OVER HER DEAD BODY: The Bliss Legacy - Book 2 (26 page)

She looked at him as if he were crazy, then shook her head and cursed. “So that’s what the nun meant about you and her taking care of things. You running off and playing hero, guns blazing.” She glared at him. “No fucking way.”

“You got a better idea?” He knew she didn’t, recognized she was panicked, waffling between flight or fight. Best she let off some steam.

“You don’t get it, do you?” she said. “The son of a bitch has already shot off my brother’s finger. He’ll kill him if I don’t do things his way, get him what he wants.” The distraught woman of last night was gone, replaced by a hard-faced woman in crisp black slacks and a red power sweater. This morning Erica Stark was all business. Her eyes were knife sharp when she added, “You’re security around here, right?”

“That’s right.”

Her look was speculative when she said, “Whatever she’s paying you, I’ll double it.”

“Sorry. I’m not in the market for a new boss.”

“I’ll make it worth your while. Just get me what I need … please.”

Her lame attempt at getting to him by tacking on a
please
carried the weight of the dry toast he’d picked up from her tray. “What exactly is it that you need?”

“The names of my long-lost sister and her mother.” She planted her hands on her hips. He noticed she still had the bandage on her right hand.

Gus took a bite of the toast and studied the aggressive woman in front of him. She was ambitious, bitchy, goddamn mean—and scared shitless about her brother. Whoever Mace was, he had her terrified.

“Not sure that long-lost sister is going to be too happy to make your acquaintance,” he said.

Her mouth slackened. “You already know who the bitch is?”

“Uh-huh.” He left the room to silence.

“And the mother. You know her name, too?”

Gus chewed on the dry toast, said nothing.

“Tell me,” she demanded. “I’ll triple the deal.”

“We don’t have a deal to triple.”

He heard the door close, then Keeley’s voice. “Gus can’t be bought, Erica,” she said. “You’ll meet your sister when the time is right. In the meantime, you can tell us about your father—and his connection to this house.”

Keeley came up beside him, and with her came the scent of roses and lemon. She slipped her hand in his, and while her hand tightened around his fingers, her trust tightened around his heart.

Erica shot a knowing, impatient look at their joined hands. “I figured there was something going on with you two.”

Keeley glanced up at Gus, her face sober. “Not yet, but I’m working on it.”

Gus met her gaze: it was steady enough, but as perplexed now as it had been earlier, when he’d walked out of her bedroom and taken his messed-up feelings with him. He’d spent what was left of the night trying to tidy them up, and still wasn’t sure how, or if, this new idea of his would play out, an idea that shot his nerves more effectively than Erica’s damn Glock could ever do.

When he squeezed Keeley’s hand, she closed her eyes briefly as if to block him out, then again looked at Erica. Good idea, Keeley, he thought, concentrate on the matter at hand. Time enough for their … thing when this was over.

“Now about your father, Erica,” she said. “Tell us about him. Everything. Maybe between us we can put the pieces together and do something for your brother—and sister.” She let go of Gus’s hand and gave him a get-on-board with this idea look.
Not a problem.

“Sounds like a plan to me,” he said. He picked up Erica’s phone from the bed, hit redial, listened, and clicked off. He tossed the phone back on the bed.

“They’re at the Jasper.” He looked at Erica. “And now that’s settled, we’ve got time to hear your side of things. You either help me get your brother out of there, or I do it my way. Your choice.”

“Shit!” She finger-combed her long dark hair off her temples, sighed noisily, then sat on the edge of the bed. “You know about the call from the Weaver woman?”

They both nodded.

“At first it didn’t make any sense,” she said. “All her yammering about forgiveness, us having a sister, her killing our ‘daddy,’ but then we got to thinking about it, because the dates matched. Fall, nineteen eighty. That’s when my father, the late, great Jimmy Stark, took off and the last time any of us ever saw him. I was ten or so; Paul was thirteen. To be honest, I never missed the son of a bitch, because as fathers went, he wasn’t much. Always busy with the business.”

“He made those movies, too, then,” Keeley said.

Erica shot her a hard look. “Yeah,
Sister
Keeley, he made ‘those movies.’ Damn good at it, too. The movies weren’t the problem. The problem was he couldn’t keep his hands off the hired help.” She got up and went to the window. “Paul knew he was fucking one of the actresses, a newcomer named Icy Cream. We figured they’d run off together. End of story.”

