The tail man didn’t look like a firefighter, but he didn’t seem the type for a shadow job either; he was too broad-beamed to be unobtrusive, to pass for just another face in the crowd. If a subject once caught a look at him, he woudn’t be forgotten. He was a big bastard. Appearances be damned, though; a tail man was just what he was. A tail man and what else?
He wore a dark sport jacket, tight T-shirt, and baggy slacks. He wore a gun in a shoulder rig, and from the size of the bulge it made under his left arm, it must have been some cannon.
At first impression, Steve would have tagged him for a cop, an undercover cop maybe. That would have jibed with the Crown Vic he was driving; the machine had a major-league mill with mucho muscle under the hood, and was favored by a lot of police departments around the country.
Steve checked out the man’s shoes; shoes were a tipoff. Cops, even undercover ones, tend to pamper themselves with a certain kind of shoe: wide, thick-soled black oxfords that are comfortable for those who spent a lot of time on their feet. This guy, though, was wearing heavy-duty work boots with reinforced toes; they stuck out from beneath wide-legged pant cuffs. Footwear that was good for kicking down doors or giving a stomping.
Whoever he was, before he stepped through the club’s front doors, a couple of head shots of him were snapped by Steve’s cell phone camera.
Steve wasn’t much for fancy gadgetry when he was on assignment; the fancier the gadget, the more that could go wrong with it. Should he be apprehended by the authorities, it wouldn’t do to be found in possession of sophisticated hardware that could be sourced back to the military and compromise his cover.
Nowadays, everybody has a cell phone, and even the most basic models come with built-in cameras. Steve’s cell had a few refinements that weren’t exactly standard option, such as an encrypter-decrypter, scrambler, and several other security devices, including a fail-safe destruct mechanism that would activate if any unauthorized personnel tried to tamper with or investigate the unit, turning its hardware into a fused lump of slag that looked like the results of battery leakage.
The communication mode was now switched off; when Steve was on the hunt, there was no distracting taking or receiving of calls.
The tail man smelled of cop, but it didn’t figure. Durwood Quentin III was in deep shit, but it was all on the federal level. No federal investigative agency, not the FBI or ATF or any of the others, tolerates heavy steroid use by its personnel, and this guy was seriously on the juice. That was obvious at a glance; even his muscles had muscles. Legitimate bodybuilding can do only so much and no more; you can be sure that anybody built like a comic book superhero got there with some chemical assistance.
The same generally went for state cops. A county or city cop could get away with it maybe. But why would they be interested in Quentin? The tail man’s acquaintance with the likes of Ginger could indicate a vice squad operation. Or a criminal one, either Mob or independent. Or who knows what…?
Whatever it was, Steve didn’t like it, but for now he’d play a waiting game. He decided against going into The Booby Hatch for a look-see. He didn’t think the tail man was on to him, and didn’t want to risk tipping him off by nosing around too closely.
Steve hung around outside the club for another five minutes before slipping away. He crossed the street, taking a circuitous route to an alley he’d noticed earlier and filed away mentally as a good potential observation post.
Certain that he was unobserved, he eased into the passageway between two buildings, where a few paces swallowed him up in blackness. From the alley mouth, he could see the club, its parking lot, and down the street where the Crown Vic was parked. He stood around for a couple of minutes, letting his eyes grow accustomed to the lack of light before giving the alley a quick once-over. The passageway didn’t run clear through the block of buildings to the next parallel street; it terminated in a kind of courtyard behind the backs of the two buildings fronting the street, and was used by both businesses as a parking lot. It was empty now of all but a white delivery van.
The back of the space was hemmed by an eight-foot-high chain-link fence; beyond lay a long gravel strip ten feet wide that bordered the backs of several one-and two-story commercial buildings separated by driveways and walkways that accessed the street parallel to this one.
That was good. No locals were going to be using the alley as a shortcut between the two streets. Steve settled in for stakeout.
