Dirty Harry 09 - The Killing Connection

DAMNED IF HE DOES,
DAMNED IF HE DOESN’T.
DIRTY HARRY
STANDS ALONE!

Anything goes in San Francisco, but now it’s gone too far! Somebody is carving up beautiful lesbians—and that somebody has the right friends. Only Harry can stop the slaughter, but now both the gays and the cops stand in his way. Will he have time? The answer is at the end of a barrel—a .44 Magnum barrel!

Harry raised his stein of beer to his lips. But he didn’t stop there. With one quick sweep of his arm, he threw the stinging brew directly into the eyes of the man to his right. Blinded, the gunman sputtered back, his snubnose revolver wavering.

Harry kept his momentum, letting the toss whirl him around, and grabbed a fistful of the man’s shirt. He pulled him forward just as two men by the booth aimed and fired.

Their point-blank ammo sparked across the room and burrowed into the trunk of their friend. Harry felt the hood jerk in his hands as the tiny balls of lead ripped up his insides . . .

Books by Dane Hartman

Dirty Harry #1: Duel For Cannons
Dirty Harry #2: Death on the Docks
Dirty Harry #3: The Long Death
Dirty Harry #4: The Mexico Kill
Dirty Harry #5: Family Skeletons
Dirty Harry #6: City of Blood
Dirty Harry #7: Massacre at Russian River
Dirty Harry #8: Hatchet Men
Dirty Harry #9: The Killing Connection
Dirty Harry #10: The Blood of Strangers
Dirty Harry #11: Death in the Air
Dirty Harry #12: The Dealer of Death

Published by
WARNER BOOKS

WARNER BOOKS EDITION

Copyright © 1982 by Warner Books, Inc.
All rights reserved.

Warner Books, Inc., 75 Rockefeller Plaza, New York, N.Y. 10019

A Warner Communications Company

Printed in the United States of America

ISBN: 0-446-30050-0
First Printing: October, 1982

DIRTY HARRY  #9
THE  KILLING
CONNECTION

C H A P T E R
O n e

E
verything looked fine until the girls kissed. Up until then, they simply looked like two girlfriends coming home after a movie or a late dinner. There was nothing unusual in that. In fact, it was a real good idea to pair up on these balmy September San Francisco nights. Between the fog and the intermittent showers, a person had to be careful.

In this case, only one of these girls showed any concern at all. And that concern was limited to an occasional glance in some direction other than the face of her companion. While the pairing of the two was not unusual, the same could not be said of the pair themselves. For while many sets of women walked the city streets, not all of them were this striking.

The brunette was taller, at least five foot seven in her medium heels. She wore a casual suit, well-tailored slacks, a sweater, and a light jacket. She could have been a model, but her face had an open freshness which ran counter to the angular bent fashion editors prefer. Her cheeks were high and round, her dark eyes sleepy and her red lips full. Between searching looks at the night mist, she smiled down at her partner as she walked.

The other girl was shorter. With a mane of cascading hair whose color lay between blonde and auburn; deep, dark blue eyes; innocent, serene features; and a compact, but devastatingly rich body, she gave off an impression of sweet lust. While the brunette was elegant, the blonde radiated sensuality.

The tense male hands checked the snugness of his thin, form-fitting black gloves for the fifth time since the two women appeared from around the corner of Arguello Boulevard.

Even with the fog the man saw them kiss. While the two women moved in and out of his vision, the rolling white stuff creating makeshift camouflage, there was no mistaking their actions in the apartment house foyer. The two walked up the brownstone steps, oblivious to everything around them but each other. Their arms snaked up onto each others’ backs, as if they were making sure neither slipped. But even this act revealed a tenderness, a deeper consideration. There was something more than friendship here.

That much became crystal clear when the blonde unlocked the front door and the two entered the illuminated anteroom. From the man’s vantage point, the duo executed a silent routine in which the blonde looked one way while the brunette looked the other, then the two switched gazes. It was obvious that they were checking to see that no one was watching.

Satisfied that no prying eyes would witness their moment of passion, the two wrapped their arms around each other in a tender hold. For a moment, they smiled at each other with a contented gaze. Then they kissed. It was a luxuriant, full caress. An expression of profound commitment, ending with a look that said they knew something not many others, homosexual or otherwise, knew. They knew the meaning of love.