“Icy Cream. That would be a stage name.” Keeley again.

“Unless she had an ice cream wagon for a mother, yes, I’d say it was a stage name,” Erica said, her voice dripping scorn. “Most porn actors use a pseudonym. They’re not exactly panting to let the folks back home know they make their livings off their genitalia.”

“No, I don’t suppose they would,” Keeley said. If she found this conversation unsettling, she was doing a masterful job of hiding it.

“You judging me?” Erica’s eyes were flame hot.

“Do you see a robe and gavel?”

“No, what I see is a goddamn halo.”

Keeley waved a hand through the empty air above her head. “Darn thing, follows me everywhere.” She gave Erica a steely look. “Now stop being defensive, and tell us about Icy Cream. Everything you know.”

Erica’s stubborn expression didn’t soften. “I’m not defensive, just not sure you can handle it. Maybe I should just talk to your boyfriend here.”

Keeley ignored her. “Surely an actress had to give her real name somewhere along the line, payroll, taxes, that kind of thing.”

Erica looked briefly upward and took on a long-suffering look.

As irritating, abrasive women went, Gus put her in the top ten. “Talk,” he said.

“Okay, okay. The thing is back then, nobody did ‘payroll, or that kind of thing.’ Dad ran his business on cash. Actors, crew, suppliers. All of it. He played it safe. Most actors were paid the day they did their work. A lot of them made one film and you never saw them again. Some came back for more. From what we can figure—and you can bet we scoured the archives—Icy Cream was a one-film wonder. I guess she decided it was more lucrative to spend her time banging the producer than bouncing on bedsprings with a bunch of unknown hard-ons every day.” She glanced at Keeley and raised a brow, as if waiting for a reaction. She got none.

“And your mother?” Gus said. “She never looked for Jimmy, never wondered what happened to him?” Erica rubbed her rounded stomach, then shook her head. “The bastard broke my mother’s heart, but the answer to your question is no. She just snorted more coke. The day he left, he put a sizable chunk of cash in her account, said he wouldn’t be back. That was good enough for her.”

“Do you have the film?” he asked. “The one starring Icy Cream?”

“Yeah, the woman had some good moves, but it’s a shitty film. The master’s in Seattle, but I had Paul make up a disk. It’s at the Jasper with him.” Mentioning the Jasper turned her edgy again.

“Does anyone else know about the movie?” he asked. “Anyone associated with Starrier?”

“No.”

“The man holding your brother?”

“No. Why the hell would we tell him? First off, the guy has a habit of shooting people’s fingers off, and second—”

“It might ruin your blackmail scheme,” Keeley said calmly, adding, “Anyone ever tell you you’re not a very nice human being?”

“There’s the halo again,” Erica sniped.

“What you’ve done, you’ve done, and whether I approve or disapprove doesn’t matter,” she said. “But your children deserve someone better than a blackmailer and a pornographer for a mother, Erica. You’re not stupid, you have to know that.”

“Christ, you sound exactly like Paul.” She looked as if she might explode.

“How about we get back to the business of saving your brother’s life?” Gus interjected. “You make him sound as if he’s worth the effort.” Gus rubbed his scar. “We need that disk.” And if it proved Icy Cream was who he thought she was, he needed to make sure Hagan never got his oily hands on it. “Call the Jasper. Tell Mace you’ve found what he’s looking for and that you’ll bring it to the Jasper as soon as you can get away.”

“You’re crazy!” Erica’s eyes, heavy with dread and concern, shot to his. “That asshole catches me lying, he’ll kill Paul. He’ll kill all of us.”

“Nobody’s going to get killed.”
I hope.

“You can’t risk the babies,” Keeley said firmly. “No way.”

“I don’t plan to,” Gus said. “Those babies are staying right here with you, at Mayday House.”

“Then how in hell are you going to get in the motel room?” Erica asked.

“With a short recording.” He held up his cell phone. “And your key.”

“You’re crazy.”

“Impatient, too.” Gus figured she was right about the crazy, but getting Paul Stark out of that motel room wouldn’t be made easier by wasting time. “No time like the present.”

“I’m going with you,” Keeley said. “I am a nurse, remember. I can help Paul.”

“Not a chance.” He shook his head for emphasis. “If Paul’s made it this far, he can make it here on his own. So forget the heroics. This is a one
man
operation. You’re staying here.”

The look she shot him was lethal. “Then we should call in the police.”

