The Sam Prichard Series - Books 9-12 (Sam Prichard Boxed Set 3)

by David Archer

  Suddenly it occurred to him that Sam and Harry were no longer alone. With Kenneth Long on their side, the three of them made up a formidable force. It would be very difficult for Michael to take them all out, at least by himself.

  He picked up his phone and dialed a local number. “Vito?” he said, once again disguising his voice. “You don’t know me, but we have some mutual friends. One of them was Michael Reed, and I’m sure you heard he was murdered yesterday. Well, I’m zeroing in on his killer and the people helping him, but I need some backup. Yes, no problem. I can pay.”

  * * * * *

  The limousine had driven all the way to Colorado Springs, and the killer had managed to keep it in view the whole time. Along the way, he had been formulating a plan, something so daring and crazy that he thought it might actually have a chance of success. When the limo and its escort had peeled off an exit, the killer had followed.

  He had no doubt he had been spotted, but at this point he was counting on it. He hung back just far enough to cast a little doubt about whether he was intentionally staying with them, but by the time they had made three consecutive turns, he knew they would be certain. He wasn’t a bit surprised when the escort car suddenly spun sideways and two men jumped out and aimed guns at him.

  He didn’t stop. Instead, he shoved his foot to the floor and laid down in the seat so that he was out of the line of fire. The old Dodge truck he was driving was pretty stout, and the two men didn’t even have time to jump out of the way before it plowed into their SUV.

  One of them was caught between the grill of the Dodge and the side of the SUV, while the other was crushed between his door and the car itself. The killer sat up and looked through his bullet-riddled windshield, then backed up and went around the wreckage of the car. The limo was just disappearing around another corner, as he picked up the Mac 11 submachine gun and used its barrel to break the rest of the glass away.

  He pressed the accelerator all the way down once again and fishtailed around the corner, just in time to see the limo turn into a driveway. He slid to a stop just behind it as three more bodyguards leapt out, but the Mac made short work of all of them. None of the bullets penetrated the car, even bouncing off the glass, but once the guards were down, the killer put the truck in park and stepped out. He had picked up another Mac, along with a hand grenade. No matter how armored the body of the car might be, a grenade underneath it would almost certainly do the job.

  He had completely forgotten his orders. The longer the chase had been, the angrier he had become. If his employer wanted Prichard to be distracted, he was pretty sure killing his entire family would get the job done. He kept the Mac pointed at the car as he approached, then put a finger in the ring of the grenade and prepared to roll it under the car.

  That was when the driver’s door flew open, and a pistol was thrust out through the opening. The driver was already squeezing the trigger, and while the first two shots missed completely, the third one caught the killer in the throat. He stumbled backward as he dropped the gun and the grenade, his hand going to his throat to try to stop the bleeding, but it was far too late. Only seconds passed before the loss of blood to the brain was enough to bring him down.

  The limo door closed, and everyone inside stayed when they were until police arrived seven minutes later. At that point, George finally stepped out to speak to them, but first he bent at the waist, put his hands on his knees and vomited. It was the first time he had ever killed anyone.

  Of the three guards who had been in the limousine, only one had suffered a fatal wound. The other two would survive, but the two in the SUV had also died. The police had their hands full trying to keep the scene secure with all the neighbors standing in the yard and trying to see, and it would be more than two hours before they finally had all of the information they needed.

  George was allowed to sit back down in the driver’s seat, and he finally looked at his passengers. They were safe, that was true, but he was terribly worried about what the little girl had seen.

  “Ms. Kenzie,” he said softly, “are you okay?”

  The child looked up at him and George was astonished at the calm in her face. “I’m okay,” she said, “and so are Mommy and my grandmas. Don’t cry, George. You had to shoot that man, you just had to. You’ll be okay.”

  George managed a smile through his tears. “As long as you are all safe,” he said, “I’m sure I’m gonna be fine.”

  “You will. Sometimes my daddy has to shoot people, too, and sometimes he cries about it. But he says you just gotta do it, sometimes, and then he’s okay again. You’ll be okay in a little while.”

  George continued smiling, as he stared at the little girl in her mother’s arms.

  31

  “Ha!” Sam said. “I wish I knew. Did I ever tell you about Beauregard?”

  “Yeah,” Ken said. “That’s the ghost that tells your mother-in-law what’s going to happen, right?”

  “Right. Well, Beauregard says I’m playing poker with Reed, and that each hand I lose will cost a life. So far I seem to have lost two, and the first one cost me the tobacco shop clerk, the second seems to have been the detective, Lawton. Now, he isn’t dead yet, but it’s quite possible he’s going to have enough brain damage that he might as well be. Still too soon to tell. Beauregard says there are still two more hands to play, which means at least two more lives hanging in the balance. And then the last message I got from him says the last hand will come when I have to decide when to shoot, and I shouldn’t be afraid to bluff, but I can’t figure out what kind of bluff would do me any good in this game.”

  “There’s something about games with us, isn’t there? When we first met, I used chess to explain to you what was going on, and now you’re dealing with a highly trained government agent who might very well be either a traitor or a psychopath, and you have to consider your interaction with him as a poker game. Sounds like we got kind of a pattern going, doesn’t it?”

