Ричард Старк - Flashfire [= Parker]

“Checked all the motels round about,” he told her. “Talked to the cabbies, checked the bus terminal. Got no cars stolen. You’re right, Parmitt didn’t go out of there on his own, he had help.”

“Well, it wasn’t me,” she said. “Last night, was it?”

“Sometime before one. Between eight and one, we figure.”

“I was home,” she said, “with my mother and my sister, watching TV. I don’t know if your own family is considered a good alibi, but that’s where I was.”

“Okay,” he said, then seemed to think things over for a minute. “The point is,” he said, “anybody around Parmitt is likely to be in trouble.”

“For helping him, you mean.”

“No, a different kind of trouble. We caught a fella in the hospital last night, came there to kill our Mr. Parmitt.”

That did astonish her. “My God! No!”

“Yes. Might of slipped in and out, nobody the wiser, except we were already on the scene, account of Parmitt being gone. So now we got this fella, and pretty soon he’ll tell us who hired him, and then we’ll learn a lot more about Daniel Parmitt than we know right now.”

“Good,” she said.

“But the thing is,” Farley told her, “this is the second try at him we know about, the first being the gunshot put him in the hospital. Before we catch up with the fella that’s paying for all this, some other goon might catch up with Parmitt. And probably anybody standing too close to him.”

“Thank you, Sergeant,” she said. “I understand what you’re saying. Just in case I am involved with Daniel, I should know to watch out. But I’m not.” The laugh she offered was almost completely real. “Speeding tickets is as big a criminal as I’ve ever been.”

“Good, keep it that way,” he said, and got to his feet, at last. She also rose, as he said, “If you hear from him, I’d appreciate a call.”

“Absolutely,” she said. “And if you find out anything about him, would you let me know?”

“Will do.” He extended a hand. “Nice to meet you, Ms. Mackenzie.”

He’s got a thing for me, she thought, as they shook hands, but he’d never show it in a million years. She said, “I guess I can cross Daniel Parmitt off my list of eligible bachelors.”

His grin was just a little sour. “Good idea,” he said.

She had Daniel stashed in the condo where he’d first told her about the three men who planned to rob tonight’s jewelry auction. That condo had now been sold, by her, but the closing hadn’t happened yet, so nobody would have any reason to go in there for a couple of weeks. She’d brought him in last night, with the help of Loretta, who was suddenly happy and perky and full of good cheer now that the scary part was over, and they’d left him with milk and candy bars and two blankets.

Now, once she was sure Farley wasn’t still around and following her, she drove back down to the condo, carried the canvas bag in with her, and found Parker seated on the bench on the terrace, where they’d talked the first time. He had one of the blankets wrapped around himself.

“I have clothes for you,” she said, and showed him the canvas bag.

He got up stiffly, but he could move better today than last night. He took the bag from her and went off to another room, and when he came back, dressed, he looked almost his normal self, but more gaunt, and still moving slowly. “I could use a razor,” he said as he sat on the terrace bench again. His voice at last was above a whisper, was now a hoarse burr, like a palm brushing corduroy.

She sat beside him, saying, “Okay. Anything else?”

“Can you pick me up at seven-thirty?”

“Daniel, you still want to go after those people? Tonight?”

“Tonight’s when they’re doing it.”

“But you’re — I don’t suppose I could argue you out of it.”

“If you argue me out of it,” he said, “you don’t get anything.”

“If they kill you I don’t get anything either.”

“Maybe it won’t happen.”

“Maybe,” she said, giving up. “Sergeant Farley came to see me this afternoon.”

He watched her. “Did he worry you?”

“A little,” she admitted. “But he had more news.”

“What?”

She told him about the hired killer Farley had captured. He grunted at that and said, “That’s the end of it, then.”

“But who is he? Who’s after you like this?”

“The stupid thing is,” he said, “I don’t know. The guy’s making trouble, and he doesn’t have to.”

“I don’t understand.”

“I got some identification from a guy,” he said.

“Daniel Parmitt’s identification?”

He shrugged. “He’s a guy who does that kind of thing. He did it for somebody else, South American or Central American I think, maybe a drug guy or a general, whoever. Turns out that guy wants to erase anybody knows about his changeover. He sent people to kill the guy did the work for him. I was there, he thinks I know his story, too, he’s tracking me down. Only now the law’s gonna follow the string back from the guy they just nabbed, and they’re gonna find him, and his cover’s blown. He must be wanted badly somewhere, and it’ll come out. You’ll read about it in the papers, a month or two from now, some guy everybody’s after, he suddenly pops up.”

“But you’re not concerned about him,” she said. “He tries to kill you, and it doesn’t matter to you. These other people, you feel they cheated you, that’s all, but you won’t give up.”

“The other guy’s gonna self-destruct,” he told her. “He has to, he’s too stupid to last. He’s somebody used to power, not brains. But these three are mechanics, we had an understanding, they broke it. They don’t do that.” He shrugged. “It makes sense, or it doesn’t.”

Did anything about Daniel Parmitt make sense? Getting to her feet, she said, “I’ll see you at seven-thirty. With the razor.”

At seven, the big doors were opened onto the driveway to Mrs. Fritz’s house, and the police car drove in to park just off the gravel, facing out. The private security people set up their lectern on the left side of the entrance and stood around waiting, but no one was going to be unfashionably on time, and the first guests didn’t arrive till seven-twelve.

Each car stopped at the lectern, where the driver handed over to the guard the invitation the guest had received last night after making his sealed bid on one of the items up for auction. The guard checked the invitation against the list on his lectern, then politely nodded the guest through. At the main entrance, staff opened the car doors, the partygoers emerged, the driver was given a claim check, and the car was driven by a valet around to the parking area at the side.

Just over half a mile to the south, Melander and Carlson and Ross had started to dress. Stacked on the dining room table and on the floor were their fire boots, their rubberized gloves, red fire helmets, and black turnout coats with the reflective horizontal yellow stripes and, in block yellow letters on the back, PBFD. Leaning against a wall were their three black air canisters, also with PBFD on them in block white letters. When completely dressed, their visored eyeguards and the mouthpieces from their air canisters would cover their faces entirely.

“I love a costume party,” Ross said.

A few miles farther south, Leslie stood in the bathroom doorway and watched Daniel shave off that ridiculous little mustache. It changed him. Without the mustache, he was a hard man, very cold. She realized with surprise that, if she’d seen him this way at first, she wouldn’t have dared approach him.

He was still battered, though, and she didn’t see how he could hope to beat those three men. He’d stripped to the waist to shave, and his torso was still swathed in bandages, partly because of the bullet holes front and back but mostly because of the broken ribs. Why wouldn’t they just ride right over him?