and along came SPIDER ( A Martina Spalding Thriller ) (Spider Series Book 1) (12 page)

Back down at a quarter
of four, Gloria said as she approached, “I don’t know what to think of your
taste in sleepwear, Martina.”

Marti hadn’t a clue
what Gloria was talking about, and could only watch as she produced a box from
under her desk.  It was pink, and ‘Natalie’s’ was clearly printed on it, just
like the one she had left in the car, containing the nightdress she had
purchased for her.

Gloria opened the box
and whipped out a frilly black, see-through nightie with a skimpy bikini bottom
to match.  “Don’t you know what a nightdress is?”

“I didn’t buy that!” 
Marti pointed suspiciously.  “Where did that come from?”

“Natalie’s delivered it
just an hour ago,” Gloria said blankly.  “If you didn’t have it sent, then who
did?”  She dug through the paper in the box and found nothing in the way of a
note, or card.

“There was a man in the
store…  Gloria, what does Raym dress like, normally?”

“Western suits,
mostly.  Sometimes blue jeans and a western shirt.  Why?”

“Does he ever wear a
hat?”

“Now that his hairline
is receding, yes.  A white Stetson.”

“Oh my God!”

“You saw Raym?”

“I think so.  I didn’t
get a good look at his face, but there was a man wearing a white hat in
Natalie’s while I was there,” Marti said.  “He wasn’t there at first.  I know
that.  He must have come in later.  What kind of car does he drive?”

“He just bought a new
baby blue Ford Thunderbird.”

“Then it was him.  I
saw that car behind me on Main Street.  He even turned around at the gas
station where I did.  Then I saw it again parked up the street when I drove
away from Natalie’s.  Gloria, I think he was following me.”

“Why would he do that? 
What could he possibly want with you?” Gloria said.  “And this nightie?  What
was the reason for him sending it?”

“I think he’s sending a
message.  Black is the color associated with death,” Martina said, her eyes
widening.  “Gloria, I don’t want you leaving here at five without me.  I’ll
come up with an excuse to get away long enough to walk you home.”

“And miss going to
Hannity’s after work?  Not on your life.”

“Oh, Gloria.  Please
don’t do that to me!” Marti pleaded.  “I’ll worry the entire night.”

“I’ll go straight there
after work… and stay there till you get off at midnight.  We can have a drink
or two together before they close.  Okay?”

“Oh, Gloria!”

“Don’t worry,” she said
and took Martina by the arms.  “I’m packing heat, remember?”  Her eyes twinkled
as if she meant that to be humorous.

CHAPTER
TWENTY

When midnight rolled
around, Martina didn’t waste time changing out of the uniform.  She took her
purse and rushed to the elevator.  Within a minute, she was out of the building
and running toward Hannity’s, five blocks away.  At this hour on a weeknight
there was zero walking traffic and she covered the distance in no time. 
Entering the bar, she spotted Gloria at the far end and made an attempt at
acting normal… which was near impossible to do, when one’s lungs were screaming
for more air.

Lenny spotted her
coming and glanced at the clock on the wall behind the bar.  “There she is,
right on time.”

This prompted Gloria to
spin on the stool to face Martina.  In front of her was a cup of coffee.  “You
see, I’m perfectly fine.”  She tossed her hands feebly into the air.  There was
no doubt she was drunk.  But, with all that had happened, perhaps she deserved
to be.  Could be the black nightie was the final straw that drove her to do it.

Martina took the stool
beside her.  “Yes, you are that,” she said sarcastically.  “Would you like to
go now, or can I have a glass of wine to settle my nerves, first?”

“Have the wine.  I’m in
no hurry,” Gloria said and turned back to her coffee.  “After seven hours on
this stool, my ass feels like a flat tire.”

Lenny brought a glass
of merlot.  “It’s on me, sweetie.  And you may be interested in this…”  He slid
a cupped fist across the bar and deposited the Beretta 32 in her hand.  “She
was waving it around a little.  I thought it best I take it for safe keeping.”