Erica shot to her feet “No cops! All they’d do is fuck things up. A whiff of blue and Mace’ll kill Paul in a heartbeat. I’ll eat my goddamn key first. You got that?” Erica stopped, jerked, and scrunched her face in pain. “Goddamn it!” She clutched her back and straightened.

Keeley rushed to her. “Sit down. Now.”

Gus looked at Keeley. “She’s right about the cops, but I need the key and I need it now. And a short tape recording.”

Gus parked on the street behind the Jasper a block away, got out of the car, pulled his jacket collar up against the rain, and started to walk. Less than five minutes later he was across the street from the brightly painted but badly aging motel. He studied its two-floor structure closely.

Room eleven, where Mace was holed up with Paul, yielded a lucky break. It was at the far end of the lower floor near the stairwell, and only one room, ten, bordered it.

Other advantages: none of the doors on the rooms had peepholes, the day was dark, and it was raining like a bitch, which kept people indoors and sound muted.

If his luck held, room ten was vacant. He clicked on his cell phone, called the Jasper, and asked to be connected to ten. When a man’s voice grumped a hello into his ear, he hung up.

Not lucky.

He shrugged deeper into his jacket and crossed the street. He had one chance, but he’d have to be fast. Very fast.

He came up on the room’s door from its blind side, the stairwell leading to the second floor. Positioning himself tight to the door, to avoid detection from the windows on the other side, he rapped sharply three times.

“Who is it?” a tired voice said. He figured it for Paul.

He inserted Erica’s key in the lock and put the miniature tape recorder against the door. “It’s Erica.” Pause. “I’ve got it. I’ve got it, Paul.” Erica was good. She sounded both nervous and excited. Perfect.

Slipping his phone into his pocket, he turned the key and shoved into the room, Erica’s gun in his left hand.

“Everybody easy,” he ordered, and kicked the door closed behind him.

“What the—”

Gus scanned the room in one sweep. Same as the one he’d been in. Long and narrow, bathroom in the back, two beds. TV on.

One man lying on the bed closest to the bathroom, hand wrapped in a towel. Tall, thin, and sheet white.
Paul.

Second man, Mace, on the bed nearest the door, big, overly muscled—and lightning fast.

On the bed one second, off it the next, Mace rolled to the floor. Gun in hand. A split second from surprise to armed and dangerous.

Shit!

Gus leveled his gun at the bed, the point closest to where he thought Mace would be, and slipped some cold steel insurance from his wrist sheath into his right palm. “Get rid of the gun, Mace,” he ordered. “Or I’ll get rid of you.”

“Sure, buddy, anything you say.” A muffled voice came from behind the bed.

Next came a gun barrel. “Your turn to drop it, asshole.” The gun barrel came further into view, as did Mace’s head, his eyes, like the gun, aimed at Gus’s gut.

Then came a goddamn pillow swung fast and hard to the back of Mace’s head. Mace’s neck jerked and the gun wobbled.

Paul swung again. “You son of a bitch! Threatening my sister. You son of a bitch!” He kept swinging.

A blizzard of feathers exploded into the room. Mace turned his head.

Gus took his chance and threw. Blood spurted from Mace’s ear. Gus switched the gun from his left to his right hand, but with Paul cursing and bashing at Mace with what was left of the pillow, he couldn’t get a clear shot.

It was nuts. While Paul unleashed his wild, one-armed assault, someone on the TV talked about bad breath, the guy next door banged on the wall, and Mace growled like a rabid dog.

Through the swirl of dusty feathers, and holding his hand to his bloodied ear, Mace roared up and off his knees. In a blur of motion, he slammed Paul against the headboard, put his head down, and tackled Gus in the mid-section.

Gus went down hard, his breath leaving him in a harsh, abrupt rush. He started to get up, and Mace went for him again, intent on ramming his gun into Gus’s head. Gus shifted in time, but caught a grazing blow over his right ear. He didn’t black out, but the stars and pulsing lights in his skull stopped him long enough for Mace to make the door, fling it open, and take off.

By the time Gus lurched to his feet and got to the door, the bastard was gone.

There was a thump on the wall, and a man’s voice yelled, “Put a lid on it in there or I’ll call the fuckin’ manager.”

Gus stumbled to the nearest bed and sat down. Holding his head between his hands to gray down the kaleidoscope of colors his brain was mired in, he caught his breath. Then he cursed.