About fifteen minutes later, the tail man emerged from inside the club. The crowd of loiterers was thinning, though the lot was still about two thirds full of parked cars. He stood off to one side by himself, smoking a cigarette.
Ten minutes later, Quentin came out through the front doors, hanging all over Ginger, an arm draped across her shoulders. Loose-jointed, disheveled, his red flushed face plastered with a sloppy grin, he seemed to be feeling no pain.
The tail man was in Quentin’s field of vision, or would have been if Quentin hadn’t been busy trying to look down the front of Ginger’s top. He didn’t have to look hard to see much; that plunging V-neckline put plenty on display.
Ginger and the tail man made eye contact for an instant, no mutual flash of recognition passing between the two. Quentin steered Ginger into the parking lot, making for his car.
The tail man turned, walking south, moving briskly but not running. When he was about halfway to the Crown Vic, Steve Ireland stepped out of the alley and headed north, quick-time, toward where his car was parked facing south.
He entered by the passenger-side front door, climbing over the transmission hump and into the driver’s seat. He fired up the engine, its muffled but powerful rumblings sending a shudder through the car, a shudder that died down to a shiver. He rolled down the front windows to let in some air and get a feel of the night, but kept the headlights dark.
Not far from the street’s southeast corner, a pair of headlights flashed on: the Crown Vic’s.
A couple of minutes later, Quentin’s Cadillac rolled out of the parking lot, its right rear wheel going over the curb, thumping the undercarriage against the asphalt road surface. The machine moved northbound, picking up speed. It passed Steve; inside, he could see the outlines of two silhouette heads, Quentin’s and Ginger’s.
The Crown Vic pulled away from the curb and into the lane, following. When it passed, its driver’s head was facing front toward the road ahead, not so much as glancing in Steve’s direction.
Steve looked left, right, left again, not seeing anything that looked like a police car, at least not a marked one. A couple of cars, one of them an SUV, came rushing along northbound. When they flashed past Steve’s sedan, he gunned the engine, whipping the steering wheel around hard left.
The sedan made a screeching U-turn across the white line and headed north. Getting into the lane behind the SUV, using its bulk to cover him from being seen in the Crown Vic’s rearview mirror, he switched on his headlights.
Traffic lights were green for a long way along the straightaway. Rows of street lamps lit the thoroughfare like a stage set. Jockeying past the SUV, Steve pushed the sedan along at a quick clip until he caught sight of the Crown Vic. It was sticking pretty close to the Cadillac, which was about a half-dozen car lengths ahead.
Steve switched lanes, slowing to allow the SUV to pass him on the left. The SUV’s driver must have taken being passed earlier as some kind of personal affront, because he punched the accelerator to zoom past the sedan. Moving up fast, it caused the Crown Vic to glide right into the next lane to allow it to pass.
Good; that would momentarily distract the tail man from the vehicles behind him. Thanks, Speedy, Steve thought, grinning without mirth. The SUV bulleted onward, crossing lanes to pass the Cadillac on the right, then flashing ahead, its taillights rapidly dwindling out of sight.
Steve nestled in with a knot of three or four vehicles, using them for cover while keeping the Crown Vic and Cadillac steadily in sight.
A quarter mile further on, red an
d blue flashing lights came into view, slowing traffic on both sides of the roadway. The SUV was pulled over at the side of the road, a police car standing behind it. A uniformed cop stood beside the driver’s side of the SUV.
Steve grinned again, this time meaning it. Tight grin. An instant’s passing amusement, and then he was once more all business. He, the tail man, and Quentin and Ginger all vectored north toward a final destination unknown, imminent, and inexorable. And for some, perhaps all—terminal.
THREE
Not more than ten minutes drive north of The Booby Hatch, Quentin’s Cadillac quit the avenue, turning right on to a street running east-west. It was far enough removed from the main flow that the traffic lights at the intersections flashed only amber caution lights.
