Chapter 4

 

The wind had eased up, and it was not long before the rain stopped completely. Drumming his fingers on the steering wheel, Owen filled his lungs with the fresh air. It was salty and carried a hint of briskness.

He must be insane to be here. He was a fool not to have called back the police station and reported the call. He ran a hand through his hair and waited.

From where he’d parked on the little road off of Bellevue, the side entrance to the Van Horn mansion was only fifty feet away, an old fashioned gas street lamp throwing light on it. Not far from the high gate that opened along the wall, he could see a smaller gate for pedestrian traffic. That was the one she’d used before to access the estate grounds.

Owen took another deep breath and frowned, remembering Sarah’s brief but desperate-sounding plea.

This wasn’t TV police drama, Owen reminded himself. This was real life. He ran over what he’d be telling the detective, once Archer finally got back to him.

He’d given a stranger a ride. Later, he’d come to suspect she was the murdered attorney. He’d called the police. It was just Archer’s tough luck that he’d been too busy to take the call the first time. And right now he was just making sure he wasn’t way off base in thinking the woman was really Sarah Rand.

After all, he could hear himself saying, he didn’t want the police thinking he was just some Hollywood crackpot.

Five minutes after arriving at the Van Horn Mansion, Owen had seen two men in a silver van with “Steele Security Company” on the side, putting a chain on the barred main entrance gate. He just hoped that she was still inside. If she’d already left the estate, he would have no clue where to go after her.

Circling the mansion before parking on the side street, Owen had realized that the estate took up the entire block. Other than these two gates, he’d found another two chained gates facing Bellevue and an old delivery gate on the back street that looked like it hadn’t been opened since the Crash of ’29. If she was going to come out, then she was coming out here.

The same silver security van he’d seen before passed along Bellevue Avenue at the end of the little road, and in a few minutes Owen saw its headlights in his rearview mirror. The van had circled the block and was rolling up the street, the two guys inside eyeing the perimeter of the estate wall. He tilted his seat back to a reclining position, and the van passed by and turned again on Bellevue.

As Owen returned his seat to an upright position, the hackles on his neck rose.

In the silence that was so peculiar to this time of the night, the click of the deadbolt came distinctly through the darkness. His eyes were riveted to the iron gate as it swung open. An instant later, a dark-coated figure emerged, casting a look up and down the side road.

He started the Range Rover’s engine. She immediately spotted him and hurried across the street.

She’d pulled on a black raincoat that was about three sizes too large for her, and with the collar of the coat turned up, there was little of her that could be seen by any pursuer. But Owen knew it was Sarah. From the bulge at her hip, he could tell that the briefcase she’d been carrying was still slung over her shoulder.

She was almost beside the car when a police car appeared on Bellevue, and she came to a dead stop. Panic was apparent in her stance, and Owen thought for a moment that she was going to run for it. He lowered the passenger window and turned on the headlights.

“Get in.”

Regaining her wits, she quickly went around, pulled open the door, and hopped in.

“Let’s go.”

“Not yet, Ms. Rand. Not until...”

“Please, Mr. Dean.” The panic was audible in her whisper as she reached over and took hold of his arm. The cruiser came slowly down the street. As it reached them, she leaned over the center console and buried her face into the crook of his neck. The brush of her breath against his skin was too warm and too difficult to ignore.

The police car passed without stopping. Watching in the mirror as the cruiser crept to the end of the block, Owen frowned when the same security van appeared again, its driver waving the policemen to a stop. A conversation ensued, but he could hear nothing at this distance.

Owen looked down into the face inches away from his. It was pale, and he could feel her shivering.

“What kind of trouble are you in, Ms. Rand?”

She looked down the street where the two cars were still idling. “I don’t know. But I haven’t done anything wrong.”

“Why are you running away from the police?”

“I’ll tell you everything...but later. Please get me out of here…this street.”

“Everybody believes you’re dead. There is an innocent man in jail. A man who—”

“Please help me,” she interrupted, pulling at his arm as the two drivers finished their conversation at the end of the block. The security van came by at a faster clip this time, turning in the direction of the town center when it reached Bellevue.

