Domino

by Chris Barnhart

  "It'll be just a minute or two before we have her," he assured Morgan. "They're closing in on her. Rogers saw her on the number four monitor. She's down by the front gate."

  "Good," Wolfe replied. "I want this whole mess cleaned up by midnight."

  "She can't escape, Mister Wolfe. Two of the guards are wearing these." Marco held up a pair of night vision goggles. Wolfe nodded his satisfaction.

  Marco stood facing his employer on the bottom step of the small front porch but his attention was distracted for a second. He felt a sudden unexplained uneasiness, a minute disturbance in the air around him as subtle as a drop of moisture falling off a leaf. His acute senses went automatically on alert and he turned away from Wolfe for a moment to read the shadows and study the wind.

  "What is it, Marco?" Wolfe asked.

  Marco moved down the front walk to the edge of the driveway. The only detectable movements were the guards he had assigned to patrol the front gates and Dalton searching the trees on the front lawn. He watched for a moment, satisfied that the ring of guards were closing in on Clarissa.

  Yet Marco was tense. His muscles bunched and flexed under the black t-shirt and shoulder holster, and he was inwardly coiled like a cobra ready to strike. He was sure of the disturbance. Whether it was a sound or movement out of place, he couldn't tell. He slipped on the goggles, peered down the driveway toward the garage trying to pierce its darkness. Nothing. He did a slow scan of the front lawn down to the wall, across the driveway and toward the garden and gazebo in the side yard. Nothing.

  It was the stillness that triggered Marco's warning signals and his head snapped around back toward the garage. There should have been movement there. He should have sensed Alex searching the garage's interior. Marco took the first running step almost too late. The Jaguar's engine came to life in a revving roar, bathing Marco in the red glow of tail lights. He screamed and tore the goggles off of his blinded eyes, dived sideways as tires squealed on the smooth cobblestones and the car's rear bumper slammed toward his head in a swirl of dust and burning rubber. He scrambled to his feet and dove again as the bumper seemed to chase him onto the lawn as Clarissa backed the Jag up on the grass into a sliding turn.

  Then the tail lights sped away from him and Marco rose up on one knee. He managed to empty his revolver into the Jag. One tail light exploded and the rear window took two bullets but the Jag never slowed on its torpedo run toward the gates. The wrought iron yielded under the impact in a showery hail of sparks.

  "Get her!" Wolfe screamed at Marco. "Where the hell is Rogers?

  Clarissa almost lost her grip on the steering wheel as the impact at the gates thrust her toward the windshield and back against the seat. The older car had no airbag, thank God. She wrenched the wheel into a sharp turn onto the street and felt the warm pull of a sprain in her right shoulder. No force of will would let her ease up on the gas pedal. She negotiated each twist and hairpin turn of the winding canyon road with blind terror. Her tears of relief had become more of an annoyance and she brushed them away angrily. She was free of Wolfe's grasp only for the moment and her one desire was to put as much distance between them as she could.

  The city lights beckoned from below on their carpet of black velvet and Clarissa wanted only to lose herself in the dark spaces between the lights. Panic-driven and nerve-taunt, she fought the dark road with an acute sense of dread, but no headlights appeared in her rear view mirror. Only when she reached the bottom of the canyon at the Sunset Boulevard intersection, did she relax her stiffened arms and fingers and wipe the tears and sweat from her face with the back of her hand.

  The traffic light turned green and Clarissa eased the Jag onto Sunset, heading west toward the beach and the exclusive community of Pacific Palisades. A quick second look in the rear view mirror and the muscles of her stomach tightened. A dark sedan pulled onto Sunset from the canyon intersection. Clarissa couldn't take her eyes off the car and narrowly missed a bend in the road, swerved to avoid a slump-stone wall. The sedan veered off into a turning lane and disappeared into a dark residential street. Clarissa let herself relax for a brief moment, then picked fumbled in her purse for her cell phone. She thumbed through her contact list, missing Hugo's number twice before her nervous finger jabbed at it.

  The phone rang almost six times before an unfamiliar male voice answered.

