Bannerman's Law

by John R. Maxim

  Bannerman nodded. All too well.

  “Susan has now lived with you for one year. Is that correct?”

  “Just about.”

  ”‘Is there anything of substance that she does not know about you?”

  “Not of substance, no.”

  “She is accepted by all your people?”

  Bannerman understood where she was headed. “She is accepted for the person she is and within the limits of what she can do. Otherwise, she is trusted without reservation.”

  “Then we can agree, perhaps, that she is not made of spun sugar.”

  “That would . . . shorten this discussion, yes.”

  “Lesko?” Elena nudged him.

  “Hey.” He raised his hands. “I'm her father. I get protective.”

  “You are my protector. You are my lover. One day, please God, I will have your child. Your plate is full, Lesko.”

  It was more than a blush. Color exploded on his cheeks. Susan had to hide her face.

  Lesko pushed to his feet. He looked at the door, longingly. Elena took his hand and held it.

  “What do you want him to do?” she asked Bannerman.

  “Call the detective in charge of the task force. Tell him we think that we can give him the serial killer but we will do so only on these conditions. No detainment of our people or of Leo's, no formal questioning, no surveillance, and none of our names are released to the media. Further, he agrees to tell us, through Lesko, everything he learns about Hickey and Sur La Mer.”

  “Can he make such an agreement?”

  Bannerman shook his head. “He'll need the approval of his superiors and the cooperation of the FBI. That will take time so the call ought to be made tonight.” He turned to Lesko. “They've identified Carla and Molly and by now they know that the KGB is involved so I think they'll take you seriously. I'll meet with them if necessary but I'd prefer not to. I'd like you to be the intermediary. You will deliver Claude if we catch him.”

  Lesko nodded slowly. “In one piece?” he asked.

  Bannerman hesitated, only slightly. “We'll try,” he said, “for Carla's sake.”

  29

  Reaching their door by way of the inside corridor, Weinberg inserted a key of coded plastic and opened it quietly. The light from the hallway revealed a telephone notepad on the floor just inside. There was writing on it. His hand snaked to the Smith & Wesson in the small of his back. Barbara saw this but not the note. Her own hand reached into her purse. She covered the hallway as Weinberg stepped inside. Barbara followed, closing the door but not fully.

  The sliver of light from the hallway showed no sign of Nellie. Or, oddly, of her cot. The heavy drapes were drawn across the picture window. Barbara saw that they bulged at the bottom. She approached the bulge, soundlessly, from the side.

  Behind her, Weinberg now closed the door fully. He flipped on the bathroom light. That surprised Barbara. He had left her backlit. But she did not turn.

  “Hey,” he said softly.

  Barbara glanced back though only for an instant. She reached for the edge of the drapery but as she did, his brain registered an image that made no sense to her. It was that of her husband, the note in his hand, no weapon, silently kicking off his shoes. His jacket was already on the floor. Barbara shook it off.

  She parted the drape where it met the window wall. She saw Nellie, on her side, her face lit by the moon. Someone had moved her cot flush against the window. Someone had drawn the drapes over it. Nellie's eyes were half open. They stared sightlessly. One arm rested on Dunville's briefcase.

  Fabric rustled behind her. She crouched and turned. And she froze. She saw her husband, standing, framed in the light from the bathroom. His shirt had come off as well. He was twirling it, tossing it, in the manner of a strip tease dancer. He undid his belt.

  “Alan . . .” It was more a gasp than a word. It was all she could say.

  He was dancing now. Advancing on her. To music. His tongue made the sound of muted snare drums against his teeth.

  Barbara rose, slowly. “Have . . . have you lost your mind?” she managed.

  Still dancing, he held out the note. She took it. He reached for her gun hand, caressing it, kissing it as he eased the hammer into place. He took it from her, putting it aside, then led her toward the light while undoing her buttons for the second time.