Steve Ireland had to lay back even more to avoid tipping the tail man in the Crown Vic that he was being tailed. Out on the avenue he’d just left, there was a lot of traffic to provide cover; here, not so much.
That was a funny thing about roaming late at night in the city. Especially in a city like Washington, D.C., basically a company town whose main industry was government. At quitting time, the office buildings emptied out, their occupants making a mass exodus to their homes outside the city. Of course, there were plenty of eager beavers to be found toiling, putting in extra hours, but usually by ten P.M., even the diehards had packed it up and called it a night.
One might assume that after midnight the streets, except for the main thoroughfares, would be more or less deserted, but that wasn’t the case. There was always a lively hum of activity from folks abroad in the wee hours—not just the obvious ones like party people, police, firefighters, EMTs, hospital caregivers, night shift workers in general, and road crews doing repairs that would have tied up traffic during the daylight hours. There were plenty of citizens to be found out and about, going to or coming from whatever mysterious assignations and rendezvous had called them out when most folks were at home tucked safely in their beds.
It was a phenomenon that had served Steve well in the past, not only in Washington, but other cities as well. It was good to have other fish swimming around in the pool to provide the cover of relative anonymity.
Now, out here off the main drag, his caution would have to be doubled. This was a quieter part of town, the quiet of abandonment and neglect. One thing he had working for him was the stink-o state of the economy. Like everybody else, the city was hurting for money. That meant fewer police cars to be deployed, with more of them being assigned to the obvious trouble spots and fewer for routine patrol along the routes less traveled.
This street was quiet but not dead; a scattering of vehicles traversed it in both directions. Steve hung back a good distance from the Crown Vic, so far back that sometimes he couldn’t get as good a look at the Cadillac as he’d like. That was okay. The tail man would keep it in sight, and he’d do the same for the Crown Vic.
He still couldn’t figure where the tail man came into this. The guy wasn’t federal, that was for sure. He could have been an undercover cop or a crook; going strictly on appearances, it was sometimes hard to tell the two apart. The Crown Victoria was a car model in use by a lot of police departments, both as marked and unmarked vehicles; on the other hand, its automotive muscle recommended it as a good getaway car, too…
As he went eastbound, the north side of Claghorn Park came into sight on the right. The left side of the street was fronted by several blocks of long-abandoned brick factory buildings. The city didn’t want to spend the money to tear them down, so they’d been boarded up, padlocked, and forgotten. Somehow, they’d survived the best efforts of the local vandals and arsonists.
Named after a skirt-chasing, bourbon-swilling Southern senator of yore, the park was a lop-sized oval the size of several football fields lumped together; its long axis ran north-south. Its west side was parallel to the avenue where the strip club was located. On the east, it was bordered by a narrow street that ran alongside a highway, beyond which lay the river.
It was quartered by two roads, one running through its long axis, the other crossing it at right angles at its midpoint; shortcuts for those not wanting to detour the long way around the park. Access and service roads also wormed through it, eating up more land.
The grounds featured a broad open flat dotted by several paved courts, some outbuildings, and a duck pond, all ringed and streaked by lumpy patches of scrub brush and skinny, sickly-looking trees. It was the kind of park that savvy parents warned their kids to steer clear of even in broad daylight.
The Cadillac slowed to a speed of a few miles an hour, causing the Crown Vic and Steve’s car to do the same. The lead car poked along as if it was looking for something. Farther back, the Crown Vic pulled in to the curb, halting at the corner of a street that bordered the park’s west side.
Steve kept rolling, passing the Crown Vic, not giving it so much as a sidelong glance. Continuing east, he passed the Cadillac. It stood facing the mouth of a gravel service road that ran through a park field into some brush.
About 150 feet ahead lay the public entrance to the park. Before reaching half that distance, Steve looked in his rearview mirror and saw the Cadillac enter the service road and head south along it.
Behind it, the Crown Vic was in motion, its headlights swinging right as it entered the street on the west side of the park.