  "Is Hugo there?" Clarissa tried to mask the desperation in her voice with a cheerfulness that came out more like hysteria.

  "He's in La Jolla all this weekend," the man replied in a hissy annoyance. "Call the salon in Beverly Hills if you want to make an appointment. I'm just his roommate, not his damn receptionist."

  "Please, this is Clarissa Hayden," she cried into the phone. "I need to talk to Hugo. Please. Where is he staying in La Jolla? Do you have a number?"

  There was a disgusted sigh in her ear before the man replied. "Look, I don't know where the hell his ass is, okay? I'm sure somebody at the salon can help you with your emergency perm or whatever the hell is wrong with your hair."

  "It's not my hair. I need help. Please. Where is he staying?"

  "I'll be right there," the man snapped impatiently to someone with his hand half over the phone. "Some bitch of Hugo's is having a bad hair day. I've got to go, lady," he said to Clarissa. "Call the salon in the morning."

  The line went dead. Clarissa's reserves went dead with it. Panic rose like a slow, clinging fog and she shivered with a chill. She had forgotten about Hugo opening the salon in La Jolla on Monday. She racked her brain for the name of the salon but she wasn’t even sure if Hugo had told her.

  The city suddenly felt like a desert. She was alone and friendless among eight million people. There had been only Hugo to run to. She never had many friends in Los Angeles when she grew up here and she had lost contact with all of them. There were a few acquaintances in New York and her old modeling agents there. They were of little use to her now. It was pointless to continue on to the Palisades if Hugo wasn't there. His roommate obviously wouldn't be too receptive to her showing up and waiting there for him to return.

  Clarissa followed Sunset until it crossed the 405 Freeway and made the turn down the on-ramp heading north toward the San Fernando Valley. The Friday night freeway traffic had lightened and there was no one behind her. She needed time to calm down, to think, to formulate some kind of plan to keep herself alive. She had two hundred dollars in cash in her wallet and a couple of credit cards. That would get her through for a while. By the time Morgan got the credit card bills to trace her, she would be long gone or long dead.

  She could feel the tenseness slowly ease from her body as her mind took over the job of survival. The Jaguar's tank, as were all of Morgan's vehicles, full of gas. She could make it to Interstate Five and be more than half way to San Francisco before she had to stop for fuel. Morgan had probably already reported the Jag stolen but she hoped that she would make it out of the city before the Los Angeles Police or the Highway Patrol spotted her. If she could make San Francisco International Airport before dawn, she could abandon the car and be on a plane to anywhere before Morgan could find her. Then she could call her brother and he could wire her the plane fare to wherever he was in the Middle East. Andrew would know what to do. The number to reach him at the American oil company he worked for was in her cell phone and she would place that call when the plane landed. She would tell him what had happened. The digital clock on the dashboard read nine-twenty.

  Clarissa started the long descent down into the valley. It already felt good to put the hills of Bel Air between her and Morgan. The solid sea of lights of the valley gleamed brightly as she watched the green exit signs slide by. At the Victory Boulevard exit sign she knew she was only a few minutes away from the Interstate that would take her due north through the lonely agricultural San Joaquin Valley. Four hundred miles of nothing but fields and an occasional hamburger stand would put her in San Francisco by three in the morning.

  She did not notice when the black Cadillac ch
anged lanes directly behind her and stayed there past the Ventura Freeway cut-off and crept steadily closer. She did not see the glint of a revolver reflected from the overhead freeway lights aimed directly at the back of her skull. When she looked casually in the rear view mirror the lane behind her was clear.

  The scanner was on the passenger seat beside him. Marco glanced down at the blinking red light on the screen. The sending unit installed in the Jaguar was putting out its signal perfectly. All of Morgan's vehicles, except the Rolls Royce, had the tracking devices installed, especially those driven by the staff, including Virginia's own Mercedes. The scanning units were portable and there were only two. Morgan had one and Marco the other. Each device had a range of almost fifty miles. It kept down the theft of the expensive cars and any one of Morgan's employees could be managed and located almost immediately.

