"For God's sake, Harry, it's no big deal! Why are you being like this? Please let me go with you! Stop! Ow!"
The door opened and a pretty dark-haired girl with an extraordinary bust stumbled into our little prison, her face red from crying. Her hands were bound like ours.
"Marvin?" she said "Oh my God! What's happening? Are they going to kill us all?"
"Hello Fantasia, dear. Yes, I think they are planning to kill us. Plantagenet and I paddled up here to rescue you. But we don't seem to be doing a very good job, do we?"
"Hello Marvin!" said a voice that boomed like cannon fire.
Into the room walked a large, balding old man in wrinkled Ralph Lauren. He looked like his pictures. Harry Sharkov. Alive and well. All I could think was—poor Doria. How miserable to be married to this awful man.
He surveyed us all, then pushed Fantasia into a sitting position on the coffee table.
"Change of plans. You can have her back, you old pervert," he said to Marvin.
"Hello Harry," Marvin said. "Did you get tired of her?"
"Got tired of keeping her away from my Colombian guests," Harry said. "And my submarine is here. Time to go. It's been swell meeting you all."
He motioned for his guards to come in. They had more rope. They started to tie Fantasia to the coffee table. Then another one grabbed Plant and tied his legs to the the loveseat.
Then he came to me. He pulled the rope so tight it hurt. I wanted to kick him in the face. But that obviously would have got me shot by the guard with the rifle.
"What's going on now, Harry? Why are you doing this?" Fantasia's voice squeaked. "I was only flirting with Mr. Reyes because he scared me. Look, I'm not with them. I never even slept with Marvin. I swear. Just the lesbian stuff when he was Marva—for the show."
"Fantasia, dear, I don't think he ever intended to take you with him. Those narco-subs are a very tight fit. And what's all that jewelry you're wearing?" Marvin spoke with a bravado none of the rest of us could muster.
Fantasia ignored him as her voice rose to a shriek. "I promise I won't try to stow away on your stupid boat. Why would I? You're a jerkwad. All I want is to go home. Give me back my dad's dingy and take the damned jewelry. I don't know why you suddenly gave me all this stuff."
She tried to pulling off a diamond bracelet, but of course it wouldn't come off over the ropes. Then she reached for the earrings and started fiddling with them.
"Take them! Take them. I don't want any of it. I want to go home!" She dropped the earring on the floor.
I recognized the jewelry—very like the diamonds I'd seen on Doria Windsor on the cover of Home magazine last December.
Harry strode over and clapped a hand over Fantasia's mouth.
"My lovely wife seems to have been resurrected from her watery grave, according to the local radio, so we need a better corpse for her this time. Yours will do fine." He put the earring back in her ear. "These were always her favorite. Somebody will be able to identify them. By the time forensics finds out it's not Doria, I'll be long gone. Nobody will suspect anybody was here but Doria and her gang of prostitutes and perverts. Case closed."
He gave us all a horrible grin. "Thanks for providing me with a nice little red herring for the local cops."
Nobody else spoke as the men tied us to the furniture in silence.
I fought panic and wondered if the rest of them could smell what I smelled.
Kerosene.
One of the men standing in the little hallway carried a big can of it.
"You know, I have the worst luck with fire," Harry said. "Too bad it takes at least forty minutes for the nearest fire department to get here."
Chapter 83—A Nice Little Miracle
Doria stood under a pine tree on the side of the parking lot, with absolutely no idea what to do next. The people in the RVs said she wasn't allowed to stay there after the 4:30 closing time unless she was one of their elite members.
They wouldn't even let her sit on the grass nearby.
Her limbs didn't seem to belong to her, the way they sometimes behaved in dreams. She had that walking through Jell-O feeling she'd had right after she heard about the fire.
Maybe she'd been dreaming this whole time. None of it had happened. She was still lying in the L.A. hospital, waiting for Dr. Singh.
She clutched her guardian angel pendant and prayed. If that angel was up there, this would be the time to kick in with a nice little miracle.
