Shooting Star

by Bradley Wright

  Lawson heard what Sloan was saying, but his mind stuck on something else. When Lawson was explaining what happened with the two men who tried to take Lexi, when he told Sloan someone killed them and tried to kill Lawson himself, it was lost in all the chaos––who the man was that would be shooting at Frank and Victoria’s men in the front of the truck. And who’d chased Lawson through the streets as he fled from the vehicle, shooting at him before Cassie showed up and saved his ass. He never even considered who that could have been. How could he have missed that? And how much would it cost him for overlooking it?

  “Something wrong, Mr. Raines?”

  Something was wrong. Very wrong.

  30

  The Malibu sun was hot, but it was the nerves and the fear that were making Taylor sweat. This felt much more like one of her movies than reality. And she would give anything if someone would shout, “Cut!” The men were gaining on her and Lexi. Lexi was doing great, they were weaving their way through the crowd of people on the pier fairly well, but the men coming after them were running right through them.

  Traffic was heavy, but there was a stoplight at the pier entrance. Through one more row of people, Taylor could see that the light was red. They had to make the light to give them a chance.

  “Come on, Lexi! Run!” Taylor shouted, giving Lexi’s arm a violent tug.

  They both surged forward, knocking into a group of women leaving the pier. There was no time for apologies. Just as they reached the road, the light changed. Without thinking, Taylor yanked on Lexi one more time, and they ran out into traffic just as the cars began to move. They made it past the first lane, but horns were already blaring. It must have scared Lexi because she pulled from Taylor’s grip and fell to the ground. Taylor turned and reached out a hand for her as she held up the other for the Cadillac in front of her to stop. Lexi grabbed her hand, and as Taylor pulled her up, she looked back at the pier; the two men had reached the edge of the road. The first man stepped forward and almost got smacked by the car in the first lane that was already on the move. He was forced to step back. Just before Taylor turned to maneuver across traffic, their eyes met, his telling her she wouldn’t get away. She was sure her eyes told him—begged him—to leave them alone.

  Taylor moved into the next lane, cars already moving around them. She let go of Lexi’s hand and waved her arms frantically above her head. One car swerved, just missing her, and the next one slammed on the brakes and laid on the horn. Taylor held out both hands, asking without words for them to wait. She waved Lexi over, and luckily the cars in the last lane had already stopped due to all the commotion. Lexi surged past Taylor, and finally they were on the other side of the street, running toward the SOBA center a few blocks down.

  Taylor glanced over her shoulder, and much to her horror the two men were already running parallel down the opposite side of the street, matching Taylor and Lexi’s pace with ease. They weren’t going to make it to the SOBA center before the men. And even if by some miracle they did, no one there would be equipped to stop the two men chasing them. Her head was pounding and she was scared to death. But she had no other alternative. She had gotten herself and Lawson’s daughter into this situation, and she was going to get them out of it.

  She had to.

  As they ran, she scanned her mind for a different place to go. She knew a few people in Malibu, but only as well as you can know someone in this town, which is not that well. Not enough to bail her out of a situation like this one. She didn’t have a weapon to use to steal someone’s car. But she did have one thing that did go a very long way in Hollywood and its surrounding areas.

  Celebrity.

  If she used her celebrity, though, the story would absolutely get out. At the point when men were chasing you to take you to even more dangerous people, the consequences of a story didn’t really matter. Because the consequences of real life were potentially much, much worse.

  The Malibu Health Club was just ahead on her left. She did a number of personal training sessions there while getting in shape for her last movie. The place was always busy, and if her trainer or someone she knew at the front desk wasn’t there, she knew that several, if not all, of the people in the club would recognize her. She wouldn’t be surprised if video of her running across the street in traffic just a minute ago was already being watched all over social media.

  Social media.

  Taylor couldn’t believe she hadn’t thought of it before. But it would have to wait until she and Lexi were safe. Just because people knew her didn’t mean they could help, even if they were willing.

  “We’re going to the health club just up ahead, Lexi!” Taylor shouted.

  Lexi had been looking across the street at the men chasing them. When she looked over at Taylor, there was nothing but fear on the poor girl’s face. Taylor was so disappointed in herself in that moment for getting Lexi into this that she felt sick. She never thought it would involve kidnapping a sweet, innocent girl. Victoria had lied to Taylor, telling her no one else would get hurt, and now her feeling of sickness turned to anger.

  Taylor turned left, pulling Lexi along, and ran up to the entrance of the health club. She glanced back as she opened the door, and the men had stopped, watching intently. There was no light or intersection. No crosswalk for them to get a break in traffic. This would buy Taylor at least a couple minutes. Maybe that would be enough.

  Taylor opened the door and walked in. She could only imagine what kind of hot mess she looked like. For the first time in her life, she hoped it was as bad as she felt. It would only further compel someone to help. She turned the lock on the door, hopefully buying her more precious seconds.

  “Hey, you can’t lock that—Taylor Lockhart?”

  This was a first: she was ecstatic to be so instantly recognizable. She hurried to the counter. The man who recognized her was young and fit. Typical for Malibu.

  “Are you all right?”

