Trace (Trace 1)

by Warren Murphy

  “Good. So now we’re going home?”

  “One more stop,” Trace said.

  When he pulled up outside the apartment building, Chico asked, “Who lives here?”

  “The lawyer,” Trace said. “I’ll be right down.”

  “It’s Trace.”

  “You can’t come in. I look worse than yesterday.”

  “I just wanted to say good-bye. I’m leaving.”

  He was answered by silence, and then the door opened slightly. Jeannie Callahan stood behind it, peering out with just one eye, hiding one side of her face.

  “You heard?” Trace said.

  She nodded. “I talked to George this morning. He told me.”

  “I didn’t want to leave without saying so long,” he said.

  “Yeah.”

  “You know, Mrs. Carey’s going to be alone for a while,” Trace said. “You might think about staying with her for a few days. Might do both of you some good.”

  “I’ll think about it,” she said.

  He hesitated. “Well, so long, then,” he said.

  “So long,” she said. “Thanks for making this a one-lawyer town again.”

  He started away, but she reached out a hand to stop him.

  “Trace?”

  “What?” he said as he turned.

  “Could we stop drinking?” she asked.

  “Could you?”

  “I don’t think so.”

  “I don’t either,” Trace said.

  “We came close, didn’t we?” she said.

  “Close but no cigar.”

  “If I visit Las Vegas, will you buy me a drink?”

  “As many as it takes to drag you into bed,” he said.

  “One’ll do it. Kiss me good-bye.”

  He took her in his arms and kissed her hard.

  “Now get out of here,” she said, “Before I make you change your mind.”

  They were halfway to Newark Airport before Chico broke the silence.

  “How come so quiet?” she said.

  “Just thinking.”

  Five miles more, and she said, “Trace, with us, it’s never going to be like it was, is it?”

  Five miles more and he said, “Maybe it never was.”

  31

  Two weeks later, Trace got a call at his Las Vegas condominium.

  “This is Mitchell Carey.” The voice was gravelly and labored, as if produced only by great exertion and willpower.

  “How are you feeling?” Trace asked.

  “Matteson says I’m getting better, but I still feel like crap. I just called to thank you.”

  “Do what the doctor says,” Trace said. “Tell me, did you know what was going on when you were kind of out of it?”

  “Sometimes I did. I could hear things and sometimes I could concentrate. Like I knew that Muffy was using Amanda. I spotted that in the hospital, but then I got worse and I couldn’t do anything about it.”

  “Do you remember, in the sanatorium, you told me that somebody was trying to kill you?”

  “I kind of remember that,” Carey said.

  “You were counting,” Trace said. “A hundred, a hundred hundred, do you remember? Do you know what that was about?”

  “I was thinking about my brain cells dying. Maybe I was counting them off,” Carey said.

  “Yeah. I thought that’s what it was,” Trace said. “So get well.”

  “I’m working on it. And thanks.”

  A week after the phone call, Trace was summoned to appear before a New Jersey grand jury. The jury subsequently indicted Muffy, her brother, and Yule for attempted murder.

  Trace got in, testified, and left the same day. His ex-wife and children never knew he was in the state until it was too late for them to do anything about it.

  Three months later, he received in the mail an invitation to the wedding of Jeannie Callahan and Dr. George Matteson. He saw the marriage would take place in New Jersey, so he threw the invitation away. No point in pressing his luck.

  About the Author

  Warren Murphy is the author of more than sixty novels and screenplays, including the satiric adventure series The Destroyer, with more than 25 million copies in print. He is a former newspaperman and political-campaign consultant whose hobbies are chess, mathematics, and martial arts. He lives in Teaneck, New Jersey.