by Stuart Woods
A maid discovered the body early in the morning and notified police and hotel security. The hotel was locked down and a search conducted, resulting in a confrontation between Ms. King and police. When she pointed a pistol at them, she was shot to death.
“That’s it?” Stone asked. “No reference to what happened at the Four Seasons or to Mason?”
“It’s the clean version,” Dino said. “Only Purdue gets his name in the papers.” Dino threw up his hands. “Don’t look at me. This came from a lot higher up the food chain.”
“Speaking of food,” Stone said, reaching for a menu. A waiter set down a Wild Turkey on the rocks. “Want to share the porterhouse for two?”
“Why not?” Dino said. “I haven’t eaten. Mary Ann is at her father’s.”
“The porterhouse, medium to medium rare,” Stone said to the waiter.
“Make that rare,” Dino said.
“Make it rare on his side,” Stone countered, and the waiter went away.
Carpenter suddenly appeared, looking businesslike in a suit. She sat down.
“Drink? Dinner?” Dino asked.
“Neither. I’ll eat on the airplane.”
“There’s a flight to London this time of night?” Stone asked.
“There’s an RAF airplane waiting for me at Teterboro,” she said. “I’m taking back two bodies as hand baggage.”
“Oh, yes.”
“What will happen to La Biche’s remains?” she asked Dino.
“Potter’s field is my guess.”
“No,” Stone interjected. He told them about the package from Marie-Thérèse. “She wants her ashes sent back to Switzerland.”
“Why don’t you just flush them down the toilet?” Carpenter asked.
“Shut up, Felicity,” Stone said.
“You liked her, didn’t you?” she asked.
“No, I didn’t. I admired . . . some of what she was—determined, even principled, in a way.”
“And you don’t like me anymore?”
“I like you, but I don’t admire you,” Stone said.
“I did what had to be done.”
“No, you did what you had to do; there’s a difference.”
“At least I know that she’s not after me anymore. I can relax now.”
“I don’t know how you can ever relax again,” Stone said.
“I’m quitting, you know.”
“Are you really?”
“I’m thinking about it.”
“Don’t think about it, just quit. You can’t be a human being again until you do.”
“I wish you understood,” she said.
Stone shrugged. “Like you said, it’s a war; what’s to understand?”
She stood up. “I have to go.” She gave Dino a hug, then turned to Stone.
“I don’t feel like kissing you,” she said.
“Then don’t.”
“Call me when you’re in London?”
“After you’ve retired.”
She gave him a little wave, then left.
They were quiet for a while, sipping their drinks, then Dino finally spoke. “You were too hard on her.”
“Was I?”
“We all have our dirty work to do—Carpenter, me, and you.”
Stone downed the rest of his bourbon and signaled a waiter for another. “I think you’d better order a police car to take me home tonight.”
“It’s waiting outside,” Dino said.
THE ENDMount Desert, Maine, June 26, 2002
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I am grateful to my editor at Putnam, David Highfill, for his continuing fine work on my manuscripts and his shepherding of my books inside the publishing house, as I am to all the people behind the scenes at Putnam who do so much to make my work a success.
I am grateful, too, to my literary agents, Morton Janklow and Anne Sibbald, for all their work in the management of my career over the past twenty-two years. They have always made me feel I am in good hands.
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 of 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 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 these. 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, G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 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 90212-1825.
Those who wish to conduct business of a more literary nature should contact Anne Sibbald, Janklow & Nesbit, 445 Park Avenue, New York, NY 10022.
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 Putnam representative or the G. P. Putnam’s Sons 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 David Highfill at Putnam, address above. Do not e-mail your discoveries to me, as I will already have learned about them from others.
A list of all my published works appears in the front of this book. 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 on-line bookstores can help you find them. Otherwise, you will have to go to a great many garage sales.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events or locales is entirely coincidental.
Reckless Abandon
A Signet Book / published by arrangement with the author
All rights reserved.
Copyright © 2004 by Stusrt Woods
This book may not be reproduced in whole or part, by mimeograph or any other means, without permission. Making or distributing electronic copies of this book constitutes copyright infringement and could subject the infringer to criminal and civil liability.
