Killer Weekend (14 page)

   "Cochairman," Danny repeated, his voice tightly wound. "I would if I could, but I control thirty-one percent of the voting shares, and as such—"

   "It's cochair, a partnership, or you take your dog and pony show on down the road. You want to turn me down, Danny, it's a free country."

   "I mean no disrespect, Stuart. It's just that I've always thought of this as my company. You must know that feeling. And —"

   "Of course I do."

"Exactly!" Danny said. "And so you can see how—"

   "Take it or leave it," Stuart said, interrupting for a second time. "No hard feelings one way or the other, Danny." He checked his watch, a heavy thing with a titanium housing, white gold trim, and a platinum band. "It's ten million dollars. My guys will go over the paperwork, if you agree. Your brother's got us all on a tight leash. I'd like your answer now—I like a man who can think on his feet—but if you need more time . . ."

   "It's not a matter of time, it's a matter of—"

   "Time and money, Danny. Those are the only things that had better matter. If you're good with the money and don't need more time, then I'd say we have ourselves a deal." He extended his hand. "We have an agreement, if you want it."

   Danny willed himself to lift his arm. He understood the opportunity this presented. He'd be a fool to walk away from such an offer.

   He was saved from the handshake by a knock on the door. Danny looked up, expecting Emil.

   Instead, Ailia entered, packed into a pair of white tailored pants, a long-sleeved shiny salmon blouse, and wearing a string of pearls the size of mothballs.

   "We're going to go in for the full ten," Stuart informed her. He extended his hand again, and this time Danny shook it. Ailia joined her husband on the couch. "Ailia will take my seat on the board."

   Danny felt the room spin. "What?" he choked out. She looked over at him as if she'd won the lottery.

   "Danny," Stuart said, "meet your new partner."

W
hy the top secret treatment?" Fiona asked. She sat in the passenger seat of Walt's Cherokee, its motor rumbling. He'd parked in the lot of the Hemingway School, on the west side of Ketchum, facing an athletic field and an over-forty intramural soccer game.

   Walt had changed out of the blood-soaked uniform shirt and into a black special tactics T-shirt he kept in the back.

   "It's not a favor. You'll be paid," he said.

   "I'm scheduled to guide on the river most of the weekend."

   "It's not like that. I want you to loan us your camera gear."

   "You have your own stuff."

   "We don't have telephoto lenses, and I can't rent them here in town. The soonest Salt Lake can get them up here is Monday, and I need them today."

   "Because?"

   "There was an incident at the C
³
opening."

   "I heard."

   "Yeah . . . so . . . I got to thinking that if I was a hit man hired to kill Shaler, the best place I could hide would be out in the open."

   "With the protesters."

   "Yes. I need photographs—digital close-ups of every face. There's a chance I can run them through national databases—facial recognition. Maybe identify this guy—a suspect—in time."

   "I can do that for you."

   "You're busy."

   "I just made myself unbusy. Randy can guide for me."

   "It's risky work. Sometimes people don't like their photograph taken. I'm thinking Brandon."

   "So I'm supposed to loan you my gear and train Tommy Brandon?"

   "You'll be paid."

   "This isn't point-and-shoot. Not exactly."

   "You can keep it simple though, right? I've got a guy in Seattle with the Marshal Service. I need to get these e-mailed to him this afternoon."

   "Then let me do it. Forget teaching Brandon."

   "It could get ugly. I'm not putting you into that."

   "I'm touched," she said sarcastically. "So, I'll partner with Brandon."

   Just the words "partner with Brandon" turned his stomach.

   "Face recognition software requires good pictures, Walt. High-quality, full-frontal shots. You think Brandon is going to get this right?"

   He was transported back to his imagination: Gail and Brandon sweating in the tight confines of the trailer's bedroom.

   "Earth to Walt," he heard her say.

   "Okay . . . okay," he said. "You'll team up with Brandon," he agreed. Anything, he thought, to keep Brandon out of that trailer.

T
revalian's trick was to put a liberal amount of Vaseline laced with cayenne pepper up both nostrils. His nose ran like a faucet and gave Nagler the excuse to miss most of the events. The beauty of the Nagler identity was that the former academic was a virtual recluse, rarely seen outside the think tank. He did not travel in these circles, nor was he known by them. He crashed the invitation-only luncheon he'd seen mentioned on Cutter's home computer.

   No one would be so impolite as to bounce a blind man, and they did not. A place was set, and he sat through the outdoor luncheon, on the lawn of the Guest House, only three tables away from the woman he'd come to kill. Had he not cared about his own freedom, he might have run a knife through her and been done with it, for the Secret Service agents kept their distance, guarding the perimeter but not the woman. With his semitransparent contacts in place, Trevalian could see well enough to not make a mess of eating.

