Cool Heat (19 page)

They drove past Zephyr Cove, up past Glenbrook, and through the tunnel, leaving 50 and heading up 28 past the Ponderosa Ranch turnoff, into Incline Village and Crystal Bay.

Sydney said, “If we come in by boat, it’ll be right out there.”

“They really think they can get hold of George Willett’s Thunderbird Lodge and all that property?”

“They think they can do just about anything. You have the right friends here, in Vegas, and Washington, there’s no limit to what you can get away with. You just make deals. Build everything Green to placate the Greens, and who knows? But they aren’t going to get the chance if I have anything to do with it. The plan is, they’ll start with the old casinos around the Cal-Neva. Work from there. I’ll show you the piece of land he wants as his starter property when we get over there.”

He turned down Shoreline Boulevard in Incline Village.

“Half the homes along here were in foreclosure,” Sydney said. “Thorp and Rouse ended up with many of them. They’ll be worth a lot more money once the resort is in place.”

He slowed down on Lakeshore Boulevard. Now they were passing the big Incline estates. Grand houses behind trees, gardens, gates. No lights on the street, the residents not wanting the ambiance disturbed by streetlights.

“We have a checkpoint,” she said, “better pull over and douse the lights.”

A limo passed. “Guests arriving already,” she said.

“They block off a whole street?”

“No, they’re just checking. That gate, that house—what you can see of it, anyway—is Thorp’s. The next one is Rouse’s. They actually have a tunnel that connects the two. Rumor has it, he keeps a lion down there just like the guy who built the Thunderbird Lodge did back in the thirties. George Whittell brought in Hughes and the movie stars of the day. That’s Thorp’s game plan. He wants to be George Whittell. The man couldn’t carry Whittell’s piss bottle. He was the real playboy of the Western world.”

He stared at the houses partially hidden back in the trees, prime lakefront. They switched places, and she got them back on the road. They went a few more blocks down Lakeshore Drive, turned up to the next street, Southwood, and started going back.

“The help they use, Mexicans mostly, live in these apartment complexes,” Sydney said. “They cut the lawns, do the gardening, run the households, kitchens.”

“What’s with the satellite dishes?” Marco asked. Every apartment seemed to have one. They looked like a vertical field of mushrooms.

Many Mexicans were out and about, lots of kids in the street playing.

“No streetlights?” Marco said.

“No. They city doesn’t allow them. It takes away from the ambiance.”

They headed back to the Shaw house. Going through the Cal-Neva highlands, she slowed. “Right up there. Used to be a big casino, then it was torn down and was going to be rebuilt, but it never was.”

A security or cop car, she couldn’t tell which, turned toward them and Sydney eased on down the road. They turned back up to the main highway and headed back.

“You’re right,” Marco said. “The only way will have to be by boat.”

“Right now, I need that Jacuzzi and some wine.” She couldn’t help thinking maybe a massage wouldn’t be a bad idea, too, though she hadn’t said it again. A massage would be really nice, and she had an idea he would do a good job on her abused body.

What the hell? she thought. We came this far—maybe we should seal this relationship while we’re reasonably alive and well.

42

Nothing clears the mind like a long shower,
Kora North thought, lifting her face up into the rush of water as if it might wash away this crazy day.

A little earlier, she’d briefly contemplated suicide, but not too seriously, though she did have hypnotic sleeping pills and figured she could take a bottle of them with enough vodka to kill a couple truck drivers. But suicide wasn’t her thing. So, changing her mind, she chose a shower and a big glass of wine to help her think about the mess she was in.

Because, why did everything in her life end up like this?

I’m cursed, she decided.

In the shower, she again contemplated running. Playing it out. Back and forth. Where? How long before they hunted her down? Girl like her couldn’t hide easily. She’d have to get a protector and, once again, she’d be under some guy’s control until he got tired of her.

She reached her arm out and found the glass of wine on the vanity. She drank half the glass, then put it back down, returning to the shower for a moment, luxuriating in the flow of water over her perfect body. The feel of a thousand tiny fingers on her flawless flesh.

So many grubby, grasping fingers on her, in her—no water could wash those memories away!

