by Terry Odell
Blake looked out the window at some run-down buildings, most empty. A few storefronts with grimy windows, many boarded up with graffiti-covered plywood, lined the cracked sidewalks. The cab pulled away, hung a U-turn and was gone.
He glanced around. “River North. Charming neighborhood. You live here, Vance?” In this neighborhood, a gunshot would go unnoticed. Certainly unreported.
“I said, ‘Shut up’, Windsor. Walk, or your so-called cousin gets hurt.”
“You need to get a better speech writer, you know. You’re starting to sound like a bad movie.”
“There’s a construction site down there.” Griffith cocked his head to his right. “We’re going to cut between these two buildings, walk down this alley, and then you’re going to have a little accident.”
Wind howled between the buildings. Kelli walked beside him, hunched against the cold, her hands stuffed in her pockets.
He set his fury aside and kept his tone civil. “You could at least be a gentleman and give her your coat. Tell me what you want. I’m sure we can work out a deal.”
“We’re not negotiating here, Windsor.” Vance’s voice was low, muffled by his scarf. He moved the coat enough to confirm he held a gun to Kelli. “Walk.”
Blake took a breath. Negotiate. That’s what he did. Okay, so it wasn’t usually someone’s life on the line, but he’d been staring down gun barrels a lot lately. He’d almost built up an immunity. Right. Maybe to some of the panic. But definitely not to the bullets.
While they walked, Blake moved closer to Kelli, not sure if he was reassuring her or himself with the proximity. Her cheeks were ruddy from the wind and he thought he could hear her teeth chattering.
“If you’re not going to be chivalrous, Vance, I hope you don’t mind if I give her my coat.” Without waiting for a reply, he began working his arms out of his topcoat.
“Doesn’t matter to me.” Vance said. “You’re not going to be around much longer, anyway.”
“Kill me if you have to, but leave Blake out of this.” Kelli’s voice rang out, high and shrill. He heard more anger than fear. “You can tell Mr. Hollingsworth he doesn’t know anything.”
Griffith made a choking sound. “Hollingsworth? That wimp? He may be cutthroat in business, but he has no clue about politics.”
“This is about politics?” Blake stopped, turned to face Griffith and forced a smile. “Hell, he’s got my vote, although I can’t say I approve of your campaign methods.” Slowly, he took his coat and laid it over Kelli’s shoulders. She seemed so tiny under its bulk. He tried to insert himself between Kelli and Griffith, but she made no effort to move aside. Had she resigned herself to whatever Griffith had planned for them?
“So you sent those other thugs after us?” she said. “Scumbag McGregor and that delivery man.”
“Too bad they botched it. Good help is so hard to find, isn’t it?” Blake said.
“My mistake,” Griffith said. “I’ve learned if you want a job done right, you gotta do it yourself. Don’t you … Casey?” He laughed, a low-pitched grating sound. “Dwight is such a trusting fool. Sending a total amateur to find out if it was really you out in the woods. And then taking you ” —he glanced at Blake— “at your word. I mean, just because a man straps on a tool belt doesn’t make him the right man for the job. You might have pulled off the carpenter bit, but Dwight never thought past phase one—finding out if Kelli Carpenter was Casey Wallace. I tried to get him to leave things to me, but no—the old geezer had to send you out there on a stupid fact-finding mission.”
His eyes, cold as the winter sky, narrowed. “Which, I may add, you failed miserably. Enough talking. Start walking.”
The gun to the small of his back was enough incentive. He moved a few paces apart from Kelli. It would be harder for Griffith to control them if they weren’t so close together. He glanced back and forth, looking for someplace he could shove Kelli to safety and deal with Vance on his own. But the buildings crowded together, shoulder to shoulder, with not a gap between them. He tried to pick up the pace, maybe get to the end of the block and cut away, but Kelli trudged along. Delaying tactics? Or had she shut down? His coat dragged like a royal cloak behind her, threatening to fall off. When he tried to wrap it tighter, she shrugged it back and shook her head.
“I’m okay,” she whispered.
He turned around again, fixing his gaze on Griffith. He needed to keep it personal, between the two of them. Get him to forget Kelli for the moment. “Why don’t you put the gun down and we can work something out. Shooting us isn’t going to look like an accident, is it?”
