Tales of Chills and Thrills: The Mystery Thriller Horror Box Set (7 Mystery Thriller Horror Novels) (112 page)

Marco and his opponent were locked up and smashing into one
wall, then the junk against the other wall with such fury and speed, it was hard
for Sydney to get into the fight. When Marco snapped his arm down, freeing his
hand, he then tried to bring his own weapon up but took a vicious elbow in the
throat and a knee as they twisted back and fell against skis and a snowboard.
Marco tried to regain his footing, spin the guy back into the wall, but took
another hard elbow.

Sydney finally had a target and swung the dumbbell bar, but
it hit a glancing blow off the man’s shoulder. The two men fell against the
steps. As the assailant twisted around toward her, Sydney found another chance.
She swung the bar like a baseball bat.

The dumbbell bar hit with a sickening crack of bone. The guy
let out some kind of wild-sounding moan and backed to the door, his hands flying
to his face, his gun hitting the floor. She tried to get him again but he thrust
out both arms and pushed her violently back into Marco, and the two of them went
down against the steps.

The man fled out the back door, sunlight bursting into the
narrow, junk-filled hallway.

“I lost my gun,” Marco said, frantically scrambling away
from her and trying to find it.

She located the gun their attacker had dropped, then went
out the door. Marco, having found his weapon, came right behind her. At first
they didn’t see any sign of the guy.

“He could be close. Have a backup piece,” Marco said,
inching toward the side of the house.

But then Sydney saw the man run behind the garage, his hands
cradling his face. She fired three shots. It was a long way for a snub nose to
be accurate, but she saw him stumble, and it looked like he fell in the shrubs
just inside the tree line.

“Looks like you got him,” Marco said. “He’s not short and
fat.”

“That’s definitely not Corbin,” Sydney said.

She figured he wasn’t going to survive the breaking of his
skull and the bullets. It hit her that she’d never killed anyone before.
Everyone involved in law, or the military, was ready to do the obvious if
necessary, but the fact of it would be something she’d think about later. It
wasn’t that he didn’t deserve what he got. That was never the issue. It was just
that it was something that, when it happened, was significant.
Or should be,
she thought. But maybe for some, not so much. Or maybe it was all context. She
didn’t know. That would all come later.

“Let’s clear the house,” Marco said. “See if fat boy is
there. The guy in the woods with the broken head might be able to talk on a cell
phone, get help, so we need to get out of here. Bastard could still fight.”

Marco, his mouth bloody as well, spit some to the side and
then wiped his mouth and nose with his shirt tail. “You had to have ripped some
of those stitches.”

“We’ll deal with that later.”

She had the Colt and handed him the Heckler and Koch compact
with silencer. They headed into the house slow and cautious, just in case Corbin
lay in wait.

34

A hundred yards up the hill from the house, Leon leaned
against a tree, feeling sick, the pain shooting spikes through his skull.

Jesus, Jesus Christ, I’m dead. The bitch broke my fucking
skull. It’s her! Jesus!

The pain was like nothing he’d ever known before in his
life. Had to have a broken face.

The three shots hadn’t hit him, though one bullet had taken
a piece out of his left ear. Fucking bitch was crazy. He stared down toward the
house, tears welling in his eyes, blurring his vision, blood dripping from his
nose and mouth.

I messed up. I took a job on short notice and messed up.

Enraged, he pulled out his cell phone and found he couldn’t
talk. He put it away and reached for his ankle holster. But the effort spiked
the pain and any thought he had of going back into the fight vanished.

He found himself trapped between his desire to get down
there and kill these people, put an end to this, and the excruciating,
immobilizing pain that became so intense he wanted to scream.

He’d gotten a glimpse of her and seen enough pictures to
know that was Jesup and Cillo’s nephew.
Jesus, tough sonsabitches.

He couldn’t believe it. They weren’t running and hiding—they
were on the hunt!

Everything now flipped over on its back. Tahoe had suddenly
become a very dangerous place.

He sat on a fallen branch on the hillside in the pines
trying to get his mind settled, get himself calm, his skull on fire. Pain spiked
and shot in waves through his head. What had she hit him with? That bitch had
tried to take his fucking head off!

