Book Deal

by Les Standiford

  He was still dangling weakly when he heard a cry behind him, saw a dark shape hurtle past him and fly out over the precipice by his side. She hit the bottom with a sound like shattering glass, skidding off a ways over a flat white surface, and Deal realized that it was a river down there, frozen over now in the cold.

  He stared dumbly as the woman came to her hands and knees, catching sight of him almost immediately. A machine, he was thinking. A woman who puts Schwarzenegger to shame. She raised her hand, pointing at him, and he realized she still had the gun.

  Sure, he thought numbly. Just his luck. So aching cold here the thing had probably frozen to her hand. Another muzzle flash then, a report that echoed off the cliffside above, a scattering of ice chips that burst near his face.

  She was on her feet now, bracing herself, taking her time for this one, enough fooling around for one night. She took a step closer, another, then stopped. He couldn’t see her face behind her upraised hands, but he’d have bet money she was smiling.

  “Go to hell,” he muttered, waiting for it to end.

  And then there was another sound of shattering glass, a cry, and a final crash as the ice beneath her feet gave way.

  She went down as if a greased chute had opened beneath her. One more gunshot straight into the air, a muffled splash as one palm smacked the surface of the water, and then nothing.

  Deal stared uncertainly at the round black hole in the water, stunned at first, then gradually able to comprehend what he had just seen. Seemed good, he thought, but any second she could be bouncing back through the ice, sporting a bikini and a flamethrower in each hand. He counted off a minute, then two, and by that time the feeling had returned to his groin, and he could draw a deep breath without setting off a fire everywhere south of his chest.

  He pulled himself up by the slender trunk of the tree that had saved his life, took one more look down at the frozen river, then turned and began to climb.

  ***

  By the time he had pulled himself to the top, slipping back one foot for every two he gained, his hands were bleeding, frostbitten wrecks, his lungs were burning, his pants soaked and shredded. He heaved himself over the berm that the snowplow had built up, checked to make sure he was headed down the right row. It was solid dark, but there were scattered vapor lights here and the snow seemed to have abated, the wind fallen off somewhat as well.

  The snowplow was working another quadrant of the lot now, its yellow light still whirling, rooster tails of snow still flying off either side of its blade. Deal hurried down the aisle, spotted the Previa van where he’d taken shelter, saw a dark blotch of ice marking the spot where he’d shattered Iris Kittle’s nose, where Dexter Kittle had tried to kill him.

  He’d known what to expect, of course, had hoped against hope anyway. How long had he been gone from this spot? Five minutes? Ten? Fifteen at the most.

  The spot where Dexter Kittle had lain was empty. The space where Kittle’s truck had been parked was an open gap in a line of snowbound vehicles. And, worst of all, in the place where Janice had been, there was nothing but a blank and frozen mound of snow.

  “Janice!” he cried. Maybe she’d awakened, was making her way toward the distant lights of the terminal. Sure. He turned that way, scanned the mounded tops of cars, the unmoving dark lot. “Janice!” he cried again.

  Only the snowplow roared in answer.

  Chapter 21

  “We’ve got people looking for your wife, Mr. Deal. You ready to tell me why you assaulted our snowplow driver, now?” The airport chief of security—Delbert Cuddy, according to his nametag—was perched on a desk, staring down at Deal, who was sitting in a wobbly secretary’s chair, where a paramedic had patched him up. Cuddy gestured into a corner of the bright, overheated staff lounge, where the same paramedic was pasting a butterfly bandage over a cut on a fat man’s cheek.

  It was a good-sized room, with several round tables, a couple dozen standard-issue metal chairs, a couple of vending machines in a corner. There was a microwave oven set up on a serving counter just behind the fat man and a colorful poster featuring a bear in hard hat and ear protectors who urged employees to be safe, and never sorry.

  “I didn’t touch him,” Deal said. That was close to the truth. He’d already gone over the story once with a patrolman, a guy Deal had finally found circling the parking lot in a little Japanese pickup topped by an enormous set of flashers. “I didn’t have time for a discussion, that’s all.”

