Whirlpool

by Elizabeth Lowell

  “Smooth as silk,” Cahill said. “He was so interested in sticking his ear to the door that he didn’t hear me come out of the stairwell.”

  Hudson’s shrug said he didn’t care about the details.

  Cahill prodded Swann with the cold muzzle of the gun. “Hit the wall. Both hands. Spread your feet. Stay that way.”

  Swann braced his hands against the brocade wallpaper and let Cahill frisk him. It didn’t take him long to find the gun.

  “Lobby surveillance cameras, right?” Swann said to Cahill as he removed the gun. “You’ve got a buddy in hotel security.”

  Cahill chuckled, more relaxed now that Swann was disarmed. “We were on the Bureau’s bank robbery squad in Dallas twenty-two years ago. We still help each other out from time to time. Thought you’d never get tired of looking at the ladies in the lobby.”

  “Come in and sit, Mr. Swann,” Hudson said in his odd, papery voice. “I was hoping you would show up soon. Ms. Toth doesn’t seem to know how to make the egg open.”

  Swann looked at Toth. And smiled.

  A silvery chill of excitement and fear rippled down Toth’s spine. She’d always wondered what death would look like. Now she knew. It was waiting for her in Jamie Swann’s feral eyes.

  She would have sold what remained of her soul for the chance to have sex with him one last time.

  Swann’s smile told her that he knew what she was thinking.

  With the muzzle of his gun, Cahill shoved Swann toward a chair. Swann responded slowly, watching and waiting for the right opening. Cahill was acting like a man who had forgotten everything he’d learned in the FBI about guns and prisoners.

  Swann was looking forward to the instant when he would feed Cahill his own gun. But first, Swann had to make that beautiful pit viper believe that all he wanted was out of the game. It had to be done carefully or she wouldn’t believe him.

  “Party’s over,” Cahill said. “Sit down and act civilized.”

  Swann sat down on a wingback chair, keeping his weight forward and his legs coiled under him, ready to spring.

  “Lean back. Relax,” said Cahill. “I used to eat guys like you a dozen at a time.”

  Swann let his weight lean back slightly in the chair, but he kept his legs coiled. Then he began easing his weight forward again, moving just a bit at a time.

  Either Cahill didn’t notice or he didn’t care. He holstered his weapon and pulled out a leather-wrapped billy club.

  “Nice bit of work, lover,” Swann said to Toth. “Double or die, right?”

  “Nothing that dangerous,” she said. “Mr. Hudson has made us a very generous counteroffer.”

  “I’ll bet he has.”

  She smiled, licked her lips, and bit the bottom one, watching Swann the whole time. “But first he needs proof that the egg is what we say it is. You can do that, can’t you?”

  Swann stared at her with open contempt. “Sure, babe. No problem.”

  “Good,” Hudson said. “Please demonstrate.”

  “Fuck you, fool.”

  Hudson glanced at Cahill. The security man slapped Swann with the billy club. The blow wasn’t hard enough to break the skin, but it rocked Swann’s head back.

  “Is that the best you can do?” Swann asked.

  Cahill cradled the billy club in his palm, weighing the weapon and watching Swann with indifferent eyes.

  “You don’t want to see my best,” Cahill said matter-of-factly. “Make the egg do its trick or you’ll be spitting teeth for a week.”

  Swann laughed. “Bet you were the terror of kindergarten.”

  Cahill looked at Hudson.

  “You can knock out every one of my teeth,” Swann said, “and you still won’t have what you want.”

  “Tough guy, huh?” Cahill said. “Think pain won’t make you talk?”

  “You could wire my pecker to a phone and call room service all day long,” Swann said, “and it still wouldn’t get the job done.”

  Toth started to speak.

  Hudson cut her off with a sharp motion of his hand. He stared at Swann. “What, precisely, is the problem?”

  “It will cost you a hundred grand to find out,” Swann said.

  “Don’t be stupid,” Hudson said. “You’re hardly in a position to bargain.”

  “Think again, old man. Yeah, I’ve just been cut out of the deal. Yeah, there isn’t much I can do about it without screwing myself as much as you.”

  Hudson nodded.

