Time Out of Mind (49 page)

“
Good morning.” He showed his teeth. “I'm Raymond
Lesko.”

The face looking back at him reminded Lesko of Marine
top sergeants he'd known. It was square-jawed, deeply
weathered, and topped with a stiff brush of hair gone
mostly gray, The eyes were blue and rock-steady except for
a brief light of recognition that the man was not quite able to control.

”
I beg your pardon?” Lesko saw a movement of the
man's shoulder as he spoke.

“
And your name is Tom Burke, I betcha. A guy named
Ed Garvey works for you, but I think he's on sick leave
now.”

“
Move your car, buddy,” the man said quietly.

Lesko leaned closer, dropping his voice to a confidential
tone. ”I don't want to embarrass you or anything, but a
guy who's head of Security shouldn't get blocked in when
he's doing a tail. You
are
just doing a tail, aren't you,
Tom?”

“
Move it now”—the shoulder did something else—“or
I'll get out and move it for you.”

.Lesko held up one finger and slid back behind the wheel.
He made a show of putting Mr. Makowski's car in park, then shutting off the engine. He held up the ignition key
for the other man to see, stuck out his tongue, and placed
the key on its center. Tom Burke blinked at him.

“
Here's another thing,” Lesko slurred wetly, gesturing
toward the windshield of the BMW, “doing a job like this, I'm a little surprised you'd drive around with a Beckwith Hotels parking sticker on your car. How about your gun?
Can I see it? Do you at least have the right kind of
weapon?”

The square jaw reddened at its jowls but the hard blue
eyes went slack. What kind of dingo is this, Lesko could
see him wondering. That was good. Lesko stuck out his
tongue, showing the key again, then tucked it back between
his teeth. “Except, whatever you got, don't shoot me with
it.” He felt for the left door lock behind him and snapped
it down. “You shoot me, then first you have to come over
here and smash this window to get the door open, then you
have to pry the key out of my mouth so you can move the
car, but by then I'll probably have swallowed the damned
thing. First thing you know we'll both have parking tick
ets.”

“
Look what's in my hand, Tom.” Lesko brought his
right hand into view and tapped the barrel of his .38 against

the doorpost. “See? I'm showing you my weapon. Now
you have to show me yours.”

Burke showed no sign of fear, only calculation and con
trolled fury. His chances, he knew, were next to none in
terms of advantage. The best he could hope for was a stand
off. He could simply sit still. This Lesko character would
not shoot. Not with witnesses on the street.

“
Okay,” Burke piped. “Easy. Just take it easy.” Slowly,
carefully, he lifted the wooden pistol grip of a cut-down
shotgun into Lesko's view. Lesko snatched it with his left
hand and pulled it into his car, where he dropped it into
the floor well. His hand came back into the other man's
face, snapping its fingers and showing an empty palm.

“
Your piece, your holdout,” he hissed. “Let's have it.”

Carefully, as before, Tom Burke produced a gleaming
Beretta automatic. For a moment he held it beyond Lesko's
reach. “Take the clip,” he begged. “It's enough you just
take the clip.” Lesko's eyes bulged again and he took the
breath for another scream. Burke slapped the gun into his
palm. He winced as Lesko threw it clattering against the
other. Lesko leaned back into his car. With his own gun
held out of sight but ready, he looked over his right shoul
der. Corbin, Gwen Leamas, and Harry Sturdevant had
reached the parking garage down toward Madison and were
pausing at its entrance ramp. He saw the Leamas woman
looking around, upward, as if for the source of the peculiar
shout she'd heard. She seemed more curious than alarmed.
But not Sturdevant. Sturdevant looked nervous. He touched
her arm, and all three disappeared down the ramp.

That coat!” Lesko pointed to a folded trench coat on Tom Burke's passenger seat. ‘Take out your wallet, put it
in the coat pocket. Do it now.” Burke obeyed. “Now your keys.” Burke freed a large ring from the steering column and moved to disconnect his ignition key. “All of ‘em. In
the pocket. Now. Then gimme the coat.” White with silent
rage, Burke did so. He thought of arguing for all the keys
Lesko had no business having, all the new locks that would be needed on so many Beckwith properties, of the punish
ment he'd face for surrendering them, but he looked at
Lesko's insane face and at Lesko's fingers, which were
pressed hard against his temple as if in an effort to control
a building madness, and he handed the weighted coat
through the window. Lesko threw it.on the floor.

Lesko listened. From behind his car he heard the whine
of another engine climbing a ramp in low gear. Once more he glanced over his right shoulder to see Sturdevant's Mer
cedes pause at the curb cut, its turn signal flashing. Two
heads, Corbin's and Leamas's, were visible in the back seat.

“
Shhhh!” he whispered across to the BMW. “Shut your
eyes real tight so they won't see you. Shut them now.”
Burke' s eyes glazed at the lunacy of Lesko's order, but he
shut them. “I'll count ten,” Lesko told him. “When I say ten you can peek. If you cheat, though, that's very bad.”

Lesko began counting as the Mercedes hummed past his
back. At five he spat the key from his mouth and started
his engine. He was at eight when Sturdevant reached the corner traffic light and disappeared left onto Fifth Avenue.
At ten, Lesko squealed away, leaving the Beckwith security
chief blinking in helpless disbelief.

A block ahead, Harry Sturdevant's Mercedes signaled
left onto Second Avenue. Lesko followed, staying well be
hind until Sturdevant signaled again at Seventy-seventh
Street. The English girl's place, he knew. Let's hope they're
not going to hang around there too long. A BMW's a bitch
to hot-wire, but Burke could have a spare key stashed. Let's
also hope Ed Garvey didn't leave a mess so we don't have a call to the cops slowing down the action here.

He waited as Corbin and Gwen Leamas left Sturdevant
with the double-parked car and climbed over a snow mound
toward her door. As on Sixty-ninth Street, there were no p
arking spots except where curb cuts had been cleared. A
half dozen other cars were double-parked. Lesko pulled in
behind a station wagon. Sturdevant, who'd seemed a bit
uneasy when he left his house, showed no sign that he was
concerned about being followed. But he was drumming his
fingers on the dash. Probably a little antsy about those two
calls this morning. Lesko leaned over and lifted a corner
of Tom Burke's raincoat. The shotgun, he recognized, was
a Remington 1100, a five-shot automatic. At least a foot
and a half of barrel, as well as most of the stock from the
pistol grip on back, had been cut away. He whistled. If he'd
been five minutes later, just a few more cars on the road
or the Midtown Tunnel Tolls down to one lane, he would
have arrived just in time to see the three of them splattered
all over Sixty-ninth Street.