Hadley rolled the Suburban to a stop in the shade of ancient oak and nodded toward the house across the street. “That’s it.”
Lance studied the stately Victorian with its curving porch and wide steps. The place reminded him of the big old houses in the exclusive neighborhoods of his hometown of Lawton, Oklahoma. When he was a kid, he used to dream of owning a place like this someday. He let his gaze drift over the ornate gables and the stained-glass bay window, and knew an echo of the combination of envy and longing he used to feel every day when he’d walk past those beautiful old places on his way to school.
“The nurse took the old lady for a walk about five minutes ago,” said Hadley, glancing at his watch.
Lance nodded. “Let’s do it.”
He had his hand on the car door when his phone began to vibrate. He frowned. The call was from Buck O’Meara, who had gone with Stuart Ross to the marina. As the senior partner, Ross should have been the one checking in. Lance flipped open the phone and settled back in his seat. “What is it?”
O’Meara’s voice was tight. “Ross is dead.”
Lance’s gaze met Hadley’s. “What happened?”
“The girl was here.”
“Guinness?”
“Yes.”
“Did you get her?”
“No.”
Lance slammed his hand against the car door in frustration. “Why not?”
“Some smartass came up. Driving a Pontiac G6.”
The G6 again. Who the hell was this guy? “Tell me about him.”
“Late twenties. Slim. Medium height. He didn’t give his name and I forgot to ask for his business card. He shot Ross. Vu’s dead, too. Ross killed her.”
“And the Guinness woman?”
“She took off in the cruiser with the smartass.”
“She knows him?”
“He acted like he knew the professor, but I’m not so sure he really did. The guy’s a pro.”
“Have the local police been brought into this yet?”
“Not that I know of.”
“Where’s Ross’s body?”
“In the boat, with the girl and the smartass.”
Shit, thought Lance. Aloud, he said, “Where are you now?”
“I swam back to the marina.”
“Swam back?”
There was a short pause. “You need to send a car to pick me up. Ross had the keys in his pocket. And you might consider sending someone to stake out the asshole’s G6. It’s still here.”
“What about the girl’s car?”
“I don’t see it, but it must be around somewhere.”
“Find it. I’ll send Barello.”
There was a short pause. “Can you tell him to step on it? I’m wet.”
Lance grunted and put the phone away.
“I thought Ross was good,” said Hadley.
“He was. One of the best. We’ve obviously got another player in the game.” Lance tapped his phone against his lips for a moment, then put in a call to Fitzgerald.
“We got any Semtex left?”
“Yes. Why?”
“The girl’s car is somewhere near the marina at the West End. Send Reggie to wire it to blow when she opens the door.”
Lance snapped his phone closed and stood up, his shirt sticking to his back in the humid heat. They’d already checked out the girl’s next door neighbor, Ambrose King; the guy was a clueless lowlife. “Let’s go talk to this colonel. The last thing we need is one more loose end.”
Tobie ran the cabin cruiser parallel to the shore. She wanted to put as much distance as she could between herself and the men she’d left swimming in the lake behind her. But she was shaking so badly she finally had to throttle back and simply let the boat idle in the water.
Unwanted memories crowded in on her, of a desert night filled with tracers and bomb blasts; the ugly thump of bullets striking flesh; the sobbing screams of a frightened, hurting child. Letting go of the helm, Tobie slid to the floor, her arms hugging her bent knees tight against her chest.
Eyes wide and vacant, Dr. Elizabeth Vu stared at her.
Tobie tightened her jaw. She was not crazy and she wasn’t going to start acting like it. If she wanted to stay alive, she needed to think.
She sucked in a deep, steadying breath, then another. She was on a boat in the middle of Lake Pontchartrain with two dead bodies. She couldn’t simply pull back into the marina and tie up at the dock. Even if Lance Palmer or his men weren’t there, waiting, she couldn’t risk being seen leaving the scene of another crime.
A fly buzzed her face. She brushed it away, but it was back again in an instant. The smell of blood hung thick in the air, mingling with the briny fresh breeze coming off the lake. Beneath her, the cruiser rocked gently with the waves. Pushing to her feet, she stared off across the sun-sparkled water, her gaze scanning the shoreline.
A stepped concrete seawall formed the edge of the lake here, with the grassy slope of the levee and a cluster of tall buildings marking the University of New Orleans rising up beyond that. In the distance she could see the sprawl of the Industrial Canal. There’d be a dock there, she thought, then realized she couldn’t risk heading into it. Even in this post-Katrina world, there would be too many people around. She needed to find someplace else, someplace like…
Pontchartrain Beach.
Her gaze focused on the small cove below the university. She’d heard that at one time the people of the city used to come here to swim and picnic. There’d been a pier and a restaurant, even an amusement park with a Ferris wheel, before the beach had to be abandoned with the rise of the pollution levels in the lake. Now there was only a deserted strip of weed-grown sand and the remnant of a storm-shattered pier that stretched out to nowhere.
Squinting against the late afternoon sun, Tobie scanned the levee and the copse of oaks that grew on the small point just beyond the beach. No one was in sight. But she still didn’t like the idea of pulling into the cove with two bloody bodies sprawled across the deck in plain view. She went looking for a tarp.
The only one she could find wasn’t big, which meant she had to drag Dr. Vu’s body closer to her killer in order to get the tarp to cover them both. She threw a quick glance at the dead man’s face and felt her stomach tighten. The bullet that killed him had taken out one of his eyes. She’d seen worse—much worse—in Iraq, but she’d never gotten used to it.
That done, she rummaged around until she found an old T-shirt that she used to wipe down every surface on the boat she could possibly have touched, including the bow. Then she took the helm again and eased the throttle forward. Turning the bow toward shore, she ran the cruiser straight into the beach.
The cruiser’s hull screeched along the bottom, then caught fast to lurch sideways at a drunken angle, the engines racing. She quickly killed the engine. In the sudden silence, she became aware of the sounds of the lake, the lapping of the waves against the cruiser’s hull, the cries of the gulls. She started to take off her sandals, then reconsidered. Surely footprints were as dangerous as fingerprints?
She wiped off the helm again and slung her messenger bag over her shoulder. She had one leg over the side, ready to jump, when her gaze fell on the redhead’s Glock—the one that hadn’t been fired. Scooping it up, she shoved the gun into her bag.
It was uncomfortably heavy, whacking against her hip as she eased herself over the cruiser’s side into the shallow water. But she was glad to have it as she splashed ashore, the sand sticking to her wet feet and legs as she crossed the narrow beach to climb the levee beyond.