  “I don’t care if we play monopoly,” Sam said, “as long as I figure out a way to win. In this case, winning is going to mean proving Harry didn’t kill this guy, but it could also mean bringing Michael Reed to justice. Harry thinks the reason he’s doing this is because he’s decided to go rogue. Apparently Michael knows where, as Harry puts it, a lot of bodies are buried both literally and figuratively, and could seriously cash in on that kind of information.”

  “Harry’s probably right. When I went rogue eleven years ago, I never did stoop so low as to sell information that could hurt my country. I sold plenty of it back to my country, information they needed but didn’t have any way to get on their own. A man like Michael Reed, though, he’s going to be looking at turning all that information into his retirement account. He’s out to accumulate an awful lot of money in a short time, then retire to Barbados, or the French Riviera, somewhere like that. He’ll have yet another new identity, a small army to make sure nobody can get to him and enough money to live that lifestyle for 100 years.”

  “Sounds like a dream, but the price is too high. Ken, we’ve got to stop this guy if we possibly can.”

  “We can,” Ken said. “He’s just as evil as Chandler, but not nearly as smart. I worked with him once, so trust me when I say that. This guy isn’t nearly as smart as he thinks he is, even if he is brighter than the average person. He’s got a weakness, and we have to find it. Any women in his life, other than the one he stole from Harry?”

  “His secretary,” Sam said. “She’s a sweet young thing, early twenties I would guess, and he seduced her. The usual lies, about how he and his wife were going to get a divorce and he was going to marry the pretty young girl, but I’ve seen her and I’m convinced she has no idea he’s still alive. He even told me himself that he was done with her, so I don’t think we can consider her any kind of weakness.”

  “Okay, and he doesn’t have any other family. He’s walking away from everything he had in this life, so we can’t use any of that against him. Damn, he isn’t making
it easy, is he?”

  “Not even a little bit. So far, the only mistake he’s made that I can find is forgetting about the manicure. If the nails on that body had been neat and trimmed, I never would’ve figured it out.”

  Ken stared out the windshield for a moment, then turned to look at Sam. “There’s got to be something else, something we can use. Something even the police can’t turn a blind eye to.”

  “I agree, but I don’t know what it…”

  He was interrupted by the ringing of his cell phone, the one inside the glove box. He put a finger to his lips to tell Ken to be quiet, then reached over and snatched the glove box open, grabbed the bag and dumped it out in his lap. He got the box open by the fourth ring and answered the phone.

  “Sam Prichard,” he said.

  “Mr. Prichard? This is Annie Keller. You said to let you know if—if anything came up about that man?”

  Sam’s eyes went wide. “Yes. What’s happening, Annie?”

  “Well—listen, I know this might sound crazy, but I think someone just tried to kill Heather.”

  “What? What happened?”

  “Well, we’ve been getting ready to leave to go visit my sister, but we had to make arrangements for the dogs and stuff, and Heather’s been—well, you saw how she was this afternoon, she hasn’t gotten any better. She decided to go outside and sit on the porch for a few minutes, but then she said it was too hot and wanted to come back in. Just as she started to get up off the chair out there, something came through the window right behind it, and now there are three little holes in the wall. She screamed and ran inside, and I heard a car take off really fast…”

  “Are you still at the house?” Sam asked.

  “Yes, but we were about to…”

  “Stay put, and stay inside. I’m on the way. I’m only about two or three minutes away, I’ll be there in no time.”

  Sam cut the call and shoved the phone back in the box, and Ken finished wrapping it in the bag and putting it back in the glove box. “What was that?” he asked.

  Sam had whipped the car around and then fishtailed around another corner before he answered. “Heather Keller, the secretary? It seems somebody just took a shot at her. Michael had told me earlier that he had no reason to bother her, that she was in no danger from him, but he must have remembered something. We’ve got to get to her, and quickly, or she’s going to be dead.”

  Ken reached under his jacket and pulled out a Glock nineteen, carefully checked to be sure there was a round in the chamber, and then kept it in his hand. He didn’t say anything as Sam raced through the residential streets, and when Sam slid the car to a stop in front of the little house, he was out even before Sam got the car into park.

  Sam followed, drawing his own weapon and looking around as he got out of the car, and the two of them quickly but carefully made their way to the house. When they got there, Sam knocked on the door.

  “Annie? Heather? It’s Sam Prichard. Come on, we need to get the two of you out of here quickly.”

  The door started to open, and Annie peeked out before swinging it wide. Heather was right behind her, still crying but looking terribly frightened.

  “Annie, run for my car and get into the backseat as quickly as you can. Leave the door open, my friend and I will bring Heather right behind you.”

  Annie looked at them and their guns for a moment, then seemed to steel herself and rushed out the door toward the car. She snatched open the passenger door and flipped the seat forward, diving inside as quickly as she could.

  Back on the porch, Sam and Ken each grabbed Heather by an arm and kept her tight between them as they hurried her along the walk. When they got to the car, they folded together behind her as she climbed into the backseat, and then Ken told them both to get down, to keep their heads down and stay out of sight.

