Stuart Woods - Santa Fe Edge

“Of course. I’m sorry to have troubled you,” Vittorio said. He turned to go back to the car.

Bart watched through the window in the door as another man fell in behind the Indian, and saw him returning a pistol to its holster. He locked the door, found the cell phone Eleanor Keeler had given him and called the number he had memorized.

BACKIN THE CAR, Cupie slammed his door. “Now can we stop coming out to this place all the time, please?”

“All right, all right. Sounds like Barbara doesn’t need her house anymore. You think she’s really in San Francisco?”

“That’s what I heard the guy say,” Cupie replied. “If he did the sublet deal on the phone, he would have been calling a San Francisco number, if that’s where she was. And by the way, he had a gun in his right hand, out of sight.”

“Did you see it?”

“No,” Cupie said. “I smelled the oil.”

BARBARA GOT TO the cell phone in her purse on the fifth ring. “Yes?”

“It’s me. I’m at the house. There were two men just here looking for you: an Indian and a fat guy, like you said.”

“That’s Vittorio and Cupie Dalton,” she said. “What did you tell them?”

“That I saw an ad on a bulletin board at the studio and called you in San Francisco and sublet the place. They asked how long I would be here, and I said until the end of the month, maybe longer, if work required. They left peaceably, and I saw Dalton putting away a gun as he went.”

“If they come back again, kill them, and I’ll pay you another ten grand,” she said.

“Hey, wait,” Bart replied. “Let’s not litter the landscape out here with corpses before I get the main job done.”

“They’ve seen you now. It would be in your interests to kill them as quickly as possible.”

“We’ll see. I’m not ready to commit to that right now.”

“They work for Eagle,” she said. “When it’s done, they’ll come looking for you, and I don’t want them to find you.”

“Look, lady, I don’t want this job to spin out of control. Jim will cover my alibi that I’m working for him here.”

“We’ll see. I’ll mention it to him. He’s coming back there in a few days to see how his shooting is going.”

“Tell him to find me some work here when he comes,” Bart said. “That’ll help with my alibi.”

“All right.” She hung up.

VITTORIO AND CUPIE SAT in the Blue Corn Café on Water Street and ate dinner.

“I think he’s a hit man she hired,” Vittorio said.

“Why do you think that?” Cupie asked.

“That’s just how it smells,” Vittorio said. “It doesn’t make any sense for Barbara to be in San Francisco, or to sublet the house before she’s done with Eagle. We need to keep an eye out for this guy.”

“I didn’t see him,” Cupie said. “What does he look like?”

“Six-two, dark hair, thirty-five to forty, athletic; wearing jeans, cowboy boots and a western-style shirt.”

“I didn’t see a car.”

“In the garage,” Vittorio said. “We don’t know what kind. That’s a disadvantage for us.”

“Jesus, this food is hot,” Cupie said, wiping his sweaty face with his napkin.

“It’s the peppers,” Vittorio replied. “Better get used to it while you’re in Santa Fe.”

“I’ll never get used to peppers,” Cupie said.

“We need to be at Eagle’s house early tomorrow, before he leaves for work. That’s a vulnerable time for him.”

“You think this guy has already got him staked out? Looks like he just got here.”

“No way to know,” Vittorio said.

TODD BACON GOT BACK to his hotel room hot and tired. He had chased down three Grand Cherokees, owned, respectively, by an old lady, a local doctor and a couple in their seventies. He had been to the Las Vegas Airport and talked with the man who ran the place, who told him he hadn’t seen any Cessnas that day and that he hadn’t had any hangar space for rent.

That didn’t make any sense at all. There was no other airport where Teddy Fay could have taken his airplane except Las Vegas, given the direction he had flown in and the fact that Lauren Cade had obviously picked him up there. He still hadn’t gotten a decent look at either of them, and the Grand Cherokee had just melted away in Santa Fe.

This was driving Todd nuts.

Shortly before dawn Vittorio had scrambled up the hill above Eagle’s house and placed himself in a nest of good-sized rocks. He had a hunting rifle with a big scope by his side, already sighted for the distance. Cupie was down the road below the house, in some other rocks, positioned to fire into an automobile racing down the hill from Eagle’s place.

They were using handheld radios the size of a Snickers bar, and Cupie pressed the push-to-talk button. “Are you sure this is the best place for me?” he asked. “I can’t see a goddamned thing.”

“You can see the road in both directions, can’t you?” Vittorio replied.

“Well, yeah.”

“Then you can warn me when a car is coming up the hill, so I can be ready, and I can warn you when one’s on the way down the hill, having made an attempt on our client.”

“Yeah to that, too,” Cupie admitted. “I just won’t see any of the action.”

“I’ve got the action covered,” Vittorio said. “You just keep your eye on the road, and don’t get seen by anybody.”

“You expect me to hit the driver of a car, first shot, with a revolver with a two-inch barrel?”

“Okay, we’ll get you a better piece for the job. You’d have a shot anyway, if you extend your arm, brace against a rock, then cock and squeeze. Don’t try it double-action.”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” Cupie muttered. “I’m going to bring some kind of folding chair, too. This fucking rock is incompatible with my ass.”

“You’ve got your own built-in cushion, Cupie.” Vittorio chuckled. “Quit your bitching.”

“Have you got the coffee Thermos?”

“Yes, I have.”

“I want one of my own tomorrow.”

“You had your coffee before we left,” Vittorio pointed out.

“I can’t have a second cup?”

“Tomorrow you can have all you can choke down.”

“It’s your fault if I fall asleep.”

The sun crested the mountain above the house, and the light from it worked its way across the parking area in front and eventually illuminated the front door. It was close to eight before the door opened and Eagle stepped onto the front porch, followed by Susannah. He turned, gave her a kiss and walked toward his black Mercedes, while Susannah, with a wave, went back inside.

Vittorio pressed the button. “He’s outside. Anybody coming?”

“Nobody either way,” Cupie replied.

“He’s in the car, and it’s moving. It’s a black Mercedes. Don’t shoot him.”

“No? I was looking forward to it,” Cupie growled. “Okay, he’s driving past.”

“Can he see you? He won’t like it if he knows we’re staking out his house.”

“He won’t see me. There, he’s gone, down the mountain toward Tesuque. Can we get out of here now?”

“Let me get the car, and I’ll pick you up in three minutes.”

“Bring coffee,” Cupie said.

TEDDY FAY LAY IN BED, Lauren’s head on his shoulder. They had made love-Lauren liked it best in the morning-and she had gone back to sleep.

Teddy reviewed his day. It was his practice when settling in a place, however temporarily, to immediately start work on new identity documents, so as to be prepared to run if he found himself being pursued. He’d start that this morning.

He was being pursued, sort of, but his pursuer wasn’t certain he was still in Santa Fe. He’d had a call from the man at Las Vegas Airport: Bacon had been there inquiring about him, but the man had told him no Cessnas had landed there and that there was no hangar space available. That would have confused Bacon.