Kent Conwell - Tony Boudreaux 15 - The Mona Lisa Murders (16 page)

We followed Franco across the spacious entry, through a main room at least a hundred feet wide to a wall of French doors opening onto a rear porch identical to the one in front.

Franco paused before opening a door. He knocked on the glass. Outside, holding a cocktail in his hand, stood a gray-haired dude who looked like one of those sophisticated gang bosses in a 1960’s gangster movie. He wore a light blue Ascot tucked down the open collar of his white silk shirt. He nodded.

‘Keep them here, Ice,’ Franco said. He held out his hand. ‘Mister Sebastian wants the bag.’

Ice, a.k.a. Slick Hair, handed him the bag. I glanced out the window. The land dropped away sharply. Down to the river, I guessed. How far down, I had no idea.

Sebastian pulled out the backpack, unsnapped it, and opened the flap, revealing the wooden box. I could tell he was instructing Franco to find an implement to cut the metal bands.

Franco nodded to us, and Sebastian replied.

When Franco came back inside, he gestured to the stairs and ordered Rosey and Ice to lock us up. ‘Until after Buckalew arrives. Then the boss will decide what to do.’

Locked away. Great, I told myself. Then we could dial 911.

Halfway up the stairs, Franco called out. ‘Make sure they ain’t got no cell phones.’

‘Yeah, Franco.’

I muttered a curse under my breath.

On the second floor landing, Ice sneered. ‘I got yours,’ he said to Latasha. ‘Now, boyfriend, gimme yours.’ He started to search me, but I quickly handed him mine.

‘Here it is.’

‘All right, get in there,’ Rosey growled, gesturing to a door. Before I stepped inside, I noticed a door at the end of the hall. ‘Hurry up,’ he barked, pushing us into a spacious bedroom and locking the door.

As soon as the lock clicked, I checked the windows and French doors opening onto a balcony. Wrought iron bars secured them all.

My younger cousin lifted a quizzical eyebrow. ‘You sure were accommodating.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘You just handed him your cell. No argument or anything.’

‘Hey, we don’t have any room for argument. Besides, if he’d dug in my pockets, he’d have found my pocketknife. It ain’t much, cousin, but like the old saying, it’s better than nothing.’ I headed for the window.

Latasha plopped down on the edge of the bed and watched me. Wryly, she said. ‘I got a feeling these aren’t Vasco’s men.’

I replied over my shoulder. ‘You got that right.’

‘What do you figure happened?’

‘No idea. Don’t care. All I want is to find us a way out of here.’

‘You’re a P.I. Can’t you pick those locks?’

I stepped back and glared at the locked doors in frustration. ‘If I had the tools.’ I glanced around the room, my eyes falling on the vanity dresser. ‘Maybe—’

A shadow passed in front of the French doors. I looked around to see Tootsie place a folding chair in front of the doors and plop down in it. He had removed his jacket because of the heat. A black octopus stood out on his pale arm like the proverbial sore thumb.

Throat Cutters! Nemo’s goons.

Latasha spotted it the same time. She muttered an unladylike curse. I couldn’t blame her.

My mouth was dry. I went into the bathroom to draw a drink of water. From the bedroom, she called out. ‘What do you think they’ll do with us?’

‘No idea,’ I replied for my benefit as well as hers.

In the bathroom mirror, I spotted a closet behind me. I continued talking while I opened the door. ‘I don’t know how we can hurt them, so I don’t see anything they’d have to gain wasting us.’

‘Wasting?’

‘Killing.’ I looked up and my heart did a triple somersault. I was staring at a trapdoor leading to an attic.

‘Jeez!’

Chapter Twenty-Nine

I didn’t answer. Instead, I grabbed the vanity stool and slid it into the closet. Standing on it, I gently pushed on the trapdoor.

‘Tony!’

I slid the door to one side.

‘What are you doing?’

I looked around. She was staring up at me. ‘Quiet.’

Her eyes grew wide when she saw the opening.

With a strained grunt, I pulled myself into the attic. The heat was choking. Sweat popped out of every pore. I made my way across the joists to the next room and discovered a similar trapdoor. Opening it, I stuck my head below the ceiling and listened. The dark room was silent.

I hurried back and lowered myself. I turned to Latasha. ‘Let’s go back in the room.’

‘What are you waiting for? Let’s get out of here.’

I gestured to Tootsie outside the French doors. ‘Keep an eye on him.’

‘What are you going to do?’

