Death in Paradise (45 page)

Laura was a child. Whatever we adults might be up to, with our plots and schemes and tortured relationships, Laura was an innocent kid who had fallen into the midst of things. I had encouraged her to get involved, and highlighted her in the eyes of the bad guys by my presence. Now I had to get her out of this. A strong voice reminded me that I had more reasons than ever not to get involved. To stay behind my locked door and be very, very careful.

What was the old expression? Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean they aren't out to get you? Yeah. That was it. Earlier tonight I had vowed not to trust anyone. But I'd spilled everything to Jonetta. I trusted her. I loved her. I needed her backing me up. And yet. And yet. But it wasn't Netta. It was circumstances. With so much unknown and unpredictable, I felt an edge of uncertainty, an urge to be secretive. The clock was running as my feelings ricocheted. If I could trust anyone, it was Jonetta. But could I trust anyone?

I flushed the toilet, just to make it look like I was still engaged in appropriate bathroom business, and turned on the water. While it ran, I picked up the phone. One of the beauties of a suite is the phone in the bathroom—important people are assumed to want never to be far from their phones. Regardless of what I decided to do, I was going to leave a trail behind me. As I fumbled Bernstein's card out of my pocket, I realized that the phone was being used. I heard buttons being punched in, and then my messages were announced and Rory began to speak.

I opened the door and stuck my head out. "Netta... oh, sorry. I didn't know you were on the phone...."

She turned, suddenly, guiltily, I thought. "I was just going to check on that room service," she said. "Seems like they've been an awful long time." She looked pointedly at her watch. "And speaking of time..."

Checking on room service? At a time like this? And anyway, that's not what she'd been doing. Not long ago, I had been chilled by fear, then stunned by lethargy. Now sweat trickled down my back. My heart was pounding. Like a jet on the runway, revving its engines before take off, I was gearing up.

"Right," I said. "I'll be out in a minute." I closed the door and picked up the phone again. This time there was a dial tone. I called Bernstein's beeper, and then called the number for the police station. When the dispatcher answered, I said, "Is this call being recorded?"

"Yes, ma'am," he said. "How may I help you?"

"I don't have time to tell you," I said. "It's an emergency. This is related to the hotel murder and the murder at the hospital tonight. I just want to talk to the tape." Sometimes in life you get lucky. He didn't interrupt, he just let me talk. I told the tape, as rapidly and briefly as I could, who I was, why I was calling, everything Jonetta and I had discussed and what was going on. Then I said to the dispatcher, "Please get this to Detectives Bernstein and Nihilani as soon as possible. And can someone call the hotel and have them preserve my messages?"

As I spoke, I was pulling on my running shorts under my sundress and pulling a tank top out of my bag. Clearing the decks for action, so to speak. One cannot move fast in a long, billowy sundress.

"Will do," he said. He sounded as eager to get off the line as I was.

Then, because even the Lone Ranger usually had Tonto, I called security and asked for Naveen, Alyce Edgerton's handsome friend. Better the devil you know than the devil you don't. Once again I got lucky. I explained as quickly as I could who I was and why I was calling, and then I asked if he could arrange to follow me unobtrusively when I left the hotel. He seemed delighted to oblige.

I couldn't reasonably stay in the bathroom any longer. As if she'd read my mind, Jonetta pounded on the door. "Thea, are you all right? We've got to do something."

I opened the door and went out, feeling like a prisoner marching to her execution.

"Now can we call the police?" she said.

"You call them. I've got to go. I wish you'd come with me, Netta. I'd feel a whole lot safer."

"The only way to be safe is to stay right here."

But Laura's voice was screaming in my head. "Laura's not safe." I picked up the laptop.

"So you're determined to go?" she asked.

I nodded.

Jonetta sighed. "Just stay cool and use your head. I'll call the police."