Owen could feel her fingers clutching his arm. He grabbed her by the chin and lifted her face to his. “Ms. Rand, I don’t trust you.”

“Please, I just got back tonight. I’ve been away. In Ireland. And...and they’re trying to kill me...and I don’t know why.” Owen heard her let out a ragged breath. “I only ask you to take me away from this street. That police car will be back, and I need a few minutes...just to...just to think what I should do.”

Owen frowned, watching her as she looked beseechingly into his face. She was trembling from head to toe. From the cold or from fear? His money was on the latter.

“And just what would you advise a client to do here, Ms. Rand?”

“Wait! I can prove that I’ve been away.” Quickly, she let go of his arm and fumbled beneath the raincoat. Hauling up her bag, she unzipped the top of the brief case and reached inside. A vision flashed through Owen’s mind of Sarah pulling a gun out of that case.

“Here’s my passport. The ticket stubs from my flight. They’re tucked inside of it. Could we please be on our way? They’ll be turning the block any second.”

“Why not go to the police?”

“They are the ones who are after me, trying to kill me, and I don’t know why. Please, Mr. Dean.” She practically shoved the passport into his hand. “This proves where I’ve been. Please, just give me a chance!”

Owen stared at her for a long moment, knowing better than to trust anything she was trying to feed him. But at the same time, she’d called him for help. Of all the people she must know and work with, she’d called him, a stranger.

She, indeed, had to be desperate.

“I’ll help you, but only to get away from this street. After that, we talk.”

She nodded and pressed down the door lock herself.

