Vegas Vengeance (8 page)

One of the marble-size lights was flashing.

A red light.

“What's wrong, Barbara?”

She shook her head and hit one of the toggles. “Something triggered one of the sensors out back. It alerts the computer, and the computer sets off chimes in my suite.” She held her finger to her lips as she adjusted a volume knob. “Listen!”

At first, Hawker could hear nothing but the hollow buzz of the outdoor microphone. But then his ears focused on a familiar sound: the whispered grind of footsteps on gravel. Slow footsteps. Careful footsteps.

The woman left the volume on and reached for the telephone. “I'm calling the police, Hawk. Those bastards need to be stopped, and stopped now.”

Hawker placed his hand over hers so she couldn't take the phone from the cradle. “No. Not yet. I'm going out there.”

She grabbed his sleeve as she stepped toward the door. “Please don't, Hawk! You don't know how many of them there are. And they might have guns, for Christ's sake!”

The rush of adrenaline caused him to sweep her hand away harder than he had planned. “Have I criticized your business, told you how to run it, Barbara?”

“No … no, you haven't, Hawk.”

“Then don't tell me how to run mine.”

Hawker moved quickly down the hall into the main suite. He peered through the glass wall, let his eyes adjust to the shadows of tropical garden, the onyx mirror of swimming pool.

No one there.

Hawker patted his jacket, damning himself for not taking the time to replace the lost Walther with another from his armament store shipped to him by Jacob Montgomery Hayes.

Another mistake.

When in the hell had he become so sloppy?

Maybe it was the to-hell-with-tomorrow attitude carefully cultivated by the people of Las Vegas.

Whatever the reason, he had to get over it, get over it damn quick.

Or he would end up all too dead.

Hawker peeled his trouser leg up over his calf.

He still had the Randall Model 18 Attack/Survival.

And the Randall had pulled him through more than one tight spot.

Hawker balanced the cool steel of the knife in his right hand as he made his way through the living room to the side exit. He cracked the door open, then stepped through.

It was a clear Nevada night. An August night with low humidity and stars that glistened through the black light-years like ice shards. The desert wind was warm on his face, and he could smell the musk of the tropical garden and the chlorine odor of the swimming pool.

Hawker closed the door behind him and followed the stone walk to the back of the house. The walk was edged by some kind of tall African grass, higher than his head.

The landscaper had chosen river rock over sod for the backyard. Less maintenance. The footfall they had heard had been in gravel.

Hawker knew the interloper was out back someplace. Someplace in the shadows; someplace waiting, watching.

It didn't take him long to find out exactly where.

Hawker heard a door creak open, and he turned to see Barbara Blaine peeking out. He had been crouched in the shadows, but now he stood to wave her back inside.

When he did, something hit him from behind. A man, hiding in the tall grass. A big man with a big belly and wide shoulders. A man who grunted and wheezed and smelled faintly of alcohol.

The impact knocked Hawker tumbling and whipped his neck back painfully.

But it didn't knock the knife from his hand.

The man stood glowering over Hawker. He raised his right hand—an aiming pose. In the darkness, the handgun looked more like a chunk of coal. Absently Hawker noticed that the man carried something beneath his left arm. Something the size of a shoebox.

And Hawker also realized that he was going to be shot. Realized there was nothing he could do about it. Saw it all as from some higher platform of observation: saw the gun lift toward him; saw himself sprawled on the gravel; knew the man could not miss at that range, even with a handgun.

In that microsecond of realization, it flashed into James Hawker's mind that Wendy Nierson, the blond-haired free spirit on the mountain, had been right.

He was to die.

Die all too soon.

nine

Determined not to die meekly on the ground, Hawker made a desperate lunge toward the figure that stood before him.

He kept low, waiting for the heavy, impersonal impact of lead that would announce his own death.

But instead of a gunshot, there was a scream.

A woman's scream.

Somehow Barbara Blaine had gotten to his attacker. Even though he had waved her inside, she had followed him out. She had sprinted toward the gunman, her fingernails clawing at his eyes.