  “So I’ll just take a hundred grand and go away,” Swann said. “Under the circumstances, that’s not a lot. It’s less than the bribes you’d have to pay to hush up a killing in the Beverly Wilshire Hotel.”

  Hudson looked at Toth.

  She shrugged.

  “All right,” Hudson said. “Ms. Toth can pay you from the money I brought with me today. Now, why can’t you make the egg work?”

  “Missing pieces,” Swann said succinctly. “All you’ve got is a very fancy skeleton.”

  It was the truth, which only made the words more effective.

  “What?” Hudson cut a hard glance at Toth. “She said you’d bring everything we needed.”

  “She lied.” Swann smiled thinly. “Get used to it. If the bitch is breathing, she’s lying.”

  Toth watched Swann. Her hungry black eyes looked back on being his lover and forward to being his executioner.

  “Was she lying about the E Bloc computer?” Hudson said.

  “Damned if I know,” Swann said. “What did she say?”

  “That we needed one.”

  “You do.”

  They also needed the original ruby, but Swann wasn’t going to mention it. If Toth hadn’t discovered the substitution yet, he wasn’t going to tell her unless it gave him an advantage.

  “Is there a way around the necessity for a computer?” Hudson asked.

  “Maybe a cable link and a hacker could get the job done.” Swann shrugged. “Ask Novikov. It’s his toy.”

  “Under the circumstances,” Hudson said, “I don’t think he’d want to help.”

  “Yeah, well, some people just don’t have any sense of humor, do they?”

  Hudson eyed his prisoner carefully, suspecting that there was more to Swann than he’d seen yet.

  “Is lack of a computer the only problem?” Hudson asked.

  Swann just looked at him.

  Cahill moved, turning his body slightly as though preparing to strike again.

  The movement caught Swann’s eye. He glanced at the security man.

  “At ease,” Swann said, lying as convincingly as he’d told the truth. “Your boss has the whole thing, or he will as soon as he gets the computer link.”

  For a moment there was only silence. Then Hudson looked at Toth.

  “Now you’re catching on,” Swann mocked. “She’s the one who can answer your questions. She’s in this with Novikov up to her tits.”

  Hudson watched Toth, waiting for confirmation.

  She studied Swann’s face for a long time, uneasy without knowing why.

  “Oh, for Christ’s sake,” Swann said curtly to her. “Get me the hundred grand and I’ll get the hell out of everyone’s life. I’m sick of this game.”

  Toth came around the table slowly. With feline grace she knelt in front of Swann.

  “Poor babe,” she murmured. “You really aren’t as hard as I thought, are you?”

  “I used to be. I’m getting old.”

  Tenderly she touched the slight bruise that was beginning to puff up on Swann’s cheekbone.

  “You were the best,” she said in a voice only he could hear. “The only one who never had to beat me to make me come.”

  “My mistake. Get me the go-away money and I’ll be gone.”

  She searched Swann’s eyes, looking for a lie. All she saw was the same animal hatred she’d seen when he first walked into the room. She didn’t doubt the truth of his hatred.

  Slowly she stood up. She looked at Hudson and nodded very slightl
y.

  “Now, Bill,” Hudson said distinctly.

  Cahill hit Swann just once. The blow landed at the base of Swann’s skull. Cahill cocked his arm again, ready to strike, but Swann was already sprawled facedown on the carpet.

  “That’s enough,” Hudson said. “We don’t want him marked up.”

  “Why not? Let me work him over a little more, then dump him somewhere. He won’t be back, believe me.”

  “That’s not necessary,” Hudson said. “Go get the limousine and bring it around to the lobby exit. We won’t be long.”

  51

  Los Angeles

  Wednesday night

  Jamie Swann groaned and rolled his head slowly from side to side as if dodging blows only he could see.

  With a combination of fear and fascination, Toth watched. Already he was trying to roll over and pull himself up by the arm of the chair.

  “Jesus, he’s a strong bastard,” she said under her breath. Then, to Hudson, “Hurry up.”

  “Help me get him into the chair.”

  Together, Hudson and Toth guided, dragged, and pushed the barely conscious Swann back into the chair. He mumbled and pawed at the side of his head like a wounded bear.

