Domino (22 page)

When things were in discord, Marco could not
leave them alone. Life had to run in harmony and only then could
Marco feel in absolute control. He needed to be in control. He
trusted no one. Not even Morgan Wolfe. He had let his guard down
only once when he trusted Alex Rogers to secure the estate on
Friday night. That had cost Marco dearly. That one minor slip had
endangered the entire operation. It was not the money, the security
of the job and the six figure yearly income. If Wolfe's domain
began to crumble, the cartels would come down hard, leaving no
trace that there ever was a Wolfe connection.

Now, Wolfe had ordered Marco to trust again.
This time, an assassin that the Lu cartel had recommended.
McKinnon. Unknown, untried, and expensive. Morgan should have just
let Marco do his job. No one knew the human animal as well as
Marco. He had hunted human prey since the mountains of Afghanistan.
None had escaped him. Not until Clarissa Hayden.

Virginia's words had played over and over in
his head. "You'll go down with him, Marco. He won't let you live.
No one will be alive if the empire crumbles. All because of
Clarissa Hayden. Clarissa Hayden. Clarissa Hayden."

But she was trapped inside the Hampstead
Hotel. Marco surveyed the outside of the building from where he was
parked just down the block from the dilapidated homeless shelter.
Morgan was wrong. He could get to Clarissa anywhere, anytime. She'd
be dead right now if Morgan hadn't told him to let McKinnon handle
the hit. He would wait until dark, get into the building up that
fire escape, isolate Clarissa, and rake a blade across that bitch's
throat before anyone knew what was happening. Assassin. Trust.
Wrong.

Marco raised the car window and snuggled down
deeper into the seat. Clarissa would be dead by dark, and so would
the assassin if he got in Marco's way.

Marco was just about to close his eyes and
take a catnap until sunset when Clarissa stepped out of the
Hempstead Hotel and walked away from him toward Western
Avenue.

“Well, well, well. What have we here?” Marco
smiled. Things were back on a smooth track. It couldn't be a better
day for a hunt. “Looks like we can pick back up right where we left
off on Friday night.”

He pulled two large black plastic garbage bags
and two wire ties out of their box, folded them neatly, and stuffed
them into his jacket pocket. He checked to make sure his gun was
loaded, shoving that into his shoulder holster. He took a small axe
from under the passenger seat and hooked the handle into a loop in
his belt. Then, with a grin wide as a Cheshire cat, he started
after Clarissa.

St. Hector's was a ruin and so was Clarissa's
spirits as she hung onto the chain-link fence surrounding her old
high school. Most of the windows on the two-story tan brick school
building were broken, some boarded up, others were missing their
panes altogether. One wing of the building had been gutted by fire.
The bricks above those windows were soot-stained and the roof was
open to the sky. Even the convent up on the hill looked shabby and
overgrown with trees and shrubs.

Clarissa had attended only two years of the
four year school, but it was still painful to see the place in such
sad shape. There had been some good times here. Alice May and Ginny
Taylor, red-haired twin sisters who were her best friends. Derek
Montgomery, her first crush and her first kiss. Barry Nobbs, her
first real date and one of her closest friends. He was sixteen and
had an old Datsun B210 missing the front fenders and the back seat.
Probably why Myra Hayden had let her daughter go out with him in
the first place.

Clarissa smiled at the long forgotten
memories. She had been a shy girl, more into reading romance novels
and mysteries than school social activities. With Alice May and
Ginny she spend most weekends in movie theaters or browsing through
the unique shops down on Hollywood Boulevard. She turned down more
dates than she accepted, preferring to spend days at the beach or
in art galleries with the nerdy but likeable Barry.

She had gotten a letter from him years ago
when she was living in New York. He had seen her first magazine
cover and wrote in care of her agent to say congratulations on her
successful modeling career. Barry had married and was expecting his
first child and had become a computer IT geek at Jet Propulsion
Laboratories, the company that tracks mars landings, and the
Voyager space crafts on the west coast. Clarissa sent him a short
note wishing him well but never heard from him again. She couldn't
even begin to remember his address.

"Not a pretty sight, is it?" The voice
startled Clarissa out of her reverie. The figure in the black
long-sleeved, knee-length dress, black hose and a small black veil
fastened to the back of her short cropped salt and pepper hair
smiled. "Did you need some help?"

"No...I...went to school here," Clarissa told
the young nun.

"Oh, when was that?"

"About thirteen years ago," said
Clarissa.

"I've been here only six. I'm Sister Ruth
Cecilia. I teach math." The nun extended a thin white hand.
Clarissa shook it warmly.

"I hated math," she admitted. But Sister Helen
Patricia was my favorite. She got me through it.”

“She’s still here, you know. On retreat at the
moment, but you should stop in and say “Hi” sometime. She loves
talking to her old students. You know, she was my teacher, too. I
hated math but don't tell anybody. I was just good at it, thank the
Lord."

"When was the fire?"

"This past summer. Faulty wiring. We've
started to rebuild. St. Stephen's Church has set up some temporary
classrooms in their parking lot for our sophomores and juniors. St.
Francis School is taking our seniors. We make due. What is your
name?"

"Clarissa Hayden."

The nun stared at Clarissa as if trying to
remember something. Then her eyes brightened. "You know, there's
famous New York model named Clarissa Hayden. She used to do those
cosmetic commercials for Cheswick Makeup. Any relation?"

"No."

"Too bad. You live close by?"

"I'm staying with friends. Do you think I
could use a phone? I need to call my friend to come and get me and
I don't seem to have any change."

"I think that would be alright. There's a
phone in the office up at the convent."

The nun unlocked a gate in the fence and
Clarissa followed her past the school and up the path to the
convent on the hill. Neither noticed Marco as he silently cut a
hole in the fence and melted into the shrubbery beside the
path.

