Doing Hard Time (19 page)

“My car is in the employee lot,” she said, pointing.

“We’ll take my rental car,” Todd said. “It’ll be a nice surprise for Mr. Burnett.”

“As you wish,” Charmaine said.

“Here we are,” Todd said, as they approached a black Camaro. He handed her the keys. “You drive.”

He put her bag in the trunk, and they started their journey to Los Angeles.

• • •

Teddy worked until three at the Centurion armory, then went home to his new apartment, showered, then, at five o’clock, he called Charmaine on her cell phone.

• • •

A ringing came from her handbag. “It’s my phone,” Charmaine said to Todd.

“I’ll get it for you,” he said. He found the phone in her purse, opened it, and pressed the speaker button.

“Hello,” she said.

“Hi, there. Why are you on the speakerphone?”

“It’s against the law to use a cell phone in the car. It’s not so obvious when the speakerphone is on.”

“Are you on schedule?” Teddy asked.

“Right on the button. Where are we meeting?”

“Would you mind going to Michael’s again?”

“Not at all. I liked it there.”

“Michael’s, then, at seven-thirty.”

“You’re on.”

“Are you wearing my favorite scarf?”

“The red one? You bet!”

“Great, I’ll see you at the bar.” Teddy hung up.

“What does the red scarf mean?” Todd asked, stuffing her phone back into her purse.

“Mean? Nothing—he just liked it the last time I wore it, so I wore it again.”

He squeezed her thigh. “You sure about that?”

“Oh, don’t be so nervous,” she said. “Billy has no way of knowing you’re coming.”

Todd checked his watch. “Step on it,” he said. “I want to be a little early.”

• • •

At Todd’s instruction, Charmaine pulled over to the curb down the block from the restaurant, instead of giving it to the parking valet. It was seven o’clock. Todd pressed the button to lower the windows, then switched off the ignition.

“I like the night air in L.A.,” he said, making himself comfortable in the passenger seat. “All you have to do now is to alert me when you see your Billy drive up to the restaurant.”

• • •

Teddy reached through the car window and placed the silencer to the back of the man’s head. “Why wait to be introduced?” he asked.

“Shit,” Todd muttered.

“Charmaine,” Teddy said, “please get out of the car. Is your bag in the trunk?”

“Yes,” she said, getting out and pressing the trunk release.

“Move over into the driver’s seat,” Teddy said, prodding Todd with the silencer.

Todd scrambled over the console as instructed.

“Charmaine, go into the restaurant and have a drink at the bar. The gentleman and I will have a little chat, then I’ll be back. I won’t be long.”

“I’m here to deliver a message to you,” Todd said.

“Start the car, and let’s drive over to Shutters,” Teddy said. “You haven’t checked in yet, have you?”

“No, but they’re expecting me.”

“While you drive, you can give me the message.”

“Mr. Majorov would like to meet you in Las Vegas,” Todd said.

Teddy chuckled. “I’ve already received that message, from the last gentleman Mr. Majorov sent, and you may recall, I declined.”

Todd drove the short distance to Shutters and, on Teddy’s instructions, pulled into the garage.

“I should warn you,” Todd said as he parked, “Mr. Majorov doesn’t like having his invitations declined, and he doesn’t like his messengers shot.”

“You needn’t worry about that,” Teddy said. “We’re going to call Mr. Majorov after you’ve checked into your room, and I’ll speak to him. Get your luggage from the trunk.”

Todd pressed the trunk release, and the two men got out of the car. They walked to the rear, and when Todd leaned over to retrieve his bag, Teddy shot him in the head. He quickly folded the body into the trunk and closed it with his elbow, then he put away the pistol and walked the short distance back to Michael’s.

Charmaine was sipping a margarita at the bar, and he sat down beside her and ordered her another and one for himself.

“I think he meant to kill us both,” Charmaine said.

“So do I,” Teddy replied.

“He’s not going to get a chance to do that, is he?”

“No, he’s not.”

“How am I going to explain this to Pete Genaro and Majorov?”

“I’m going to make a proposal,” Teddy said, “and if you accept, you’ll never have to worry about either of them again.”

“I’m all ears,” she said.

“First, let me ask you some questions: Do you have any family?”

“My mother died last year, and she was my closest remaining relative. I have a couple of cousins, but I haven’t been in touch with them for years.”

“Is there anything in your Las Vegas apartment that you can’t do without?”

She thought about that for a moment. “Nothing that can’t be replaced on a shopping spree.”

“Do you want to go on working at the casino and hotel?”

“No, it’s getting too scary there. I mean, they sent that guy to kill me, as well as you.”

“Then come and live with me, and let me take care of you. I’ll give you a new, foolproof identity, and Genaro and Majorov will never be able to find you. I’ll give you a wonderful life.”

She took his face in her hands and kissed him. “Yes,” she said. “Yes, yes, yes.”

“Oh, where is your car?”

“In the employees’ parking lot at the hotel. It’s leased. I can have the leasing company pick it up.”

