by Lee Driver
“You don’t eat red meat. What I want you to do is get into the cardinal’s hotel suite. Find one of the maid outfits, have a look around, plant some bugs.”
“Hmmm. That certainly sounds more interesting than listening to Sheila all night. What if he has a guard outside the room who insists on following me into the suite?”
“Then you may have to get creative.” Dagger winked. The printer at Dagger’s desk started humming.
“Yo, Dagger.” Skizzy’s voice bellowed from the computer speakers.
“What did you find?”
“Decrypted a couple Emails in the laptop. It used a very old cipher code created by the Greeks. They used something called a Polybius Square that kinda looks like a five-by-five checkerboard. Number it one through five at the top, same on the side, then run your alphabet A through Z…”
“Break it down, Skizzy. I’m aging as we speak.”
“Some lady by the name of Connie sent Emails detailing Cardinal Esrey’s travel plans, plane, hotel, dates, times. An Email from Demko to Connie states the amount of security planned for the cardinal and asks how he should proceed. They tell him to hire someone local to get close, someone who would be a dupe. Use and dispose is how they termed it.”
“Use and dispose.” Dagger didn’t like the sound of that. “Was Demko supposed to report in?”
“His last communication was what I just said. He never reported to them whether he found anyone. There wasn’t a mention of your name. But obviously when he didn’t report in, it must have made them suspicious.”
“Did they give a deadline?”
“He was supposed to report in by ten in the morning. Instead I showed him booking a flight to Vancouver.”
Dagger thought about that for a few seconds. Obviously someone was monitoring Demko’s whereabouts. Would that someone know Demko had been at Sara’s house? “It’s a little risky eliminating their man just because he hadn’t reported in. What if he had been in the middle of a shopping center?”
“Coulda been a timer, you know, so much time after he expired. Unless they were watching him,” Skizzy said. “Big Brother and all.”
Dagger didn’t like the sound of that. After ending his conversation with Skizzy, Dagger gathered the papers off the printer and carried them into the Florida room. Stair-step tables were lined up in front of the windows where flowering plants were on full display. A large paddle fan droned overhead. It was five hundred square feet of quarry-tiled floor and floral cushioned furniture. Dagger had built it from the ground up. Carpenter projects were his best release valves.
He turned his attention to the papers, thinking it would start with a biography of Cardinal Michael Esrey. It didn’t. Other than the cardinal’s current travel plans, the only biography Dagger had was the one Sara had printed from her Google search. His suspicious mind started questioning the cardinal’s true identity. All Dagger had to do was snatch a wine glass the cardinal touches and, as a backup, have Sara pick up some prints from the hotel room. That was their only starting point.
His mind drifted to Demko. Why did he seek him out specifically? There were other P.I.’s in the area. The more he thought about it, though, he realized they were all high-profile. Their pictures were on billboards, smiling up at you from restaurant placemats, on flyers posted at the local grocery store. Someone would get suspicious if any of them were found dead. But most people knew little about Dagger. His clients were all word of mouth. His obituary would be a tiny blurb buried near the classifieds.
And then there was the cardinal. Dagger studied the face. Could he be wrong? Did Esrey only resemble someone from Dagger’s past? Why were some people he had killed so fresh in his mind but Esrey was a blur? There wasn’t anything in the cardinal’s past that even hinted at corruption or misconduct. Maybe…Dagger shook the thought from his head. That was too bizarre to even contemplate. But the thought nagged at him, kept pushing its way to the forefront until he gave it some structure.
Maybe it wasn’t the cardinal’s past that had him targeted. It could possibly be his future.
CHAPTER 8
Mansion didn’t quite describe the size of Robert Tyler’s home. Castle was a better term, Dagger had always thought. The grounds were manicured, the evergreens shaped to resemble animals. Fountains sprayed and pools bubbled. The veranda where Dagger stood offered a great view of the Tyler boat dock in the distance, the stables off to the right. This side of the house faced east. Dagger could only imagine what kind of sunrises they enjoyed. Then his thoughts drifted to Sara. She would hate living in a house this size with servants and high-profile elites drifting in and out. Or would she? The house didn’t have rooms…it had wings. The ballroom had held many gala events including a post-election party for the Indiana governor several years ago. There were groundskeepers, a cleaning service, a limo driver whose responsibilities included washing all of the Tyler vehicles. Captains were hired whenever Tyler took the yacht out on Lake Michigan. A stable master kept the horses groomed. Yes, Sara would definitely hate it here.