For a moment, the man felt a rush of envy rising up inside him, but just as he was trying to identify it as such, it turned into a blazing hatred. The gloved hand checked his jacket pockets, feeling the comforting, round hard shape there. He heard metal clink against metal, then he moved sideways, edging into the fog-filled night.

“Are you sure you can’t stay?” Kim Byrnes asked with honest longing.

“I really wish I could,” Lisa Patterson replied with an insecure glance out the front door at the mist-covered street. “But I’m expecting a call.” The brunette smiled with anticipation. “About the part, you know.”

Kim’s nose and eyes crinkled in a mischievous expression. “Why don’t you go home and set your phone for call forwarding to here?”

Lisa shook her head slightly in pleased disbelief. “I need my sleep,” she laughed. “Honestly, I’ve never met anyone like you before.”

“And you never will again,” Kim said, feigning jealousy. “Remember that.”

Lisa became serious. “I won’t,” she promised sincerely. “How could I?”

Again, the two needed no words to express the bond between them.

Reluctantly, Lisa broke the clinch. “I really have to go,” she said with concern, looking outside, as if trying to convince herself as well.

“Do you want me to call a cab?” the smaller girl asked, reading her lover’s face.

Lisa thought about it for a while. “No,” she finally decided. “The park is beautiful this time of the night.”

Kim skeptically followed her lover’s gaze out the front door. She saw the mist, alternately thin and thick, rolling across the edge of Golden Gate Park. “I don’t know, Lisa,” she said reluctantly. “I really think you should call a cab.”

Lisa looked at her friend, then laughed lightly. “Nonsense,” she said. “I won’t hear of it. There’s no reason I shouldn’t be able to walk home.”

“You never know who’s out there,” Kim said with more than concern.

“You forget,” she said eagerly. “If I can’t see them, they can’t see me either.”

This time, it was Kim’s turn to laugh. “I never can change your mind about anything, can I?” she mused. “Once you make up your mind about something, that’s it.”

“That’s it,” Lisa agreed. “Don’t worry. I’ll be all right.”

Kim nodded bravely, unable to clear her expression of concern. “All right,” she echoed. “But call me when you get in, OK?”

“OK,” Lisa agreed, using that as a cue to part. She turned and pushed open the front door. She paused and turned back to her partner. “I love you,” she said simply.

“I love you too,” Kim replied, not having moved from where Lisa had left her. “Be careful.”

“That’s easy for you to say,” Lisa quipped, trying to lighten the mood. “You’re already home.”

Kim laughed as Lisa exited, each giving the other a last wave. Kim then watched her friend trot down the steps and walk across the street. She kept watching until Lisa disappeared into the mist-enshrouded dark, remembering the times they had together—both upstairs in her apartment and in Lisa’s place on Kirkham Street. She remembered the security and the warmth. Then she shivered.

Turning away from the empty street and empty foyer, she dug into her pocketbook for the key to the second door. That was one thing she liked about the building. Although they didn’t have a doorman, like Lisa’s apartment house, they had decent security, with well-lit hallways and solid construction. It was comforting for a girl like her to know that she was safe.

After all, she was an old-fashioned girl, she thought. Leaving home had been a tough enough decision, so it was a pleasure to find a place in the big city where she felt so comfortable. Here, in San Francisco, she could still take long walks, scout the antique shops, and wear as much lace as she could find. She enjoyed being a woman, so she acted and dressed like it.

Tonight, for instance. While Lisa looked comfortably casual with her jacket and slacks, Kim was more friskily feminine with a soft, breezy patterned dress belted at her slim waist. She felt the fabric fluttering against her moving thighs when she walked, a reminder of her disappointment with Lisa’s departure.

As she moved up the stairs and along the landing past the first two floor doors, she also felt the material of what she wore beneath the dress. She had, after all, dressed that evening to kill. Below the v-neck of the dress was a soft, satin bra and panties as well as a lace garter belt and shiny hose. It all ended with dark beige ankle strap heels which were far harder to walk in than Lisa’s conservative shoes.