Clarissa dialed the number again. There was no
answer, not even the answering machine. She let it ring sixteen
times before she hung up. The clock on the desk in the convent's
office said three thirty. Virginia might still be at the Wolfe
estate. It just gave her an uneasy feeling that her answering
machine had been turned off. She tried the secretary’s cell phone
with the same result. Not even voice mail. That too, was strange.
It said the number was unavailable. Clarissa’s skin prickled.
Something was wrong.

Clarissa picked up the phone and dialed the
number for Morgan's office at the house. Her heart raced as she
waited, hoping that Virginia would answer.

"Hello?" Clarissa slammed down the phone. It
had been Dalton's voice. What was he doing in Morgan's office?
Where was Virginia? Or Alex Rogers? What was happening?

"Get through?" Sister Ruth Cecilia poked her
head in the office.

"Still busy," said Clarissa. "Can I try my
friend's roommate in Pacific Palsies?"

"Sure, go ahead."

Her fingers still shaking, she dialed Hugo's
number. She had no idea what Hugo was calling the new salon in La
Jolla so calling directory assistance was pointless. Maybe his
roommate would have the new number or at least the name of the
place.

The call went directly to voice
mail.

"Wayne, this is Clarissa Hayden," she said to
the machine. "I'm a friend of Hugo's and I need to get in touch
with him about the new salon right away. I need to get the number
down there. Could you call the convent of St. Hector's School,
five-five-five, sixteen hundred and leave the number with someone
here? Thanks."

"Your friend coming?" the nun wanted to know
as she walked Clarissa to the front door.

"I couldn't reach him. But thanks for letting
me try. I left a voice mail.”

"Looks like we're in for another storm," the
nun said as a breeze blew in the open door and the sun had gone
behind a bank of darkening clouds. "Would you like an
umbrella?"

"Can you spare one?"

The nun opened a closet by the door that
revealed a cardboard box full of umbrellas. She handed Clarissa a
red one.

"We have plenty. Kids leave them in school all
the time and never claim them. At the end of the year we bring them
up here and give them out where they're needed."

"Thank you. I could use one more favor. I left
a message for someone to call me here with a phone number. If I
check back with you later, could you give me the
number?"

"Of course. Can I call you
somewhere?"

Clarissa hesitated, wanting to lie, but the
sweet-faced nun demanded the truth. And the truth hurt. She had to
go back. It was the safest place, the only place that she could
think of where no one would find her. She told herself it would be
for only one more night. Then Hugo would come for her. "I'm at the
Hempstead Hotel."

The nun's expression never changed. She just
continued her pleasant smile. "I'll call the desk and leave a
message with old Dusty. He'll see that you get it."

"Thanks again."

"Just go down to the back gate. Mister
Reynolds, our security guard, will let you out," the nun instructed
as she waved good-bye.

The path wound back down the hill. From this
vantage point, Clarissa could see the back of the school building
where the fire had done the most damage. The worse damage was where
Clarissa remembered the cafeteria to be, on the ground floor. The
fire must have started there and spread up to the classrooms and
the gymnasium on the second floor. New construction materials had
been piled up behind the building and a white sedan with the logo
of Stanton Security Service was parked next to the construction
trailer.

Clarissa walked slowly toward the gate, her
thoughts preoccupied with the telephone call to the Wolfe estate.
Something had happened to Virginia, Clarissa was convinced. What if
the secretary had told Morgan where she was hiding? What if they
were waiting for her now at the Hempstead Hotel? Her pace slowed,
reluctant to approach the locked gate, afraid to leave the relative
safety of the school grounds. Maybe, if she went back to the
convent, the nuns would let her stay the night there and wait for
Hugo.

The nagging thought persisted and she tensed
with the anxiety of the prospects. Where was Virginia or Alex
Rogers? It was Monday morning. They both should have been at the
estate. Morgan had that business meeting in Washington
and....Clarissa smiled. Of course. The meeting. How stupid to be so
frightened. Morgan had to be in Washington D.C. on Tuesday. Alex
would be with him and Virginia was probably driving them to the
airport.

Clarissa sighed with relief. She had been
under such stress the last couple of days that she wasn't thinking
clearly. She chided herself for getting all worried over nothing.
Morgan and Alex were out of town. Virginia was at the airport.
Dalton was probably recruited to answer the phones while she was
out. Everything was perfectly normal. In fact, better than normal.
That things were business as usual at the estate, was proof that
they had forgotten all about her. They had given up their
search.

She could rest easy and wait for Hugo. She was
certain that Wayne would give the hairdresser the message and that
she would be out of the Hempstead hell hole by morning. Besides, it
didn't look so bleak as it had on Friday night. She had met Doc
Rowland, the kindest, gentlest old man in the world, a young
photographer fan, and even the crotchety old Dusty wasn't so
fearsome as he had once seemed. He had promised Virginia that he
would protect her if Marco came around looking for her.

"Mister Reynolds?" Clarissa called out.
"Mister Reynolds, could you open the gate, please."

She had waited patiently at the gate for
several minutes but no security guard had showed up as promised.
Calling out didn't seem to bring him to the gate either. Maybe he
was in the school building. Clarissa decided to go looking for him.
The chain link fence surrounding the school grounds was eight feet
high with a roll of razor wire at the top.

As she walked back toward the school building
she suddenly had the odd sensation that she was totally and utterly
alone. The silence was as heavy as the darkening clouds overhead.
She felt as if the whole neighborhood around the school had been
abandoned in the wake of some awesome disaster. The overbearing
stillness before the coming storm and the dirty tan brick of the
burned building fed this unreal sensation until it began to grow
into a panic.