Stuart Woods - Santa Fe Dead

“Right.” She hung up.

BARBARA NOTED THE police car as she pulled out of Jimmy Long’s driveway, and she made it easy for them, driving a steady thirty miles an hour and stopping for all the stop signs. She had never understood why there were all these four-way stop signs in Beverly Hills. Hadn’t these people ever heard of right-of-way streets?

She drove down Rodeo Drive and gave her rental car to the attendant behind the Ralph Lauren store. She had not been inside the shop for more than a minute before she spotted a woman browsing whose cheap pants suit made her look out of place in the elegant store. Well, she could just eat her heart out, Barbara thought.

She tried on half a dozen things and chose a slinky, black dress and a couple of cashmere sweaters. She made sure the policewoman saw her black American Express card as she paid for them.

She walked out the front of the store and made her way down Rodeo, window-shopping, occasionally going inside and buying a dress or a pair of shoes. She had lunch alone in the garden at Spago, then worked her way back to the Ralph Lauren shop and retrieved her car. She was back at Jimmy’s by midafternoon, and so was the police car. Let them report that!

JACK CATO REPEATED his actions of the weekend before, but this time he brought along a set of lock picks. What he wanted from the armory was locked in a large room that he had never been able to get a key to.

He let himself into the building and walked into a windowless hallway, closing the door behind him so that he could switch on the lights. He knelt before the double steel doors and took a close look at the lock. It was the sort of thing you’d see on the front door of a house, really, nothing special. He put on his reading glasses and unzipped the little case holding his lock picks. He selected two and began probing the lock, feeling it out.

It turned out to be a pain in the ass before he could get it open, but at least he knew the lock now, and it would be easier to deal with later. He swung open the heavy door and switched on the lights inside. The fluorescent fixtures flickered on, and he was staring at enough weapons to equip the SWAT teams of a city: assault rifles, machine guns, grenade launchers, even half a dozen mortars. He’d love to have sacked the whole room, but he wanted only one thing: an ordinary-looking aluminum briefcase, tucked away on a high shelf. He pulled up a stepladder and got it down.

It had two combination locks securing it, but it turned out that the combinations were just three zeros. He opened it and checked out the contents: a beautifully crafted, disassembled sniper’s rifle that had been made by an old man named Al, a gunsmith who had a shop on Melrose, for a spy movie that had been made on the lot. Jack doubted if it had had more than half a dozen rounds put through it.

He closed the case and helped himself to a pocketful of.223 ammunition from a drawer. He knew the armorer didn’t log ammo use, so he was safe. He relocked the steel door, let himself out of the building and returned to the stables.

He had already checked the shooting schedules for work under way. Nobody would need the sniper’s rifle anytime soon, so he was good through the weekend.

He called a phone number and waited.

“Compton Flying Club,” a woman’s voice said.

“Hey, Sheila, it’s Jack Cato.”

“Hi, Jack. What can I do for you?”

“Is the Bonanza available this weekend?”

“Let me check.”

He could hear her turning the pages of her desk calendar.

“All weekend,” she said.

“Great, I’ll take it Friday evening and have it back by Monday morning. I’m going up to San Francisco this weekend. Can you have it fueled and left on the line after about five on Friday? Leave the key under the nosewheel chock.”

“Sure thing. Have a good flight.”

Cato hung up. Everything was all set now.

EAGLE GOT A call from the LAPD a couple of days after his request to the chief.

“Mr. Eagle, this is Detective Barnes; the chief asked me to call you.”

“Yes, Detective.”

“We’ve had a team on Barbara Eagle for two days now, and all we’re seeing is shopping trips in the daytime and restaurants in the evening. Mr. Long seems to work at home as much as he does at the studio. I don’t know how much longer the chief will let us keep this up.”

“Has she met anybody on her shopping trips or in the restaurants?”

“Hasn’t spoken a word to anybody but store clerks and waiters and the diners, but we don’t have the phone tapped, so who knows? Oh, I don’t know if this is important, but she stopped in the Beverly Hills Post Office and mailed a package.”

“What sort of package?”

“Just a manila envelope.”

“She mailed a payoff to the hit man. Were you able to see an address?”

“No, sir, we couldn’t get close enough.”

“Okay, thanks very much, and thank the chief for me. Be sure and tell him about the envelope.” Eagle hung up. The weekend was coming, and he had an idea the hit man was coming, too.

He called Susannah, who was at her house, dealing with a washing-machine repairman. “Hello, there.”

“Hi, what’s happening?”

“Barbara is still in L.A., and the cops are keeping an eye on her.”

“That’s reassuring.”

“Don’t let it be. She was seen at the post office, mailing a package. That has to be the payment for killing Joe Wilen. I have a feeling we’re going to hear from her hit man this weekend, and I’d like you to stay at your house.”

“Not going to happen,” she said. “If the hit man shows up, you’re going to need another gun. You already know I can shoot.”

“Don’t worry, sweetheart, I’ll have help. I want you out of harm’s way. Barbara saw you at the trial, and she may have recognized you from your movies. I hope you understand.”

“I understand, but I don’t like it.”

“After the weekend, you can come home to me.”

“Ed, I don’t think you’ve thought this through.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, suppose you catch the guy, or kill him. Do you think that’s going to stop Barbara?”

“Probably not,” he admitted.

“I think what you’re going to have to do is stop her before she gets to you.”

“What are you suggesting?”

“I think you should take whatever steps are necessary.”

“I’m not sure I like the sound of that.”

“I don’t like saying it, but you have to protect yourself. If you don’t, she’s going to keep trying until she wins.”

“Right now, we have to think about this weekend, so let’s talk about this another time,” Eagle said. “I’ll call you tomorrow. Bye-bye.”

Eagle called the district attorney.

“Bob Martínez.”

“It’s Ed Eagle, Bob.”

“Hello, Ed.”

“I need your help.”

Martínez chuckled. “In court?”

“Thanks, no. That I can handle by myself.”

“What, then?”

“I think Barbara is going to send a hit man to Santa Fe-the same guy who killed Joe Wilen in Palo Alto-probably this weekend.”

“Why do you think that?”

“You know her history. What would you expect her to do?”

“You have any idea who he is? A description would help.”

“No, no idea.”

Martínez didn’t speak for a moment. “You want some protection, is that it?”

“A couple of men will do, just for the weekend.”

“Let me call the chief. I’ll get back to you.”

“Thanks, Bob.”

DETECTIVE ALEX REESE was driving to Centurion Studios on Friday afternoon for his meeting when his cell phone buzzed.

“Hello?”

“Hi, Alex. It’s Raoul Hernández.”

“Hi, Raoul.” Hernández was a New Mexico state trooper who was also a pilot and who often flew state officials.