The one place she knew she couldn't go was back to the camp. Lucky was fierce. If she thought "Dorothy" had stolen her husband, her life would be worth nothing.
Finally Doria walked out to the street and back to the bus stop. She felt in her pocket, as if a magic bus token might have materialized.
Nope. No miracle-activity there.
So should she sit at the bus stop? What would she do if a bus came and she tried to get on without the fare? They'd probably report her to the cops. She'd be better off walking. She saw some campers illegally parked across the street, but the legal RV-ers in the parking lot had warned her about huge fines for being caught there. Better to stay away.
So she Jell-O walked down Prado Road. She had no idea how much time had elapsed. Thoughts mushed around in her head with visions of Harry, dead.
Then Harry, alive.
And Joey, looking at her with all that hurt in his face.
She needed to go somewhere. Anywhere. Maybe she could pretend she had amnesia. Get a job as a cook. Or a housekeeper. She was the world's premier expert on homemaking. Not useless. She simply needed to get a ride. She stuck out her thumb a few times, but nobody seemed to notice her.
Walking was slow, but exhausting. She was out of shape after her week in bed at Marvin's. When she got to a sturdy looking fence, she leaned against it to catch her breath.
She prayed again. Please. Send someone to help.
Okay, she needed to be more forceful with the hitch-hiking. She stuck out an assertive thumb at an approaching car.
But it whizzed by.
Then she heard sirens. And saw flashing lights.
The police. They'd come for her.
Chapter 84—Gregg Shorthand
Fantasia screamed as the smell of kerosene wafted through the little cabin.
"Fire! They're going to burn us all to death!"
Actually, there wasn't any fire yet, although we all knew what was going to happen. The silent henchperson still stood guard over us, his rifle at the ready, half-in and half-out of the open cabin door. Maybe Harry had left orders to wait to light the fire until his submarine was ready for launching. I had no idea what that might entail.
Personal submarines. I had no idea they existed. But apparently Harry had been working with South American narco-sub makers to build an upscale version for wealthy businesspeople and celebrities who wanted to travel in complete privacy.
Marvin and Ronzo were now trying to educate us on the subject, between Fantasia's screams.
Ronzo had apparently figured out Harry's scheme after talking to Fantasia's father and some assorted fishermen in various states of inebriation. Some people said they'd seen the missing boat up here, and there was speculation that Fantasia might be opening her own brothel at the Raggedy Inn.
So Ronzo had hitched a ride with a couple of kayakers the next day and jumped off at the cove where the boat was beached.
Which turned out to be a bad idea. Harry's Dangerous Dudes had caught him almost immediately.
Ronzo told his story in small bursts while Marvin tried to calm Fantasia, which only made her scream louder.
Plant and Silas were looking into each other's eyes from across the room. Plant mouthed "I love you" to Silas. They seemed to have given up hope.
Ronzo had not, as was obvious from the way he was twisting his ropes, trying to get himself untied in spite of the wounds from what must have been quite a beating. I tried to work at my knots, too, with no luck.
It always looked so easy when people did it in movies,
but my efforts only seemed to be rubbing the skin off my wrists. And make my wounded arm hurt like crazy.
But I refused to believe we were going to die here. It was so random, and…stupid. Harry Sharkov. How could this person who was such obvious slime get away with our mass murder?
Hope and despair were at war with the terror that almost had me screaming, too.
But we all got quiet when we heard scurrying outside, even Fantasia.
The rifle man took a step back to look.
He made an awful noise. Not very loud. Then he fell forward. Spurting blood from his throat.
Fantasia screamed anew as a group of men—scruffy ones I hadn't seen before—leaped over the rifle man's body and ran toward us. One had a shotgun. Another had a knife. A big, bloody knife. A third had a hammer—a plain claw hammer—but it looked as if it could be pretty lethal. He had a scarred face and was missing one arm below the elbow. Two others rolled the dead man over and took his rifle and a revolver from a shoulder holster.
The man with the knife came at us. He was well along in years and had a limp, but he wouldn't need speed to do to us what he'd done to the rifle man. A scream almost made its way out of my throat when I realized the old man was cutting the ropes on my wrists.
