“What woman? What something?”
Winston coughed. He coughed until he choked, and Rupert punched him between the shoulder blades. When he finally collected himself, Fanelli and Moroni were still frowning at him.
“I don’t think I ought to give that kind of detail to anyone but Mr. Hasaki. Rupert here was supposed to buy something important so we could feel safe completing our business for Mr. Hasaki—”
“There ain’t no Mr. Hasaki no more.” Fanelli sniffed and rotated his neck inside his starched shirt collar. “You can think of me as him. So what happened in Notting Hill?”
Winston Moody was cold. Miniature flakes of snow began to fall through the gloom, but he was already as cold as he ever wanted to be. “I shouldn’t have listened to you, Fish. Coming here was a mistake.”
“It wasn’t my idea,” Rupert said. “You were the one. And I said we should go to The Dakota, not meet people we don’t know in Central Park.”
“Don’t speak unless I tell you to,” Winnie said. “Eat your bread.”
Rupert did tear off another mouthful of bread, but a glance at Moroni took his appetite away. The man’s big eyes turned a person’s stomach. Rupert took the bread from his mouth and shoved it into a pocket.
A bullet zipped past him. “Keep your hands up,” Fanelli said.
Winnie slid to his knees and started crying. “He’s tidy,” he sniffled. “Doesn’t like to waste food or make a mess, so he puts the crumbs in his pockets. He doesn’t have a gun.”
“Okay,” Fanelli said. “I just got back from London myself, see. I got friends there. In Notting Hill. How d’you think I knew what I wanted you to get for me in the first place? I just dreamed that piece up? I saw it at my friends’ and paid you to get it for me. Paid you two separate checks like you asked. Only you took my money and didn’t do your job.”
Winston offered up pleading hands. “We meant to call you about it. Honestly we did. But our first responsibility to Mr. Hasaki—to you—was to try to complete our commission.”
“You decided you wanted to steal from your friends?” Rupert said to Fanelli, digesting the idea.
“I decided I wanted yous to steal from them. You didn’t do it.”
Winnie stammered, “Give us another chance, please. Something happened and we were interrupted. We had some trouble. You know how that can be. I’ll just tell you exactly the problem. We were—er, making sure everything was exactly as it should be before we removed the item, when these people came. A decorator or something, and a photographer. The photographer started clicking all over the place and we couldn’t risk sticking around and getting our faces on film, so we ducked out. That wretch”—he hooked a thumb at Rupert—“that wretch was sent to buy the film from the photographer, just in case her camera had caught something inconvenient to us. She wouldn’t let him in so, in his wisdom, he decided to conduct business through her letterbox. He pushed in an envelope that was supposed to contain money to pay her and took a packet of negatives from her. Later we found out they weren’t the right negatives. And he’d given her our entire bank deposit, including your checks.”
Rupert slowly lowered his hands to his sides. If he had a gun, he’d use it to kill Winston.
“I’m going to get the checks back for you,” Winston said, getting up from his knees and taking a couple of halting steps toward Fanelli. “I’m closing in on the woman and I’ll soon have what you want.”
Fanelli spat the toothpick onto the ground. “I don’t fucking give a shit about the checks. I made sure they ain’t worth the paper they’re on no more. What I care about is you jerking me around. You don’t jerk me or my people around.”
Rupert heard Winnie swallow and didn’t blame him.
“You know what I told you to do, Moroni,” Fanelli said.
Moroni lumbered closer. “Back up,” he said to Winston and Rupert. “Stand against that tree.” He now held a gun, an even bigger gun than Fanelli’s.
“Oh, no,” Winston moaned.
Rupert glanced at him, noted how his legs were pressed together and saw the dark stain spreading down his trousers. Disgusting coward.
“Whatever you say,” Rupert told Moroni and began backing up. “Okay if I put my bread in my pockets? You’ll see what I’m doing.”
Moroni said, “Boss?”
“Let the lamebrain put his bread in his pockets. Maybe he’s like them Egyptians and thinks he’s gonna need it on the other side.” He smirked and snorted at his own joke.