For information address:
The Berkley Publishing Group, a division of Penguin Putnam Inc.,
375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014.
The Penguin Putnam Inc. World Wide Web site address is
http://www.penguin.com
ISBN: 978-1-1012-1009-3
A SIGNET BOOK®
Signet Books first published by The Signet Publishing Group, a member of Penguin Putnam Inc.,
375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014.
SIGNET and the “S” design are trademarks belonging to Penguin Putnam Inc.
Electronic edition: November, 2004
Contents
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10
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58
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60
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
AUTHOR’S NOTE
This book is for Harry and Gigi Benson.
1
ELAINE’S, EARLY.
Stone Barrington had just walked through the door when his cell phone vibrated in his jacket pocket. He dug it out, while Gianni led him back to his usual table. Dino wasn’t there yet.
“Hello?”
“Stone?” An unfamiliar female voice.
“Yes.”
“It’s Holly Barker.”
It took only a nanosecond for Stone to display her image on the inside of his eyelids—tall, light brown hair, sun-streaked, well put together, badge. “Hello, Chief, how are you?”
“Confused.”
“How can I help?”
“I’m in a taxi, and I don’t know where to tell the driver to take me. Can you recommend a good hotel, not too expensive?” “In what city?”
“In New York. I’m headed for the Midtown Tunnel, I think.”
“Why don’t you stay at my house? There’s a guest room.”
“I have a friend with me.”
“Male or female?”
“Female.”
“My secretary is there right now, working late. I’ll call and tell her to expect you.” He gave her his Turtle Bay address. “There are three guest rooms—two with king beds and one with twins, all on the top floor. You choose.”
“Are you sure? I don’t want to put you to any trouble.”
“No trouble at all. That’s what the guest rooms are for.”
“When will I see you?”
“Have you had dinner?”
“No.”
“Drop your luggage, freshen up, and meet me at Elaine’s—Second Avenue, between Eighty-eighth and Eighty-ninth.”
“Sounds great. We’re at the tunnel now. How long should it take me?”
“If you’re quick, half an hour, but you’re a woman . . .”
“Half an hour it is, and don’t ever put a ‘but’ in front of that statement.” She hung up.
Gianni put a Knob Creek on the rocks in front of him, and Stone took a sip. “Better get him something, too,” Stone said, pointing at Dino, his partner when he had been an NYPD detective. Dino spoke to a couple of people at the front tables, then came back and pulled up a chair. His drink had already arrived.
“How you doing?” Dino asked.
“Not bad. You?”
“The same. You’re looking thoughtful.”
“I was just trying to remember everything about my trip to Vero Beach, Florida, last year, when I was picking up my Malibu at the Piper factory.”
“Why?”
“I was in a bank in the next town, a place called Orchid Beach, getting a cashier’s check to pay for the airplane, when a bunch of guys wearing masks walked in and stuck the place up.”
“Oh yeah, you told me about that. They shot a guy, didn’t they?”
“Yes. A lawyer with a funny name—Oxblood, or something like that.”
“Oxenhandler.”
“How did you remember that?”
Dino tapped his temple. “I do The New York Times crossword every day. Calisthenics for the brain.”
“Funny, it doesn’t seem to have muscled up.”
“I remembered the name, didn’t I? While your brain has apparently turned to mush. Why were you thinking about the bank robbery?”
“Not the robbery so much, the woman.”
“Ah, now we’re getting to the nub of things. I’ll bite. What woman?”
“She’s the chief of police down there, name of Holly Barker. She was supposed to marry Oxenhandler that very day. I met her at the police station.”
“You went to the police station?”
“I was a witness, and I didn’t have a shirt.”
“You’re losing me here.”
“I took off my shirt and held it to Oxenhandler’s chest wound, not that it did much good. He died shortly after reaching the hospital.”
“So you were bare-chested in Orchid Beach, and you met this girl?”
“Woman. We’re not supposed to call them girls, remember?”
“Whatever.”