“I said keep walking.” Griffith stepped forward and put the gun to Kelli’s head. “Where you’re going, nobody’s going to be able to tell if you were shot or not. You’ll be part of the foundation of a new low-income housing project. A little variation on the cement shoes. Chicago has such a rich history, doesn’t it?”
Blake’s heart lurched. He put his hands up and took three backward paces, maintaining eye contact, trying to keep the fear from showing in his face or voice. “No need for that. I’m walking. But exactly what am I supposed to know?”
“She didn’t tell you?”
“I couldn’t tell him what I didn’t know, Mr. Griffith.” She emphasized the name. Kelli’s tone was even now, steady and clear.
“I think, under the circumstances, you can call me Vance.”
“Very well, Vance,” Kelli said with the same clear enunciation. A hint of sarcasm, perhaps?
She shouldn’t be making the man mad. Blake interrupted. “Will someone tell me what the hell is going on? If you’re going to shoot us, I’d like to know why.”
“Now who sounds like a bad movie?” Griffith said. “Turn around and move it.”
“I’d rather see the man who’s trying to shoot me. Or do you prefer to shoot your victims in the back?”
“You talk too much, Windsor. Next word out of your mouth and the gun might go off. Too bad it’s pointed at her.”
Kelli turned to Blake, her eyes begging him to do what Griffith asked. He shrugged and fell into step beside her. Still walking, she looked over her shoulder.
“So Dwight Hollingsworth doesn’t know you’re here, does he, Vance? You’re doing this on your own, right?” she said.
“Hollingsworth refused to understand you can’t put your faith in the system. You have to manipulate it if you want to go places, and believe me, I want him to go places. That’s been the plan since college.”
“The fraternity,” Kelli said. “And are your law partners part of the scheme?”
Griffith transferred his eyes from Kelli to Blake and back. “Not exactly. Back in college, they thought we could work together, get one of us into politics and take him to the top with benefits for all. But they all got happy doing their legal stuff and pretty much forgot their little club. Except for Dwight, who wanted more. Making money hand-over-fist wasn’t enough for him.” He sniffed. “So I offered Hollingsworth my guidance.”
“Mighty generous of you,” Blake said.
Griffith shrugged. “Dwight will have the title, but I’ll call the shots once he’s governor. And after a while, president. He’s got the charisma. I’ll do the rest.”
“And Kelli knows something that would keep him from being elected.”
“Even if she didn’t, there was no way I was going to risk it.”
This time Kelli stopped. She gave Griffith a stare that made Blake shiver. He’d never seen her this icy.
“Berlyno Manufacturing in Philadelphia. A job I had for two days before they decided they didn’t need my services after all. They paid me well for my trouble. I went back home to San Diego and a few days later, Charles and Lucas were killed. I never thought about Berlyno again. Until today.”
She looked at him now, not Griffith, and her expression softened, although her voice was as clear as ever. “Years ago, Dwight Hollingsworth worked for Berlyno. He’d been embezzling. I didn’t have a chance to get further than t
hat this afternoon, but—”
Blake cut her off. He could negotiate, keep Vance talking. In familiar territory, the panic eased while his mind worked through the ramifications. “So Dwight realizes someone’s going to be checking his past. The scrutiny of a political campaign could uncover his earlier misdeeds.” He looked at Griffith. “And if that happened, no more behind the scenes power for Vance Griffith. How am I doing?”
“Not bad, Windsor,” Griffith said.
“Wait,” Kelli said. “By the time I was hired by Berlyno, Hollingsworth was long gone. I would never have noticed the discrepancies. That wasn’t what I was hired to do.”
“Not a chance he was willing to take,” Griffith said. “When Dwight found out they were doing a complete system overhaul, he panicked. By then, he’d parlayed his earlier … windfall, shall we say, into Hollingsworth Industries and moved to Chicago with his grand political aspirations. He convinced his old boss he knew a better systems analyst, someone local to Philly and Berlyno let you go. I guess the boss felt guilty, because they gave you a nice chunk of change for doing nothing.”
