The Money Shot

by Stuart Woods

  “Would you like a drink?”

  “I haven’t talked to you in a month. Walk me out of earshot.”

  Teddy led Tessa into the library room. “See? Nothing quieter than a library.”

  Tessa grabbed his hands and looked into his eyes. “Is it over?”

  “It’s over. I have the last remaining physical copy, and the electronic file has mysteriously vanished from all of Mason Kimble’s computers. I’ll give you the DVD, and you can do whatever you want with it. But you’re safe now. All the people who wanted to hurt you with it are dead.”

  “Thank God.”

  “Now that it’s over, I strongly advise you to tell Ben about it. You’ll feel better, and it’s the right thing to do.”

  “I already did.”

  “Good girl.”

  Tessa smiled. Her eyes glistened. “I don’t know how to thank you. If there’s anything I can do for you, anything at all . . . ”

  Teddy considered. “Well, in the next movie we do together, could you stop upstaging me so damn much?”

  Tessa laughed, and batted at him playfully.

  AUTHOR’S NOTE

  I am happy to hear from readers, but you should know that if you write to me in care of my publisher, three to six months will pass before I receive your letter, and when it finally arrives it will be one among many, and I will not be able to reply.

  However, if you have access to the Internet, you may visit my website at www.stuartwoods.com, where there is a button for sending me e-mail. So far, I have been able to reply to all my e-mail, and I will continue to try to do so.

  If you send me an e-mail and do not receive a reply, it is probably because you are among an alarming number of people who have entered their e-mail address incorrectly in their mail software. I have many of my replies returned as undeliverable.

  Remember: e-mail, reply; snail mail, no reply.

  When you e-mail, please do not send attachments, as I never open them. They can take twenty minutes to download, and they often contain viruses.

  Please do not place me on your mailing lists for funny stories, prayers, political causes, charitable fund-raising, petitions, or sentimental claptrap. I get enough of that from people I already know. Generally speaking, when I get e-mail addressed to a large number of people, I immediately delete it without reading it.

  Please do not send me your ideas for a book, as I have a policy of writing only what I myself invent. If you send me story ideas, I will immediately delete them without reading them. If you have a good idea for a book, write it yourself, but I will not be able to advise you on how to get it published. Buy a copy of Writer’s Market at any bookstore; that will tell you how.

  Anyone with a request concerning events or appearances may e-mail it to me or send it to: Publicity Department, Penguin Random House LLC, 375 Hudson Street, New York, NY 10014.

  Those ambitious folk who wish to buy film, dramatic, or television rights to my books should contact Matthew Snyder, Creative Artists Agency, 9830 Wilshire Boulevard, Beverly Hills, CA 98212-1825.

  Those who wish to make offers for rights of a literary nature should contact Anne Sibbald, Janklow & Nesbit, 445 Park Avenue, New York, NY 10022. (Note: This is not an invitation for you to send her your manuscript or to solicit her to be your agent.)

  If you want to know if I will be signing books in your city, please visit my website, www.stuartwoods.com, where the tour schedule will be published a month or so in advance. If you wish me to do a book signing in your locality, ask your favorite bookseller to contact his Penguin representative or the Penguin publicity department with the request.

  If you find typographical or editorial errors in my book and feel an irresistible urge to tell someone, please write to Sara Minnich at Penguin’s address above. Do not e-mail your discoveries to me, as I will already have learned about them from others.

  A list of my published works appears in the front of this book and on my website. All the novels are still in print in paperback and can be found at or ordered from any bookstore. If you wish to obtain hardcover copies of earlier novels or of the two nonfiction books, a good used-book store or one of the online bookstores can help you find them. Otherwise, you will have to go to a great many garage sales.

  Keep reading for an exciting excerpt of the latest Stone Barrington novel,

  DESPERATE MEASURES

  1

  The early morning conversation had taken place in bed in London, after drinking brandy with guests until the wee hours. So if Stone had once remembered what was said, he had now forgotten it.

  He struggled to put it together in his mind during their flight from his house, Windward Hall, in England, back to Teterboro, but he had failed. There wasn’t much conversation on the airplane, but he put that down to Kelly’s hangover, which must have been as monumental as his, since she had matched him drink for drink. Once they were back at his house in New York, they had dinner and went to bed early.

  He woke at seven the following morning, a preordered breakfast on a tray resting on his belly. There were empty dishes on her bed and sounds of packing from her dressing room. His eggs were cold, but he ate them anyway, to settle his stomach.

  Kelly came out of the dressing room naked, with predictable results. When they were spent, she stood up.

  “I told you yesterday that I’d gotten a chopper ride back to Langley today, didn’t I?”

  Of course she had, he could remember that much. “Surely, not at this hour,” he said.

  “I’m to be there at nine-forty-five sharp, for a ten o’clock departure, and I can’t miss it. Fred can drive me to the heliport.”

  “No,” he said, getting up. “I’ll drive you myself.”

  “Thank you,” she said, then went back into the dressing room.

