Authors: Jeff Buick
Leona sat at the bar, sipping a glass of red wine. Tyler poked his head out of the kitchen to see if she was still there,
then stripped off his apron, poured himself a draught beer and came out to sit with her. It was after one and the last patrons
had left the restaurant an hour earlier.
“Quite the night.” Leona set down her pen and closed the cash-out book. She pushed it and the function sheets for the weekend
to the side.
“Fridays always are.” Tyler downed half the beer in one long draw. “Man, we got slammed about nine o’clock. I think the whole
place ordered entrées in less than half an hour. Boozy was crashing on the grill. Janet came over from the salad line to help
or he would have gone down.”
“You’d never have known it from out here,” she said. “Everyone left happy. Lots of compliments on the food tonight, especially
the tuna feature.”
“We sold out by ten on that one,” Tyler said, grinning. “Thirty-six specials. At thirty-eight dollars. Told you tuna was the
flavor of the week.”
“You know what they want.” She gave him a pat on his arm. “We make a good team. You think so?”
“Damn right,” he said with a lilt to his voice.
Leona reached for her wine, but her finger touched the stem and the glass wobbled, then crashed on the bar before she could
grab it. It smashed, and shards of glass mixed with the spilled wine. Tyler leapt up and ran to the kitchen for a cloth.
“Damn it.” Leona picked the largest pieces of broken glass out of the wine as it slowly spread across the shiny wood. Tyler
returned with a cloth and paper towels and they wiped up the spill. He wrapped the broken glass and paper towels in the cloth,
disappeared through the kitchen doors and returned a minute later with a fresh glass of wine. He set it on the bar.
“No spilling this time,” he said.
“Promise—and thank you.” Leona took a drink and glanced at her watch. “Can you come in half an hour early tomorrow? There’s
something I want to run past you.”
“Sure. Not tonight?”
“Nah, you enjoy a few beers and go home and get a solid night’s sleep. I’ll see you at ten-thirty.”
“Sure.”
“Make sure the rest of the kitchen staff get in on that beer,” she said. “Keep track so I can subtract it from the day’s sales.”
“Thanks. Could be a few pints. I think the guys are pretty thirsty.”
“Thirty-six specials at thirty-eight dollars each. Plus an other two hundred entrées and wine and drinks. I think I can afford
to get my kitchen staff drunk.”
“Well, in that case . . .”
“Good night.” She placed the almost-full wineglass on the table. She couldn’t help laughing at the fox-with-the-key-to-the-chicken-coop
look on his face.
Outside it was muggy but still warm. The low-pressure weather front had dissipated, gone wherever they go, and normal temperatures
were back. She walked the half block to where her car was parked in its underground stall. The parking structure was quiet,
only a few cars left at the late hour. She hit the open button on the key fob and the parking lights blinked once. A movement
to her right caught her eye and she turned quickly. Nothing. She stood a few feet from her car, concentrating on the line
of concrete pillars fifty feet away. There was no sound, no motion to indicate anyone was hiding. She kept her eyes riveted
on the area as she slowly edged toward her vehicle. When her hand touched the side of her car she looked down and grabbed
the door handle and pulled. She swung through the open door, closed it and locked it, sliding the key in the ignition and
turning. The motor caught and she shifted the car into gear. She glanced in her rearview mirror before backing up and screamed.
The man standing beside her car jumped back, startled at her yell. On his shirt was the insignia of the building above the
parking lot. Clipped to his front pocket was an identity card with his photo.
Leona touched the button and the window silently slid out of sight. “I’m sorry,” she said. “You scared me.”
He gave her a half smile. “You scared me when you yelled. Is everything okay?”
“Yes. I thought I saw something moving behind those pillars.” She motioned to the long line of concrete posts. “I was a bit
nervous and all of a sudden you were right beside my car.”
“Sorry about that. I didn’t mean to scare you.” He looked over to where Leona had indicated. “I’ll check it out. I’m doing
my nightly rounds.”
“Sure.”
She rolled up her window and pulled out of the garage onto the deserted street. What was wrong with her? Spooked by her overactive
imagination. Reginald Morgan’s disappearance and the death of the Senator from Utah may or may not be tied together. The police
weren’t sure. They suspected, but had nothing more than that. Suspicions. She had to pull it together.
Her cell phone rang, startling her again. She pulled it from her hip holder with shaking hands and flipped it open. The incoming
call was a mass of static, but through the wall of white noise was Kubala’s voice.
“I can hardly hear you.” She cranked on the wheel and pulled over to the side of the road. The static diminished a touch and
she could make out his words with little difficulty.
“I have found Tuato’s car,” he said excitedly.
“What took you so long?” Leona asked, her tone inquisitive, not accusatory. “It’s Friday night. You called me two days ago.”