  Barbara held the note to the light, straining to read it Weinberg made it difficult. The snare drums had stopped but he was now humming. ”A pretty girl . . . is like a melody . . . she haunts you night and . . . ” He slipped her dress from her shoulders, down over her arms, over her breasts. She wore no bra. It was no longer needed quite so much. Weinberg undid her belt. The dress fell. He took her by the waist, lifting her, bringing the perfect new breasts to his lips. He made purring, groaning sounds. ' 'Gabriella . . . ” she heard, in a throaty whisper. She felt him swelling against her thighs.

  She wrapped an arm around his head and steadied the notepad with the other. She was able to focus now. The note, in Nellie's hand, was addressed to him. It read: Would it shock you to learn that a sweet old lady still enjoys a good romp in the hay? Well, this one does. You might try it yourself. I have gone to the lake with Tom. Will return after breakfast. I have taken your silly briefcase with me.

  P.S. Have you told her yet that she's beautiful?

  Bannerman was in bed.

  Unlike Weinberg, he would have preferred to sleep while he could. It was not yet midnight, Pacific time, but almost three on his and Susan's biological clock. Molly and Elena had gone to their respective rooms. Lesko had driven off in Yuri Rykov's car.

  When Susan emerged from their bathroom, leaving its light on, wearing nothing at all, a can of baby powder in one hand, Bannerman knew that sleep was not imminent.

  She moved, gracefully, languidly, through the semi-darkened room, past their bed to the window where she parted the drapes. She stood there, in the light of the moon, looking up at it. She sprinkled baby powder into the palm of one hand and rubbed it, very slowly, along each arm in turn and then against her throat, working lower.

  Bannerman watched through hooded eyes. Next, he knew, she would do her breasts. She would linger over them, far longer than necessary, one hand moving in circles, kneading, caressing. The hand would then move to the flatness of her stomach, then lower, over the tiny bulge of her abdomen, then lower still. Her back would arch. She would shudder as if chilled. She would pretend to have no idea that he was watching all this. No idea of its effect on him. He was about to be manipulated again.

  Someday, he said in his mind, he ought to tell her that this routine of hers had worked him only once or twice, maybe three times. Certainly not the tenth time or the twentieth. But he would not. He enjoyed being vamped.

  She'd wheedled him into letting Billy teach her to street-fight, and to shoot a few standard weapons, but not into giving her a gun of her own. He still could not bear the thought of it. He'd let Molly, not Carla, teach her how to defend against a knife. Carla would have taught her to use one. He'd had John Waldo show her a few things about driving. Spotting a surveillance. Foiling pursuit.

  All of these were essentially defensive skills. When pressed, he could not justify saying no. But knowingly letting her get into a situation where she might have to use them was something else entirely. No, she was not made of spun sugar. But she was no Carla Benedict either.

  The vamping process was picking up steam.

  Susan, just about now, would turn and she would say, “Oh,” or “Hi.” She would stand there, totally unselfconsciously, making no effort to cover herself. She would wait for an outstretched arm before coming toward him.

  She would approach him, slowly peel the covers from him, and she would turn him onto his back. Carefully, barely touching, she would sit astride him. He would feel a cool sprinkling of powder or, first, the touch of her lips against his chest and the soft trickle of trailing hair.

  “Oh,” she said from the window. “Hi.”

&
nbsp; “Um...hi” Inthe darkness, Bannerman allowed himself a smirk. But he quickly made room for her.

  She tossed back the covers and sat across his thighs. He reached to touch her, not with any real expectation of doing so but because this was where she would normally take both his hands and slide them under her knees, pinning them.

  Her head came forward. The hair trailed. Her tongue, this time, explored his chest. It caused him to squirm. Several minutes passed before he felt the powder.

  “Where did my father go?” she asked, in a soft murmur. “To meet that detective?”

  “Ah ... not yet, I don't think.”

  He did not enlarge on his reply. Susan had just eliminated her father as the subject at hand. She would ask several more questions, usually unrelated, before she eased into it. It would begin with the phrase, “By the way . . . ”

  “Then where did he go?”

