The Big Hit

by James Neal Harvey

  Dear Roger,

  I don’t want to burden you with my troubles, but I feel I should tell you about a problem. I’ve run across something that I think is highly illegal, and it frightens me that I know about it. I think Ron knows about it too and may even be involved.

  But I’m afraid to speak out publicly, not only because it could ruin my career, but also because I think it would put me in danger. As I’ve told you, I’ll be in New York in a couple of weeks, promoting my new movie. I’ll call you, and we can discuss it further. I wish I could come out to Greenwich to see Dad, especially because he’s so sick. But you know how he feels about me.

  Lots of love to you and Sarah,

  Cat

  Barker looked at Delaney. “Did you reply to this?”

  “Yes. I wrote back and said I’d look forward to seeing her. I told her whatever her problem was, not to worry. I said we’d figure out a way to handle it.”

  “So did she call when she came to New York?”

  “She did, the night she arrived. I tried to get her to tell me more about what was troubling her, but she refused to discuss it over the phone. Whatever it was, she was very tense. We agreed to get together after she’d made some publicity appearances. She said she’d tell me everything then. That was the last time we spoke.”

  Barker read the letter again. “Ron is her ex-husband?”

  “Yes. He’s a financier in Los Angeles.”

  “He didn’t come to the funeral?”

  “No. He called, after Cat’s death, to express condolences, but I didn’t have much to say to him. We weren’t at all close.”

  “What did she mean, she wished she could come out to Greenwich to see her father? Why couldn’t she?”

  “She and Father were estranged, I guess you’d say. Had been for years. Father never forgave her for becoming an actress.”

  “Why was he against that?”

  “You’d have to understand Father. He’s always been as straitlaced as it’s possible to be. He said actresses were nothing but whores, and if she insisted in pursuing such a career, he wanted nothing more to do with her.”

  “And you didn’t agree with his views?”

  “Certainly not. I was always very proud of her. I tried to bring him around, make him see there was nothing wrong with acting, and that she’d become very successful. But that only made him furious with me. Finally, I simply stayed clear of the subject. I had enough to worry about, running the business after he went downhill.”

  “That’s the family business?”

  “Correct. Delaney Industries. We own bauxite mines in Jamaica and Australia. Bauxite is aluminum ore. We produce aluminum from the bauxite and then import it into the United States. Manufacturers of everything from aircraft to automobiles buy aluminum from us.”

  “Did your father found the company?”

  “No, my grandfather did. He was the one who had this house built.”

  “And you and Catherine grew up here, went to school in Greenwich?”

  “Yes. I was two years ahead of her at Greenwich Country Day. Then I went on to Choate, and when she graduated, she went to Beau Soleil in Switzerland. That’s where she got the acting bug.”

  “And from there to Hollywood?”

  “Eventually. She had parts in some forgettable movies that were produced in Paris, but one of them was shown at the Cannes festival, and an American director saw her there. He took her to Los Angeles, and her first picture was a hit. You may have seen it. It’s called Love Me Now. Runs on late-night television every so often.”

  “Afraid I missed that one,” Barker said. “Did she keep up friendships with other people here in Greenwich? Any of the people at the funeral, for example?”

  “Not that I know of. The ones who came today were all family friends. Some of them had known her when she was a child, but I don’t think any of them were her contemporaries.”

  “And the pallbearers?”

  “Same thing. They were family friends too.”

  “Okay,” Barker said. He held up the letter. “May I keep this?”

  “Yes, of course. But I want to make a copy.” Delaney took the letter to a machine on the desk and copied it, then returned the original.

  Barker slipped the sheet of paper into the inside pocket of his blazer. “How I can reach you, if I need to?”

  Delaney took a card from his wallet and wrote on it, then handed the card to Barker. “That’s my office in New York. The number I wrote on the back is the number here at the house.”

  “You said you’re only staying here while your father’s ill?”

  “Yes, I commute to the city every day. Ordinarily we live there. We have an apartment on Fifth Avenue at Seventy-Ninth Street. And also a summer house in the Hamptons. Sometimes we go out there for a few days, because Sarah gets a little stir-crazy being here.”

  “Is she also a native of Greenwich?”

  “No, she grew up in New York.”

  “Is that where you met?”

  “Yes, a mutual friend introduced us.”

  “Children?”

  “No, unfortunately. Sarah can’t bear a child. We’re thinking about adopting one.”

  Barker put the card into his pocket and rose to his feet. He took out a card of his own and gave it to Delaney. “Thanks for your cooperation. If there’s anything else you think of, anything at all, be sure to call me.”

  “I’ll certainly do that,” Delaney said. “And I realize you must be terribly busy, but could you let me know if there’s any progress? I’d really appreciate it.”

  “I’ll do that,” Barker said.

  Delaney rang for the maid and had her bring Barker’s raincoat. The two men shook hands, and Delaney showed him to the door that led out to the porte-cochère. Barker got into the Mustang and backed out onto the driveway.

  The rain had stopped and the sun’s rays were piercing the clouds, reflecting from the raindrops on the grass. Without the gloom, it was a different world.