  Marco had been in constant phone contact with Wolfe. They knew Clarissa would try to contact the hairdresser. One of the guards had already been dispatched to watch the Pacific Palisades house. Morgan had allowed that one friendship of Clarissa's to continue only because Hugo had been cooperative in relating any information Clarissa had discussed with him during her hair appointments. The partnership had worked out to benefit both parties. Hugo had been paid well. He was a hot hairdresser and Morgan's investments in the Beverly Hills salon were paying off nicely. The new shops in La Jolla and Santa Barbara should prove equally lucrative.

  Marco crested the rise on the 405 Freeway under the Mulholland Drive overpass. He had the gray Jaguar in sight. He sped up until he was right behind Clarissa and took a practice aim. Then he eased the Cadillac over into the lane next to her, sped up a little until he was in her blind spot. Two of Morgan's other men were waiting at the warehouse in the city of Sun Valley, an industrial district in the east section of the San Fernando Valley. All Marco had to do now was head Clarissa in that direction. The hit would be safer and easier in the warehouse than at the house, and much more enjoyable.

  The first bullet slammed into the trunk of the Jag and Clarissa thought that she had thrown up a stone from the road. Her rear view mirror showed that the lane behind her was still clear. The next bullet shattered the side mirror and she swerved wildly toward the Roscoe Boulevard off ramp. The high-beam head lights slid slowly across her rear view mirror until they were directly behind the Jag.

  She winced from the blinding glare and her body jolted with the shock wave of renewed terror. Instinct shoved logic aside. They had found her and it was Marco Camponello behind the wheel of the car behind her. The surge of panic left her heart pounding and the taste of nausea in her throat. She drove for the dark spaces, the only refuge where she was certain that she could hide.

  She ran the red light at the foot of the off-ramp and pulled onto the street heading east. The garishly lit stores and shabby supermarkets gave way to shoddy Mexican specialty shops, taco stands and, car dealers. Though traffic was light on the boulevard, Marco had made no move to force her off the road. Instead, he was following closely. Clarissa could see his twisted grin in the mirror. He was toying with her, sapping what was left of her nerve before he finally grabbed her.

  Clarissa could hardly think. She had to lose Marco somehow and the frustration of not knowing what to do was overwhelming. She fought tears and terror, and she tried to make her mind work against the rising tide of defeat. She drove on, looking for an all- night gas station or convenience store. To her utter dismay, light industrial facilities and automotive repair shops locked up behind chain-link fences and gates, replaced the shops and stores along the street.

  She had made a terrible mistake taking this road. There was no traffic this time of night. She did not know exactly where she was, the street was getting darker, and Marco was still behind her. He was not making any moves and that unnerved her even more. The darker side streets were no comfort. She didn't know if they would suddenly dead end on her and she would be trapped. The once welcome dark spaces between the lights she had seen from the crest of the hills were now only dark alleys and dangerously empty avenues.

  The boulevard suddenly turned a bend and narrowed into a two lane road. Marco was almost on her bumper as the street wound in and around factories and warehouses. She knew with a striking clarity that he had wanted her here. He had let her get to that exit on the freeway, had forced her off with the gunshots. He let her think that she was getting away from him, when he really was herding her into a trap. Ahead were more industries and warehouses. She couldn't even see an intersection or another traffic light. Farther up the road red lights blinked and the arms of a railroad crossing began to descend. The end of the line. There was nowhere else to go.

  The clanging of the railroad signal was like a death knell. Death at the hands of Marco. The way he had looked at her, the licentiousness of his desires, made her flesh crawl with the memory. She felt sick to her stomach.

  "Damn you, Morgan Wolfe," she screamed. "Damn you to hell!"

  Her foot jammed down on the accelerator and the Jaguar leaped toward the oncoming train.

  Marco picked his teeth with his fingernail and watched the one remaining tail light of Jaguar ahead of him. His thoughts were lost in the fantasy of what he was planning to do to Clarissa in the warehouse. This one he had been waiting for a long time. It was not often that one of Morgan's women attracted him as much as Clarissa. She had the same seductive looks and empty-headed charm like the others but there was a feistiness about Clarissa that excited Marco.