Rupert broke the bread in two and stuffed half in each pocket. It made him feel better to do one, last good thing.
“Feeding his goddamn pockets,” Fanelli said, sounding incredulous.
When Rupert and Winston stood with their backs to the oak, Moroni unwound a black scarf from his neck. “Yous can have a blindfold. Take it in turns.”
“Thank you,” Rupert said.
“You can be last,” Moroni told him.
“I’ll be last,” Winston said. “It’s the least I can do.”
“I doubt it,” Fanelli commented.
“Let him be last,” Rupert said. “He never was good at making the best choice, I don’t want the blindfold.”
“Hands all the way up,” Moroni told him. “I gotta see where I’m shootin’. My aim never was so good.”
Rupert put his hands up and prayed that at least this once, Moroni would hit the bulls-eye.
“I’ve changed my mind,” Winnie said, “I want to be first.”
“Too bad, dickhead,” Fanelli said. “Now shut up.” Moroni closed one eye and extended both hands. Rupert looked down the barrel of a gun that wavered in all directions.
“Don’t you have a silencer?” Rupert said. “People will hear. They’ll be all over you. Swarms of people.”
“Sure they will,” Fanelli said. “I always interfere with crazies in Central Park. Moroni, one, two, three, shoot!”
“Look at that, boss,” Moroni said, slowly letting the gun drop. He took a step back and the gun discharged into the ground. “Look at that!”
Fanelli said, “What, what? Whassamatta with you? Look what you did.”
“Rats,” Moroni said. “Rats coming out of his pockets. You know I can’t stand ’em.”
“A rat here, a rat there. Two rats is all I see. Who cares?”
Rupert felt his American friends squirming free, one from each pocket, their tiny claws sinking into his legs as they ran down his trousers.
Moroni screamed.
Fanelli snarled, “Shoot,” through clenched teeth.
“Wonder why he doesn’t do his own shooting,” Rupert muttered.
“Because he’s the boss,” Winnie said through snuffles. “Bosses don’t do their own dirty work.”
The rats Rupert had found near a garbage can reached the ground and skittered about eating crumbs. They were adorable. Fanelli held up a hand and said, “Quiet.”
The rustling Rupert heard could be nothing more than wind through the trees—if there was a wind, which there wasn’t. Something or someone, or maybe several someones, were creeping about under the cover of encroaching darkness, and dense shrubs and trees.
The rhythmic thud of hoofs on hard ground was the next sound. He looked at the carriage, almost expecting to see that the horse had fled. He hadn’t.
“It’s a Mountie,” Winnie shrieked. “A Mountie, a Mountie.”
“That’s in Canada,” Rupert told him. “Here it’s a policeman on horseback.”
The next thuds were made by Fanelli and Moroni running toward the track as fast as the dense undergrowth would allow.
Rupert elbowed Winnie. “In future, you follow my instructions. We’re going straight back to London.”
Twenty-seven
Kitty had planned carefully. Vince at The Fiddle had made it clear for months that he wanted her, and now he’d get his chance—for at least as long as it suited her. Anyway, she quite fancied him, and a girl needed a man around. As soon as she got the money, she’d be off to
find a very different sort, one who would understand his place, and his place would be whatever she said it was.
She smiled to herself and made sure the expensive silk head scarf she’d bought completely covered her hair. Courreges sunglasses had been a big splurge when she couldn’t use a credit card and her cash was running low, but they’d been worth it. Soon enough she’d have more money than she’d ever go through. Time enough to worry about bills then.
Another thing she’d made up her mind about was that she’d never travel anything but first class in future. She massaged her body into the soft leather seat and sighed. Her ankle-length, cognac-colored leather coat with its luxurious fake mink collar already felt too warm for the plane, but at least she felt safe and rich. Rich could help a girl put up with a lot of things, and she’d have to wear the coat all the way to London, anyway. It was doubtful anyone would have found out she was on this flight, but just in case, she had to be sure she wouldn’t be recognized. She pulled a copy of Lip Service by Suzanne Simmons from her bag and was deeply involved by the time the plane took off.