Griffith didn’t seem to notice they’d stopped walking. Anything to delay what Blake hoped would not be the inevitable worked for him. He needed to keep the man’s mind off their final destination.
“Okay, Vance. I’m confused. Indulge me. Let’s take it from the top. Dwight embezzles money, but he thinks he’s covered his tracks. He moves to Chicago and Hollingsworth Industries grows by leaps and bounds. He starts laying the groundwork for his political career.
“Then he finds out Kelli—as Casey—is going to look at Berlyno, and he’s afraid she’ll uncover the embezzlement. He gets her off the job and thinks he’s okay. How am I doing so far?”
“Not bad, Windsor. Not bad.” Griffith’s gun hand dipped.
The tightness in Blake’s gut eased a fraction. Keep talking. Keep him occupied with him, not Kelli. “Maybe he checks up on her from time to time—finds out her company closed and she left the country. Now he’s feeling like he’s really home free.
“But one day he sees her picture in a plastic surgeon’s office and panics. He’s seen Kelli Carpenter’s picture in Thornton’s brochures, and he realizes she’s got a new appearance. Maybe she’s still around. The picture doesn’t tell him enough, so he sends me to Camp Getaway for the up close and personal reaction.”
“You’re close.”
“The timing doesn’t work,” Kelli said. “You needed to make sure everything was taken care of or your dreams of controlling the governorship were gone. I’ll bet you were doing a lot more than Dwight knew, weren’t you? You were looking for Casey Wallace long before I surfaced at the Camp Getaway project.”
Griffith gave a self-satisfied smirk. “Of course. I’ve been involved since the early days. Dwight was a jerk. He refused to consider a worst case scenario. So I had to do it for him. Besides, better if he didn’t know. Made it easier for him to be honest.” Sarcasm oozed with his final word.
Crap, now Griffith’s focus was back on Kelli. Along with the gun. Blake watched Kelli’s eyes widen.
“Didn’t know what?” she said. “You didn’t … You couldn’t have … Tell me Charles and Lucas didn’t die instead of me. You didn’t kill them.”
Blake gripped her elbow, pulled her closer to him. He felt her shaking. Cold? Fear? Or anger? He shifted his gaze to Griffith. Something in the man’s eyes told him he might have killed them if he’d been in the loop at the time. He shuddered along with Kelli.
“No, nothing like that,” Griffith said. “Before my time. A convenience store shooting in San Diego doesn’t make the Philly papers, so Dwight never saw it.”
Kelli lifted her chin. “So how did you find me? Through Dr. Einsel, right? Dwight saw the pictures and told you I might still be around.”
Griffith shrugged. “More or less.”
Blake saw the pause, the quick shift of Griffith’s eyes. There was more than he was saying. The pain of his own fingernails in his palms made him take a breath and unclench his fists. Did he hear sirens in the distance? Police cars were as common as drunks in this neighborhood, but would the cops look down this alley?
Afraid to turn toward the sound for fear Griffith would notice the approaching wail, he raised his voice. “There’s more, Vance, isn’t there? How did you put everything together?”
“It wasn’t all that hard. You have to start with no assumptions. Find the beginning. I started with Casey Wallace’s disappearance and backtracked her history. When I found the convenience store shooting, I wondered if she took back her maiden name.” Griffith flicked a glance in Kelli’s direction. “It’s more common with divorced women, but it was worth a shot.”
Kelli’s mouth opened, then closed. “You knew I was Karen Abbott.” Blake watched the wheels turn as she processed the information. “You found me at Berkeley. Even before Dwight found out about my surgery.”
“Let’s just say I knew you were there. I watched you. Thought everything was copasetic.”
The sirens faded away and the shred of hope Blake allowed himself vanished. He set his gaze on Griffith, using his best boardroom stare. “So what made things un-copasetic?”
“The Camp Getaway brochure,” Kelli said. “Combined with the before and after pictures in Dr. Einsel’s office.”
“She’s pretty smart, Windsor. Too bad. In my line of work, smart people can be a problem.”
“So you got Dr. Einsel’s clerk to check the files,” Kelli said. “You matched Karen Abbott’s new face to the picture of Kelli Carpenter from the Camp Getaway brochure. And you knew where to find me.”