It didn't sound like much of a plan. "Give me a few minutes and then follow me, Netta. The end of the parking lot closest to town. That's what they said. Will you at least do that?" I couldn't tell whether she nodded or not. I thought she did. I tucked the laptop under my arm and walked out. Stood outside leaning against the wall. Counted to ten. Let myself back in. Jonetta was on the phone but when she saw me, she replaced the receiver without saying anything. I pointed ruefully at my bare feet. "Forgot my shoes," I said. Quickly, I put on running shoes and socks, very elegant with my new sundress, and left again.

My pounding heart was a rich, strong throb that reassured me that I was alive even if I didn't know for how long. Was there another heartbeat within me? Was I putting little Mason or Claudine at risk? Risking one child to rescue another? I really was going to have to get out of this business. This was no job for a mother. Far too risky. When I told casual acquaintances that I was a consultant, I could see the bored glaze steal over their faces. What if they knew the truth—that I had the world's most dangerous job? How many of them walked out to meet a gang of killers, with only a can of Mace in one pocket and an alarm in the other?

I left the laptop with the concierge with instructions to give it to no one but myself or the Maui police, amazed at my ability to sound calm and lucid when my insides were writhing like a barrel of eels. I'd promised Bernstein I'd wait for his people, and give it only to them. But what could I do? I already knew the rooms weren't safe and I couldn't take it with me. Feeling his curious stare against my unprotected back, I opened the door and stepped out into the soft tropical night.

As soon as I was in relative darkness, I stripped off the bright sundress, rolled it into a ball, and stuck it under a bush. Then, with the roar of my heart matching the external cacophony of the insects, I strode off down the parking lot.

 

 

 

Chapter 31

 

The parking lot represented the triumph of atmosphere over practicality. Despite the fact that it was supposed to serve as a place for guests to park their cars and thus, presumably, to enable those guests to find the cars again at a later date, the lights were low and dim, mostly illuminating the dense shrubbery with small pools of green and orange. Useful if you are less than two feet tall and can see in the dark. Not so good for a weary almost six-footer with rubbery legs. My teeth were chattering. Halfway down the long lot, I stumbled over an irregularity in the tar and twisted my ankle, knocking heavily into a parked car.

Like something from a bad movie, the car erupted into speech, commanding me to back away from the vehicle, followed by an assortment of whoops and bells and whistles. If I had ever hoped that my approach might be silent and subtle, that hope died. I staggered away from the noise and hurried across the space between the parking aisles, crouching between two cars until the clamor died down. No one came rushing to see what the problem was. The night remained still and empty. I stepped cautiously out and began walking again, squinting against the darkness to see where the lot ended. A faint mist hung in the air, giving everything a soft, amorphous quality. I seemed to be walking through a place from one of my dreams, an endless landscape. I could walk forever through that unpeopled, roaring night and never arrive.

I heard the distant crunch of tires and the soft purring of an engine. As I turned to see where it was, there was a sudden roar, the squeal of tires and a blinding glare as headlights came on and the car raced straight at me. I sprinted for the closer row of parked cars, hurling myself up onto a hood as the car rushed past, so close I felt the side of it thump against my flying foot. I didn't wait to see if they'd come back. I rolled off the hood, ran, crouching, in front of the cars, along the edge of the shrubs until I was several cars away. Then I crawled under a car and lay there, panting, trying to smother my breath with my hands. Trembling. Waiting. Nursing a savage fury.

A tank top and running shorts were great for moving swiftly and lithely through the darkness. They were not so good for lying on the ground under a car. I was acutely aware of the bumps in the tar and the gravel beneath me, of the new bruises I was getting on top of the old. I was also aware of how my five months in Detective Lemieux's fitness camp were paying off. A well-tuned body is like a quality watch—it takes a licking and it keeps on ticking. I shifted around so I could pat my pockets to be sure I hadn't lost my Mace or my alarm. They were still with me. I'd have preferred an Uzi at this point, but I'm sure that if I'd had one there'd be as much danger that I'd shoot myself as that I'd shoot one of them. Andre keeps offering to teach me to use a gun; so far, I've resisted.