  * * *

  —

  He surveyed his face in the bathroom mirror and was surprised to find that he didn’t look like a man with a hangover. What was more, he didn’t feel like a man with a hangover. He felt perfectly normal, except that he still couldn’t remember their conversation in London. He shaved, showered, dressed, and called down to Fred, his factotum. “I won’t need you this morning,” he said; “I’ll drive myself.”

  “As you wish, Mr. Barrington,” Fred replied.

  * * *

  —

  In the car Kelly said, “Fred is going to collect my other luggage at the hotel and send it to me.” She had a suite in a residential hotel not far from his house.

  “Plenty of room at my house,” Stone replied.

  “Stone,” she said, “do you remember our conversation in London?”

  “Of course,” Stone lied.

  “Because you’re not behaving like a man who’s being abandoned.”

  That rocked him. “‘Abandoned’?”

  “Do you remember my telling you that I’m returning to the Agency—and that they want me to live down there in a place they’ve found for me?”

  “Yes,” he lied again, “and I’m very sad about it.” That last part wasn’t a lie; he suddenly felt overwhelmingly sad.

  “It’s sweet of you to say so, but I think you’ll have forgotten me before long.”

  Stone knew a cue when he heard one. “I’ll never forget you,” he said.

  “Oh, shut up!” Kelly cried, beginning to weep. “Did you expect me to pass up a promotion and give up a career I’ve put fourteen years into?”

  “I’m not sure what I expected,” he said. And that wasn’t a lie, either.

  He drove to the East Side Heliport, was admitted to the ramp, and stopped beside the experimental Sikorsky X-2 helicopter the Central Intelligence Agency was testing for the builder. The pilot stowed Kelly’s luggage, assisted her to a rear seat and handed her a headset.

  “Well,” she said to Stone. “I could never say it wasn’t fun.”

 
“Neither could I,” Stone said. He kissed her, then closed and locked the door. The rotors began to turn, and he backed away as the machine lifted off and pointed itself to the south.

  He was still backing up when he bumped into someone, hard. He turned to find a miniature airline pilot standing behind him. “I’m so sorry,” he said.

  “You shouldn’t walk backward at a heliport,” she replied. She was, in fact, not a miniature at all, but a small woman in an airline captain’s uniform.

  “What can I do to make it up to you?” he asked, for she was quite beautiful, too.

  “If you have a car, you can give me a lift,” she replied.

  “I do, and I’d be delighted. Where to: Westchester? New Jersey? Los Angeles?”

  “Lexington Avenue will do,” she said.

  He took her single bag and walked her to the Bentley.

  “I hope this is not a joke car,” she said.

  “It’s a perfectly serious car,” he replied, stowing her bag in the trunk and opening the front passenger door for her.

  “Are you a chauffeur?” she asked.

  “Only for you,” he replied, getting into the driver’s seat. He held out a hand. “I’m Stone Barrington.”

  She took the hand. “I’m Faith Barnacle,” she said.

  “Faith?”

  “It’s better than Hope or Charity, isn’t it? I’m the victim of a pious Catholic mother.”

  “It’s certainly the best of the three. I’m trying to think of a barnacle joke, but I can’t remember one.”

  “That’s all right, I would have heard it in high school, anyway.”

  Stone got the car started and moving. “Where on Lex?”

  “East Forty-seventh Street,” she replied. “It’s one of those seedy hostelries where they store airline employees when they’re not being used.”

  “For whom do you fly?”

  “Pan American Airlines,” she said.

  “Didn’t they go out of business a couple of decades ago?”

  “I just wanted you to see if you were paying attention. I fly for Trans-Continent, a charter airline. We’ve only got three airplanes, and I fly them all.”

  “How many pilots do they employ?”

  “Somewhere between a dozen and a dozen and a half, depending on the season and the day of the week.”

  Stone pulled up in front of the hotel and popped the trunk, so the doorman could take her bag.

  “How does the week ahead look?” he asked.

  “I’m here for three nights.”

  “Will you have dinner with me tonight?”

  “Thank you, yes. It’s either you or Jeopardy!, and I hate Jeopardy!.”

  He gave her his card. “I’m just a few blocks downtown. Come for a drink at my house, and we’ll go out from there.”

  “At what hour?”

  “Six-thirty?”

  “Fine. How shall I dress?”

  “Nicely.”

  “What are you wearing?”

  “A necktie.”

  “This is going to be interesting,” she said, getting out and waving goodbye.

  Driving back to his house Stone suddenly recalled, in great detail, his conversation with Kelly in London. It made him sad again.

  2

  Stone pulled the car into the garage and went into his office. Bob, his Labrador retriever, and Joan Robertson, his secretary, greeted him with equal enthusiasm.

  “I perceive that you are alone,” Joan said.

  “You are very perceptive. Bob doesn’t seem to mind.” Bob was offering him his favorite toy, a red dragon. “Nobody wants that dreadful toy,” Stone said, scratching his ears.

  “He wasn’t going to give it to you,” Joan said. “He just wants you to know he has it.”

  “Do I have anything to do?” Stone asked.

