Lawrence Block - Hope to Die

And it provides a fine view of the coffee shop entrance.

His own fault, but it wasn't just simple carelessness. Because he'd found himself itching to tie off that loose end, and he'd been suspicious of his motives. His hand remembers the way the gun had bucked in it, remembers gripping the knife, cutting that throat with surgical precision. And his whole being remembers the way it felt.

Thrilling?

Well, perhaps. But he doesn't much care for the word. Roller-coaster rides are thrilling. Drugs are thrilling. Breaking rules is thrilling.

What he'd done was… what?

Satisfying?

Whatever you called it, he had wanted more of it. And so he'd overruled the impulse to tie off this loose end, talked himself out of it on the grounds that he'd be running a risk to no real purpose.

Instead, he'd run a greater risk by leaving the deed undone.

There is a lesson here, he thinks, if one can but find it. There is almost certainly an important underlying principle. He will have to think about it.

What's the best that can happen?

She's in there, sitting with them (whoever they are, Mr. Salt and Mr. Pepper, whatever it is they really want). Well, the best thing that can happen is that the only questions they think to ask lead to answers that have nothing to do with him. In which case the only harm done by this meeting in this dubious restaurant will be to their respective digestive tracts.

Conversely, what's the worst that can happen?

The worst that can happen is not that dire. She can tell them she met with a man named Arden Brill. That's the name he gave her, and it is manifestly not his own. If they look for Arden Brill, they will search in vain.

Still, it was incredibly stupid to give her that name. Why not John Smith, for God's sake? Why not John Doe or Richard Roe, or, hell, anything properly anonymous and uninformative? He was being cute, calling himself Arden Brill, and to what purpose? Making little jokes only he himself could appreciate? That was ego in action, setting traps into which he alone could fall.

Stupid.

God, he loathes and detests stupidity! He finds it annoying in others, though unquestionably useful at times. But he just plain hates it in himself.

She can tell them his name, Arden Brill's name. She can furnish a description of Arden Brill. She can't provide a photograph of him, can't supply anything his fingertips have touched. He never spilled any DNA anywhere near her- though, he has to admit, she's physically attractive, and that aching vulnerability adds to the strength of the attraction.

Not that it should make any difference. He's not going to make love to her. He doesn't want to, and even if he did, it's not something he would permit himself to do. He would not be quite that stupid, thanks all the same.

What he is going to do- and the sooner the better- is kill her. And why on earth should it be any more satisfying to kill a pretty woman than a plain one?

But it is. He knows it, knows it in his tingling hands, knows it in his surging blood.

Knows it in his bones.

The two men are first to leave. Side by side, youth and age, black and white, they walk uptown on Broadway, headed away from him, looking like a poster for National Brotherhood Week. Well? Shall he follow them?

No, his business is with Lia.

Shall he seize the moment? Stride into the restaurant, do a plausible double-take. Lia, my goodness, I've never seen you in here before. Do you have time for a cup of coffee? No? Well, which way are you headed? I'll walk with you…

No, too visible. People around, and someone might remember something. There's no Bierman handy to take the blame. This is going to be murder by person or persons unknown, so best to stay unknown, and out of sight.

Anyway, she's leaving the restaurant. Now what? Shall he follow her?

Without his willing it, his hand moves to his throat, touches the disc of mottled pink stone. So smooth, so cool to the touch. Different minerals have special properties, that's why men have chosen to wear them since time immemorial. It's not just for adornment. Amethyst is supposed to make you immortal, especially if you dissolve it in brandy and drink it. He doesn't know the traditional properties of rhodochrosite, but it seems- seems – to clarify thought.

Because it's suddenly all quite clear to him. She's bound for home. She may stop somewhere en route, may go home directly. It doesn't matter. He needn't follow her if he knows where she's headed.

First, he has to do something about his car. It won't do to leave it parked where it is, across the street from the Hollander house. And he'd better figure out just what he's going to do about Lia Parkman, and what tools the job will require.

How they met:

Excuse me, but aren't you Lia Parkman?

Yes, and you're-

Arden Brill. You don't know me, there's no reason why you should know me. But… well, let me plunge right in. Someone told me you're related to the writer Susan Hollander.

She's my aunt.

By marriage, or…?

My mother is her sister.

And you, uh, you know her?

Well, sure. She's my aunt.

I'm sorry, I must be coming off as very silly. You see, I happen to think she's an outstanding writer. One of the best of her generation. As a matter of fact…

Yes?

Well, she's the subject of my dissertation.

You're doing your master's on her?

A doctoral dissertation, actually.

Oh, a doctorate. I'm impressed.

I'm the one who's impressed. Susan Hollander's niece. Could I buy you a cup of coffee? Because I have a million questions I'm dying to ask you.

Well, sure. And if you want…

Yes?

Well, I could probably introduce you, and-

No, you're wonderful to offer, but I don't think that would be a good idea.

Oh.

Academic distance and all that. I think I'd be compromising my objectivity if I actually met the woman. But to meet her niece, I think that lies well within the bounds of the permissible.

I see.

Especially when the niece in question is so charming…

She lives on Claremont near La Salle, in an apartment house purchased years ago by the university for student housing. She shares a fourth-floor apartment with three other female students. There's a large living room with a Pullman kitchen, and a long hallway with four small bedrooms off it, and a bathroom at the end of it.

When he moved the car, he went into his office and got a ring of keys from his desk. There are three keys on the ring and they are all shiny. One of them fits the front door of the house on West Seventy-fourth Street, and it has been used only once since he had it made. The others, made the same day by the same locksmith, have not been used at all, so he can't be entirely certain that they will work.

He waits until there's no one around, then picks one of the keys and tries it in the front door. It works perfectly. He turns the key and walks in, crosses the bare lobby.

There's an elevator, but he passes it up and takes the stairs to the fourth floor, walks the length of an empty hallway to the door he knows is hers. He puts his ear to the door, listens, hears nothing.

Ring the bell?

No.

He slips the remaining key in the lock, turns it slowly, eases the door open. The living room is empty, but there's music playing behind closed doors elsewhere in the apartment. He walks quickly down the hall to the last door before the bathroom. He listens, hears talking within.

The door's closed, but not shut tight. He nudges it open an inch or so. She's on the phone, and, incredibly, he hears her say his name.

Well, not his name. Arden Brill's name.

"You have the number if you want to call me. I'm sorry I didn't tell you this before but I had to think about it. I'm sure it's nothing and I don't want to make trouble for anybody but I thought you should know. I just thought- "