A friend of mine, who scuba dives, liked to talk about the woman on one of her dives who had a knife strapped to her ankle. "Not my thing," she'd said, "but I suppose it makes sense. You never know what you might get tangled up in and when you're going to need it. And boy did it look cool." As my vision of myself changed, as I was forced to confront myself as a woman who needed to learn to defend herself, the image of a strong, tough woman with a knife strapped to her ankle became more appealing. Like my friend said, you never know what you're going to get tangled up in. I could have used it right now. I would have used it now.

I heard a car go by again, very slowly this time, and the murmur of voices. I stayed put and waited. Eventually both faded away. I was alone in the loud night and woefully late for my rendezvous with killers. Just thinking about it spooked me. Finally I crawled out from beneath the car, dusted the gravel and sand off, and headed down the parking lot again.

I reached the end of the lot without incident but there was no one there. I walked slowly along the row of cars parked there, checking each one. All the cars were empty. I did find one with a warm hood suggesting it had recently been driven but there was no one inside and no one nearby. I tried the doors. It was locked.

Limping a little to favor my tender ankle, I began the long walk back through the lot, staying close to the parked cars this time, primed to dive for cover if necessary. My neck, already bruised and sore from that earlier pair of homicidal hands, ached from the constant swiveling of my head. A breeze had come up, raising goose bumps on my bare arms and legs. Against the backdrop of insect noise, there was now the occasional startling rasp of a stiff leaf being propelled across the rough, tarred surface. Each time one moved, I jumped.

As I walked, I wondered. Had they lured me out here just so they could run me down? They wouldn't have gotten me out just so they could get in my room again; I didn't have anything they wanted except the laptop, and I was supposed to have brought that with me. And meanwhile, what was happening to Laura? Was she all right?

Ahead of me, a dark shape stepped out from between two cars, blocking my path. I handled it like the soul of tact and cunning that I am. I put both hands over my mouth and screamed.

The figure jumped back, startled. "Please, Ms. Kozak. Don't scream. It's me. Naveen."

"Naveen? Where have you been? I thought you were watching my back."

"I have been all the time right behind you."

"Even when someone tried to run me down?"

"I don't understand," he said. "You came through the lobby in your peach-colored dress and nodded at me. I followed you out the ocean side of the hotel, around the hotel to this parking lot... then I lost you for a few minutes and now I've found you again."

So much for having someone watching my back. Naveen hadn't been there after all. Who knew who he'd been following? And no sign of Jonetta, either, I noticed. There had been no one there. In an act of belated caution, I grabbed his arm and pulled him down between two cars. "I didn't nod at you," I whispered. "That wasn't me you were following."

"Then who was I—"

I heard footsteps across the lot. I pulled him farther back into the shadows. "Someone else," I whispered. "Probably Linda Janovich. She looks a little like me from the back, I've been told. Do you hear those footsteps?"

We held our breath and listened. Now it sounded like more than one person. Then a voice, very clear and distinct. "Thea Kozak? I know you're there. Just stand up slowly and come out from between those cars."

I stood up, very slowly, motioning for Naveen to stay put. Maybe, if I was lucky, they hadn't seen him. I stepped out into the driving aisle and waited. The cool wind brushed my bare arms and legs, sending little shivers down them.

"Very good. Now turn around and head toward the end of the parking lot again."

How the heck could he see so well, when I couldn't see anything? Maybe he had a night scope. You could buy them for a song these days. Suzanne's stepson wanted one for his birthday and he'd piled up a stack of catalogues with the appropriate pages marked. Thanks to the miracle of mail order, the whole world could be equipped like a squad of Navy SEALs. I closed my eyes and opened them again. Looked around. There he was. Quite close now. "Where is Laura?" I asked. "Is she all right?"