  “Quick, get a glass,” Hudson said.

  She hurried across the room to the small refrigerated bar and grabbed a glass from the shelf above it.

  “Whiskey,” Hudson said. “Fill it.”

  “He drinks vodka.”

  “Whatever. Just get it!”

  She rummaged through the narrow shelf in the refrig erator bar and came up with two small bottles of vodka. With vicious motions she snapped the seals on the caps and poured. Vodka gurgled into the tumbler. The two bottles filled the glass more than halfway. She hurried across the room to Hudson.

  Without a word he took the tumbler. Turning his back on Swann, Hudson dropped two small tablets into the clear liquid. They dissolved instantly. He swirled the liquid around several times before he handed the glass back to Toth.

  “Give it to him,” Hudson said.

  Black eyes widened as Toth realized she was going to be the one to kill Swann. And she would be doing it in front of a witness whose word in court would be even more powerful than her own.

  “Don’t lose your nerve now,” Hudson said softly. “It will appear entirely innocent. A man has a stiff drink. A heart attack follows. He falls, bruising his cheek and the back of his skull. He dies. How sad. How ordinary.”

  She stared for a moment at the glass, then down at the groggy, helpless man slumped in the chair.

  “Oh, babe,” she murmured. “My poor babe.”

  She knelt beside the chair and tried to straighten Swann’s head with one hand while holding the glass to his lips with the other.

  “Poor, poor babe,” she said softly. “I’m sorry they did that to you. I didn’t know it would happen. Here, drink this, you’ll feel better. Then I’ll get your money and you can go.”

  Swann tried to push the glass away with his hand, but he was too weak, too disoriented.

  Gently she covered the big hand that was warding off the tumbler. “Come on, babe, this will make you feel so much better. It’s vodka. It will clear your head. Otherwise you won’t be able to walk out of here with your money.”

  She tipped the glass until a little of the liquid ran between Swann’s lips. He tasted the familiar astringency of vodka and swallowed reflexively. She tipped more into his mouth and he swallowed again.

  The alcohol had a bracing effect. Swann’s eyes slowly focused on the opposite wall. He shook his injured head and brushed the glass away with his free hand.

  “Swee’ Jeeshush,” he groaned, slurring like a drunk.

  Painfully he fought to control his body. He didn’t know what had gone wrong. He only knew that something had.

  He focused on Toth’s intent face.

  “Bitch. Shoulda done you when I had the chance.”

  The words were sloppy but coherent.

  “Yeah,” she agreed, smiling gently, brushing her lips over his bruised cheek. “Here, lover. Drink some more. It’s making you feel better, isn’t it?”

  As she spoke, she brushed her long fingers through Swann’s hair at the base of his neck, examining the small swelling where he had been struck.

  “I’m really sorry they hurt you that way,” she said in a husky tone. “They weren’t supposed to.”

  Disoriented, Swann heard only the soft words and felt only the gentle touch on his battered head. He straightened up in the chair and took the tumbler she was pressing into his hand. He stared at the glass for a moment, trying to remember where it had come from.

  He couldn’t.

  Automatically he tossed back a swallow of vodka. The gesture sent blood pounding through his head and he groaned again.

  “Bitch,” he said.

  “Aw, babe, don’t be like that,” she said. “I only did what you would have done in my place.”

  Narrow-eyed, Swann stared past Toth, noticing Hudson for the first time. Swann frowned, trying to remember who Hudson was and why he was there. Fragments of memory came back.

  Hudson and Toth and double-cross.

  “Don’ trust her, old man,” Swann said, speaking carefully, wanting Hudson to understand every word. “She’ll cut off your nuts and feed ’em to you like pistachios.”

  “Not as long as she has an interest in keeping me alive,” Hudson said. “That’s the secret to a happy relationship. You should have learned it.”

  Hudson laughed.

  The dry sound was that of leaves skipping across a patio. Swann had heard it before. Recently. He knew it was connected with something important.

  He just couldn’t remember what.

  Slowly Swann moved his head and stared fixedly at Toth. Her expression was a mixture of pity and fear and dark excitement. Distantly he realized that his head was clearing, but there was a deep chill in his belly that was slowly radiating outward, consuming his once-powerful body.

