Exit Strategy Part 16

If the case he was working on was child-friendly, he'd tell me about it and not only ask my advice, but act as if he took it seriously, jot down notes, promise to follow up and let me know what happened. He always did; solved or shelved, he'd tell me how it worked out.

I stood in the draft of the open fridge, staring at the milk container.

"Letting out all the cold air."

I jumped, the door slipping from my hand. Jack stood behind it.

"Have you ever had warm milk?" I asked.

"What?"

"I was looking for hot chocolate mix, but Evelyn doesn't seem to have any, so I thought maybe I'd try warm milk. They say it helps you sleep. Doesn't sound too appetizing, though."

"It's not." He skirted around me, opened a cupboard and took out two containers, one labeled cocoa, the other sugar. "Hot chocolate."

I looked from one container to the other. "Requires cooking skills, doesn't it? Maybe I'll just stick with-"

"Sit down." He grabbed the milk from the fridge.

"No, really, I wasn't asking-"

"I know. Hand me that saucepan."

I reached for a big copper pot hanging over the counter.

"No, the sauce-The little one."

Jack moved to the stove and leaned down to turn it on. As I handed him the pot he turned sharp, nearly colliding with me.

"Here's the-" I said. "Oh."

He wasn't wearing his biker-guy getup from earlier. Not surprising, given the hour, but it was only now, standing a few inches away under the harsh kitchen lights that I realized he wasn't wearing a disguise at all. The dark brown eyes, the short, wavy black hair, it was what I'd seen all those nights at the lodge. Even his face was pretty much as I remembered...except for one thing.

When I'd first gotten off the plane and seen Jack's biker disguise, I'd been impressed by the first-rate job he'd done with aging-the crow's feet around the eyes, the lines around the mouth, the sun-weathered skin that changed him from a man in his thirties to one closing in on the half-century mark. Well...it hadn't been makeup.

"You're not wearing a disguise," I blurted before I could stop myself.

"Neither are you." He gave a half-shrug. "Seemed only fair."

There was something expected here, some response-any response-to an action that couldn't have been made lightly. I opened my mouth, hoping something intelligent would come out. When nothing did, I snapped it shut.

As I handed him the pot, I cursed myself. Was it too late to crawl back to bed?

Jack turned to stir the cocoa in and I found myself looking at the back of his head, noticing the silver mingled with the black. Why was I so shocked? If I'd been thinking logically, I'd have realized long ago that Jack couldn't be anywhere near my age, not with his reputation.

"I need pants," I said.

Jack turned and gave me the same "what?" look as when I'd asked about hot milk. Then he glanced down at my bare legs sticking out from under the oversized T-shirt I wore to bed.

"Sit," he said. "I won't look."

I slithered to the table and busied myself refolding the newspaper. When Jack shoved the cocoa and sugar back into the pantry, I got up and returned them to the cupboard, in the same places they'd been, labels forward.

As I sat down again, the dogs padded into the kitchen. They glanced at Jack, then slipped around the table, Scotch stretching out at my feet, Ginger pushing her nose under my hand for a petting.

"Snuck out of Evelyn's room." Jack laid a mug at my elbow, then pulled out the chair beside mine. "You should get one. A dog. For the lodge."

I shook my head. "I'd love to, but I have to consider my guests. I could get someone who's allergic and they wouldn't appreciate a house filled with dog dander."

"You have dogs? Growing up?"

Another shake. "My mom loved cats. Personally, I can't see the attraction. You feed them, pamper them, clean up their c.r.a.p, and they still act like they'd be gone in a second if they got a better offer. Call me needy, but I want a pet that wants me back. I brought a puppy home once but...It didn't go over too well, so we had to get rid of it."

According to Brad, my mother had shipped the dog off to the pound while I was at school, though she'd told me it ran away.

"How about-?" I began, then stopped.

"How about me?" Jack said. "Pets, you mean?"

"Sorry, I didn't mean to pry."

"Wouldn't ask anything I minded answering myself." He stretched out his legs, earning a grunt from Scotch as he invaded her s.p.a.ce. "Had barn cats. Don't really count as pets. Found a dog once. Should say, my older brothers found it. Gave it to me."

"That was nice of them."

"I thought so. Till I realized they just wanted someone to do the work. Feed it. Brush it. Take the blame if it caused trouble. Dog played with all of us. Didn't care who 'owned' it."

I laughed. "Smart brothers."

"Yeah." He smiled, then went quiet, traced a finger around the circle his mug had left on the table. "Yeah, they were." Jack swiped away the condensation mark with his hand, then waved at Ginger, who was still sucking up my attention. "No reason you can't get a dog. Build a good outside kennel. You're outside most of the time anyway."