The man clubbed her solidly behind the ear, then turned his attention once again to Hawker.

But the woman's charge had given Hawker the extra second he needed.

As the gun came vectoring around, Hawker ducked under it and used his head to butt the man solidly in the solar plexus.

It should have knocked him to the ground. Instead, he hit the side of the house, and the clapboard walls kept him on his feet. He snapped off two quick shots. In the dry Nevada night, the gun sounded like the
kerWHACK
of a bullwhip.

Hawker felt a burning sensation in his ear. He wondered if he had been shot.

Hawker used his left elbow to knock the man's gun hand up and away—but too late. The man used the butt of the revolver like a sap, clubbing Hawker solidly behind the head. All the world went slow and dreamy for a moment; a world of bright popping lights; the red, green and yellow starburst world caused by a sudden cranial pressure trying to escape through the delicate aqueous jelly of cornea.

Somehow, the blow jarred the knife from his hands. It fell with a heavy metallic thud into the gravel.

And then the test of strength began. Hawker had both hands locked around the gun, trying to force the weapon up and away. His attacker had his left hand over Hawker's hands, trying to force the revolver down to face level. The man grunted and wheezed and groaned, but the match began to lean in Hawker's favor. Hawker sensed the knee snapping toward his groin, and he turned his thigh into the blow just in time.

The kick threw the man's balance off, and Hawker twisted the gun out of his hands. It flew in a high arc into the bushes.

The adrenaline rush of desperation had left Hawker now, leaving only a cold, cold fury.

This stranger had pistol-whipped the pretty lady. This stranger had tried to shoot him; had tried to kill him dead, dead, dead.

Hawker drew back his right fist and drove all his weight behind it. The fist collided with the man's cheek, making a flat sickening sound.

The man staggered back against the wall again, and still did not go down. And suddenly, Hawker was back in the old Bridgeport Gym in Chicago again; back training for the Golden Gloves championship, light heavyweight class, and this stranger was the heavy bag.

Hawker pummeled his ribs and belly, then raised his shots higher when the man's arms fell limply to his sides. Hawker's left hand held the man by the throat as he drove his right fist home again and again and again until, suddenly, there was someone beside him, pulling at him, and there was a voice:

“James!
James!
It's over, for God's sake!”

Hawker stepped back dizzily, and the man slithered down the wall, collapsing at his feet.

Barbara Blaine was at his elbow. Hawker took a deep breath and shook himself out of the dreamy world of near-unconsciousness. He took her by the arms suddenly. “Are you all right?”

“Yes … I think so. He knocked the wind out of me for a second, I guess. When I finally got to my feet, you were beating him. You beat him for a long time. It seemed like you would never quit. That's why I got up. That's why I stopped you.”

Hawker wiped his hand over his face, checking for blood. Amazingly, there was none. He hadn't been shot, yet his left ear still burned. The man had fired the gun so close that the powder detonation had scorched him.

Hawker kneeled over the man. He was bigger than he had expected. Six-three or six-four, maybe 260 pounds. Black, carefully oiled hair over the pulpy mass of face. Dark long-sleeved shirt and dark slacks. Clothes for night stealth. Hawker touched his fingers to the man's neck, then stood.

“He's dead.”

The woman put her hands to her face. “My God, this is awful, James.” She hesitated. “The police—I'd better go call them.”

Hawker turned from her and began searching in the bushes where he had first collided with the man. “That's a decision you'll have to make, Barbara. We have every right to defend your property—but that's not going to make the publicity any better. Personally, I have a real aversion to seeing my name in print.”

“But we have to do something, James. We just can't leave him here.”

Hawker kneeled and carefully listened to the shoebox-size package the man had been carrying. In the weak light that came through the main window, he could see that the box was built of wood and metal. There was a toggle switch on the wooden frame and a kitchen timer.

A homemade bomb.

Hawker wondered if he should tell the woman. He decided not to. No sense upsetting her any more than she was.