Hurrying to the bed, I replied, ‘Buying us some time, I hope.’

‘Buying us—’

‘Just watch. Hokey, I know, but it’s a chance,’ I snapped, pulling the covers back and quickly stuffing pillows under them to simulate a body. ‘We’re getting out of here. We need all the time we can get.’

‘And you think that’ll work?’

I shrugged. ‘Can’t hurt.’

She shook her head. ‘I sure hope not.’

I kept glancing out the doors. Tootsie was reading. Probably a comic book. I didn’t care as long as it kept him  preoccupied.

When I finished my handiwork, we hurried into the bathroom.

I pulled myself up into the attic. ‘Climb up on the stool. I’ll pull you up. Stay on the joists or you’ll go through the ceiling.’

‘Joists?’

‘I’ll show you.’ Thirty seconds later, she knelt on one joist and braced her hands on the one next to it.  ‘Wait here.’ I crawled to the next room, opened the trapdoor, then returned to close the opening from which we had come.

I wiped at the sweat stinging my eyes. ‘We’ll drop down in here and slip into the hall. Then if we’re lucky, we’ll find a way out.’

The hall was empty and dark. I strained for footsteps ascending the stairs. Only silence, delightful silence. ‘Okay. Let’s go.’

In less than thirty seconds that seemed like thirty hours, we reached the door at the end of the hall. Beyond was a small balcony with stairs descending to the ground. To the east were several barns.

‘That’s where they stashed the pickup.’

‘How do we get there?’ She asked, indicating over a hundred yards of open area with grass turning yellow from the heat.

‘Through the trees. We’ll go down the slope out of sight and skirt the barn. We can come in on it from behind.’

Small oak populated the slope, which was about thirty degrees or so, steep enough that we had to watch our balance and not stumble over the rocky surface. The intense heat made it hard to catch our breath. Overhead birds chirped, and from below I thought I could hear the river water churning between the banks.

Ten minutes later, we slipped into the rear of the cavernous barn. The only light came from the open bay doors in front. ‘There it is,’ Latasha whispered, pointing to the F-150 sitting in silhouette in the middle of the barn.

Rising from behind a stall railing, we crept around the perimeter of the barn toward the pickup. Voices reached our ears. Ice and Rosey.

We dropped to our bellies behind a couple bales of hay in a stall. Dust motes floated in the shafts of sunlight laying out a rectangular track across the straw-covered ground and, to our shock, over the two bodies in the corner.

Latasha parted her lips to scream, but remained silent. I breathed a sigh of relief.

Ice said, ‘We’ll toss the stiffs in the pickup here and get them two in the house.’

‘I’ll drag the bodies over to the pickup,’ Rosey announced, heading directly for the stall in which we were hiding.

Latasha gasped and clutched my arm.

My brain raced. I felt in my pocket for my small knife and its two-inch blade. Forget that, I muttered to myself. I glanced to the rear of the stall at the two bodies.

‘No sense in that. I’ll back over.’ Ice opened the pickup door and cursed.

Rosey looked around. ‘What?’

‘The keys. That stinking Tootsie must’ve taken the keys. Hold on. I’ll be right back.’

‘No hurry. I’ll grab a cigarette.’

‘Not in there. You know what Mister Sebastian said. He don’t want to burn nothing down.’

I glanced around at the bodies.

The dead goons were Hatchet Face and his muscle-bound partner, Bulldog, a.k.a Shawn.

Grabbing her hand, I led Latasha from the stall into an adjoining one, all the while keeping my eyes on Rosey’s retreating back.

Latasha whispered. ‘Those dead guys are the ones who followed us to the flea market.’

‘Yeah.’

‘You think they were Vasco’s men?’

All I could do was shake my head. I gave her a futile look. ‘Cousin. Right now, I don’t know what to think.’

I looked around the barn, spotting a large stack of baled hay a few stalls over.

Voices sounded from outside the barn. Rosey took off in a run across the hardpan to the house.

I grabbed her hand and jerked her toward the stacked bales. More than once as a kid, I’d dodged unwanted chores from my
Grandpere
by hiding in a cave I’d made within the stack of hay we put up each year.

Four criss-crossed layers high, the stack ran the length and breadth of two stalls, about thirty feet. Several open bales lay at random around it.

‘Keep watch,’ I said, dropping to my knees at the rear of the stack. I grabbed the baling wire holding the straw together and with a grunt, tugged out one bale from the bottom layer.