  “Who?”

  “My father.”

  “Oh,” Bannerman answered, stretching. “He wouldn't have called from here. He'll move from phone to phone for a while.”

  She sprinkled more powder onto his shoulders. She began massaging them.

  “What were you two talking about? Just before he left, I mean?”

  “Mrnm? When was that?”

  “You walked out into the hall with him. Were you talking about me?”

  “Nope. Just some odds and ends.”

  He had asked Lesko to warn the police that any agreement, once made, must be kept. That once they agree to no surveillance, and bearing in mind that the two who shot Yuri were still unaccounted for, anyone caught following them will be presumed an enemy arid might never get the chance to prove otherwise.

  “Did you ask him to talk to Uncle David?”

  Lesko's dead partner. ”I . . . told him that if I had an extra mind, another set of eyes and ears, I'd certainly use them.”

  “You have mine. You have me. And I'm real.”

  ”I know that.”

  “Do you?”

  Bannerman chose not to rise to the bait just yet. He was having too nice a time. He felt her hands pressing against his forearms. Holding them. The knees moved off. Her body backed away, her hair with it. He felt it trailing lightly over his stomach, his abdomen, then lower. He felt only the hair. She was teasing him with it.

  “By the way . . . ”

  “Hmmph.”

  Her head came up. “Beg pardon?”

  “Um . . . nothing. By the way, what?”

  “Well, I was just thinking.” The hair came back down. “Carla said she asked Claude to call her in the morning. He'd call the Beverly Hills Hotel, right? And Molly says the hotel is holding some maps of Sur La Mer for her by now.”

  ”Uh-huh.”

  “But you told them they can't go back there. They can't even go get their things.”

  “They knew that. Their hotel would have been staked out within an hour of that mess in Burbank.”

  “They'd be arrested?”

  “Unless we can make a deal, yes.”

  “Would I?”

  “Probably not. They'd photograph you ... try to find out who you are that way. One would follow you when you leave. But the others would sit tight and wait for Carla and Molly to show.”

  She sat erect, her head cocked to one side. ”Ban-nerman?” she asked. “Does your mind really work that fast or have you already thought about this?”

  “Sending you over there? I've thought about it.”

  ”I could be there when he calls,” she said quickly. “I'll tell him about Yuri and why Carla has to lay low. I could offer to meet him someplace and take him to her.”

  Bannerman felt himself go limp. “Not a chance, Susan.”

  She reached for the bedside light and switched it on. In almost the same motion, she vaulted into sitting position at his side, resting on her heels, her hands on her thighs. Sex must be over, he thought, grumbling.

  “Listen,” she said. “That phone call is our only chance of making contact with him. If Carla can't be there, someone else has to, right? And a man's voice would probably scare him off.”

  Bannerman realized that.

  “Even if Carla could be there,” Susan pressed, “your next problem is getting her to help you catch him. You heard her. She thinks this guy is her friend.”

  ”I know,” he said, frowning.

  His initial thought, still taking shape, involved having Susan tell Claude that Carla wanted to meet with him. She would warn him not to say much over the phone. Someone might be listening in. Short of a court order, which did not seem likely this soon, Bannerman doubted that the Beverly Hills Hotel would permit eavesdropping on a guest. But better not to take the chance. And the warning might persuade him that this was no trap. She would tell Claude that Carla was in trouble. That she needed him. That Carla said she'd wait for him at the place where Hickey had turned his car around to avoid being spotted. He would know that she meant Rodeo Drive. Bannerman could have a dozen people there by early afternoon.

  “Could Carla really be that . . . damaged?” Susan asked, not unkindly.

  “That she'd think of Claude as a friend?”

  Susan nodded.

  “She could be that loyal.”

  Susan blinked. She started to speak but she fell silent.