 

~~~~

 

The two detectives’ silent exchange of looks went unnoticed by Frankie O’Neal as he sat at one end of a battered steel table, his head buried in his hands. At the far end, a muscle-bound rookie in uniform sat operating a tape-recorder.

“Let’s see if we got this right.” Disbelief evident in his voice, Bob McHugh lifted a shiny, black wingtip onto a chair and leaned two hairy forearms on his knee. Dan Archer straddled another chair and looked at Frankie. The heavyset man never raised his head. “You left your brand new Mercedes just off Bellevue and decided to take a stroll down to the Cliff Walk at midnight, in the rain, where somebody assaulted you?”

Frankie groaned and dug his fingers deeper into his hair. “My head is exploding. If this ain’t a concussion...?”

Archer took a pack of cigarettes out of his pocket and slid it in front of the suspect.

Frankie peered through puffy eyes at the pack. He didn’t reach.

“And whoever it was that clocked you, carried you all the way back from the Cliff Walk, crossed Bellevue, hauled you another half a block to the Van Horn’s side entrance, dragged you into the judge’s office wing, and dumped you in that little kitchen off the library.” The red faced detective rolled his eyes. “Jeez, Frankie. Can’t you come up with a better fucking story?”

“I want my lawyer.”

Bob moved in, looming over the ailing suspect. “We want to know what the fuck you were doing in the judge’s house, Frankie.”

“I told you before that I didn’t go in there of my own free will.” His eyes lifted only as high as the coffee cup on the table. “I was knocked unconscious. I was dragged there.”

“Dragged by who? And why? Oh, and have I mentioned that your goddamn fingerprints were all over the place?”

“You’re full of shit, but I told you I want my lawyer.”

“What the fuck for?”

Frankie lifted his head for the first time and squinted into the officer’s red-rimmed eyes. “I’m the victim here, and you’re treating me like shit.”

“Victim, my ass. We could be talking breaking and entering. Theft. Resisting arrest.”

“I know my rights. I’m not saying another word until my lawyer is sitting right there.”

Archer dropped a thick folder with Frankie’s name on the tab onto the table, then moved over to the coffee pot, pouring out two fresh cups. “Let him be, Bob.”

The short detective turned his sights on his superior. “What do you mean, let him be? This scumbag—”

“Let him be!” Archer commanded harshly. “Hand him that phone. Better yet, take a hike and cool your jets.”

There was a moment of silence as the two glared at each other. Muttering, Bob kicked the legs from under a chair and huffed out of the room, slamming the door behind him.

Frankie’s surprised gaze traveled from the door to the casual shrug of the remaining detective.

“Just sugar, right?”

Frankie nodded, staring at the steaming cup Archer placed in front of him.

Archer pulled an economy-size bottle of Tylenol out of his jacket pocket and put it on the table next to the cup of coffee.

“Help yourself. I got a concussion myself last year. It was a pretty nasty thing. What with puking all night, I just wanted to crawl into a hole and go to sleep.”

Again there was only silence for a moment. Frankie reached for the pills.

Archer picked up the chair that had been overturned and sat in it, positioning himself about half way down the table from the suspect—and in a direct line with the only door out.

“Hey, sorry about all the grief Bob was giving you. He watches too much TV.”

Frankie snorted as he dumped a half dozen pills into his hand.

“Take too many of those at one time, and your liver’ll shut down.” Archer sipped his coffee as Frankie dropped all but two back into the bottle.

“I still want a lawyer.”

Archer paused, patting the thick file on the table as if considering something, and then moved his chair closer to Frankie. Taking a cigarette out of the pack on the table, he lit one for himself and slid the pack back down the table. “We don’t really have anything we can book you on.”

“I didn’t think so.”

“That was all standard bullshit Bob was pulling on you...that stuff about resisting arrest.” Archer inhaled deeply. “I mean, I’d be going nuts, too, if I were knocked out and then woke up to a bunch of uniforms pawing me.”

Frankie took a swallow of coffee and shook a cigarette out of the pack. Archer slid his chair a little closer and held a lighter for him.

“And we both know there are no fingerprints of yours in that house.”

“So I guess you’re letting me go then.” Frankie took a long drag before crushing the newly lit cigarette on the edge of the table.

“Sure. But before you go, there are just a couple of things.” Archer paused, searching in his jacket pockets for a moment. Having no success, he stood up, finally locating a crumpled piece of paper in his back pocket. Sitting down again, he flattened it out on the table. “Just answer a couple of questions for me, and I’ll get one of the guys to take you out to your car.” Archer looked at the man apologetically. “They towed your Mercedes to the pound.”

Frankie eyed him warily as Archer reached inside his jacket pocket for a pair of reading glasses. Putting them on, the detective looked the crumpled page up and down.

“Here we go. First...there were these...these knobs from the stove in your hand when you were found lying on the kitchen floor. Well, never mind that. They could have popped off on their own.” He lowered the glasses on his nose. “Okay. Here we go. I definitely need help with this one. The uniforms arriving on the scene found a key to the judge’s house in your possession. We’ll hold off on that one for a sec, too. What’s this next one? Oh yeah...when we towed your car, the uniform helping the tow truck operator finds these dark spots in the trunk of that nice clean Mercedes of yours. He says blood...I say no. Now, we still could do some testing and stuff like that to find out what it is.”

Archer looked at him over the rims of his glasses. Frankie closed his mouth and fixed his gaze on his coffee.

“Unless you want to tell us about it and save us some time. But what’s worse, Frankie, we found this bag in a little compartment in the front seat and...and there was a...” The captain looked at his paper again. “A silver-plated 9mm handgun in there. But, of course, I’m sure you have a permit for that, and can explain where in Newport you might have fired off a round or two?”

Archer looked up at Frankie’s pale face and turned again to his list. “There are still some other questions that I have. Like this phone call that you got tonight at O’Malley’s Pub.”

Dan Archer paused and watched Frankie’s eyes move from the coffee cup in his hand to the bottle of Tylenol to the wrinkled piece of paper on the table.

He slid his chair a bit closer and spoke in a low, confidential voice.

“I could have all of these checked out myself, Frankie. But I thought, since I know you’re a decent guy and...Look, I understand how things happen, and you know the person who was with you in the judge’s house—the person who called us—is bound to turn up sooner or later.” Archer leaned forward and touched the man lightly on the knee. “Listen, Frankie, I can help you out if you’d just—”

“I’ll talk.”