“Dagger, there you are.” Robert Tyler stepped out onto the veranda and handed Dagger a beer. “Cardinal Esrey will be coming down in a few minutes.” Robert rested one elbow on the railing and watched the guests in the sitting room.
Dagger figured Robert was so used to the grounds that he now took them for granted. Even his string of resorts ran like clockwork so there wasn’t a need for him to travel that much. Robert’s tanned skin showed few lines which had Dagger wondering if the man recently had a facelift. His hair appeared thicker and more silver. Hair plugs? Was Robert trolling for wife number three? He had always been trim and in excellent shape but having an in-home gym with a weight trainer visiting three times a week would keep anyone in shape.
“I’m sorry Sara couldn’t make it. She is a lovely young woman.” Robert studied his manicured fingers. “She would be a catch for any man, don’t you think?”
Dagger gave a hint of a grimace which he hoped looked like a smile. Maybe Nick was the wrong Tyler he should keep an eye on.
Sara shoved her shorts and top into the gym bag and stashed it in the supply cabinet in the women’s washroom. The hardest part was trying to shove all of her hair under the short red wig. The gray and white uniform fit loosely but it was all she could get her hands on in such short notice. She had worn her own gym shoes so hopefully she wouldn’t run into a member of management who would notice her lack of adherence to dress code.
Next she put on tinted glasses, more to hide her eyes than anything else. Her eyes were an unusual color and would be the first thing people would remember. She looked at her reflection in the mirror. This would do. The uniform was large enough to hide her curves and she wasn’t wearing anything that was too eye-catching to be memorable.
She pulled on latex gloves and walked out of the second floor restroom and down the hall to a red house phone. She dialed the cardinal’s suite and listened while it rang several times. After it went unanswered for a full minute, Sara hung up. With luck, his entire entourage was with him at the Tyler residence.
A map on the wall near the employee entrance pointed out the location of all the supply rooms. One was on the floor just below the Presidential Suites. She didn’t know how Skizzy did it but he made her a master key card for the Ritz so she didn’t have to try to steal one from a cleaning cart.
She rode the elevator to the eleventh floor. Alternatives played in her head. What if housekeeping was in the cardinal’s suite now? What if security was posted outside the room? What if the security guard insisted on joining Sara in the room? What if a member of management, knowing that housekeeping shouldn’t be working after six o’clock, pulled her aside?
As she wandered the hall, she heard music coming from one of the rooms. Voices from a television set, the news possibly. More voices arguing. Sometimes Sara wished she didn’t have enhanced hearing. She concentrated on blocking out the background sounds.
As she approached the supply room, she pul
led the master key card from her pocket and opened the door. Cleaning carts lined one wall. Towels and bed linens were stacked on shelves above the carts. Cleaning supplies were on the shelves on the opposite wall. Sara grabbed the closest cart, pushed it out of the room and over to the elevator. Once on the elevator she pushed the button for the twelfth floor. The doors closed but the elevator didn’t move. Sara held her breath. Now what? She pushed the button again. Still nothing. Sara inserted the key card into a slot labeled Suites. The elevator moved.
The lavish décor on the twelfth floor far exceeded anything Sara had ever seen before. A rain forest of plants surrounded a fountain in the middle of the atrium. She checked the sign on the wall. Cardinal Esrey’s was the Cordova Suite. Soft music was coming from one of the suites. Humming, probably from refrigerators. Ice clinking. Someone was making a drink in another suite.
Moving quickly down the hall, Sara located the Cordova Suite. There wasn’t anyone standing guard. So far so good. She parked the cleaning cart just outside the door, grabbed a few towels, then shoved the master key card in the slot. A green light flashed. Slowly she pushed the door open, waited and listened. She heard her pulse pounding in her ears. She gently closed the door, then bolted it so no one could enter.