  As he went down the drive to the street, Barker passed both the security guard and a gardener who was trimming a hedge. He wondered how many in help the Delaneys had. Counting the chauffeur, the maid, the old man’s nurse, the cook, the guard, and the guy with the clippers, at least six. And possibly more.

  Would he want to live this way? Instead of in his one-room loft apartment in SoHo? Thanks, but no thanks. Life was complicated enough as it was.

  Such thoughts aside, this had been a worthwhile trip. In fact, he’d got far more than he’d hoped for. The letter from Catherine Delure could be solid gold. Provided he could follow up on it without having to contend with Hogan.

  He’d figure that part out later. And he’d keep trying to contact Delure’s secretary. As he pulled onto westbound I-95 his optimism continued to mount. He swung into the far-left lane and gunned it.

  11.

  When the car bearing Dana Laramie deposited her in front of the entrance to the Regency, she hurried past the doorman and went up to her room. Once there, she got out Len Zarkov’s number and called it.

  A woman answered, and Dana told her who she was and said she had to talk with Mr. Zarkov, it was important. A moment later he came to the phone.

  “I’m sorry to bother you,” she said.

  “No bother at all. What is it?”

  “You were right. About the authorities trying to keep me in New York. I’ve just come from Catherine’s funeral, and there was a detective there who must have followed me, and—”

  “Hey, take it easy, okay? Are you at your hotel?”

  “Yes, the Regency.”

  “Stay where you are, and I’ll come over. I’ll be there in just a few minutes.”

  Dana closed her phone. She’d worried that by calling him she might seem like just some ditzy female, but he had seen the situation as serio
us, obviously. And he was right, she had to calm down and get hold of herself.

  She took off her raincoat and hung it in the closet, then turned on the TV. As she’d expected, CNN, Fox, and MSNBC were all showing the funeral. She watched as the church doors opened and the pallbearers carried the casket down the steps and put it into the back of a hearse. A female commentator was chattering away, but Dana paid no attention to what she was saying.

  Next came a shot of mourners leaving the church, and seeing herself among them was unsettling. The police were holding back the crowd, and a few of the onlookers waved at the camera. From there, the coverage picked up shots of the action at the gates of the cemetery. At least the videotape had nothing of her running from the entrance to the car.

  She turned off the set and went into the bathroom, where she washed her hands and face and brushed her hair. Her skin was still tan from exposure to the California sun, and as usual she wore no makeup. She thought her eyes looked puffy, but maybe she was imagining that.

  A wall-mounted telephone rang, and the sound made her jump. She picked up. “Yes?”

  Zarkov said, “I’m in the Library Bar. I’ll wait here for you.”

  She hung up and made one more brief inspection of her image in the mirror. Then she left the room and took an elevator back down to the lobby.

  As its name suggested, the Regency’s bar was tricked up to look like the reading room of a library, complete with shelves of books and with newspapers laid out on many of the tables. A little hokey, Dana thought. It reminded her of a movie set.

  Zarkov rose from one of the tables. He took her hand and steered her to a seat next to his. He asked if she’d like a drink, and when she said she would, he called a waiter over and they both ordered scotch on the rocks.

  “So,” he said, “what’s this about a detective?”

  “He was one of the ones who questioned me at the Sherry-Netherland­ after Catherine’s murder. He was at the cemetery, and as I was leaving he tried to stop me. But I ran past him and got into the car and we drove away.”

  “We? Was someone else with you?”

  “No, just the driver. I hired the car to drive me up there and back. I realize I shouldn’t have run, but I was really scared, especially after what you told me about the authorities wanting to keep me here in New York. Now I feel like a criminal.”

  “You’re no such thing,” Zarkov said. “And frankly, the police were overreaching. Anyone in your position would have done the same thing.”

  “I hope that’s true.”

  “Of course it is. At the funeral, did you talk to anyone?”

  “Yes, with Catherine’s brother and his wife. They knew I thought a great deal of her personally. And that she’d always treated me very well. Almost like a kid sister.”

  “Did they question you?”

  “About what?”

  “About anything. Catherine’s life in LA, for example. Any of her contacts there.”

  “We talked about her career a little. And how she’d been holding up under the constant badgering by the paparazzi and having to deal with the media.”

  “Anything else?”

  “They asked about her former husband, Ron Apperson.”

  “What did you tell them?”

  “As much as I could. I knew Cat’s marriage had been rocky. He and Catherine spoke on the phone now and then, and afterward she’d be tense and angry.”

  The waiter returned and served their drinks. Zarkov raised his glass and said, “Good luck.”

  “To you too,” Dana said. They touched rims and drank.

  At first, the scotch seemed very strong, but as soon as it made its way down, it produced a welcome warmth. And it also relaxed her.

  “This detective,” Zarkov said. “What was his name, do you know?”

  “Yes. It’s Barker. He also has a partner, whose name is Spinelli. But I think he was alone today.”

  “Did he manage to speak to you at all?”

  “No, I didn’t give him a chance.”

  “Good for you.”