‘See anything?’ I growled.

‘Nope.’

I crawled underneath and grabbed the second bale. After a few seconds groaning and struggling I worked it out. The bales of the second layer lay crossways, supporting to top layers.

I grabbed a few more bales and laid them on either side of the opening, then stacked more bales across the top.

Looking around at her, I chortled. ‘I’m glad we’re both skinny.’ Before she could reply, I pointed to the gaping hole. ‘Okay. Scoot.’

‘In there?’ She looked at me in disbelief.

‘Press up against the side. I’ll slip in with my back to you, then pull the bale in to close the opening.’

Agitated voices from outside brought our discussion to an abrupt halt. She slid inside, and I followed.

‘You think this will work,’ she asked as I pulled the bale into the opening.

‘If they don’t look too hard.’

A stream of light popped through the crack at the top of the mouth of our cave. Distant voices, muted, carried through the barn. They grew closer, and then we heard feet shuffling around the hay. After a few seconds, the voices began to fade.

We remained in our hidey-hole.

‘How long, do you think,’ she whispered.

‘A few minutes. Then we’ll slide out.’

We remained silent, the only sound our breathing.

After some time, I whispered. ‘I’ve been thinking.’

‘Yeah?’

‘Those two, the dead ones. They could have been Vasco’s men. When the big one stopped me outside the door at the motel last night, he didn’t try to get rough or anything. Not like this bunch.’

‘If they were Vasco’s men, why didn’t they identify themselves?’

‘Maybe they weren’t his boys. Maybe this Uberto Bianchi decided to get back in the game.’

‘You think he might have sent someone out when he heard what was going on?’

‘Possible.’

‘That’s three bunches, Vasco, Uberto, and Nemo?’

‘Yeah.’

We fell silent. Minutes later, she murmured. ‘Tony.’

‘Yeah.’

I felt her hand on my shoulder. ‘Sorry I got you into this.’

I chuckled. ‘Hey, what are cousins for?’

Wryly, she replied. ‘I don’t know, but not this.’

Chapter Thirty

Finally, I slipped from our cave and rose to a crouch, peering about the darkened barn. Latasha started to follow. I stopped her. ‘Wait. Sebastian might have left someone in here.’

Another ten minutes passed slowly. Outside, the bright glow of the sun was turning to hazy pink. I waited and watched as the dusk grew thicker.

Several lights shown through the windows of the main house. Two limos and the pickup were parked in the drive. The stables west of the house were lit. Silhouettes passed back and forth in front of the open doors.

‘Come on out,’ I whispered.

Brushing herself off, Latasha stopped at my shoulder. ‘Now what?’

I led the way along the wall to the rear doors.

Our options were limited, a classic understatement if I’ve hear heard one. We could steal a car or take to the river. Die in a hail of gunfire or risk drowning or whatever else we might run into down below. ‘Over there,’ I muttered, indicating the river.

Using the corral rails as cover, we disappeared into the oak and cottonwoods behind the barn. Once inside the trees, we trotted for the river.

We paused just inside the tree line at the top of the slope.

I glanced at the house and then the barn. There was no disturbance. Maybe we could pull this off.

A string of lights from the house to the river flashed on back to the west, startling us. More lights came on, lighting the entire grounds.

‘Jeez,’ she muttered.

‘Yeah. Well, come on. Let’s get down to the river.’

I turned and froze.

A sneering goon had stepped from behind a tree not five feet from us. Even in the dusk, I could see the veins lacing his bulbous nose ‘You ain’t going nowhere but back where you come from, buddy.’ The automatic he held in his beefy hand backed up his remark.

‘Tony! Latasha grabbed my arm.

‘Don’t worry, sweet cheeks. We ain’t forgetting you neither.’ He gestured with the muzzle. ‘Now let’s go.’

‘All right, but her leg is hurt. I need to help her.’

She shot me a puzzled glance, then fell into the charade. ‘Thanks.’

He just snorted.

I turned to her, put my left hand on her arm, my right on her back. ‘Let me help. That leg must hurt.’

Pivoting on my left foot, I eased Latasha in a half circle about me, at the same time taking a couple steps backward. ‘Careful,’ I said. ‘Don’t stumble on that rock.’

I crossed my fingers our bozo would glance at the rock. He did, giving me the extra second I needed to hurl my shoulder into his stomach and send both of us tumbling down the slope in a ball of rocks, dusts, shouting, and confusion.