  “No, I need your help. We’re in trouble.”

  31

  Cassie left Clint’s office in a rush, but she didn’t leave the premises right away. There was something odd about the way Clint looked at Jenny when Taylor called. Cassie didn’t know what it was, but it was enough to make her take pause. So instead of running directly to her car and booking it to Malibu, she ducked behind a nearby trash bin to see if Clint or Jenny would make some sort of move.

  Not five seconds passed before Clint and Jenny came sprinting out of the office building. They ran directly for his car, jumped in, then sped out of the parking lot. Cassie ran for the BMW she’d taken from the Roosevelt Hotel valet parking lot and tore out onto the road to follow them. She had the advantage of Clint not knowing what car she was driving, so she let him lead her right to where he was going. But she already knew his destination.

  Malibu.

  What she didn’t know was why. When she left, she told him she would handle it. There was no reason for him to get involved. He had bigger fish to fry. Sloan. And he wasn’t going to have the help of Lawson after refusing to help with Sloan’s son.

  Cassie had no way to let Lawson know that Clint wouldn’t be kidnapping Sloan’s son. So if that was still what Lawson planned to threaten Sloan with, things were going to get worse—fast. As Cassie followed Clint from a distance, the question now was, who the hell was Clint working for? If for himself, why did he care about helping Taylor when so much was on the line for him with Sloan? Unless . . .

  Cassie nearly hit a car coming out of a side street. She swerved around it, and her heart pounded as she kept Clint’s Dodge in view. Her mind kept jumping back to Frank and Victoria, but mostly to Victoria’s speech about insurance. She made it clear that it was what separated her from Nero De Luca, and it would be the reason she would succeed where De Luca didn’t in getting Lawson to do what she wanted him to do.

  The insurance Victoria had spoken of was Taylor Lockhart. Cassie had no idea why Taylor had been helping Victoria, especially with something involving an innocent yo
ung girl like Lexi. Cassie had to assume that Victoria wasn’t up-front about everything with Taylor, which is how Taylor made it seem on their frantic call. But that didn’t really help the situation now. What could help is knowing if the needling sensation at the back of Cassie’s brain was based on fact or not. Had Victoria gotten to Clint? Is that why Clint was racing to Taylor—not to help her but to make sure Lexi became their hostage?

  As she followed Clint onto the Santa Monica Freeway, in her mind she scanned every situation and conversation she’d had over the last two days. She and Lawson had missed something. Nothing jumped out at her, so she contemplated what they’d learned. They originally thought all of this was because of Sloan. It made sense, and it was what Clint wanted them to believe. Then they learned that Frank and Victoria were behind it all. However, they didn’t learn that until the shoot-out on the street, which Lawson narrowly escaped. The two men who tried to take Lexi weren’t so lucky. If it was Victoria who wanted Lexi, then those two dead men had to be working for her and Frank. So who in the hell killed them right in the middle of the street?

  Cassie didn’t know the answer, but she knew that was the missing link. Regardless, all she could do right now was try to protect Lexi. From Clint Hues, from Victoria Marshall, and from Marty Sloan. They were in a bad situation. Cassie felt almost helpless. All she could do was hope that Lawson could tap into that old detective magic he used to possess in spades. She could try to help Lexi, but Lawson was the one who needed to figure out how to end it. And he had to find out who was really pulling all the strings.

  32

  The Library Bar was quiet. All Lawson could hear were people outside the doorway to the hotel lobby hustling to wherever they needed to go. Sloan had asked him if something was wrong, but Lawson was too deep in his own thoughts to answer. So much so that he stood from the table. There was something on the tip of his tongue that his mind was reaching for.

  “Mr. Raines, do I need to have you removed? Are we finished here?”

  Lawson looked at him but didn’t see him. “Can I get a drink?”

  While Lawson could certainly use a drink, it was time that he really needed.

  “Hector,” Sloan shouted. “We are finished here. Please remove Mr. Raines from the hotel.”

  A lightning bolt shot through Lawson’s body. When he turned around and saw Hector coming toward him, a flash memory of the man following him yesterday hit his mind’s eye. The next frame of the memory was of himself running from the car that had just been shot up, then seeing Cassie and looking back over his shoulder. The same face approaching him now was the same one he saw firing at him from around the side of the house during the shoot-out. Hector. And Hector was the name of the man Clint mentioned who used to work for him.

  Lawson held up both hands in a surrender position. As Hector and Sloan’s other man reached for Lawson’s arms, Lawson turned his open right hand into a fist and slammed it into Hector’s forehead. When Hector reeled from the blow, Lawson moved his left hand to the second man’s waist and grabbed him by the wrist before he could pull his gun. Lawson threw him a head butt to the nose—the benefit of being hardheaded, as Cassie calls him—and as the man reached for his nose, Lawson took his pistol and wheeled around just in time to match Sloan’s own extended gun. Though Lawson had been the one fighting, Sloan was the one heaving for air.

  “This isn’t your thing, Sloan, put the gun down.”

  “You think I won’t shoot you?”

  “I think you can’t afford to.”

  Sloan stood trying to calm his breath. The end of his gun was shaking.