The man with the shotgun—a leathery, long-haired man who seemed to be a leader of sorts—took a knife from a belt holster and started to saw away at Fantasia's ropes.
She stopped screaming.
"Better keep screaming a little bit longer, girl." He gave a rough laugh. "Or they'll know something's going on. You're one hell of a screamer. Led us right here."
Plant and I stood, trying to rub circulation back into our hands. Once Silas was free, he ran to Plant and gave him a hug.
"I'm sorry, Plant. I should have believed you."
Marvin hugged Fantasia. "But the lesbian sex was special, wasn't it sweetie?" he said.
The man with the wild hair was still cutting Ronzo's ropes. Once he'd freed him, he reached out and shook Ronzo's hand.
"Hi there, Bonzo," he said. "Let me introduce myself. They call me Hobo Joe. Not to be confused with J. J. Tower, who happens to be a dead guy. You shouldn't have let poor old Tommy the Tooth bullshit you like that."
Ronzo gave a big laugh.
"No shit?" He gave me a quick look of apology. "I mean, um, you knew Tommy was giving me info about you?"
"Totally bogus," Joe said. "Like the photo this jerk sent to your blog." He pointed at Marvin with his thumb. "I'm just an old hobo. Not some dead a-hole, okay? And you totally didn't fool me with that suit. You're a rock and roll guy. Maybe Tommy couldn't tell, but I could."
Ronzo gave him an enigmatic look and started to say something, but the knife man interrupted.
"Listen—we'll all be dead a-holes if we don't get the heck outta here," he said. "We got a van up at the top of the hill. Move slow and steady and real quiet. Those crooks all seem to be down at the pier. If they don't see us, we're home free. If they do, looks like we're all gonna be crispy critters."
He sniffed the air, thick with the stink of kerosene.
"You go on ahead, Bucky," Hobo Joe said. "I'll cover you guys. This weapon's got a pretty good range." He brandished his shotgun.
"How the hell did you guys find us?" Ronzo said as we trekked up the path.
"I read Gregg shorthand," said Hobo Joe from behind us. "You sure had everything detailed in that notebook. You should be a real reporter, you know that? Why are you wasting your time with that Internet crap?"
Chapter 85—Invisible
Doria could hardly breathe as the police car slowed and stopped a hundred yards or so from where she was standing.
It parked right behind another, unmarked car that had just pulled over. She wondered if the two women in front seat of the first car might be from the FBI. She was wanted by the FBI as well as the local police, according to that USA Today article.
She made her slow way toward the policeman, who had got out of his vehicle and seemed to be going to join his cohorts in the other car. Best to meet him halfway, and show she was giving up voluntarily.
She called to him, "Officer, I'm not dead. I guess you figured that out."
The policeman looked over his shoulder.
"Ma'am? Do you need assistance?"
"I think my guardian angel wants me to turn myself in."
That was the message of course. It was what she should have done from the beginning. That very first day at Betsy's. All this running and hiding. It was pointless. If she was guilty of a crime, she should pay.
After all, Martha Stewart had gone to jail. And been very gracious about it.
Doria felt a huge weight lifting from her body.
The policeman was talking to the women in the car through a half-rolled down window. The driver gave him something. A small piece of paper.
"Are you from the FBI?" she called to them.
The policeman turned and looked at her with an odd expression—as if he didn't quite believe she was there. Or she was out of focus and semi-visible.
"Ma'am, have you been drinking?" he said.
"No. Lucky would probably kill me," Doria said with a laugh.
"Hey," said the driver, "Is that you, Dorothy? I didn't recognize you without the wig. It's Jen. And Jen's with me. I think we were speeding."
The policeman pulled out a notepad. "You got that right. I'm going to have to write you a ticket. You know this lady?"
"She's Dorothy," Jen said. "We were Manners Doctors together yesterday."
Was it only yesterday?
"I think she's been drinking," the officer said. "Maybe you can take her to the shelter. Or Alcohol Services. I'll tell you what, if you take your friend to the shelter, I'll let you off with a warning, okay? She shouldn't be walking out here. But remember this is 40 mile and hour zone. You were doing at least 60."