“A cop loaned me a shirt. Holly arrived and took over the case. I remember how cool she was under the circumstances.”
“Pretty bad circumstances.”
“Yeah. After I came home I called her with some information, and we had a couple of phone conversations after that.”
“So why are you thinking about this . . . person?”
“She’s in town. In fact, she’s at my house right—Jesus, I forgot to call Joan.” Stone dialed his office number and got his secretary on the phone. “There are a couple of women coming to the house—one is named Holly Barker; I don’t know the other one. Will you put them in whichever of the guest rooms they want, and give them a key?”
“You’re doing two at a time now, Stone?” Joan Robertson asked.
“I should be so lucky. Just get them settled. I’ll explain later.”
“Whatever you say, boss.” She hung up.
“What’s she doing up here?” Dino asked.
“She didn’t say. She called from a taxi on the way in from the airport.”
“Nice of you to offer her a bed,” Dino said slyly.
“Oh, shut up.”
“Did you offer the two of them your bed?”
“I offered them a guest room; that’s it.”
“So far. Well, I guess it’s how you keep your weight down, isn’t it?”
“Dino . . .”
Gianni put some menus on the table.
“We’ll be two more,” Stone said. “And we’ll order when the ladies arrive.”
Gianni brought two more menus and a basket of hot bread. Stone tore into a slab of sourdough.
“Carbing up for later?” Dino asked.
“Get off it. I just want to get something in my stomach with the bourbon.”
“Mary Ann and I worry about you, you know.”
“Mary Ann has enough to worry about with you on her hands.”
“We want to see you settled with some nice, plain girl.”
“You just want to drag everybody down with you,” Stone said. “And what do you mean, ‘plain’?”
“A beautiful woman demands too much of a man.”
“You’re married to a beautiful woman.”
“I speak from experience. Their care and feeding is a full-time job.”
“Mary An
n cares for and feeds both of you, and without the slightest help from you, as I recall.”
“She’s an exceptional woman,” Dino said. “You’ll never do that well.”
“Thanks a lot.”
They finished their drinks and had just ordered another round, when Dino nodded toward the front door. “I’ll bet that’s your lady cop,” he said.
Stone looked up to see a tall woman, more striking than he remembered, striding toward them, smiling.
“Hey, there,” Holly said, offering her hand.
Stone and Dino were on their feet, getting her chair.
“This is my friend Dino Bacchetti, my old partner. He runs the detective squad at the Nineteenth Precinct.”
“Hey, Dino.”
“Hey, Holly.”
“Where’s your friend?” Stone asked.
“Oh, Daisy’s exhausted,” Holly replied. “I put her to bed.”
“Can I get you a drink?” Stone asked.
“What are you drinking?”
“Bourbon.”
“That will do nicely,” she said.
Gianni brought her the drink.
“So what brings you to the big city?” Stone asked.
“I’m in hot pursuit of a fugitive,” Holly said.
Stone handed her a menu. “Let’s order dinner, then you can tell me about it.”
2
THEY WERE HALFWAY through their first course, a salad of French green beans, mushrooms, and bacon.
“Tell us about your fugitive, Holly,” Dino said. “Maybe I can help.”
“That would be nice, Dino,” Holly replied. “First, a little background: Not long ago, I wrapped up a case in my jurisdiction that involved a man named Ed Shine; his history is interesting. He came to the U.S. from Italy, as a teenager, and his original name was Gaetano Costello.”
“Costello?”
“Second cousin to Frank. The mob changed his name to Edward Shine, planted a birth certificate in the county records, and put him through high school and college, ostensibly the son of some people named Shine, who just happened to live in the same apartment building as Mr. and Mrs. Meyer Lansky. Right out of college, Ed starts building office buildings, and he never has any trouble arranging financing; he’s laundering money for the mob. He continues doing this for forty years or so, and very successfully. In the meantime, he’s visiting Florida on a regular basis, and he has a brief affair with a Latino woman and fathers a son out of wedlock, naming the boy Enrico. The kid takes his mother’s maiden name, Rodriguez, and is called Trini.