  “Now I just want to get out of here and go back to Los Angeles. You said you could arrange to have the studio send a plane. I hate to ask for that big a favor, but I’m afraid if I tried to take a commercial flight, the police might stop me at the airport.”

  “I’m sure they would. As far as the plane is concerned, don’t worry about it. Diggs is also still here, and the plane will take you both back to California just as soon as I can arrange it. Probably no later than tomorrow.” He smiled. “I do have a little clout, you know.”

  “I’m sure you do.”

  “Have you thought more about what we discussed, the last time we talked? About going through Catherine’s papers, and her files?”

  “Yes. As soon as I’m back in LA I’ll start going through everything I have.”

  “As I said, I’ll be happy to help you with it. I had another talk with my lawyer, and he said it was vital that it be done as soon as possible.”

  “All right. I’ll let you know.”

  “By the way, there’s something I’ve been meaning to ask you. What are your plans, now that Catherine is gone?”

  “I’ll be looking for a job, I guess.”

  “How would you like to work for me?”

  The question surprised her. “Doing what?”

  “I need an assistant. And from everything I’ve seen, you’re a very competent person. You learned quite a bit about the business while you were with Catherine, wouldn’t you say?”

  “I think so, yes.”

  “And becoming an assistant producer would be a nice step up for you, wouldn’t it?”

  “It certainly would.”

  “So what about it?”

  “I’m a little bit awed. I need to think about it.”

  “Okay, do that. We can talk further when I return to LA.”

  “Sure.”

  So now, she thought, he not only wants to get into my pants, he has an even bigger treat for me. He wants to hire me. I can imagine what that would be like. I’d probably be the assistant producer in charge of giving him blow jobs. Meanwhile, he’s hell-bent on getting those files.

  “Another drink?” he asked.

  “No thanks, Len. But believe me, I appreciate your help. And thanks for the offer.”

  “My pleasure.”

  12.

  The newsstand at the Crystal Palace Hotel in Las Vegas carried papers from cities all over America. Each day Mongo made it a point to buy copies of USA Today and the New York Times and look for stories on the Catherine Delure murder case.

  The newspapers usually carried them, saying the police were continuing to investigate various leads, which of course was a bullshit way of admitting they were getting nowhere.

  He also checked out what the Los Angeles Times was reporting. That paper tended to have more on Delure’s career, because its readers ate up anything on people in the movie business, and even the editors were starstruck. But the essence of today’s story was the same: the cops had zilch.

  Same with TV. In fact, the case was given more exposure on the tube than in print. The cable channels loved wallowing in the story. Night after night, Greta and Anderson and the other news geeks talked about it at length.

  At first, they’d babbled about how a daring thief killed both Delure and her assistant and stole the star’s jewels. How a massive manhunt was under way, with detectives sifting a number of clues. Mongo liked being described as daring, but he thought the rest of it was so much asswipe.

  For a while, both the TV and newspaper stories also featured a composite drawing of the killer, and it was so far off base it made him laugh. The character in the drawing looked like the Frankenstein monster with a mustache. Not only did Mongo see no resemblance to his regular features, but one of the first things he’d don
e after the hit was put the wig away and shave his upper lip.

  So the job had worked out just as he’d planned. He’d pulled it off and vanished in a puff of smoke, and now the police were chasing their tails and the media were scrambling to come up with something new. And not succeeding.

  The supermarket tabloids, however, weren’t about to leave it at that. If a new angle hadn’t come to light, they’d invent one. Mongo picked up a copy of the National Enquirer one night, and there was a photo of Delure on the front page. The headline screamed, “Star Snuffed by Former Lover!”

  Seeing that gave him another laugh. The story said the Enquirer had learned from an impeccable source that the killer was a famous movie actor who’d had an affair with Delure. She’d dumped him after becoming involved with somebody else, and jealousy had driven the actor mad. He followed her to New York and shot her, and then he shot Penny Ellis as well because Ellis was Delure’s new love.

  The story went on to say the police were close to making an arrest, and that when the killer’s identity was revealed, the shock would be felt around the world. He was a top star.

  Sure he was, Mongo thought. And his name was Elvis.

  One thing was interesting, though. This was the first time anybody had suggested that robbery wasn’t the motive. But so what? Nobody read rags like the Enquirer but a bunch of sex-starved housewives. Before long, the papers would move on to other scandals, and the story would be deader than Kelsey’s nuts.

  So there was really nothing to worry about. From here out, he could relax and have a good time, and there was no better place than Vegas to have it.

  In fact, he considered this the best good-time town in the United States. Maybe in the world, for all he knew. The glitz, the glamour, the gambling, the women, the anything-you-want-anytime-you-want-it made for nonstop excitement like nowhere else.

  Of course, some of the other cities weren’t bad. Miami, for instance, which he’d gotten to know while on an assignment for the Cubans. They were very good at hits themselves, but they’d wanted an outsider for that particular job, so that there wouldn’t be so much as a rumor that they were involved. He’d done the work with a pearl-handled stiletto to make it look like payback from an enraged woman, and that’s how it was reported. He’d collected a bundle for that one.