Marti shot Gloria a
look and slipped the small pistol into the pocket of her nurse uniform.

“I mean, it wasn’t a
big deal,” Lenny said.  “We were quiet tonight.”

“Thanks, Lenny.”

“Want I should take you
home, after you’ve finished your wine?”

“Thanks, but I think
the walk will do her good.”

“I’m fine!” Gloria said
again.  It was meant in protest to all the talk passed around about her, as if
she was unaware.

Out on the sidewalk,
twenty minutes later, Gloria yanked her arm free of Martina’s gentle guidance,
and went reeling toward the gutter, until Marti regained her grasp.  “Oops!  I
guess I
am
a little tipsy.”

“A little?”

“Oh, Martina!  What am
I going to do?”  She swayed into her as she staggered along.  “I know Raym.  He
won’t give up until I’m dead.  I know him…  I know him, better than anybody.”

Marti didn’t know what
to say, so she said nothing.

“You know how he likes
to do it?”

Vigilant of her
surroundings, Marti looked up and down the empty
street
 — 
the
street lights
leaving empty puddles of brightness periodically.  “Do what?”  Her mind was
elsewhere.

“You know… sex?”

“No!  And I don’t care
to know, Gloria!  How can you be thinking of something like that, in the state
you’re in?”  And she wasn’t speaking of her state of drunkenness.

“I just thought…”  She
burped.  “I just thought you’d want to know?”

“Well, I don’t.”

“Bastard!”

In the next block Marti
heard a vehicle coming from behind.  Quickly, she pulled Gloria into the
shadowed alcove of a storefront.

“Who is it…?”  Gloria
slurred, pulled free, and stepped back into the light.

In haste, Martina
regained Gloria’s arm and yanked her back out of sight.  “Now, be quiet!”

The car was closer now,
but she dared not look, pressing tighter against the door behind her.  She
turned to see if Gloria was doing the same…  She wasn’t.  Her head was drooped
as she used the glass at her back as a prop.  Marti slid a hand into the pocket
of the uniform and gathered her fingers around the Beretta.

A second later, the car
slowed and came to a stop at the curb, just out of sight of where they were. 
The door squeaked open and boots sounded on the concrete sidewalk.  Martina
pulled the Beretta from her pocket and gently slid a cartridge into the
chamber.

Then a man’s voice
said, “Miss Spalding?  Gloria?”

“Officer Ripley!” 
Gloria lunged from the hiding place and staggered toward him.  “What brings you
here?”  She then fell off her high heels, into his arms, nearly knocking him
over.

Seeing this, Marti
applied the safety to the pistol and returned it to her pocket.  Stepping fully
from the alcove, then, she rushed to remove Gloria from Ripley’s arms, but
needlessly.  By the time she got there, another officer had come from the
patrol car, and reached her first.

“Oh, there you are,”
Ripley acknowledged her presence.  “I thought it was you two.  I saw from up
the street.”

“What was it about us
that brought you to that conclusion, a block or more away?” Marti asked.

“Well, we were
patrolling the area, when a call came in to be on the lookout for you gals. 
Somebody from Hannity’s phoned it in.”

“Lenny…  Was it a man
named Lenny that phoned it in?”

“They didn’t say,
ma’am.  Just that you might need assistance, and then gave your names.  Both of
which I recognized, of course.”

There was that M word
again, she noted.  “Of course.  So, now that you have us, what’s your plan?” 
She noticed the other officer assisting Gloria into the car.

“Well, I was aiming to
give you a lift home.  That is unless you’d rather walk?”  He smiled.

“The ride will do just
fine, Mister Ripley.”  Martina smiled pleasantly back, happy neither of them
were going to jail.

“Yes, ma’am.”  He
tipped the bill of his cap and offered a hand.