  Nor did Bannerman try to explain. Instead, he looked at her. That lovely face. So clean. That marvelous slender body. Hardly a mark on it. No scars, save the one through her eyebrow. A constant reminder that she'd once almost died because of him. But, unlike Carla, there were no deeper scars.

  No, there was nothing fragile about her. She was very much Lesko's daughter. Smart. Honest. Strong but not tough. Never mean. She was exactly what he wanted . . . needed her to be.

  But what Susan needed, or thought she did, was something else. She needed to be a part of it. An equal part. Like the others. He'd tried, more than once, to explain to her that it could never happen. People like Carla and Molly, all of them, were born with something extra or something missing. He was never sure which.

  How could Susan possibly understand that what Claude had done to six young women would mean very little to Carla? Carla had seen too much death and many of those victims were just as innocent. On the other hand, he thought, how would he explain Molly? Goodhearted, warm, compassionate Molly who could sit up all night with a hurting friend, and who was Susan's admired buddy, but who was every bit as deadly when push came to shove.

  “Susan,” he said, reaching to touch her. “We'll see how your father makes out with the police. But in the meantime, I'm going to ask Elena to wait by Carla's phone.”

  “Good luck.” She twisted her mouth. “My father will rip your face off.”

  “I'll talk to him. She won't be in danger.”

  “Then neither will I,” she said firmly. “The difference is that my father doesn't have to know I'm there.”

  He started to speak ... to shake his head ... to say that he didn't even want Claude to know that she existed. But she put her hand to his lips.

  “I'm not a child, Bannerman. And I'm not just someone to fuck.”

  He winced.

  “Okay. Make love to.” She forgot. Paul Bannerman doesn't use bad words. He only shoots people.

  “Paul.” Her expression softened. But once again, her fingers kept him from speaking. “You're going to tell me that I'm much more to you than that. I already know it. It's why I stay with you.”

  She held up a hand. “You're also going to tell me that I'm not Carla. I know that, too. But you want me to be less than I am. That has to stop. And so does this.”

  “So does what?”

  “Me having to seduce you every time I want to take a step forward. Besides, I'm a feminist. We're not supposed to do this shit.”

  He was silent for a long moment. “Becoming more like us.”hesaid slowly. “That's your idea of personal growth?”

  “You're not listening. I don't need to be more. I just won't be less.”

  Ba
nnerman rubbed his chin. He rolled from the bed, taking the can of baby powder, not knowing why. He wandered, not speaking, to the window. Her back was to him, She knelt, facing his empty pillow. She had not moved.

  “What if I say no? Will you leave me?”

  “No.”

  He had expected a threat. At least a qualifier. Not unless . . . Only if . . . But the answer was no, quiet but firm.

  It should have relieved him.

  But all it did, together with the sight of her proud straight back, head held high, that marvelous hair gathered in one hand, pulled over her shoulder, was to make his desire come surging back. And with it, a thrill of fear.

  For nearly all his adult life he had thought of those close to him, even those he had come to love, as acceptable losses. And they knew that. There was no other way. He could not have functioned otherwise. But he knew, all this time, that he was half-dead inside.

  Since Susan, that had changed. Carla saw it even before he did. She had nothing against Susan, really. She simply knew the danger of caring too deeply. ‘There are people who hate you,” she said. “It gives them a way to hurt you.” And she was right. They had tried.

  “If anything happened to me,” he asked, “what would you do?”

  “I've . . . accepted that something could.”

  Left unsaid was that she, like Elena, had decided to have a child. Unlike Elena, she had not told the man who would father it.

  “If you had died last year,” his voice dropped to a murmur, ”I think I would have gotten over it. I could have gone on.”

  She said nothing.

  “But not now.” He groped for words. “You've become so entwined with me, so much a part of me that . . . and it's not at all that I want to hold you back. The truth is I'm scared to death.”

  “Nothing scares you.” She uncoiled, turning, rolling onto her side.

  “You do. This conversation does.”

  “Come back to bed. Make love to me.”

  He hesitated, blinking.