“He moved, Ms. Leona. I had to find his new house.”
“And you did?”
“Yes. This afternoon. It’s in a rough part of town. Very dangerous. I watched his house for a few hours until he arrived,
about five hours ago. But getting to the car will not be easy. Tuato parks it behind his apartment building right by his window.”
“If it’s too dangerous don’t try. I’ll fly over tomorrow with the money.”
“No, Ms. Leona. It’s worse for you to come here, to Nairobi, with a large amount of money. It is very likely you would be
killed. Do not try that, I beg of you. Let me see if the money is still under the seat.”
He was right. There was no upside to running directly into the fire. Her life would be in jeopardy the moment the plane’s
wheels touched the runway.
“All right. But be careful, Kubala.”
“Yes, of course.”
“When will you try?”
“Maybe tonight, but it’s almost dawn here. Probably tomorrow night. I would have tried earlier, but there were homeless people
sleeping a few feet away. Maybe they won’t be there tomorrow.”
“Call me. I want to know what’s happening.”
“I’ll call. Tomorrow.” The international line went dead.
Leona closed her phone and pulled away from the curb. She needed to get home and pour herself a glass of wine. One that she
could drink without having to drive afterward. She was a banker, in Washington DC. How could so many things be happening all
at once? Mike Anderson kidnapped by the police and in danger of being killed. Kubala skulking around a Nairobi slum waiting
for an opportunity to grab eighty thousand dollars from a car. Eighty thousand dollars in Nairobi. Eighty dollars was enough
to earn a knife in the ribs. Eighty thousand was beyond belief. Kubala was in great danger since he had signed on with the
foundation. Someone killing everyone who opposed the Coal-Balt deal. Now, her own safety threatened.
She felt the car closing in on her, the panic building. There was no stopping it. She slammed on the brakes and skidded to
a halt in the curb lane, opening the door and jumping out, almost into the path of an oncoming SUV. The headlights were right
in her face, coming fast. The driver swerved sharply and laid on the horn, missing her by inches. Leona slammed the car door
and ran to the sidewalk, grabbing a streetlight for support. She was sweating and her hands shook uncontrollably. For five
minutes she stood immobile, breathing the night air, relaxing. She concentrated on soft music and friendly memories. Anything
to drive away the massive surge of anxiety that accompanied her claustrophobia. Finally, when the shaking had stopped, she
walked slowly back to her car and eased into the seat. The panic attack was over, the car no longer felt constricting. She
took more time than necessary to start the car, fasten her seat belt, and adjust the mirrors. She shoulder checked and merged
back into the threadbare traffic.
That glass of wine was looking better all the time.
“Fucker,” Darvin whispered under his breath.
He watched the security man check the other side of the parking structure. The beam from the flashlight poked behind the concrete
pillars and cast long shadows across the smooth cement floor. After a couple of minutes the light abruptly disappeared. A
second later Darvin heard the click of a fire door closing. The man was gone.
Leona Hewitt had dodged a bullet. Literally. His first choice had been to take her out in the parking garage and make it look
like a carjacking. Easy enough to do. A bullet in the head, tire marks next to the body, and no car. But that opportunity
had vanished the moment the security guard had walked onto the scene. He slid out from behind one of the posts and walked
to the stairwell, taking a moment to hook the wire back into the surveillance camera he had previously disabled. He headed
back to street level.
He was breathing a bit deeper after climbing the three flights of stairs. The door to M Street opened next to an alley and
he ducked into the darkness and made his way toward the restaurant. Always good to have options. And while his second choice
on how to kill Leona Hewitt was his favorite, it was also the riskiest. He reached the back side of Gin House and stopped,
backing into a small alcove. The door from the rear of the restaurant to the alley was open, and two men in cook’s uniforms
were sitting on the stoop smoking cigarettes and drinking beer. He recognized one of the men as Leona’s head chef, his blond-red
hair and facial features highlighted by the glow from his cigarette. Their voices drifted across the lane, empty but for garbage
bins and a few broken bottles. He settled in to wait.
It took forty minutes for the kitchen staff to finish their beer and lock up. Once he was sure the restaurant was deserted,
he crossed the alley and jumped up on the metal Dumpster. A plastic conduit pipe ran up the side of the building, tight to
the brick exterior. He slipped a penknife from his pocket and levered open one of the joints, exposing the thin wires inside.
They were the main telephone feed to the building. Holding a small flashlight in his teeth, he selected the correct wire and
snipped it. Then he slid the cover back in place, hopped off the garbage bin and slipped back into the shadows. Darvin had
noticed the alarm the one time he had visited the restaurant, and from the control pad he suspected it was an older model
without a radio frequency backup. The system was tied into the telephone lines and without the backup to alert the alarm response
company or the police, simply cutting the phone line disabled it, giving him full access to the restaurant. He’d know soon
enough whether he had guessed correctly. Fifteen minutes passed and there was no sign of the police. He slid out of the shadows
and walked across the garbage-strewn alley to the door.