The Jen in the passenger seat opened her door and leaned forward to let Dorothy in.
"Where to?" said driver Jen, as the policeman strode back to his car.
Doria had no idea how to answer that. She fingered her angel pendant.
"Maybe back to that parking lot where we met," she said. "I have some friends who run a jewelry store near there."
And if she remembered right, they owed her a few dollars for the setting of that ring. Maybe if she gave it to Lucky for the camp, Doria would be let back in.
Obviously she didn't have to worry about the police any more. She was poor and homeless now—which made her close to invisible.
Chapter 86—Home
I sat next to Ronzo on what seemed to be a box of rotting potatoes. Fantasia sat next to us, smelling of some awful pop-celebrity perfume. The back of the van stank of so many unpleasant smells it was hard to isolate them.
Not that I was complaining. And neither were the rest of us.
I'm sure we were all grateful we could breathe at all.
I was also grateful that Fantasia seemed to have screamed herself out. She was leaning against Marvin looking like a small child who was up past her bedtime.
Ronzo was already texting somebody on my phone. Probably updating his stupid blog.
But after the friendly knife-wielding assassin called Bucky drove his rattletrap van the terrifying couple of miles up the dirt road and onto the smooth surface of Highway One, I realized that I hadn't been breathing much for hours.
I kind of had to tell my lungs it was okay to take in oxygen. Stinky oxygen still provided what I needed now.
Mostly it was the stink of humans. Homeless humans. We seemed to have been rescued by homeless people. Who had been smart enough to bypass Harry's guards and take the footpath down from the road.
Remarkable, but of course it made sense. Harry had killed one of their own.
"So how did you get hold of my notebook?" Ronzo shouted at Hobo Joe, who sat up front with Bucky.
"My lady friend found it." Joe said. "She thinks I killed you, dude, so when I saw that notebook, I figured I'd better find you
and prove I didn't. I volunteered these guys to help."
Bucky gave a big laugh. "Yeah. My old lady wasn't any too happy about it. She thinks Joe made that stuff up about shorthand because he wanted us to help him run after Dorothy when she dumped him."
Joe gave a big laugh. "Hey, there's no law that says a guy can't read shorthand. I took it in high school. That's where I met Dorothy. Business class in high school."
"We thank you all," Plant said, turning first to Bucky and then to the other three men, who sat huddled with us in the back of the van. "You saved our lives."
"How the hell did you guys find me?" Ronzo said to Plant and Marvin. "Phones are useless in there. I bought a cheap one to replace the iPhone I lost in the fight, but they took it when they locked me in that damned cabin. I sure didn't think anybody would guess where I was."
"Marvin and I put our heads together," Plant said.
There seemed to be some grudging friendship growing between them.
Plant went on. "He asked around and found out you'd gone kayaking and I remembered how Harry was interested in the old motel, so we deduced you might be there."
Marvin gave a rough laugh. "Then we thought we'd paddle into a nice ambush. Not the smartest possible move, in hindsight." He nodded at the homeless men, too. "Thanks, guys. We'd all be dead if it weren't for you."
"I'm kinda disappointed. We wanted to kill Harry Sharkov," said the small bald one. "We figured if that shorthand was right, and Harry killed Tom to stage his own death, we could kill him and get away with it—on account of he was already dead. For the sake of old Tommy."
"You hated Tommy," said another man.
"But I hated that Wall Street scum more."
Silas seemed to wake from a trance.
"Harry. The bastard. He's alive. He's getting away with it. With my goddam money." He turned to Plant. "Our goddam money."
Plant put an arm around him.
Ronzo laughed. "I don't think so. I just texted a friend at the S.L.O.P.D. and suggested they to alert the Coast Guard. I don't think he'll get far. If he's even launched that thing yet. I don't think they'd got all the bugs out of that contraption."
No Place Like Home - A Camilla Randall Mystery (The Camilla Randall Mysteries) Page 24