  He knew he would have her eventually and Marco was a very patient man. He was delighted when it happened so much quicker than he expected. Usually he had to wait until Wolfe was tired of them, set them up in some penthouse apartment for a while, to which Marco had a master key. Wolfe could care less what happened to them as long as the jewelry and cars were all accounted for and the women could not legally touch him. Clarissa was special. He could do whatever he wanted with her tonight without the worry of arrest on rape charges, as long as she was dead by dawn and her body disposed of with Roth's.

  He grinned wide with anticipation as he watched the railroad crossing arm go down across the road. He wondered if she felt the terrifying realization that she was finally snared, about to be reeled into Marco's deadly playpen. Wolfe's warehouse was on the other side of the tracks and there was no way out of the industrial park except back the way they had come. Marco took a pair of handcuffs out of the glove compartment and slipped them into his pocket. It was going to be one hell of a party.

  His pleasure turned to sudden rage as the Jaguar shot forward.

  "What the hell?" Marco swore loudly as he grasped the revolver and slid open the Cadillac's sun roof. He screeched to a stop, stood and braced his arms on the car's roof. He could see the light from the train's engine illuminate the crossing. The Jag wasn't even slowing. He had only seconds to stop Clarissa's suicide run. He fired all of the rounds at the Jag's tires. The right rear blew apart and the Jag spun wildly toward the crossing.

  Marco stared in fascination as the massive engine reached the crossing as the Jaguar crashed through the wooden arm. The Jag continued to spin as the engine clipped the Jag's front fender and sent it smashing through the crossing arm on the other side.

  "You lousy damn bitch!" Marco screamed. He slammed the car roof with his fists. "Shit!"

  The train was a long one of nearly eighty cars. Marco sat in the Cadillac thumbing bullets into the empty chambers and slamming the silencer angrily against the palm of his hand. Beneath the clacking train wheels, on the other side of the crossing, he could see the Jaguar and its blown rear tire. He would find her. He would make her wish she had been stillborn.

  The last freight car passed the crossing and Marco was across before the lights stopped flashing. He got out of the Cadillac and approached the parked Jaguar. As he suspected, it was empty. Clarissa was gone. Silently, with gun drawn, stalking like a panther, he moved into the night.

  CHAPTER 4

  Clarissa opened her eyes. The
Jag was facing the train tracks. The crossing arm had shattered the rear window already riddled with bullet holes. The right front fender was crushed and the windshield cracked like a spider's web. Her mind screamed out to her to move. Now. Before the train was past and Marco could get to her.

  The pain in her side and her sprained shoulder made her wince and cry out as she searched for her evening bag on the floor of the car. The gold chain strap was wedged down and wrapped around the seat belt anchor. Clarissa tugged at it desperately despite her pain. With every freight car that rattled by she knew that her time was running out.

  "Damn it, come on!" she cried as she gave a final, wrenching pull on the purse strap. It snapped with a force and one end stung her on the cheek. It took only seconds before she had it unwound.

  Once out of the car she began to run. The street was dark except for the lights on the exteriors of the buildings and warehouses. She sought a place to hide, a hole to crawl into where he could not find her. There was nothing. Only fences and gates with chain locks, empty parking lots and dark, unlit offices. There were no security guards that she could see, no one working late on a Friday night. A guard dog behind one of the fences growled menacingly and she begged him in a hushed whisper not to bark. He seemed to sense her need and followed her to the end of his territory with only his teeth barred.

  She moved on, aware of the hollow sound of her high heels clicking on the pavement. Then she stopped, pressed herself into the shadow of a brick-faced manufacturing building, and looked back. The train had passed and the broken sections of the crossing arms were rising. The Cadillac's headlights were already moving toward the disabled Jaguar. Clarissa watched Marco's figure as he surveyed the empty car. The prayer was quick and pleading that he search for her on the opposite side of the street. He turned and she saw the glint of his gun in the moonlight. He scanned the night with methodical precision, then started right toward Clarissa.