  Sam hobbled quickly around and got behind the wheel again while Ken got back into the passenger seat. The car was still running and Sam slammed it into gear without even bothering to put his seatbelt on, and they raced away with the seatbelt alarm ringing incessantly.

  From down in the backseat, Annie cleared her throat. “Mr. Prichard, can you tell me what on earth is going on? Why would anyone try to shoot my daughter?”

  “Because the person who shot at her is Michael Reed, himself. What I told you earlier turned out to be true. Michael is not dead, but he’s already murdered at least two people and possibly more while taking his own death. He actually had the gall to call me earlier today, and he told me Heather wouldn’t be in any danger from him because she didn’t know anything that could hurt him, but I’m guessing there might be something after all.”

  Sam whipped the car around a couple of corners and kept watching to see if they were being followed, but there was no obvious sign of pursuit. He slowed down to the speed limit and started making his way toward his appointment with Harry and Kathleen once again.

  “Heather,” he said after a moment, “do you understand what I’m saying? Michael isn’t dead, but he’s faked his own murder. In order to do that, he had to kill someone, and he’s trying to frame another man for it so he killed someone else to make sure that man wouldn’t have an alibi. This afternoon, the police detective in charge of the investigation was shot and may die yet, simply because I told him what I knew, that the body they have identified as Michael’s isn’t him.”

  “Yeah,” Heather said haltingly. “I understand, I just can’t believe it. Why would he do that? Why would he kill anybody?”

  “Sweetheart,” Ken said, “something you need to get through your head right now is that your boyfriend never was who he claimed to be. He’s actually a government agent, and one of those who sneak into other countries and kill people as part of their job. Killing someone, to him, that’s like you making sure your files are all in order.”

  “But he was always so gentle. I mean, I never even saw him get mad at anybody. Never, not once. The closest I ever saw him come to getting angry was when his wife would call and interrupt something he was doing, but even then he would just make a face and go on like it was no big deal.”

  “Well, somehow or other,” Ken said, “you’ve become a big deal to him, big enough that he figures he needs to kill you so it won’t become bigger. Can you think of anything he might have said or done in the last few weeks that he might not want you to tell anybody about?”

  “No, nothing. It’s been nothing but business as usual. I mean, my job is one of the easiest jobs in the world. All I do is answer the phones and take messages, sometimes I set appointments for him, things like that.”

  “Well, keep thinking,” Sam said. “Whatever it is he thinks you know could be the thing that brings him down.”

  Ken glanced over at Sam, and saw him watching the rearview mirror closely. “Somebody on us?” he asked softly.

  “About three cars back,” Sam whispered. “It’s made the last couple of turns with me, and always backs off to let another car get between us.”

  “Normal surveillance technique. Try a surprise turn.”

  Sam nodded, then a moment later, just before it would be too late to make a right turn, he whipped the wheel around and cut to the north. He watched the rearview mirror until he saw the offending pickup truck continue straight on the street he’d turned off of.

  He breathed a sigh of relief. “Just coincidence, I guess,” he said. Still, he continued north for several blocks before turning east once more. His route took him to North Keene Road, and he turned south when he reached it. A few moments later he turned right again onto Highway 60, which would take them across the causeway to Clearwater Beach.

  It was almost nine o’clock by the time they arrived at the Clear Sky Café, and the four of them got out of the car. They started to enter, but then Annie turned to Sam and held something out. “I don’t have a pocket,” she said simply. “Would you mind to hold these for me until we come out?”

  Sam looked and saw that what she was holding out was a pack of cigarettes,
and he reached out and took them from her without comment. He slid them into his shirt pocket and then they all walked inside. There, they were met by another surprise. Harold and Beth were sitting with Harry and Kathleen, but fortunately Harry had had the foresight to get a large table. The waitstaff had made it by putting two tables together, but it was big enough for everyone to sit down.

  “Ken,” Harry said as he and Harold rose to shake hands. “It’s good to see you again, and I appreciate your coming to help.”

  “I owe you guys,” Ken said. “You need me, I’m there.”

  Harry introduced Harold and Beth to Ken, Sam introduced Annie and Heather, and then they all sat down again.

  32

  “I’ve been bringing the kids up to speed on all this,” Harry said. “Beth is a little skeptical, but Harold is just as observant as you and me. He saw Michael’s fingernails as well, so…”

  “So if the ones on the body they identified as Michael are noticeably longer, then you’re right. It can’t be him.”

  Heather looked up sharply at Harold, but didn’t say anything. She seemed to be trying to figure out just where she fit into all of this, and seeing the widow of the man she’d been having an affair with sitting directly across from her wasn’t helping. She lowered her eyes to the table in front of her once again, and kept them there.

  Sam explained quickly about the shots that were fired at Heather, and Harry agreed that he had done exactly the right thing by going to grab her and her mother. “Obviously, the girl knows something that Michael considers damaging. If we can figure out what that is, it could be the key to solving this entire puzzle.”

  The door opened, and Sam looked up instinctively at the new customer. A chubby, balding man walked in and sat down in a booth near the door, and after looking him over carefully, Sam dismissed him. He turned back to the people at his table.