  “No, I’ve done it all,” she replied.

  “Then I’ll find something else to do,” he said, slipping into his chair. He picked up the phone and dialed.

  “Bacchetti.”

  “How do?” Stone asked.

  “I do pretty good,” Dino replied. They had been partners many years before on the NYPD; now Dino was the police commissioner for New York City.

  “Come for a drink at six-thirty, then let’s have dinner.”

  “I take it you’re back on the right side of the Atlantic.”

  “If I’m not, I will be by cocktail time.”

  “Are you bringing what’s-her-name?”

  “No. What’s-her-name has taken flight from my existence; Lance Cabot has lured her back to her nest.” Lance was the director of the Central Intelligence Agency.

  “Smart girl,” Dino said. “I’ll check with Viv. If I don’t call you back, we’ll see you at six-thirty.”

  “Done,” Stone said, then hung up and buzzed Joan.

  “Yes, boss?”

  “You must have something for me to do,” he said.

  “Do you do windows?” she asked.

  “I do not.”

  “Then there’s no hope for you. Go watch those political programs you love so much.”

  Stone hung up, yawned, and turned on the TV.

  * * *

  —

  Faith was punctual. He met her at the door and walked her though the living room to his study. “Another couple is joining us shortly,” he said. “Let’s get a head start on them. What would you like?”

  “A bourbon on the rocks,” she said. “Knob Creek, if you have it.”

  “I have it in abundance,” Stone said, pouring them each one. They sat down before the fire.

  “This is a very nice room,” she said.

  “Thank you.”

  “And the living room was very nice, too, as is the house and the neighborhood.

  “On behalf of the neighbors, I thank you.”

  “How do you live so well?”

  “Well, I got the house cheap: I inherited it from a great-aunt. My father, who was a cabinetmaker and furniture designer made all the paneling, shelves, and did the woodwork.”

  “I see,” she said, “sort of. Did you get the Bentley cheap?”

  “I got a pretty good deal on it.”

  “What do you do?”

  “I’m a partner in a law firm, Woodman & Weld.”

  “Never heard of it.”

  “There’s no reason you should have, unless your suing or being sued or want an estate managed or a will written.”

  “None of the above,” she said.

  “How long have you been flying?” Stone asked.

  “Since I was sixteen,” she said. “I went to high school in the town where I was born: Delano, Georgia, then graduated from the aviation university, Embry Riddle, in Florida, with a diploma and an ATP license. Then I flew packages and freight, was first officer on a Lear, then got in a lot of single-pilot jet time in Citations. I flew for an airline, right seat for eight or nine years, then I joined Trans-Continent and made captain as soon as they needed one.”

  “Total time?”

  “A little over fifteen thousand hours. You sound like a pilot.”

  “I am. I fly a CJ3-Plus.”

  “Nice. I flew one for a charter service for two years. Total time?”

  “About four thousand hours, half of it in Citations. Lately, I’ve been flying a borrowed Citation Latitude.”

  “That’s a great airplane. My charter service ordered three of them and sent me to Flight Safety for a type rating. Then, the day I got my rating, the charter service went bust. They reneged on their order for the three Latitudes, and I had to buy my own ticket home.”

  “That’s a sad story, but at least you got the type rating.”

  The doorbell rang, but Stone kept his seat. “They’ll let themselves in,” he said. “The
ir names are Dino and Viv Bacchetti.” He spelled the name for her.

  The Bacchettis spilled into the room and demanded liquor. Stone introduced them to Faith, then did the pouring of Dino’s scotch and Viv’s martini.

  “So, how did you two meet?” Viv asked.

  “She body-blocked me at the heliport today,” Stone said.

  “He was walking backward and nearly knocked me down,” Faith explained.

  “Why were you both at the heliport?” Dino asked.

  “Stone was seeing off a friend, and I had hitched a ride into the city from JFK on a chopper,” Faith said. “The pilot’s a friend.”

  “Sounds like fate at work,” Viv said.

  * * *

  —

  They finished their drinks, then left the house and got into Dino’s car. “Patroon,” he said.

  “What’s Patroon?” Faith asked.

  “A very good restaurant,” Stone replied.

  “Dino,” she asked, “why does your car have a blue light on top?”

  “It’s a police car,” Dino replied.

  “In a manner of speaking,” Stone said. “Not every police office has this ride, but Dino, for reasons I’ve never understood, is the police commissioner for the City of New York.”

  “I’ve never felt so safe,” Faith said.

  * * *

  —

  They arrived at the restaurant, were greeted and seated by the owner, Ken Aretsky, and ordered drinks. When they had been delivered, Dino took a deep breath. “Faith, this is not a good time to feel safe.”

  “What are you talking about, Dino?” Stone asked.

  “While you were swanning around London, we had two homicides on the Upper East Side.”

  “Only two?” Stone asked. “Why is that remarkable?”

  “Because both were small, blond, and beautiful,” Dino said. “Like you, Faith.”

  To learn more about and order DESPERATE MEASURES visit prh.com/desperatemeasures

  ABOUT THE AUTHORS