She stepped into a living room with a vaulted ceiling and dark wood furnishings, brocade sofas, and Oriental carpeting. A fireplace was on the far wall with a large basket of flowers set inside. Sara hadn’t seen anything this lavish since the Tyler house. Floor to ceiling windows gave a magnificent view of the Cedar Point Yacht Club in the distance. Lights from boats could be seen offshore. A staircase to her right led to a second floor loft, probably the bedrooms. Off to her left was a kitchen and bar area. Further on was a dining room table large enough to seat twelve, and beyond that a separate conference room. Hallways were large enough to drive a car through.
Sara could spend hours admiring the suite but reminded herself she had work to do. She had three surveillance bugs and had to pick the best places to plant them. Dagger was curious to find out more about Esrey that might be hidden from the public. The conference room had an Oriental silk screen painting on the wall. Sara placed one of the bugs on the back of the painting. She stood in the living room and studied the surroundings. She could always place a bug in one of the plants but all of the plants were live and might be watered, repotted, or thrown out. She couldn’t chance it. The fireplace had a marble mantel, a perfect place for the second bug.
She headed for the second floor. The staircase was marble with an Oriental runner and high-gloss wood handrail. The upstairs furnishings proved even more extravagant. The bed was on a platform with a velvet canopy. The bathroom had a whirlpool large enough for six people in addition to a walk-in shower. Gold fixtures were just a tad too much in Sara’s opinion.
It didn’t feel appropriate to bug the cardinal’s bedroom. But the loft did have a library and another fireplace. Sara placed the last bug under an end table in the library. A long conference table was in the middle of the room and at one end of the table was an opened briefcase.
She was just about to search the case when she heard a soft creaking, like someone stepping on a wood floor. Sara lifted her head and focused her attention on the source of the sound. It was coming from the cardinal’s bedroom. This was a bad time to travel unarmed. She focused her senses on the room as she entered. She didn’t hear anything other than her own pulse pounding in her ears and her own breathing. Or was it hers? Was there someone else inhaling? She stopped to listen closer. Creak. Her attention riveted to a set of French doors which weren’t completely closed. Sara breathed a sigh of relief. It was just the ceiling fan causing a draft. She walked over to the French doors and pulled them open.
A man, mouth twisted in a grimace, tumbled toward her. Sara screamed and stepped to one side. The man fell to the floor with a thud. Sara stumbled away and nearly collided with the bed. Her heart pounded against her rib cage as she stared in shock at what lay before her. Blue face, bulging eyes. The man had been strangled. Thoughts fired through her brain. She had on latex gloves, hadn’t left prints anywhere. The bugs were planted. Time to leave.
She ran out of the bedroom, through the library, and right into Paul Demko.
“What?!” Sara’s mouth gaped in shock. This can’t be. He was dead. But here he was. Same face, same receding hairline, same suit. Demko lunged at her but Sara called on her unusual strength and flung him aside like a rag doll. She dodged his second attempt and tore off for the staircase. A figure appeared in her peripheral vision dropping from the second floor like a suicide jumper. Demko had leaped from the loft and landed at the bottom of the curved staircase. Sara came at him feet first, landing a blow to his head. Something dropped from his hand and scuttled across the floor. He shook off the shock to his body and studied her with renewed interest, cocking his head as though calculating his next move against a 120 pound woman with unusual strength.
Demko took a swing at her but she ducked, flung her feet out and kicked at his kneecap. Bone crunched and he went down with a howl. Sara ran for the door but he hobbled right after her, grabbed a handful of her uniform and dragged her back. He pulled her into a headlock. Sara clawed for his eyes but his other arm held down her hands. She kicked backward, aiming toward his injured kneecap. She turned, moving them in a bizarre circular dance while lights sparkled behind her eyes. She heard pottery breaking and furniture tumbling. Finally her heel connected with Demko’s injured kneecap and he folded like a broken chair. Sara stepped away and took in gulps of air. Her vision started to clear as she saw Demko grope for a pen then stumble to his feet, wobbling in front of the tall windows.