It was closing in on two o’clock when Darvin slipped a thin strip of tensile steel into the deadbolt lock and felt for the
tumblers. After about thirty seconds the lock clicked open and he pulled on the door. It swung outward, revealing a small storage
area. Immediately inside, on the right side of the doorjamb, was an alarm pad. It was armed, but not beeping. Cutting the telephone
line had definitely disabled it.
The interior of the restaurant was almost entirely dark, lit by a solitary twenty-five-watt emergency light in the main eating
area, and a few shards of ambient light filtering in from the front street. Darvin moved with caution through the smattering
of tables and chairs and pushed open the door to the kitchen. It creaked with the slowness of the motion, the sound drifting
through the silent space like a single note on a piano. Inside the kitchen was another emergency light, which lit the twenty-by-forty-foot
room enough for Darvin to see what he was doing.
He concentrated on the ceiling, which was about sixteen feet above the tile floor. Numerous unlit lights hung down a few feet
from the roof on thin wires, positioned to illuminate the work area for the kitchen staff. One of the lights was directly
over the prep area, which had a metal hood that extended above the counter. He flipped a couple of light switches until he
found the one that controlled that particular light, then turned it off and jumped up on the chopping board. He climbed onto
the hood, stepping cautiously on the frame. It held his weight without buckling and raised him to a level where he could reach
up and touch the light. He unscrewed the bulb and held it in his left hand while he withdrew a syringe from his right coat
pocket. He pulled the plastic sheath off the needle with his teeth, then placed the tip against the metal base of the bulb
and pushed. The sharp point pierced the thin metal and he continued to push until the tip of the needle was visible inside
the glass. Then he thumbed the plunger and squirted the accelerant into the bulb. When the syringe was empty he withdrew the
needle and rubbed the tiny hole with his index finger to seal it. He replaced the bulb and carefully stepped down off the
hood onto the chopping block, and hopped down to the floor.
Darvin unscrewed the switch cover and detached one of the wires connected to the circuit that controlled the tampered bulb.
He bent it so there was a downward pressure on the wire, then slipped a tiny plastic device between the loose wire and the
one still attached to the switch. Remove the device, which he could do by remote control, and the wire would move down and
complete the circuit. The bulb would light, and that’s all it would take to trigger the explosion. He replaced the switch
plate and glanced over at the cooking area.
The stove-oven combination was against the far wall and he knelt in front of it. It was a commercial-grade, 30, 000 BTU natural-gas
Garland stove and griddle. He extinguished all the pilot lights on the stove and oven, then located the incoming gas line
and carefully sliced through it with a razor blade. The odor of natural gas drifted into the still air. The low-pressure line
would continue to leak the deadly gas for the next few hours, filling the entire room. All the variables were now in place
to create a blast that would obliterate the entire restaurant. Natural-gas explosions or fires were rare, but they did happen.
Especially in commercial kitchens, where there was so much activity and open flames on the stove top and in the oven. And
when they happened, they were usually so violent that they completely destroyed trace evidence. The chances of the fire department
discovering the tiny cut in the gas line were minimal to nonexistent.
He walked across the kitchen to the swinging doors that led to the eating area of the restaurant. He removed a roll of cellophane
tape from his pocket and carefully sealed the narrow gaps between the two doors, and then between the doors and the floor
and the frame. The heat from the blast would melt the tape, leaving virtually no residue. The odor of gas would stay inside
the kitchen until someone pushed open the doors in the morning and broke the seal. When they did . . . he would be ready.
Close by, with the remote control in his hand.
Darvin exited through the back door, locked it behind him, then jumped up on the garbage container and reattached the telephone
wires. He pulled the plastic cover over the joint in the conduit and rubbed a bit of grease from the Dumpster hinges on the
split in the plastic. Even from two feet away, it was impossible to tell that the conduit had been tampered with. He climbed
down from the garbage bin and took one last look at the backside of the restaurant. Every detail of his plan played through
his mind, and once he was sure everything was in place, he turned away and didn’t bother looking back.
The night was quiet, the city asleep. He walked back to his rental car and drove to his hotel. The night desk clerk glanced
up as he entered, and other than a forced smile, showed little interest in his arrival. He took the elevator to the fourth
floor, undressed and slipped under the covers. He needed some rest. Tomorrow morning was fast approaching and he knew from
talking with her that Leona Hewitt would be at the restaurant in the morning, going over the menu with her chef. He closed
his eyes, a smile on his face.
It would be the last thing she ever did.