  As he’d told the patrolman, Deal had intersected with the snowplow on the dead run toward the terminal, had jumped up to pound on the operator’s cab for help. The driver had driven on, oblivious, for a good fifteen seconds, Deal hammering away at the Plexiglas side door all the while, until the big machine finally ground to a halt, and the door swung open violently, loosing a blast of booze-laden air, giving Deal a look at a guy wearing a grimy, waffle-weave undershirt and a westerncut down vest.

  “He told me to get the fuck off his machine,” Deal repeated evenly, his eyes on the chief. “I told him someone had taken my wife, that I needed help. I left out the part that he’d already almost run over me with his machine. He yelled at me again, then he took a swing and lost his balance.” Deal shrugged. “He fell out of his seat and went all the way to the ground.”

  Deal glanced over to where the fat guy was sitting, his undershirt stained even worse now: snow grit and grease and a bright smear of blood shaped vaguely like a question mark. There was a lump on the side of his face where his bald head had bounced off the ice. The fat guy glowered back at him, but kept his mouth shut. He might have interjected how Deal had sidestepped the haymaker, had helped him out of his seat and into the snow just a little, but he had apparently decided against it this time.

  Cuddy, the security chief, was a burly guy, probably carried the same heft as the plow driver, but he looked a lot more solid. He surveyed Deal, glanced back at the driver. “Yeah, well, you probably just startled Everett. He gets into a routine out there, you know.”

  Deal considered Cuddy’s expression. “I really don’t care about Everett,” Deal said. “I’m sitting here thinking there ought to be an APB out on the truck that guy Kittle was driving.”

  Cuddy nodded, his eyes half-closing as if to forestall boredom. “I got a call in to the Highway Patrol. Four-wheel-drive type vehicle, make unknown, color hidden by snow, no tag number. Driver resembles farmer character out of Grant Wood painting.” He pursed his lips. “That narrows it down to about half the male population of Nebraska.”

  “That man has my wife,” Deal said, gritting his teeth.

  “You assume he’s got your wife, Mr. Deal,” Cuddy said, holding up a cautionary finger.

  “What are you talking about?” Deal said. “Where else could she be?”

  Cuddy eyed him closely. “You said she fell. I hate to say it, but she could be disoriented, she could have wandered off anywhere…”

  “She didn’t fall, she was assaulted,” Deal said, trying to keep from shouting. “When I saw her, she was unconscious…”

  Cuddy broke in. “You told me you thought you saw her hand come up, reach out for you.”

  Deal stopped, fuming. The man wasn’t entirely stupid, could remember the least details of Deal’s statements, but it seemed as if he were being purposefully obtuse. “What the hell is this?” Deal said finally. “My wife’s been kidnapped and we’re sitting around here jerking off?”

  The cop shifted on the desk, leaned over the chair where Deal was sitting. “Look here, Mr. Deal, I know you’re upset, but let me tell you how it might appear from another side. I get a wild man from My-yam-uh come flying through the doors of my airport in the middle of a blizzard, tells me two people followed him into the parking lot, tried to kill him.” Cuddy waved his hands about.

  “Fistfights. Gunshots fired. Lady assassin falls through the ice into Carter Creek. Man climbs up cliff to discover wife has been abducted by aforementioned male assailant. No
witnesses to any of this, of course. Though I do have a snowplow driver, employee of the City of Omaha for fourteen years, says the same wild man jumped up onto his snow removal unit, physically assaulted him without provocation.”

  “Talk to the clerk at the car rental counter,” Deal said, fighting back his anger. “He had to have seen those people. He rented them their car…”

  Cuddy shook his head. “We did talk to him. The guy remembers renting you a two-door midsize automobile, damage waiver declined. He remembers you were with your wife cuz she wanted to know if it had snow tires and he told her Hertz didn’t rent cars in Nebraska in the winter without snow tires on. But he doesn’t remember any tall guy in a golf getup, a wife that looks like Elmer Fudd. And he sure as shitting didn’t rent them any four-wheel-drive vehicle because there hasn’t been a one to rent in this airport for a day and a half, ever since the bad weather hit.”

  Deal stared at the man, trying to comprehend it. The counter had been a mob scene, all right. But the pair had been waiting right behind him…He broke off his thoughts, stared at the chief.