  “What have you done to me?” he whispered.

  “Nothing, babe,” she said gently. “Just finish your drink and I’ll get your money.”

  Swann didn’t lift the glass to his lips.

  She glanced uneasily at the tumbler in his hand. Less than half of it was gone. She tried to guide the glass back to his lips.

  Swann batted her hands away and stared unsteadily at the glass. As the chill in his gut deepened to ice, he understood.

  He flung the glass aside, sending liquid in a cold arc as he tried to grab her. His big hands were like claws reaching for her throat, but they fell far short. His nerves and muscles had already begun shutting down.

  She fell backward and scuttled away like a frightened crab. “Jesus,” she said to Hudson. “Do something!”

  “It’s already done,” Hudson said quietly.

  “He didn’t drink it all.”

  “Obviously he had enough. Look at him.”

  Swann reared up on unsteady legs, then collapsed backward into the chair. As rapidly as his body was succumbing, his brain was clearing.

  “What the hell was it?” Swann asked.

  “A Soviet concoction,” Hudson said, walking back to sit on the couch. “It will look like a heart attack, particularly for a big, beefy man like yourself. But you should have drunk it all. Death would have been painless that way. I doubt that it will be now.”

  Swann leaned to one side in the chair, fighting not to fall over.

  “Well, I’ll be damned,” he whispered, looking at Hudson. “When I saw you here, I stopped worrying about being killed right away. I didn’t think you would get your hands dirty.”

  “I’m a pragmatist,” Hudson said. “I always have been. I’d kill a dozen men like you for this.”

  As he spoke, Hudson’s hand grasped the egg. His thumb pressed. The egg opened, revealing a gleaming, extraordinary lattice of silver and gold.

  Above it, the ruby burned like a blood-red flame.

  Swann made a strangled s
ound that could have been either a death rattle or a demon’s laughter. “The whore and the pragmatist.” He gasped brokenly. “Jesus, what a pair of zeros you are. You just busted out of the game and you don’t even know it.”

  “What are you talking about?” Hudson demanded.

  Swann ignored him, looking only at Toth.

  “The ruby,” Swann said, gasping for enough air to tell her how badly she’d lost the game. “I switched it. You’ve got a dud, lover. Empty. Blank.”

  His body jerked with a combination of pain and horrible laughter.

  Hudson picked up the egg and stared desperately at the glowing ruby. He carried it to a lamp where the light was better and inspected the stone.

  “Well?” she demanded. “Is it a ruby?”

  “I can’t say. I know someone who can.”

  But Hudson had a growing, gnawing certainty that Swann had done exactly as he’d said. For a man in partnership with Claire Toth, having a double-cross up his sleeve would be simple common sense.

  Swiftly Hudson crossed the room to where Swann was slumped in the chair. Hudson’s fingers speared into Swann’s hair, clenched, and yanked his head upright.

  “There is an antidote,” Hudson said distinctly. “Tell me where you put the real ruby and you’ll live.”

  “Fuck you, fool.” Swann jerked to one side in a spasm of pain. His eyes fastened on Toth. “See you in hell, babe. Bet on it.”

  Hudson whirled and advanced on Toth.

  “Where would he have hidden it?” Hudson demanded. “Who did he trust?”

  “No one. Trusting people is dumb, and Jamie was only dumb about his daughter.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “He sent the egg to her.”

  “Where is she?” Hudson asked savagely.

  “Now? I don’t know. She has a house in Cambria. But she’s not there now.”

  “Where is she?”

  “I’m working on it,” Toth said curtly. “She and her mother had a house down here, somewhere in Los Angeles. Jamie used to hide out there a lot.”

  “No.”

  Swann’s hoarse cry was involuntary. His voice was strangled, almost unintelligible, but his anguish was unmistakable. He lunged forward, but his legs wouldn’t support him. He crashed to the floor.

  “We’ll start with the daughter,” Hudson said. “Bill Cahill has useful contacts with the local police. He’ll find the house.” He pulled Toth toward the door. “Hurry. Novikov might be ahead of us.”