At the apartment
building, Ripley was quick in getting to the curb and opening the rear door. 
“I’ll walk you to the door.  It appears Ms. Gillen will need some assistance.” 
He eyed her slouched in the seat, sleeping now.

“I’ll help you.” 
Martina came from the car, pulling Gloria along with her, until Ripley could
take an arm over his shoulder.  The two of them then walked toward the
building, Gloria between them doing little to assist in the effort.  But it
became worse when they started up the stairs inside.  Gloria just couldn’t seem
to get the hang of it, so they ended up dragging her most of the way, which was
exhausting.  Finally, on the landing between the second and third floors, it
became essential they stop for a breather.

Due to the hour, they
were doing their best to be quiet, so as not to disturb the other tenants,
again.  That’s when Gloria said, “I think I’m going to be sick,” and broke away
to head back down the stairs.  Knowing for sure she would fall without her,
Marti went along-side the entire way down and on to the exterior, where there
was a patch of grass.  There Gloria fell to her knees and retched miserably
several times, before swiping the back of her hand across her mouth, and weakly
regained her feet.

“Better?”  Marti patted
her back.

Gloria nodded and
burped again, before saying, “Why am I so stupid?”

“Sometimes we, as
humans, have no control over that, dear,” Martina consoled, noticing Ripley
coming from the building.  “She’ll be okay now.  You can go if you want.”

“I’d feel better if you
let me see you safely inside the apartment, ma’am,” he said.  “There was a
specific instruction given by Lieutenant Dunbar when he assigned me to this
patrol.”

“I’d be interested to
know what that is, if you care to tell me?”  Martina began walking Gloria to
the door.

“I don’t know as I’m at
liberty to say, ma’am.”

“It’s okay,” she said,
passing him by, “if you don’t want to tell me.  I wouldn’t want you to get into
trouble over it.”

“Treat those two as if
they were your daughters… if a bad guy wanted to do
them
harm,” he finally said.

Marti allowed herself a
smile at the thought of Dunbar thinking of them as daughters.  “Do you have
daughters, Mister Ripley?” she asked.

“Call me Ben.”  He got
the door.  “To answer your question: no ma’am.  But I know what he meant.”

“Tell the Lieutenant,
thank you.  And, thank you… Ben.”

“You’re welcome,” he
said and hurried up the stairs ahead of them.

Once secured inside the
apartment, Martina got Gloria into the shower.  She then went to the kitchen to
put water on for tea.  She would put a little brandy in hers.  The single glass
of wine at Hannity’s hadn’t quite soothed the tension that had bottled up in
her over the past nine hours.

CHAPTER
TWENTY-ONE

When Officer Ben Ripley
came out of the building, he skipped down the front steps, proud of himself for
having gone the extra mile in seeing the girls safely home.  Dropping into the
shotgun seat of the patrol car, he turned to his partner only to find Officer
Bright was no longer under the wheel.  Looking around briefly, he reached for
the radio transmitter.  What went out over the airwaves moments later, however,
was no more than a gurgling sound.  It was a last ditch effort on Ripley’s part
to save himself, once his throat had been sliced through, from ear to ear.  He
never saw the person who came up from the rear seat — only the
flash of a knife blade, and a gloved hand.  But none of that mattered now.  He
wouldn’t be telling anyone anything, anymore.

Twenty minutes later,
the phone rang in the apartment.  Gloria, fresh from the shower, picked up:
“Hello?”  She heard heavy breathing, but nothing more.  “Hello,” she said
again.  And again, nothing but breathing came over the line.  Her heart began
to race, even though she didn’t really know why she should be afraid.  Just
when she was ready to hang up, a muffled voice finally said, “They can’t
protect you.”

“Who can’t protect me? 
Who is this?”  Listening for a response that never came, she finally cradled
the receiver.

“Was that Lenny? 
Checking to see if you made it home?”  Marti said, coming from her room in a
white terrycloth robe, toweling her hair.  She had taken a shower, as well.