  “They weren’t there to rent a car,” Deal said.

  “That’s what I just told you,” Cuddy said.

  “They must have followed us into the line, to find out what kind of car we’d be driving, where it would be parked outside. We took our time getting out there. That’s why the car wouldn’t start, they must have done something to it…” His mind was outstripping itself, hurling fears, assumptions, counterclaims. Kittle had Janice. Kittle had killed others without a thought. How long did Janice have before she joined Arch, Rosenhaus, Eddie Lightner and his hooker, that poor bastard out walking his dog…?

  The door to the employees’ lounge opened then and the patrolman Deal had flagged down earlier clomped inside, banging his boots on the linoleum floor, dusting snow off the shoulders of his jacket.

  The patrolman looked at Deal, then at the chief. “That car of his had a dead battery,” he said.

  Deal started out of his chair, but Cuddy motioned him back. “You find a purse inside, luggage, anything like that?”

  The patrolman shrugged. “Bag with his name on it,” he said, nodding at Deal. “Full of his stuff.”

  Cuddy nodded, gave Deal a glance.

  “They must have taken her things…” Deal began, but Cuddy was holding a finger to his lips. After he was sure Deal was going to obey, he turned back to the patrolman.

  “Anybody check out the creek?”

  The patrolman shrugged. “Snowing too hard to get down right now,” he said. “We put a spotlight on it. It could be a break in the ice, but it’s hard to say for sure.”

  Cuddy took it in, nodding. He turned back to Deal for a moment. “I placed a call to my friend Hank Cross. He’s the sheriff out in Saunders County. Nobody named Kittle lives in Wahoo, that surprise you?”

  Deal shook his head. “Not at all.”

  “About three thousand people live in that town, most of ’em know what the rest ate for dinner last night. Hank Cross said he never laid eyes on a pair like you describe.”

  Deal stared in frustration. He’d always taken Kafka’s works as exaggeration, but now…

  Cuddy, who had been studying him, turned back to the patrolman, who was headed for the coffee machine. “Get yourself a coffee, Russ,” the chief called, “then find a rope somewhere, take my Blazer, get Phillips to winch you down the hill off the front end.”

  Russ spun about, an expression of disbelief on his face. “Hey, Chief…” he protested.

  Cuddy held up a meaty hand. “Or you lower Phillips down, I don’t care which. Call in on the radio, let me know if you see anything. You got me, Russ?”

  “Yeah,” Russ said, resigned. He drew his coffee and went out.

  Cuddy turned on the corner of the desk, back to Deal. “Now here’s what I know for sure, Mr. Deal. You came into this airport with your wife, and now she’s missing, purse, hatbox and all. You tell me there’s been foul play, but there’s nothing that really indicates that. For all I know, you two had a couple too many, got into a spat, she walked out when you had your back turned, all the rest of this is some fantasy.”

  Deal forced himself to be calm. “Why would I do that, make all this up?”

  Cuddy shrugged. “That I wouldn’t know, Mr. Deal. Maybe it’d help if you told me what brought you here to begin with.”

  Deal thought about the question for a moment. Suppose he told the chief all about it, start with Arch’s death, take it right on through Martin Rosenhaus, maybe a little discussion of American reading habits on the side. Would that help? Or just get him sent out the revolving door that much quicker?

  On the other hand, if he didn’t convince the man that Janice was in danger, what chance would he ever have of finding her? This much was certain: every minute he sat here trying to be reasonable was costing him dearly.

  “Look, Chief, you don’t know me from Adam’s off ox, I understand that. If I were in your shoes, I’d probably feel the same way you do. But maybe, if I could just make one phone call, maybe I could convince you I’m telling the truth.”

  Cuddy checked his watch. “I don’t see what the point of it is, but if it’ll make you feel any better…” He broke off, gesturing at the phone, but Deal already had the receiver in his hand.

  ***

  Actually, it took two calls. The first, to Terrence Terrell’s home, in Coconut Grove, resulted in a conversation with Terrell’s daughter Grace, who told him that Terrell was in Fort Lauderdale, being wined and dined at the waterside mansion of a fellow South Florida mogul who had a hockey team he was trying to sell. The second call was answered by a staffer for the mogul who wanted to take a message for Terrell.