Olivia tried repeatedly to make herself comfortable. Everything itched. She’d singled out a woman in first class who was very probably Kitty Fish. Kitty wore the garb of a flashy woman who capitalized on her appeal to the opposite sex, but Olivia had to admire her—she did it with flair, and if Olivia hadn’t seen her several times, she would not have recognized her.
There had been a close call when Olivia boarded the plane. She’d left the Talons’ before Aiden, but the cab driver didn’t speak English and gave her a tour she might have appreciated if she weren’t in a hurry. By the time she checked in for her flight, and her seat toward the back of the plane, most rows had already boarded. Olivia had slung her bags on her back, prayed that their being black would mean they were unremarkable, and bent low under their weight while she walked down the aisle.
Aiden had helped her with a disguise by packing his Wally outfit in an old military duffle bag, which he left in his room. She’d been able to take advantage of his being locked away with the computer to snaffle a handful of earrings—and his trilby. She had punched the trilby inside out and jammed it down to her ears. A black raincoat, so worn that it shone faintly green, covered her sweatshirt and cotton pants, but she’d had to make do with the tennis shoes. She had cut the fingers out of a pair of woolen gloves, and the overall result made her feel smug. Unremarkable. Almost invisible.
A couple of rows into the economy section, she glanced at a man’s leg inside dark-gray trousers, and her stomach rolled. She supposed there could be more than one man with thighs shaped just that way—a “touch me” way. But she doubted that.
Then she was at her own seat on an aisle. She put the camera bag overhead, her carry-on under the seat in front of her, grabbed two blankets, and plopped down. Almost at once she managed to bury herself in the blankets and assume a sleeping pose, even though she doubted she’d ever sleep again. How would she ever close out the image of that policeman’s mangled face?
Every cliché about women was true, including the one that insisted you “couldn’t live with them, and couldn’t live without them.”
Aiden couldn’t think about much of anything but Olivia back at the Talons’, sad and lonely—and frightened in case something happened to him. She’d managed to lose herself before he left. He’d gone all around the property but found no sign of her, and then Chris had arrived to run him to the airport and he’d had to leave. The good news was that he felt convinced she wanted to be with him and would do whatever it took to make sure that happened. He still hadn’t worked out all his feelings about everything, but he was pretty sure they both wanted the same things.
Kitty Fish had got a good look at him in that motel room. She’d never seen exactly what he looked like when he wasn’t in Wally Loder gear, but close enough. He rarely employed a beard and mustache, but they’d seemed the best idea for tonight. They were red, whereas the hair caught in a tail that extended to the middle of his back was pale blond. Sometimes the best place to hide was where you made sure everyone looked at you. The Armani suit Chris had volunteered was the perfect touch.
He knew exactly where Kitty sat. She’d chosen to look like an actress in standard “Yes, I am somebody famous” mode. His hunch that she’d spring for first class had paid off. His own seat was toward the front of economy. He’d considered and discarded business class just in case she’d gone that route instead.
Poor Olivia. She was quite the tiger. Following orders didn’t come easily to her, but she’d known when it was time to give in. He missed her already.
Until the moment Aiden had left Chris and Sonnie’s, Vanni had kept on making appeals for his partner to go to ground somewhere and not run the risk of being picked up for, in addition to theft and possession, the murder of Fats Lemon. Aiden believed the only way to clear himself was to get his hands on at least one of the principles in the case. He had proof that someone had tampered with a painting in Notting Hill, London. That evidence was useless to him unless he could use it to make someone talk.
By now the local police in Seattle, Chris’s boys, would be all over that boathouse. Another good reason to be as far away as he could get and still be doing something constructive.
Maybe he’d give Olivia a call from London.
“No, thank you,” Olivia told a porter hovering in the international baggage claim area at Heathrow, “I don’t need any help.”
All she needed was to keep Aiden in sight—without him seeing her—so that she could follow him and be there if he needed help.