“No.  It wasn’t.” 
Gloria looked at her strangely.  “Now that was weird,” she said, glancing back
at the phone.

“Gloria!”  Marti came
closer.  “Who was it?”

“I don’t know?  Some
guy just said:
They can’t protect you
.”

“That’s all?  They
can’t protect you!  Nothing else?”

“That’s all.”

Just then, the sound of
a siren found its way into the apartment, and continued to get louder with
every passing second.  Then there were two, maybe three, sirens.  Marti raced
to Gloria’s bedroom.  The windows there were the only ones that faced the
street, out front.  What she saw below were two police cars, lights flashing. 
And then an ambulance arrived, along with another car; this one unmarked, with
a single flashing light.

“What is it?” Gloria
came up beside her.

“Oh, my God!  I just
noticed Officer Ripley’s car is still there,” Marti said.  “The ambulance crew
is working on someone there.  Did something happen to him, I wonder?”

“Maybe he had a heart
attack, from climbing our stairs,” Gloria said and laughed.

“Gloria!  That’s not
funny.”

“Well, what could have
happened, then?  If someone was out there, why didn’t they come after us?”

“Because Officer Ripley
and the other one were there to protect us,” Marti said, and turned away from
the window.  “The message… over the phone: They can’t protect you.  Oh my God! 
Whoever called you must have done something to Ben……  Oh no!”  Marti glared,
then refocused on what was happening below.

Gloria went to the
other window and lifted the shade.  She could see a dozen or more people
milling about, under the street lights.  Then she spotted what looked like
Dunbar, just arriving on the scene.  At least the hat was similar.  In no time,
then, the hatted man raced toward the building and entered.  “It looks like
Dunbar is coming up.”

Martina had seen it
too.  She also saw several uniformed officers swarm into the building, directly
behind him.  She then went to the door where she pushed aside the brass cover
plate and put an eye to the peep hole.  Moments later, seeing Dunbar huffing
and puffing toward her, she unlatched the door and pulled it open.

“Where’s Gloria?” were
the first words from his mouth as he came through the door, gun in hand.  “Oh,
there you are!”  He spotted her coming from the bedroom.  “You two okay?”

“We’re fine,” Marti
said.  “What happened down there?”  Her words, however, fell on deaf ears.

Dunbar looked around
the room, then went back to the door to confront the officers arriving. 
“They’re okay,” he said exhaustedly.  “Check every nook and cranny on your way
down.  I want two men on the front door from here on out.  Nobody leaves this
building unless they are confirmed residents.  Understood?”

“Got it,” one of the
officers said and herded the others back toward the stairs.

Dunbar closed the door
and made the revolver disappear under his jacket.  “We have a situation.”

Hearing that, both
Martina and Gloria stood before him in their robes, arms folded, mouths agape,
waiting for more.

“Ben Ripley is dead! 
And, apparently, so is Officer Bright.  They found him in an alley across the
street.”

But even before he had
finished, both women were wearing shocked expressions, eyes glassing over.

“How?” Martina asked. 
She hadn’t heard any gunshots.

Dunbar ignored the
question.  “I take it you two never heard or saw anything unusual?”  His eyes
went back and forth between their faces.

Gloria answered with a
head shake.  Martina, however, began to form words and glanced to Gloria before
speaking: “There was a phone call.”

“What phone call?” he
leaped at the opportunity for a lead.

“The guy just said:
They can’t protect you.” Gloria blurted.

“What guy.  Who was
it?  Did you recognize the voice?”

Gloria shrugged.  “The
voice was muffled,” she said uneasily, and glanced to Martina.

“Did you hear it,
Martina?” Dunbar asked.

“No.  I was in the
bathroom.  I did hear the phone ring, though.  I thought it was Lenny.”

“Who’s this Lenny?”

“Lenny is a bartender
at Hannity’s.  He was worried for our safety, when we left there earlier. 
Without us being aware, he called the police.”