“Don’t you ever quit?” Sara said. She took a deep breath then ran straight at him, leaped in the air and caught him in the chest with both feet. Her momentum carried them both into the window. Glass shattered as they tumbled out of the twelfth floor. She expected his hands and feet to claw for purchase but instead he was clinging to the pen with both hands. The parking lot below was small and poorly lit. Demko was headed right for the hood of a truck, a vehicle which, even in the dark, Sara recognized. She pushed away from him, then shifted. Demko’s eyes grew wide as he witnessed her clothing and wig fall away and the human form change to a hawk. It flew up and landed on the seventh floor window ledge.
Demko’s body hit the vehicle with a loud crash. Several seconds later the truck exploded. In succession, several surrounding cars exploded sending up a ball of fire and fumes into the night sky. The hawk used its beak to pull a latex glove from one talon. The glove drifted in the direction of the fire only to be sucked into the flames. The hawk checked the grounds for witnesses. It scanned nearby cars, the back entrance to the hotel, the street beyond. Assured it hadn’t been seen, the hawk took flight.
CHAPTER 9
Dagger barely listened to Sheila’s ramblings about a story she was investigating which had something to do with a refinery dumping waste into Lake Michigan. He was too busy studying the cardinal seated across from him. Esrey had looked familiar in the picture on Demko’s computer but up close and personal he was just another priest dressed casually in white collar and black cassock. After spending the last few hours with the man, Dagger was now certain that he had never seen him before in his life. So why had he believed beyond a shadow of a doubt that he had killed him?
“Are you listening to me?”
Dagger shifted his gaze to the exquisite blonde seated next to him. Her silk suit looked as though it were woven with the fine platinum strands of her hair. At least she had the good sense to wear something that didn’t expose the breast implants her father had purchased when she graduated from college. Her green eyes blazed with irritation and she pursed her collagen-injected lips into a pout.
“Barely,” he replied as he lifted her hand from his thigh. “I’m trying to stay focused here.” Dinner dishes had been cleared away and replaced with some type of chocolate mousse and cream puffs shaped like swans. Three platters of
desserts had been placed at strategic points on the table. Dagger was sure if he used a yardstick each platter would be of equal distance apart.
Leyton Monroe excused himself, but not before stabbing Dagger with one final glare as a reminder that he was in his crosshairs. Standing up the daughter of one of the richest men in Cedar Point hadn’t won Dagger any soft spots in his heart. Monroe had managed to only lose the security deposit with the reception hall. He had had the foresight to add a clause in the contract to his benefit knowing that somehow the wedding of his daughter to a hooligan like Dagger was never going to take place.
“Sweetheart, come over here and talk to mummy.” Anna Monroe patted the chair next to her. She was a short, frumpy version of Sheila. Dagger imagined Sheila would look the same when she reached her fifties. Frumpy for the wealthy was quite a bit different from frumpy for the middle class. Anna’s hair was in a fashionable swirl of curls in the same shade as Sheila’s hair. Dagger figured they got a two-for-one discount at the salon. Her dress was tailored to hide the middle age spread.
“Oh, jeez,” Sheila said under her breath but forced a smile and moved five chairs down.
The dinner guest list consisted of the Monroes, Robert Tyler, Cardinal Esrey, several area bishops, Mayor James Brookins and his wife, Bobbie, who had left early because of a nanny problem at home. The cardinal’s private secretary, Donald Thomas, was a fidgety priest who made even Dagger nervous. He was a few pounds shy of pudgy with a patch of baldness on the top of his head. Skin as smooth as a baby’s bottom, it was difficult to tell the priest’s age. If there had been less hair, if it had ringed the bottom half of his head, he would almost look at home in a monastery. He had sat at the cardinal’s elbow all night with notepad in hand should the cardinal make a request. Whether bending over his plate or the notepad, Father Thomas was obsessively focused on whatever he was doing. His voice was soft, almost timid and he had waited patiently for the cardinal to finish speaking before interrupting.