Stuart Woods - Fresh Disasters

“No sucking up,” the Old Man said. “Come on, Dierdre, I’ll give you a lift back to the office. You’ve got a deposition, haven’t you?”

She was momentarily nonplussed. “Yes sir, I have, and I’d love a lift. It’s so hard to get cabs at this time of day.” She got up and went with the Old Man, but not before she had turned to Stone and mouthed, “Call me!”

Stone sighed, put away his dictator and dug out a credit card. Saved from a fate worse than death by the district attorney. And he had done himself some good, too: He had Dierdre interested not just in Carmine Dattila but in Devlin Daltry, and that could come in useful.

Stone arrived back at his house to find Herbie Fisher waiting in his office.

“Hey, Stone!” Herbie cried, as if they hadn’t seen each other in years.

“What are you doing here, Herbie?”

“I didn’t know where else to go, unless you think it’s safe for me to go back to my apartment. I mean, Cheech is dead and Gus is in jail, isn’t he?”

“You think those two guys are the only muscle working for Dattila?”

“Well, I…”

“Exactly.” He pressed a button and Joan answered. “Have we got a thousand dollars in the safe?”

“Yes, I guess so.”

“Bring me that much in an envelope.” He regarded Herbie. “Do you have any relatives besides your uncle Bob?”

“Well, there’s my mom’s sister, Gladys. She lives out on the Island. Her husband’s a plumber out there, does really well.”

“Is she speaking to you?”

“Are you kidding? I’m her favorite!”

“When did you last see her?”

“I don’t know, maybe a year ago.”

“If you turned up on her doorstep, would she take you in?”

“Sure, I guess so.”

“Then why aren’t you out there? You’ve been on the run for a while now.”

“She’s in East Hampton, and that’s too far out. I don’t like being away from the action, and that’s in Manhattan.”

“Herbie, has it occurred to you yet that just being in Manhattan could get you killed?”

“Well, I guess that after all that’s happened…”

“Exactly.” Joan came into his office and handed him the envelope. Stone handed it to Herbie. “There’s a thousand dollars in this envelope,” he said. “Here’s what I want you to do: go to Third Avenue and take a left; there’s a cell phone store there, almost on the corner. Buy a throwaway, untraceable cell phone with a couple of hundred minutes on it and be sure to ask the clerk if it has a GPS chip in it; don’t buy it if it does. Call Joan and give her the number, then get a cab to Penn Station and take the next train to East Hampton. Throw yourself on your aunt’s mercy, and don’t do anything to make her or her husband mad at you. Call Joan every morning at ten and let her know you’re okay.”

“Gee, East Hampton…I don’t know, Stone.”

“Herbie, the Hamptons are full of beautiful girls, very rich beautiful girls. Be nice to them, and they’ll be nice to you.”

Herbie brightened. “Good point, Stone. I’ll need some clothes.”

“Then sneak into your place and pack a bag, and get out of town. The D.A. is going to want you to testify to back up what’s on the tape.”

“In court?”

“That’s where testifying gets done, Herbie. You’ve been to court; you know about that. And you’re a lawyer, remember?”

“Oh, yeah.”

“The courtroom experience will be good for you.”

“What’s this going to do to our civil suit, Stone?”

“If Dattila is convicted it will improve our chances of getting a judgment against him a lot.”

Herbie managed a smile.

“But I’ve got to be able to get in touch with you on a moment’s notice, so you keep that phone on you at all times, and don’t use up all the minutes.”

“Okay, Stone.”

“Well, get going!”

Herbie shook hands and left the office.

Stone asked Joan to come in. When she had taken a chair he said, “I want you to take a vacation, sort of.”

“What’s a vacation sort of?” she asked.

“That’s where we close the office, and you go somewhere nice, and you have all the office calls forwarded to your cell phone. You can reach me on my cell.”

“Where should I go?”

“Jesus, I don’t know. Isn’t there somewhere in the country you’d like to be, besides behind that desk?”

“What’s going on, Stone?”

Stone took a deep breath. “Devlin Daltry, or somebody who works for him, murdered Celia last night.”

Joan turned white.

“Now don’t faint on me.”

She took a couple of deep breaths. “I’m okay. What happened?”

“He somehow tracked her down in New Jersey and, well, it wasn’t pretty.”

Joan put a hand to her mouth. “Her head. That’s what he did, didn’t he? Like the sculpture.”

Stone nodded. “You don’t want more details, believe me.”

“So, I’m running from Devlin Daltry?”

“I think anybody connected with me might have problems.”

“When can I go?”

“Why aren’t you already gone?”

She got up and headed for her office. “Herbie’s going to call you every day, so we’ll know he’s alive!” he shouted after her. “I think.”

Joan had her bag and was letting herself out the front door. “Bye!” She waved and was gone.

Stone ran to the front door and checked the block while she got into a cab. He waved her off, then he went inside and up to his bedroom. He opened the safe in his dressing room and took out his favorite little.45 and a holster.

He would be going armed for the duration.

Stone left the house by the rear door and walked into Turtle

Bay Gardens, the common area behind all the Turtle Bay houses. The paths were lighted, so finding his way in the dark was not a problem. He walked across the garden and used his garden key to open the door leading to Second Avenue. He looked both ways for a full minute, then stepped out into the street and hailed a cab.

Fifteen minutes later he was seated at Elaine’s with a Knob Creek on the rocks before him, and Dino was working his way toward him from the front door, table by table, greeting acquaintances. Finally he plopped himself down and accepted a Scotch from a waiter.

“So, how was your day?” Dino asked.

“I hardly know where to begin,” Stone said.

“Just begin, and don’t be a pain in the ass.”

“Okay, Herbie’s off the hook for Cheech’s murder; they’ve arrested his buddy, Gus, whose fingerprints are on the knife. Herbie’s gone to his aunt’s in East Hampton, I hope to God.”

“And?”

“And Joan’s on vacation, sort of, to keep Devlin Daltry from killing her.”

“And?”

“And that’s about it.”

“That’s funny, you seem to be forgetting the part about why Devlin Daltry might want to kill Joan.”

“Oh, that.”

“I know it’s probably of little consequence to you, but when a beautiful woman gets her head cut off, I would have thought that that would have been the first thing on your mind. Charley Sample called me.”

“Oh, and Dierdre Monahan almost got me into bed, but I was saved by the D.A., the Old Man himself.”

“See? You did it again?”

“I don’t want to even think about it,” Stone said, taking a large pull on his bourbon.

“Stone, if you don’t talk about it, get it off your chest, you’re gonna have nightmares for a year.”

“Do I have to?”

“It’s for your own good, pal.”

“Dino, I want to hunt down Devlin Daltry and kill him slow, to quote Carmine Dattila.”

“I know you do.”

“I mean, I really, really want to do that. At lunch today, I was actually thinking about fucking Dierdre Monahan, after she asked me. I was desperate for something to think about besides Celia sitting in that porch chair without a head.”