"I suppose."

"Should have one. At least for protection. That caretaker you've got? He's, what, seventy? Not much help. No security system. f.u.c.k, I tried the front door once. Two a.m. Wasn't even locked. Then there's your jogging. You take a gun along?"

"Where I live-"

"Doesn't matter. You need to be careful. Those deserted roads? I remember-" Jack shook his head. "Wouldn't believe what guys can pull off."

"Such as?"

He lifted his brows.

"Come on. You set up a story, now carry it through. You've still got"-I glanced in his mug-"half a cup left. Tell me half a cup's worth of story and we'll call it a night."

And, to my surprise, he did.

HSK.

He pecked at the keyboard with his index fingers. Slow but steady. His philosophy for all things, or so it had been...

What was the cliche? You can't teach an old dog new tricks? Of course you could, so long as you provided the twin keys to change-motivation and desire. He'd never be a sixty-word-a-minute typist, but his two-fingered method suited his purposes just fine.

Five years ago he didn't even know how to turn on a computer. But then someone showed him how useful a tool it could be and so, with motivation and desire, he'd taught himself how to use it. Now he couldn't imagine how he'd survived all those years in the business without it.

There were places down there, deep in the Web, that most Internet-savvy criminals scorned and mocked. Places inhabited by interlopers in the criminal world. Wannabes-that's the word they used these days. Computer geeks who set up shop in the underworld and tried desperately to be part of it.

He could picture them, caffeine-hyper beanpoles with bad skin and thick gla.s.ses, surrounded by pizza boxes and c.o.ke cans, fingers flying across the keyboard, ferreting out every bit of underworld gossip and lore, endlessly searching for some tidbit that maybe, just maybe, would impress someone in the business, someone who'd seen dead bodies that weren't just video game carnage. They lived in that hope, so they worked ceaselessly, improving their network of contacts, their data banks of information.

Ego being what it is, no success is a success unless it can be admired and envied by others. Lacking the audience they desired, these moles of the underground found another forum for their braggadocio. They talked to one another.

Tonight, as he sat in the Internet cafe, nursing a coffee, he'd prowled through three such chat rooms, ostensibly to get a heads-up on the investigation, hear the leaks, the rumors, the speculation. Perhaps, if he was being honest with himself, he'd admit to the thrill that came each time he saw his alter ego appear on the screen, each time someone typed the words "Helter Skelter killer."

In one of the chat rooms they'd been debating some esoteric angle of the crimes, something about the randomness of good and evil. A doctoral dissertation in the making. He'd snorted, and glided from the chat room unnoticed. In the fourth one, though, he'd entered in the middle of a conversation that made his fingers freeze on the keys.

He read slowly, deciphering their cyber-shorthand as he went.

DRAGNSLAYR: ...getting together and going after this guy. ...getting together and going after this guy.RIPPER: Going after HSK? Going after HSK?

The three initials were what made him stop. His acronym. The Helter Skelter killer.

DRAGNSLAYR: Who the f.u.c.k else are we talking about? Who the f.u.c.k else are we talking about?REDRUM: You mean other a.s.sa.s.sins are going after this guy? You mean other a.s.sa.s.sins are going after this guy?DRAGNSLAYR: Isn't that what I said? f.u.c.k, maybe I should go find people who can read. Isn't that what I said? f.u.c.k, maybe I should go find people who can read.RIPPER: Who's your source? Who's your source?REDRUM: Hey, guys, wouldn't that make a cool movie? a.s.sa.s.sin versus a.s.sa.s.sin. Hey, guys, wouldn't that make a cool movie? a.s.sa.s.sin versus a.s.sa.s.sin.RIPPER: Been done. Been done.REDRUM: When? When?DRAGNSLAYR: Heard it from 22TANGO. Said those twins-Shadow and Sid-were going around to the brokers, asking questions, seeing if anyone hired this guy. Heard it from 22TANGO. Said those twins-Shadow and Sid-were going around to the brokers, asking questions, seeing if anyone hired this guy.REDRUM: s.h.i.t. So why are they going after him? s.h.i.t. So why are they going after him?DRAGNSLAYR: Who cares? It's a great f.u.c.king story. Who cares? It's a great f.u.c.king story.REDRUM: Bet it's a job. HSK whacked the wrong guy. Now they're going to whack him. Man, that would make a great movie. You sure it's been done? Bet it's a job. HSK whacked the wrong guy. Now they're going to whack him. Man, that would make a great movie. You sure it's been done?RIPPER: How about you go start writing it now? How about you go start writing it now?REDRUM: p.i.s.s off. p.i.s.s off.