  “Me?” Sloan said. “I can’t afford to shoot you?”

  Lawson heard shuffling behind him. “Move again and I shoot him. Then I shoot both of you.”

  The shuffling stopped.

  Sloan regained some of his wits. “What’s the end game here, Raines? Kill us all?”

  Lawson was confident, looking Sloan dead in the eyes. “Get you your movie, keep your family safe, keep my family safe, and erase the bastards who put this entire thing together.”

  “That’s a whole lot of promises from one man,” Sloan said. “If you can do all of that, where do you suggest we start?”

  “With Hector.”

  Lawson turned the gun toward Hector, who at the sound of his name reached for his pistol. Lawson shot him in the thigh just below the gun and Hector crumpled to the floor.

  “Don’t shoot me, Sloan. You’re going to want to hear this.”

  Lawson moved over to Hector as he writhed on the floor in pain. He moved Hector’s hand away from the wound, took the pistol from his waistline, then pressed his foot where the hole was already leaking blood. Hector shouted in pain.

  “Who are you working for, Hector?”

  Sloan’s face was pale. It was very clear to Lawson why he wanted to be in the movie business. The blood was fake, unlike this scene.

  “Mr. Sloan!” Hector shouted.

  Lawson leaned, putting more of his weight on Hector’s gunshot wound.

  “I promise, this pain is nothing compared to what’s next if you don’t tell me right now. Who do you work for?”

  Another shriek of pain.

  The next thing Lawson expected to hear was the name Clint Hues.

  “Okay, okay! Frank Shaw! I work for Frank Shaw!”

  Lawson was shocked. How deep did this thing run? Granted, Frank had always been an asshole when Lawson was around him, but how did he devolve into this?

  Sloan walked over and, before Lawson could stop him, shot Hector right between the eyes. Upon reflex, even though the deed had already been done, Lawson turned and knocked Sloan off his feet with a violent shove. Sloan sprawled on the floor, and his gun skidded off across the bar floor. This thing was going sideways on Lawson. If he lost Sloan to police custody now, he may not get the leverage he needed to gain the upper hand and stop Frank, or Victoria, or Clint. Everything had become so convoluted. If Lawson didn’t pull it together, right then, he may lose his daughter again.

  That wasn’t going to happen.

  Screams of fear from the crowd outside made their way into the bar. No question the cops had already been called. It may already be too late. Lawson moved over to Sloan and picked him up by his suit jacket.

  “There’s only one way out of this. My way. And it isn’t going to be easy.”

  Sloan patted out his disheveled suit. “I’ll do whatever it takes. I can’t lose my family.”

  And that gave Lawson an idea. One that would certainly be met with resistance, but one that could potentially solve their problems. He’d had no respect for Sloan when he walked into the bar a moment ago. But a willingness to do anything for family, that was something he could work with. He didn’t know if he himself could do what he was about to ask Sloan to do. But if it would ultimately save Lexi, there was no way he wouldn’t.

  “Give me your gun,” Lawson told Sloan. “Are there any cameras in here?” He knew Sloan would know this. A man like him always knows who’s watching. Except of course when one of his men, like Hector, betrays him.

  “No cameras,” Sloan handed him the pistol. “You used to be FBI, right? You know how these guys think? How this Frank thinks?”

  “How did you let an FBI agent like Hector infiltrate your inner circle?” Lawson focused on Hector.

  “FBI? Hector?”

  “He said he worked for Frank.”

  “Hector has been around for a long time. He’s never been FBI. I can promise you that. I shouldn’t have trusted him, but I never thought he would rat. Frank must have something on him.”

  It surprised Lawson that Frank would do this on his own. Outside the FBI. He should probably stop being surprised by anything at this point.

  “Okay, so why does Frank want you so bad that he’ll break the law to trip you up?”

  Sloan shook his head. “Now that, is a long story.”

  “You can tell me about it on the way to your son’s school.”

  Sl
oan took a step back. “My son’s school?”

  Lawson wiped down Sloan’s pistol. “What part of ‘isn’t going to be easy’ didn’t you understand?”

  33

  Unfortunately for Taylor, the man at the front desk didn’t have a car. However, her celebrity had everyone in the facility’s attention, and several of the men and women working out in the adjacent room came running to help when they heard she was in trouble. A couple of the bigger guys went to help hold the door closed while one of the women volunteered to sneak Taylor and Lexi out the back door and drive them to safety. Taylor didn’t hesitate taking the woman up on it, and that’s why she and Lexi were lying down in the back of a stranger’s Mercedes Benz sedan, praying that the man who’d just rounded the corner of the building didn’t see them duck down.

  “Stay down,” the woman said in a whisper. “He’s at the far end of the building, but he’s coming this way.”

  “I’m sorry I got you into this situation, ma’am,” Taylor whispered. “I just didn’t know what else to do.”

  “Call me Pam, and don’t worry about it, honey. Believe me, I know there are a lot of crazy assholes in this town.”

  Pam was quintessential Malibu. Perfectly tanned, long blonde hair, a forty-five-year-old face with a sixty-five-year-old neck.