Everything they said about her was true. She was crazy. The
woman had gunshot wounds and was still on the hunt and in the fight. What kind
of crazy-ass woman was he dealing with? No wonder everybody wanted her dead.

You got to get them now, he told himself.

But he couldn’t move, couldn’t think of anything beyond his
misery.

Off in the distance where the road appeared over a rise
before dipping back down into the ravine half a mile or so away, he saw a car
coming. He wondered if it was the hooker, Kora North. Everything in Leon’s world
was going to hell.

When the car slid down around the curve, reappeared, and
slowed, he knew it was her.

***

Sydney and Marco found Corbin slumped, listless, in a chair,
eyes open, blood on his forehead, a startled look on his face.

“Rigor from a bullet isn’t exactly cosmetic surgery,” Sydney
said. “Doesn’t improve the look. But he’s not been dead long. Maybe an hour or
two.”

Marco, his senses on high alert, trigger finger flexing like
a coiled snake, readied himself for any hostile target.

They quickly cleared the other rooms. The occupant had bad
habits. Filthy toilet, mold, dirty clothes. Cracked paint. Smudges soiling the
carpets. Smells. The small house clear, they came back into the living room.

The hole in the man’s head had a filigree of red around it.
“
Flor roja la Muerte
,” Marco said.

“Meaning?”

“Death’s red flower. Something that happens very frequently
in Mexico. Whole bouquets. We need to get moving. You want to use the bathroom,
go ahead.”

Sydney let out a dark chuckle. “Funny. I’d piss in the woods
before I’d sit my ass on anything in this shithole.” Then she said, “Son of a
bitch,” as she pulled out files and a notebook computer from the open tennis
bag. “My bag, my stuff. Our boy has been busy.”

Marco came over and looked. “Well, he didn’t get far with
your stuff. Or Corbin’s. Which means he’ll be back if he’s capable. Or he’ll
send somebody. You have blood on your nose. Looks funny.”

She went into the kitchen to find paper towels to wipe blood
from her nose and mouth while he picked up some photos.

“Tapes and a folder with pictures of various sexcapades,” he
said.

Sydney looked at the photos when she’d come back into the
living room. “I know this girl.”

Marco heard a car and went to the window. “You want a little
surprise? It’s her. Just pulled up in her BMW.”

Sydney came over and looked out the window. “No way. It is.
One and the same. Kora North, one of the highest priced girls in Tahoe, who now
works exclusive with the Thorp Incline crowd. What the hell’s going on? And she
looks pissed off and in a big hurry.”

The tall, striking female left her shiny black Beamer and
came up the walk past the pickup truck. Long legs, gold hair, and substantial
breasts in a halter top, the calendar-girl body swung toward the steps with
aggressiveness. She clutched her shoulder bag like she was afraid it would swing
off her shoulder and run away.

Marco went to the door to invite the high-priced bombshell
in.

Sydney said quietly, “This should be interesting.”

Everything had changed now. He knew that, and so did Sydney.
There was no way out of this. Whatever Sydney had in mind, it now included him.
He felt a lot like he was back in Mexico.

35

Through a slit opening in the side window curtain, Sydney
watched Kora North walk up to the door, where Marco was ready to welcome her.

Kora looked stressed and angry. She started to knock, but
Marco opened the door, grabbed her arm, and yanked her inside so fast she didn’t
have time to resist. When she struggled to get something from her bag, Sydney
ripped the bag out of her hands.

He kicked the door shut.

“Easy girl,” Marco said as Kora fought him with cat-claw
ferocity, wild eyes, and screaming curses.

After taking a couple of hard blows to the face and
shoulder, he subdued her by grabbing under her armpits, pinching off the nerves,
and angling his hips so she couldn’t get a knee to his groin.

“Easy! Nobody’s going to hurt you.”

“You
are
hurting me, asshole!” she yelled.

Kora North had a Hollywood body and a viper’s disposition.
Marco grabbed her wrists and pinned them in front of her. Sydney caught a whiff
of perfume that smelled like fresh-baked apples and cinnamon. A little
surprising.

“Don’t panic, and don’t try and head-butt me or I’ll really
get pissed and mess you up,” Marco said in a calm but stern voice.

Kora’s eyes widened. She stiffened when she saw Sydney, then
Shaun Corbin’s body. She tried again to break away, but Marco swung her around
and slammed her back against the wall.