She dried off and entered her bedroom, fresh and feeling better, wearing nothing, the nearly empty glass of wine in her hand. And there stood a shocking, frightened creature in the middle of her bedroom. He had a bloated face like some movie monster.

“Jesus!”

“Not quite,” he muttered.

Naked, glass in hand, she stared at this horror, the man’s face all discolored and swollen. Then she saw a gun hanging in his hand by his side and she knew she was dead. She knew it had to be the guy Marco had beat up, the professional who’d killed Shaun and got into that fight. Shaun must have told him she was coming over. Maybe he’d seen her there from up in the woods.

Fuck, it is him, she thought. Is this how it ends?

She couldn’t deal with that, so she threw the wineglass at him, ran back into the bathroom, and locked the door. Then she went to the window, wondering if she could get out. She’d probably kill herself on the sidewalk or break something and he’d just kill her there.

Her body naked, bloody. People staring. We knew it would end badly for her, they’d say.

She didn’t even have time to formulate a real plan. The man kicked open the door and stood there looking at her, rheumy eyes raking her body. She swung at this mad clown’s wrecked face. He grabbed her hand with one hand, put the gun to her face with the other.

“Go ahead!” she screamed at him. “You bastard, you want to kill me, do it! I don’t want any sick shit while I’m alive, okay? Just know this, I’m glad you did that miserable prick Shaun Corbin. I appreciated that.”

That seemed to have a strange influence on him, because he released her hand and stepped back, as if surprised about something.

Her .32 was still in her bag, along with the money, and was on a chair in the living room. She tried to remember if she’d even reloaded it. Damn that Marco guy. He’d taken the bullets out. They’d left her defenseless. They hadn’t protected her. So much for being their inside girl.

Horror-face tried to talk, seemed like he couldn’t. He waved a gun at her, motioning her to go to the living room. She grabbed the silk robe from the back of the bathroom door and put it on as he watched. He followed her into the living room, then settled gingerly on the couch against the far wall, facing the small bar. She sat on the chair at the end of the couch, their eyes fixed tight on one another.

“They really fucked you up, didn’t they?” she said.

He stared at her for a moment longer, then glanced at the large picture above the small bar. Cost her three grand. A western scene—bunch of cowboys in a bar fight over a big-breasted girl wearing only a black cowboy hat and black boots.

He got up, went to the bar, and made himself a drink, but that didn’t work out very well. Ended up all over his chin. She told him there were straws under the counter.

He got one and was able to get it in his mouth. He sucked the alcohol in with a slurping sound. When he finally spoke, his lips hardly moved at all, his jaw didn’t move at all. She had to lean forward to understand his garbled voice.

“You…” He paused. Gathered himself. “Jesup. How are you and her…connected?” His voice was raspy and low like an old, dying man’s voice.

“We’re not connected,” Kora said with defensive anger, shifting her legs, pulling the thin robe tighter, trying to maintain an icy, calm demeanor. “They grabbed me and wanted to know things. I don’t know things. They left me here alone. Fuck them.”

She was furious at them for putting her in this situation. If they wanted to use her so bad, they should have done more to protect her.

He looked at her and she thought that’s wasn’t a good enough answer. She’d given up nothing to trade with. She added, thinking fast, “That’s not exactly true.” She had to have something he needed, something he needed right away before he got crazy on her.

She said, “Actually, they want me to help them out…this plan they have. I know exactly what they’re going to do and when they plan on doing it. They have a hold on me for my cooperation. It’s not like I want to help them out. They have recordings, video that might put me in prison.”

He stared at her. A black and yellow swath of ruin ran from his lower jaw right to the corner of his bloodshot eyes. He looked like the face from hell.

“What are they planning?” he murmured, voice barely a whisper and his eyes jumping weird, like the lights in his brain were flickering. Fucking guy was something out of a monster video game.

“Yeah, like I’d tell you so then you kill me and go your merry way. That’s gonna happen. I need something in return.”

She studied him the way you’d study a coiled rattler. The distance of the potential strike.

He was deciding something. Was she valuable enough to keep alive or not? What was it he wanted most? He didn’t kill her right away. So it wasn’t her. It was
them
!
He’s after them, not me,
she thought.
I’m just a means to that end.
She had to play that card.