“I’m still confused,” Blake said. “After all this, what was Dwight going to do if I came back and said Kelli was Casey?”
Griffith gave a guttural laugh. “I told you, the man never thought that far ahead. Maybe he was going to bribe her,” he pointed the gun at Kelli and Blake held his breath, “or just ask her nicely to keep her yap shut.”
“Tell me,” Kelli said. “Thornton. Is he in this with you?”
“Nope. Actually, Thornton would have been a better candidate than Dwight, but the man’s got too many ethics to go into politics. He couldn’t even stand being a lawyer. Now he makes money just so he can give it away.”
“So you set up my cover with Construction Temps.” Holy crap. Blake couldn’t believe he was actually trying to get someone to point a gun at him, but Griffith’s gun seemed to point at whoever was talking and Blake didn’t like it pointed at Kelli.
Sure enough, Griffith swung the gun back toward him.
“Like I said, Dwight doesn’t do a lot of thinking. I told him he couldn’t send you knocking on the door to ask Kelli if she was Casey. He insisted, but he agreed to a more subtle approach. I volunteered to handle it, made a couple of phone calls, faxed your phony references to EnviroCon. The beauty of working with the head men is they don’t do much work themselves. Your people call their people and voilâ! They think they’re talking to Thornton’s people. Of course, Dwight had no idea I’d followed up with a little plan of my own.”
Blake kept his hands in his pockets where Griffith couldn’t see them balled into fists. “Why are we here now? Why did Dwight send you after us?” Somehow, this didn’t seem like something Dwight would do, not that it mattered at this point. But he couldn’t—wouldn’t—believe he’d worked closely with the man and hadn’t seen the evil.
“Are you kidding? Dwight’s running on a truth and honesty platform. He’d probably bust a gut if he knew I had you here. Might even withdraw from the campaign.” He glanced at Blake and snorted. “Just my luck to hook up with someone who thinks he can be an honest politician.”
Good. Griffith was watching him now. “One thing you haven’t explained. If you were so worried about Kelli knowing something, why didn’t you find her at UCLA?” He added a hint of derision to his tone. “Or maybe you weren’t smart enough to look.” Blake took another half step back, daring the man to approach. If Griffith
came after him, maybe Kelli could dash for it.
Griffith shook his head as if he’d seen through Blake’s ploy. “Like I said, Windsor. If you want something done right, you have to do it yourself.” He gave a twisted smile. “I sent Robbie Kirkland to Berkeley and when he and your lady friend here disappeared, I figured it was all over. It wasn’t until much later, when I saw the EnviroCon brochure that I realized I’d made a mistake.”
“Wait,” Kelli said. “Who’s Robbie Kirkland?”
“Oh, yeah,” Griffith said with a sardonic grin. “You would have known him as Robert Kilian.”
* * * * *
Kelli’s world tilted. She staggered. Blake’s arm wrapped around her waist. Someone had sent Robert. All his charm, all his caring—everything had been a lie. Until he’d tried to rape her. Shit on a stick, he probably intended to kill her. Years of guilt floated from her shoulders.
“Looks like the little lady didn’t know she was set up,” Griffith said. “What happened to Kirkland, anyway?”
Kelli shrugged away from Blake and faced Griffith, drawing strength from her rage. “You can go to hell,” she said. “I’m sure he’ll enjoy your company.”
“After you, my dear.” Griffith waved the gun. “Enough chitchat. Let’s walk.”
Five paces from the edge of a foundation that gaped beneath them like the Grand Canyon, she heard the sirens coming back. Relief washed through her. A glance at Blake showed him gathering himself. Was he going to try something stupid? She had it all under control. Afraid if she so much as changed her expression, Griffith would panic and shoot, she kept her expression neutral when she spoke.
“Give it up, Vance. You’ll never get away with it.”
When Griffith turned toward her, Blake swung at his gun hand. Vance spun around. Blake kicked. Encumbered by the coat over his arm, Vance ducked, feinted and Kelli heard a gunshot.
“No!” she screamed, anger and fear coursing through her, chasing away the cold. Then she heard footsteps racing toward them, felt strong hands grasp her arms, securing them behind her back.