“Tomorrow I want you to write to the leasing company, then write a letter to Pete Genaro, resigning your job and asking him to wire any money owed to you to your bank account in Vegas. We’ll transfer any funds you have there to an offshore account I have, then I’ll give you the cash. We’ll find a moving company on the Internet, and you can have them pack your belongings and deliver them to a charity. You’ll write to the phone, electric, and gas companies and to the credit card companies, closing your accounts. When all that is done, you will, effectively, have disappeared.”

“As long as I’m with you,” she said.

Ten days passed. Stone and Dino flew back to New York with Mike Freeman. Stone managed to convince Emma Tweed to come with them for a visit.

Peter began shooting his new feature, starting with Tessa’s scenes, so that she could finish shooting in under a month. Ben was grateful for Emma’s absence; Tessa moved into the house at The Arrington.

Five days after it had been left there, the body of Todd German was found in the trunk of his rented Camaro in the parking garage at Shutters, and the two detectives at the West Los Angeles police station had a new murder to solve. They were now getting crazy.

• • •

Pete Genaro looked up from his desk to find Yuri Majorov filling his doorway.

“I have had a call from my Phoenix office telling me that the body of Todd German has been found in exactly the same circumstances as the body of Igor Smolensky and in the same place,” he said. “Where is your Charmaine? Did Burnett contact her?”

Genaro handed him a sheet of stationery. “I received this from Charmaine today,” he said. “I sent someone to her apartment. It was empty, and the lease had been paid up.”

“I expect you have a skip tracer employed here,” Majorov said.

“Do you want to find Charmaine that badly?”

“Where Charmaine is will be Billy Burnett.”

“Mr. Majorov, if that’s what you want, then I’ll do it. But you should consider that the bodies are stacking up. Do you want that to continue?”

“What I want is for you to assign a skip tracer to find these people. When he has done that, you will report their location to me, and I will take care of the rest.”

“As you wish,” Genaro said.

• • •

Teddy continued working part-time at the Centurion armory, overhauling weapons and interviewing applicants for his job.

Charmaine followed Teddy’s instructions, shutting down her old life, and she visited an upscale hairdresser in Beverly Hills, who cut her hair shorter and colored it to its natural shade of chestnut brown. She bought new clothes and jewelry, replacing the things she had left behind, paying with cash that Billy had given her.

One late afternoon, when all that had been accomplished, Billy sat her down with a drink. “You’re going to have a new name,” he said. “What would you like it to be?”

She thought about that. “When I was a child,” she said, “I hated my name. I always wanted to be Elizabeth and to be called Betsy.”

“Then that is who you will be,” he said. “Would you like to be Mrs. Barnett?”

“Very much.”

“Then that will be done, too. It will all be accomplished by tomorrow evening, then we will go out and celebrate.”

Teddy didn’t go in to work the following day. He spent the time creating a new identity for Elizabeth Barnett—passport, driver’s license, credit report, work history, and Social Security number, and he had a credit card issued from his Cayman Islands bank and mailed to him in Los Angeles. He also created a birth certificate and a marriage certificate and filed them both in the relevant city and state computers.

Betsy came home to find her new identity arrayed on the dining room table. “You did all this?” she asked.

“I did, and it’s all indistinguishable from the genuine article. You exist under your new name on more than a dozen computer systems around the country. You can travel anywhere in the world with these documents. I also removed your application for a casino worker’s card from the Nevada state computers, and your employment record from the computer at the hotel. Were you ever fingerprinted for any reason other than the casino application?”

“Yes, for my carry license.”

“I’ll delete that record tomorrow and make up a California license for you.”

“You, sir, are a marvel,” she said to him.

“Get changed into your new clothes,” he said. “I’ve booked a table at Spago Beverly Hills.”

• • •

While Betsy Barnett was applying her makeup, something occurred to her. If her ex-husband, Jimmy Sayer, tried to get in touch with her and failed, he would start looking for her, and she knew him to be tenacious. After a moment’s consideration, she called him.

“Hello?”

“Jimmy, it’s Charmaine.”

“Hey, babe, I was just thinking about you. How about dinner and a roll in the hay?”

“I’m afraid not, Jimmy. I got married.”

“Really? Anybody I know?”

“No, you don’t know him.”

“One of your customers?”

“Yes.”

“And where are you living?”

She hesitated. “That’s not important, Jimmy. You won’t be hearing from me again, and I don’t want you to try to find me.”

“You sound serious,” he said.

“I’m absolutely serious. For all practical purposes, I no longer exist. Understand?”

“I can’t say that I do, but if this is what you want . . .”

“It’s exactly what I want, Jimmy. This is goodbye.” She hung up, relieved that she was done with him forever.

• • •

Harry Katz knocked on Pete Genaro’s door and was invited in and told to sit.

“How many cases you working on, Harry?” Genaro asked.

“Three, at the moment.”

“Hand ’em off to somebody else. I’ve got a special case for you, and I want you to devote a hundred percent of your time to it.”

Harry produced a notebook and a pen. He was an ex–LAPD detective, and he had been trained to take copious notes. “Go.”

“Remember Charmaine? One of my hostesses?”

“The little blonde?”

“That’s the one.”

“What’s her last name?”

“Evans.”

Harry sighed. “Why do they all have such common names? Does she have any family?”