He couldn’t kill Thorp’s Daisy. No way.

Desperate to keep him on the track of her survival, she repeated herself in case he didn’t get it the first time. Then she said, “They want me to work with them. They threatened to kill me if I didn’t. Then they told me what they have planned. Don’t think you can beat it out of me. Or scare me. You can’t. If I’m gonna die…one thing I’m not going to do is give another asshole any satisfaction. You need to understand that.”

He almost smiled, tried to anyway, then mumbled, “Tell me…”

Screw that, she thought. Once he gets whatever information I can give him, this psychopath bastard is going to put a bullet right in my forehead like he did Shaun. Maybe that was Thorp’s order. He could find fifty Daisys to replace her if he wanted.

She changed direction. “You have a name?” Kora asked. Anything to connect.

He whispered something she couldn’t make out. Sounded like
Lee…On
.

I’m going to be killed by a guy with a fucking Chinese name?
Behind that wrecked face, was he Chinese? No. Maybe it was just he couldn’t get it out.

She’d had moments in her life like this. The first time she was raped and thought the guy would kill her. Somehow she’d got free of him, fighting and biting and clawing—and he’d given up and ran off. And there was the time somebody stuck a gun in her mouth and threatened to blow her head off. She was fourteen. She’d known these and many other moments, and surviving them made her street tough and street smart.

But this was the first time she’d come face to face with a real professional killer. The kind like you see in movies. Only those are just actors.

She needed to keep talking, get him thinking her way, so she said, “I’m assuming Thorp and Rouse are the ones who hired you to get Jesup. That’s your mission, isn’t it?”

He stared.

“I might be able to help you with that. You want to know how they’re going to take them down. And when. Then you need to play it my way. I’m in a position”—this occurred to her like a flash of genius—”where I can hand them to you on a silver platter. Make your life a lot easier. But it’ll cost you leaving me alive. That’s a fair trade.”

“You can do that…silver platter?” he whispered.

She thought he wanted to smile at the idea, but couldn’t handle the pain it would bring.

“I can. I think you know by now they aren’t some joke like Shaun was. This guy you’re up against, he’s the real deal.”

She was playing him now. Challenging him. She pushed it.

“This guy is a badass. Maybe worse than you, by the looks of things. He’s a Mexican stone-cold killer. You want to take him on without knowing anything, in the dark about what they got planned, good luck to you. I can help you, but do I look like a girl does things for free?”

He waited, the gun now resting on his thigh, eyes fixed on her. Fixed on her eyes, her mouth, drifting up and down.

“I didn’t get your name. Sounded Chinese.”

She leaned in when he said it this time.

“Leon.”

“Leon. Got it.” Then she said, “What they plan will surprise you. To say nothing of Thorp and Rouse. Jesup’s determined to get Thorp if it’s the last thing she does in this life. I know what they’re gonna do. You can kill me, but what good will that do you? Like I said, you can’t scare it out of me. I’ve been down that road too many times.”

She figured she had his full attention now. Working him. “Those two have some tapes, things that can hurt me real bad, and I want them back. They’re using them to make me help them.”

“Blackmailing you…help them.”

“That’s exactly right. That’s the name of the game around this stinking lake.”

“Beautiful eyes,” he said.

This psycho gonna shoot me in the eye?

She was thinking fast and coming up empty now, not sure how to play this. If she had to use a weapon, if her play didn’t work, the only weapon she could see was the corkscrew wine opener. If she could get to that and jam it in his throat, or his eye…

But he suddenly zoned out, his eyes glazed over. Then he snapped back. He reached for the bottle, poured himself another JD, and pulled out some pills. He put two of them in his mouth, pushing them in with a finger, then used the straw and sucked down some whiskey.

“You got a cigarette?” he asked.

“Yeah, but I don’t like people smoking inside. I always go out on the patio.”

He waved the gun at her. “Get me a cigarette.”

“I have a pack in my bag.”

“What’s that?” he pointed to the table behind her. “Oh,” she said, hating that she’d left a pack of cigarettes on the bar.