Steve drove to the park entrance, the head of a two-lane road that cut the park in half lengthwise. A sign warned that the park proper was closed for use after ten P.M. That prohibition didn’t hold for the road, which was a through route.
Steve turned into the park road, a straightaway lit at intervals by lampposts whose globes looked like a string of shiny pearl onions. The road was empty of vehicles in both directions. Trees and brush banded the western rim of the park; through them, he saw occasional glints of light that might have been from Quentin’s car making its way toward the south end of the park.
Acting on a hunch, Steve wheeled the sedan around in a U-turn, exiting the park and turning left, going back the way he came. Approaching the street bordering the west side of the park, he glimpsed red dot taillights off in the distance. The Crown Vic, he assumed. Hoped.
He turned left, into the street. Its east side bordered the park, its west side was lined with two-and three-family wooden houses separated by driveways. Most of the homes were dark save for lamps burning above the front doors and backyard garages. The curb was lined with parked cars.
Steve couldn’t see the Crown Vic’s taillights, but to be on the safe side, he switched off his headlights and cruised south down the street, creeping along at a snail’s pace. Street lamps provided enough light to see by. No other moving vehicles were in view, no pedestrians, not even a stray dog walker or drunk.
The trees edging the park formed one wall; the houses lining the opposite side of the street formed another. He could smell foliage and earth smells. The street was several hundred yards long; nearing the midpoint, he saw the mouth of a road on his left.
Steve paused at the entrance, looking in: a two-lane road that crossed the park east-west. It was bordered on both sides by a knee-high metal-strip guard rail, and lit at intervals by those pearl onion-globed street lamps. About a hundred feet in, the roadway rose up, cresting a low humped hill whose top was twenty-five feet above the fields that made up most of the park.
On the flat, a gravel service road emerged from a clump of trees, meeting the hillside at right angles. A tunnel underpass ran through the hill, allowing the service road to go through it and continue its course on the opposite side. The paved road ran over the top of the underpass.
The Crown Vic stood idling in a narrow shoulder of the eastbound lane at the bottom of the near side of the slope, its emergency flashers blinking.
Street lamps nicely lit the scene. The driver got out, walked around the back of the car, and stepped over the guard rail on the south side of the road, onto the grassy field. He rounded the base of the hill and vanished from sigh
t.
Steve put his car into park, got out, and crossed to the roadway mouth, standing behind the cover of a clump of bushes. It was very quiet. He could hear the whoosh of unseen vehicles driving somewhere in the distance.
After a pause, a couple of pops sounded from the direction of the underpass. They sounded like firecrackers going off. They were accompanied by several flashes that looked like flashbulbs going off.
A minute passed, two. A figure came into view, rounding the base of the hill: the Crown Vic’s driver. Not running, not even jogging, he walked briskly to the guard rail, stepped over it, and got in his car. The emergency flashers were switched off. The car drove up the slope, went down the other side, and continued at a moderate pace eastward across the park.
Steve hopped back in his car and drove deeper into the park, not bothering to put on his lights. Zooming to the foot of the hill, he skidded to a stop on the shoulder, threw the car into park, and hopped out, hurdling the guard rail and scrambling around the hillside.
The service road had been built for the use of maintenance vehicles doing their park cleanup chores. The underpass was designed for their convenience. Its rounded archway and shaft were large enough to accommodate the passage of a two-and-a-half-ton truck.
Only, it wasn’t a truck that stood in the tunnel, it was a Cadillac. Its headlights were dark, its motor was off. The driver’s side door was ajar, causing the dome light to glow.
Durwood Quentin III and Ginger were tumbled in the backseat, dead. She’d been shot twice in the left breast, both heart shots, either one of which would have been fatal. Quentin’s pants and underpants were pulled down around his knees. A bullet hole punctured the center of his forehead. Clutched in his hand was a small-caliber pistol, all shiny and with mother-of-pearl handles. A .32 probably.
Revenge of the Dog Team Page 4