There was a moment, when Kitty Fish hiked the bag that wasn’t hers from a carousel—that tempted Olivia to rush at the woman and wrestle her property back. One look at Aiden— or perhaps she should call him Wally—reminded her that she wasn’t supposed to be here, and his ego would probably never recover if she upstaged him. Also, making a move too soon could mess everything up.
Looking at him didn’t calm her one whit. The suit he wore was dark gray and clearly very expensive. A white shirt and silvery silk tie were the perfect complement to the red mustache and goatee that had stunned her at first. He wore a wig of long, sleek blond hair tied in a tail.
And every head turned.
She would never have thought of that, of making sure she was noticed, but so different as to be as good as invisible.
He was so lovely. Oh, fiddle, he positively mangled her composure, not that she had any left. He held his head very high and commanded his own space. Passersby stared, but kept a respectful distance.
Oh, good grief, she was going on about him again—even if it was just in her head.
He took off after Kitty.
Olivia took off after Aiden.
Kitty took the green-arrowed “Nothing to Declare” lane and hurried into the frantic melee beyond.
When a ruggedly good-looking man jogged to meet the woman, relieved her of the green tartan bag, and took her by the arm, Olivia followed Aiden’s example and studied notices posted on pillars.
The procession continued.
There was an instant when Olivia feared she’d got too close to Aiden. His gaze moved in her direction, and she suffered another shock. Brown eyes. Brown contacts, of course. He hadn’t missed a thing.
Allowing a little more space between them, Olivia followed all the way to the taxi rank, where Kitty and her friend commandeered the single waiting vehicle. Aiden walked into the middle of the drive-through, waved down a glistening burgundy taxi, and climbed in.
Panicking, Olivia cast around, but there didn’t seem to be another taxi in sight.
A shiny black limousine slid up beside her, and the passenger window lowered. “Where you ’eaded, miss?” the driver asked.
“No, no,” she said. “I need a taxi.”
“Then this is a taxi,” the man said. “I don’t see a queue for the limo, and any fare’s better than no fare. ’Op in.”
Apprehensive, Olivia did get in, and urgency too
k over from thrift and trepidation. “Do hurry, please. Follow those two taxis that just left.”
The limousine shot forward, throwing Olivia to the back of sumptuous black-leather seats. “I’m not sure where they’re going and they do have a head start. I’ll understand if you can’t—”
“Oh, I can, miss, you just see if I can’t. ’Ang on to yer ’at.”
Twenty-eight
Aiden had never been in London before, and he was traveling too fast to see much of it now. Kitty and her friend’s cab was lane-hopping at amazing speed given the heavy traffic.
“Where are we?” Aiden asked.
“East Acton.”
So far the guy wasn’t verbose.
“How much farther?”
The Indian cabbie looked at him in the mirror and raised his already arched brows.
Aiden colored and felt stupid. “Yeah, right, we don’t know where we’re going, so we don’t know how far it is. It’s been a long couple of days.”
“We are going northeast, it seems,” the gentleman from India said politely. “I am not so certain they are sure of their destination.”
Another silence fell, although the noise of vehicles all around them was deafening. Aiden wondered at the absence of car horns but decided not to ask too many questions since they could only add to an impression of ignorance.
“They go directly east now,” the driver said eventually. “That was Holland Park. Now we are in Notting Hill.”
Aiden shot to the edge of his seat. “Notting Hill?”
“Yes. Trendy now.” He rolled the word, trendy, over his tongue. “Used to be a war zone, if you know what I mean. Now it’s all trendy little shops and the market where people like to be seen buying their hearts of palm, don’t you know.”
“I know now,” Aiden said, trying to reconcile a place he’d heard Olivia mention with this colorful but tiny warren of streets where people seemed determined to outdo each other with the wild colors of their front doors.
“North again,” the cabbie announced. “Novice driver, I shouldn’t doubt.”
They skirted a park on the right. “Kensington Gardens and Hyde Park. Your friends are in a great hurry.”
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