“Calm down. We’re not the killers, and we’re not going to
hurt you.”

The wildcat Barbie hunched her shoulders and arched back,
rigid and defensive, ready to go off on him again.

Sydney said, “He’s telling you the truth, Kora. Relax. The
guy who killed Shaun, I put some bullets in him. He’s lying somewhere up in the
woods.”

Kora, realizing the situation was out of her control,
smartly ceased her futile struggle.

“You,” she said, now recognizing Sydney.

“Right,” Sydney said. “Me.”

She put the shoulder bag Kora had been carrying on an end
table and opened it. “Well, looks like we have money. Lots of it. And we have a
gun.”

“Girl came prepared,” Marco said.

Sydney held up the gun. “Nice.” It had hardwood grip plates
with a ruby embedded on either side. “What is it you came prepared for, Kora?”

“I don’t want anything to do with this,” Kora said. “Give me
my bag, my money, and my gun and let me get out of here. I didn’t see anything.
I couldn’t be happier that bastard is dead. I have some things here I want back,
then I’m out of here.”

“If only things were that easy,” Sydney said. “Like he
already said, we didn’t kill Corbin. When we got here, the man who did kill him
was apparently waiting for somebody, and that somebody looks to be you. He had
your nude shots out on the table. We got in a fight with him. He got the worst
of it. Took off.”

“Why would he be waiting for me?”

“Maybe to have some fun,” Sydney said. “Maybe to kill you.
We don’t have time to argue. What’s the money for?”

Kora said, “I was being threatened by Corbin. He had stuff
on me. Bad stuff that would put me in trouble with Oggie Thorp and the law. I
was buying it back. He did something bad, wanted to run, and needed running
money. If you just give me what I came for, I won’t say anything to anyone.”

Sydney packed the big tennis bag with everything on the
coffee table, then put Kora’s gun back in her shoulder bag. “Just be thankful
we’re here and not the guy who killed Corbin. And the stuff that Corbin had on
you, we own that now. So maybe we need to have a little talk. Just not here.”

Kora glanced at the body. No shock in her face seeing the
guy dead. More like she was looking at some road kill.

“I’m not going anywhere with you,” Kora shot back.

Marco said, “You want that back—your money, car keys, and
the tapes you came for—you’ll talk to us. You’ll cooperate with Sydney.
Otherwise, you’ll be walking”—he held up her keys—”and your car will be parked
in front of a dead man’s house. You’d be lucky if the cops got to you before
somebody else did. So let’s go have a nice little chat.”

Kora stared at Marco.

Sydney said, “Let’s get out of here.”

Outside, heading for Kora’s BMW, “Sydney said, “Why was
Corbin killed? What did he do, he was so scared he wanted to run?”

“I don’t know.”

Sydney stopped at the back passenger door as Marco got in
behind the wheel. She grabbed Kora, turned her, and then showed her the bandages
under her shirt. “Shaun Corbin tried to kill me. You know nothing about that?”

“No. All I know is he did something he was running from.”

Sydney studied her for a moment, then said, “Get in the
front.”

Sydney got in back with the tennis bag and Kora’s shoulder
bag. Marco keyed the engine and they left.

Sydney, leaning forward on the seat, said, “Kora, the guy
who killed Corbin robbed my place and was apparently waiting for you for
whatever reason, which means you’d be dead if we hadn’t shown up. Then he’d have
come after me. So, the way I see it, we have something in common.”

“Where are you taking me?” Kora demanded, looking at Marco.

Marco said, “Just a ways up the road, where we can talk and
see what’s going on down here in the valley.”

***

Standing in the trees two hundred yards up the hill from the
house, Leon, still in brain-freeze, pain, and shock, watched as the threesome
left in Kora North’s BMW, Cruz driving, Kora North beside him in the passenger
bucket, Jesup in the back. They had the tennis bag. He couldn’t believe it. He’d
lost his Glock and the bag with all the files, laptops, and videos. And his face
was broken.

Everything in the neat, ordered world of Leon, in the way he
usually planned, prepped, did careful surveillance, following a precise
methodology in order to get a clean kill—all of it out the window. Trashed from
the minute he’d set foot in Tahoe. And now this. He stared in shock as the BMW
headed around the bend in the hill and disappeared.