  “He can’t be disturbed,” the staffer said firmly.

  “What did you say your name was?” Deal asked, feeling the chief’s eyes on him. “Uh-huh, well, listen, Jeffrey, tell him it’s John Deal calling from Omaha and that it’s an emergency. That’s right, Jeffrey. Life and death.”

  Deal waited, his gaze locked on the security chief’s, listening to the sound of footsteps, doors slamming, muffled conversation on the other end. Finally, there was Terrence Terrell’s voice, jovial, boat horns in the background, Terrell wanting to know what the hell he was doing in Omaha. Question of the day, Deal thought, then filled him in, sidestepping as much as possible the issue of what he and Janice had intended by making the trip in the first place.

  The moment he got the drift of things, Terrell became all business. He got the name of the airport, the number, the name of the chief of security, even a badge number. Deal heard muffled conversation on the other end for a moment, then Terrell was back.

  “I’ve already got someone working this matter on another line,” Terrell said, his voice at its most reassuring. “Give us fifteen minutes, tops. You’ll get a call. Just one thing I’m asking of you.”

  “Name it,” Deal said.

  “You’re holding back on me, aren’t you?”

  “Mr. Terrell…” Deal began.

  “Don’t ‘Mister’ me, John,” Terrell said. “You can’t talk, I understand. Just call me back the moment you’re able, let me know what this is all about.”

  “You’ve got it,” Deal said.

  “That’s what I thought,” Terrell said. “Hang in there now, John. Keep me informed.”

  The line was dead then, and Deal put the phone back into the chief’s outstretched hand. Cuddy replaced the phone in the set, turned back to Deal.

  “So now what,” Cuddy said mildly. “The mayor’s gonna call me, tell me to give you the key to the city?”

  Deal shrugged, checked his watch. “I’m not sure.”

  “That how it works down in Florida?” the chief persisted. “You get your tail in a crack, you call up some goombah politician, they muscle you out?”

  “I don’t know any politicians,” Deal said.

  “Uh-huh,” Cuddy said. “Well, maybe you
ought to.”

  The big man heaved himself up off the desk, started for the door. “I’m going to go out there, make sure those two don’t drop my Blazer into Carter Creek…”

  He broke off as the phone began to ring. He gave Deal a look, moved back to answer.

  “Delbert Cuddy,” he said wearily. His eyes narrowed then, and he shot another glance at Deal.

  “Wait a minute,” he said, his voice taking on an edge. “Is this some kind of a joke?”

  Cuddy listened a minute more, then sat down in his chair, the tone of his voice shifting rapidly—annoyance, dismay, abject groveling—all in the space of seconds.

  “Oh no, sir. Absolutely not. I didn’t mean to suggest that. It’s just I never directly spoke to you before. Right, sir. I recognize the voice now, I do.”

  He had the phone tucked under his chin, moved to straighten his uniform tie, square his jacket on his shoulders. “Oh, you bet,” he said, his eyes darting to Deal momentarily. “Sure thing. Of course. Yes, sir. I appreciate the call, sir. I will. Without fail. Right.”

  Cuddy replaced the receiver, turned to Deal, took a deep breath, started to say something, then stopped, his eyes on Deal’s face as if he were searching for some detail that he’d missed earlier.

  “That was the governor,” Cuddy said, finally. “Was that Terrence Terrell you called? The computer guy? The governor was telling me how many subassembly plants of his we got in Nebraska.”

  Deal stood up from his chair. “So we can get to work now?”

  The security chief was still shaking his head in disbelief. “That we can, Mr. Deal. That we can.”

  ***

  Within minutes, Highway Patrol units were on the scene, followed closely by Omaha city police and a pair of detectives from the Douglas County sheriff’s office. Deal wasn’t a minute into his third recap of the story before his description of Dexter Kittle’s car, sketchy as it was, had been transmitted to dispatchers for all three agencies.

  Russ the patrolman called in to confirm a fresh break in the ice as well, but even the detectives were less than ecstatic about that news.