather, with me—for a few days while he heals up.”
“Where is he sleeping?”
“You don’t need to know. Let’s go down for some lunch.”
“Just a minute,” Jamie said, “did you say someone shot him?”
“It was only a flesh wound, as they say in the movies.”
“I take it that it wasn’t a passing hunter.”
“Craig’s ass does not resemble a grouse.”
“Are we in danger?” she asked.
“Isn’t that why we left the States?”
“It’s not why I left the States,” Jamie said.
“Well, you can add that to your list.” He hustled her to lunch.
* * *
• • •
They were having sandwiches in the kitchen when Dino called.
“Hey,” Stone said. “Are you on your way?”
“We’ll be there in the morning the day after tomorrow,” Dino replied.
“Good. We’ve had some action here. Is Viv listening in?”
“I am,” Viv said.
Stone told them what had happened. “Viv, will you call your London office and get some people down here?”
“Sure, they know the drill by now. So there’s going to be a movie star in the house?”
“I’m afraid so. I may have to sit on Jamie the whole time.”
“You may have to sit on me, too,” she replied. “That Calvert is a dish.”
“I’ll do whatever sitting on you is required,” Dino said.
“Call me on the satphone when you’re an hour out,” Stone said, “and I’ll have you met at the landing strip.”
“Okay,” Dino replied, then hung up.
Mick and Calvert came into the kitchen with their bags. Stone spoke to the cook about them. Calvert lowered himself gingerly into a padded chair and tried to get comfortable. “The lidocaine is wearing off,” he said.
�
�Anything I can do?” Jamie asked.
“Yes,” Stone replied, “go write another draft of your book.”
“You don’t want me near a computer,” she said. “I’m itching to write a story about what just happened to Craig.”
“Oh, Stone,” Calvert said, “I hope you don’t mind if my girlfriend joins us. She’s my leading lady, too, and bringing her down here is the only way I can keep her quiet.”
“We’d be delighted to have her,” Stone replied, and with real feeling.
* * *
• • •
Back in New York, Rance Damien entered the penthouse office of Henry Thomas, the patriarch of the Thomas family and the real power behind everything that happened at H. Thomas & Son.
Henry peered at him closely. “You almost look like yourself,” he said.
“They tell me I’ll need three or four more surgeries before that will happen,” Damien replied sourly.
“Are you ready to come back to work?”
“I’ve been back since early this morning,” he said.
“We’re going to have to turn our attention to Mr. Stone Barrington,” Henry said, “if we’re ever to have any peace.”
“I have already done so,” Damien replied. “I gave the orders last night, and a team was down at Barrington’s place early this morning, their time.”
“Did they get a shot at him?”
“Yes, but he was running with another man, and I’m not sure which one they hit. They got him back to the house, but they didn’t call the police or an ambulance.”
“That’s good news,” Henry said. “They may get another shot.”
“What do you want to tell Hank about this?” Damien asked. Hank Thomas was the old man’s grandson—formerly a congressman from New York and a candidate for the presidency, until his father’s suicide, after which he had returned to the family business to help out.
“You size him up, and we’ll decide how much he should be told. At some point, if he’s going to be here, he’ll have to know that he’s not in Washington anymore, but back in the real world.”
“I think Hank may work out,” Damien said. “He’s a gutsier guy than Jack was, and he’s always been a realist. He didn’t bat an eye last year when I told him that we were going to use our new computer installation to steal the money for his presidential campaign.”