He turned away from the monitor. His colleagues coming after him? There was something vaguely cannibalistic in that, something unfair, even treacherous. Yes, he had to admit, something hurtful. Why come after him? He hadn't trodden on any toes, hadn't stolen a job or offed a colleague. His att.i.tude and behavior toward his fellow pros had always been respectful.

And yet...

True or not true, he'd have to take it into account. Maybe it was time to change gears. Consider the possibilities. Savor the power of choice.

One choice niggled at the back of his brain. The most intriguing of the lot.

In this game he'd created, he'd allotted himself a number of special moves. His trump cards. Perhaps it was time to play one of them, an ace he'd been saving in case things went wrong. The game had changed now, though, and it made no sense to play the card. And yet...

His father had been a gambler. Lost everything they owned. Yet his father always swore that Fortune had deserted him when he'd stopped trusting her, when he'd become nervous and started holding his cards too long. A smart gambler, he'd said, knows how to make a surprise play pay off.

A surprise play. He chuckled, then surrept.i.tiously wiped down the keyboard with his sleeve, put on his coat, picked up his disposable coffee cup and left.

TWENTY-ONE.

Jack left early that morning. Evelyn and I ate breakfast, then headed out. I'd threatened to burn my Mafia-bait outfit. Now I wished I'd followed through. I was indeed dressed again as a big-haired tight-jeaned b.o.o.b-plumped Jersey girl. Evelyn swore that what had worked with Little Joe would work with Nicky Volkv, but I suspected she just liked forcing me to do things I didn't want to do.

After dropping Evelyn off on the way to talk to a nearby source, I stopped to call Emma at the lodge. It was Thursday now, the weekend coming and no sign that I'd be home in time.

Emma a.s.sured me that wasn't a problem-we were only half booked, and they were all fall foliage tourists, most of them seniors, none of whom had booked my extreme sports "extras" or access to the shooting range. She'd just tell any drop-ins that these services were unavailable this weekend, and offer a discounted rate if anyone complained. Everything else-supervising hikes, doling out bikes and canoes, hosting the bonfires-she and Owen could handle. I should just relax and enjoy my time away...and whomever I was sharing it with.

I arrived at the penitentiary just after morning visiting hours began. I parked the car, grabbed my new pleather purse and set out. Between the lot and the building was a postage-stamp bit of green s.p.a.ce filled with staff on their smoking breaks and visitors psyching themselves up to enter the prison.

As I walked through the parking lot, my gaze swept across those faces, counting and memorizing. As both a hitman and a cop, you learn to take note of your surroundings. So, although I was still a hundred feet from that green s.p.a.ce, I noticed when nine people became ten, and I knew that the tenth had not come out of the prison or stepped from the parking lot, but had simply appeared. That blip made me pay attention.

I sized him up. Burly with a trim light-brown beard and a forgettable face. Midforties. He lifted a half-smoked cigarette to his lips, but the way he held it marked him as someone unfamiliar with the vice. Something told me very few people took up smoking in their forties, and no casual smoker would brave today's bitter wind for a cigarette.

I saw his gaze slant toward me. His face was still in profile, his eyes cast to the ground, but shifting in my direction. Measuring the distance.

I forced myself to take three more steps. His left leg turned, toe pivoting to point my way, knee following, hips starting to swivel. I stopped sharp and winced, delivering the best "oh, s.h.i.t, I forgot something" face I could manage without slapping my forehead. Then I wheeled and quick-marched back to the car.

I glanced into the side mirror of each vehicle I pa.s.sed on the way. The first three times, the angle was wrong and I saw nothing. On the fourth try, I caught a glimpse of the man, following as casually as he could manage.

I reached into my purse and pulled out my prepaid cell phone.

"Hey, Larry, it's me," I said, voice raised, as if to compensate for a poor connection. "You won't believe what I forgot."

Pause.

"Okay, you guessed. I am such a ditz."

Pause.

"Well, you don't have to f.u.c.king agree with me!"

As I talked, I kept glancing in the mirrors. The man started dropping back, then disappeared, unwilling to attack while I was talking to someone. I scanned the parking lot, making sure he wasn't doing an end-run around me.

I recognized his intentions as clearly as if they'd been screen-printed across his jacket. If I hadn't turned around, he would have headed into the lot, his path intersecting mine as I walked between the cars. A tight pa.s.sage, a quiet shot to the heart and I'd fall, too far from the building to attract attention.