He stood. “‘We' don't have to do anything, Barbara. Right now I want you to go inside. Don't tell any of the girls, because it will just upset them. But first, I want to make sure you don't need any medical attention.”

She shook her head. “I don't think so. Like I said, I just had the wind knocked out of me.”

“Good. Then go back inside. Get your car keys for me. Then, if you're able, go to the front of the house and join the party. It'll take your mind off what I'm doing.”

“Are you sure I shouldn't go with you? You might need some help. You've been badly hurt, James.”

“Just bring me your car keys, Barbara. And leave me alone.”

There was a wistful tone in her voice. “You'll stop back … later? It doesn't matter how late. God, after tonight, I don't think I could get to sleep no matter what.”

Hawker squeezed the woman's arm gently. “I'll be back, Barbara. I promise.”

ten

Two hours later, just before midnight, Hawker pulled into the parking lot of the Doll House. He steered the car around back, touched the Genie control and the garage door slid open. He got out of the car and closed the garage door behind him.

It was a full-size American car. Black metallic paint and a lot of useless electronic gadgets guaranteed to drive the average mechanic right out of his mind. But the car had a trunk bigger than the wheelbase of most of the Jap imports.

Hawker had hooked up the sweeper before he left. He vacuumed the trunk thoroughly, then vacuumed his own clothes. Then he carried the catch bag to a stainless steel sink mounted inside the garage and flushed the contents down. Then he shoved the catch bag deep into the garbage.

A professional job. And getting rid of the body is always the trickiest part.

Even trickier than disconnecting the dry cell from a homemade bomb.

Hawker knew too well that a murderer could be traced by a microscopic speck of thread in the suspect's trunk, which was exactly why he had blanketed the trunk with garbage bags before dumping the corpse in.

Vacuuming the car had been an added precaution.

As he double-checked the car's interior, Hawker found his memory drifting back to the
ker-chunk
of his shovel cutting the night silence; the image of him draping the corpse over his shoulder and walking heavily beneath the star-bowl of desert darkness; the remembrance of the gaseous hiss and fecal stink as he dumped the corpse into that infinite pit which, he knew, would inevitably swallow him and all other temporal creatures who reared themselves on two legs to walk the earth as gods—for their pathetically short threescore and ten.

Death adds an edge to reality. It throws a damp gray gauze over the spirit.

James Hawker wearily rotated his head on his neck.

He turned the knob to Barbara Blaine's suite and wasn't surprised to find it locked.

He was almost glad.

In him there was no longer a taste for feminine company and polite conversation.

He wanted to be alone for a while; away from the humid looks and the wilting perfume and the teary-eyed gazes.

He was eager to get back to his room at the Mirage. Eager to wash the night away with a hot shower, crack a cold beer and get to work. He wanted to check his room for electronic listening devices, and he had to get moving on breaking the code Jason Stratton had used in his journal. He also had to talk with Captain Kevin Smith at greater length, and maybe get a hook on who—if anyone—in Smith's employ was spying for the mob.

But as he turned to go, the door opened. Barbara Blaine stood before him. She wore a white satin pajama suit. The high collar gave it an oriental flavor. Her black hair was longer than he had thought, combed in a dark sheen over her shoulders. Her brown eyes were a combination of worry and hurt.

“You were leaving?”

“Yeah.”

“Did … everything go all right?”

“Just peachy. He wasn't carrying any identification, so I didn't learn anything about him. And his car—if he came by car—wasn't parked anyplace obvious. Strike two.”

“I know you're upset, James. But you don't have to turn your sarcasm against me.”

He made an impatient gesture with his hands. “I guess I'm just in no mood for interrogation, Barbara.”

“Is that what I was doing?”

Hawker punched a button on the wall, and the garage door rolled open. He said over his shoulder, “I'll call you tomorrow, Barbara.”

Her voice turned chilly. “If it's really necessary, James.”

He thought of a number of cutting replies, most of them dealing with how many times it had been necessary for him to call a whorehouse. But he choked down the surge of adolescent meanness and walked silently into the darkness as the door clattered down behind him.