“Then what happened?” 
It was all Dunbar could do to keep from shouting, he was so angry.  He had
specifically asked them to stay close to home, preferably in the apartment when
not working their individual jobs.  Especially at night!  But then, he was
unaware that Martina worked partially at night, now.

“Officer Rip…”  Marti
paused, finding it hard to continue.  “The two officers found us walking, and
brought us home.”

So that’s why they were
parked out front.  “Did Ripley walk you up?”

“He did,” Martina
responded.  “Ben said you told him to be extra vigilant.  Thank you,
Lieutenant.  Otherwise, we could be dead now.”

At the moment, even
though it was good to know, that seemed little consolation for the loss of two
good officers.  Both of which he held in high esteem.

What Martina just said
caught Gloria off guard.  She just now realized the consequences of her having
gone to Hannity’s after work.  It had been against Martina’s, as well as
Dunbar’s, better wishes.  And now having realized her mistake, she began to
cry.

Seeing that, Dunbar
took her by the arms.  “You have to stay with me, Gloria.  There’s more I need
to know.  Okay?”

Gloria nodded
miserably, feeling his glare.

“Now, let’s get back to
the phone call.  Were there any background noises?  Anything of that nature? 
Or was it stony quiet?”

“It was quiet, I
guess.  I don’t recall hearing anything except his breathing.”

“Breathing?  How did he
breathe?  Was it rapid breathing, or normal, or like his mouth was too close to
the phone?  You said before, the voice was muffled.  What was the breathing
like?”

“I don’t know!” Gloria
shouted out.  “You’re confusing me!”  Gloria went to the couch and fell on it. 
“Okay.”  She scrambled off the couch and marched to the phone and picked it
up.  Then, using a finger to kill the dial tone, she said, “Hello.”  She
paused.  “I hear nothing, so I say hello, again.  Now I hear breathing — it’s
gasping — as if he’d been running.  Then, in a muffled voice, he
said what he said.”

Pay phone? Dunbar
wondered.  Where’s the closest pay phone?  He must have run from the scene to a
phone somewhere, that’s why he was winded.  That also told him the perpetrator
must not have had a vehicle close by.  Why run to the phone, if he did?

“Which was?” Dunbar
persisted.

“Like I told you: They
can’t protect you,” she said, putting on a deeper voice.

“You’re positive it was
a man?”

“Yes.”

“Could it have been
Raym Koffee?”

“I was thinking that,
but how could I say it?  The voice was muffled.”

“At the time when you
first heard the voice, did you think of Raym?”

“I believe I did, yes. 
But that could have been because I was thinking it was him before I picked up. 
I almost didn’t, the feeling was so strong.”

“So, you actually had a
premonition that Raym was calling?”

“Sounds strange,
doesn’t it?  But I swear that’s what happened.”  Gloria took on a pleading
look.

“That isn’t the only
strange thing that happened,” Marti volunteered.  “Today I went out to buy a
night dress for Gloria, and guess who showed up in the store where I shopped?”

“Raym Koffee?” Dunbar
guessed.

“Exactly!  And a few
hours later a delivery man showed up at Spencer House, with an anonymous gift
of a black nightie for Gloria, from the same shop.  Do you think that was
coincidental?  I think the man followed me there, and the purchase of the
nightie was an afterthought.  A way of sending another threat.  Black is
symbolic of death, is it not?”

Dunbar pulled out a
notebook.  “What’s the name of the shop?” he asked.

“Natalie’s.”

“On Main?”

“Yes.”

“Okay.  Well, I have
things to take care of downstairs,” Dunbar said, and turned for the door.  “You
two sit tight.  I’ll wait by the door until you lock up.”

“Lieutenant,” Gloria
said.  “Thank you.  I have no doubt our lives were spared tonight because of
you and your people.”  She watered up again.

With that, Dunbar
turned back to her.  “Save that for the families of those two fine young
officers.  They’ll be grateful to hear it.”

“Yes, sir.  Then, I’ll
see to it that they do.”