   Prior to dessert he excused himself, having exhausted his Kleenex, and wanting to set the hook. As expected, a Secret Service agent escorted him and Toey to a golf cart that then shuttled him back to the lodge. This planted the dog's existence firmly in the minds of the agents.

   Back in Nagler's room, Trevalian moved quickly, with a rehearsed system of changing from one man to the other. He locked the appropriate doors, hung out the privacy tags, and then left the rooms and took the stairs to the ground floor.

   Trevalian, as hotel guest Meisner, walked hurriedly into the side lot where he'd parked the rental. He drove out onto Sun Valley Road and parked along the bike path with a tourist map unfolded on the steering wheel. Ten minutes later, two black Escalades driving in tandem pulled up to the traffic light. Shaler's escort.

   He followed well back of the Escalades, turned and approached a building marked as the library. The television crews gave away her home. He parked and got out, having not figured on such a scene. There was no way he could get near her house without either being arrested or his face being shown on national television. He studied the suddenly excited reporters and news crews, all swilling Tully's iced coffees from paper cups. Their enthusiasm, manifested as shouting and screaming, waned as Shaler entered the house without comment. These same news crews would likely be covering the brunch on Sunday. They would be in the room. Now he was the one who felt on edge: jumpy and excited.

   He passed the next fifteen minutes watching them while trying to find a way inside. The journalists suddenly sprang back to life only to realize it was Shaler's Hispanic housecleaner and not the AG at the side door. But where they cursed with disappointment, Trevalian had to contain his excitement: for the housecleaner carried a bulging white canvas sack in her arms. A laundry bag.

   The maid launched the sack into the back of a beat-up Chevy, slammed the hatch, and climbed behind the driver's wheel.

   Trevalian was back in the rental in seconds and had the engine running by the time she pulled out of the drive. He followed, knowing a maid wasn't going to check for tails. She drove six blocks and parked. He couldn't find a parking place. He resorted to double parking in a private parking lot that warned of towing unauthorized vehicles. He hurried from the car and caught the door to the Suds Tub as it swung shut behind the maid.

   She thanked him.

   "Hello, Maria," a woman with stringy hair said from behind the counter. Even with two fans running, the laundry suffered from high humidity and extreme heat. "Shaler?" she said, tapping on a keyboard and beginning her count, as the laundry bag was inverted. "Be with you in a minute," she called out to Trevalian.

   "No problem," he said. The appearance of this maid was a gift. The icing on the cake came as the proprietor apologized to the maid that due to the extremely busy weekend and a broken washer, pickup would be Monday at the earliest, no exceptions.

   Maria didn't seem to care. She took a receipt, offered Trevalian a smile in passing, and left, carrying her empty laundry sack with her.

   For his purposes, that empty sack would do. But he couldn't see how to get it without making a scene.

   "Can I help you?" the proprietor inquired.

   Trevalian asked about the pricing, threw in a few questions about timing, and watched as the woman transferred Shaler's dirty clothes into a blue sack, placed a sticker on it from the order form, pinned a tag bearing a second sticker to the bag, and then wedged the sack onto the second shelf from the floor with a dozen others—all identical.

   "I don't know if you heard," she said over her shoulder, "but we're a little backlogged because of a faulty washer."

   "I'm good," he said. "You've been very helpful."

   As he left, he made a quick study of the business's security system.

   A challenge—but nothing he couldn't work with.

W
alt met Fiona in the parking lot of the golf pro shop. She climbed into the Cherokee and immediately fiddled with the air-conditioning, making it colder.

   "Damn, that sun's hot," she complained. She worked with her camera, pushing buttons on the back, and then passed it to Walt, who held it gingerly.

   On the small LCD screen, he saw a photo of a man he recognized as Andy Bartholomew, the self-proclaimed leader of First Rights. "Where is this, the chairlift?"

   "Yeah. River Run. You toggle this flywheel to move to the next shot."

   She leaned in close to demonstrate, and he tensed noticeably. Any proximity to a woman was too close for him right now. Even a bucket seat across a Jeep made him feel as if she were in his lap. She scorned him for his reaction, but went back to her corner. He toggled to the next shot.

   What had been a blob in the first photo now turned out to be a man's shoulder. Also, in this second shot the chairlift as a backdrop became more apparent. The Sun Valley Company operated a chairlift to the top of the mountain for summer sightseeing. Bartholomew, and the man belonging to that shoulder, were clearly in line for the chairlift.

   The third photo caused him to gasp. "That's Dick O'Brien."

   "That's what Tommy said."

   He didn't like her referring to Brandon by his first name, and nearly corrected her.

   "What the hell is Cutter's head of security doing with the leader of First Rights?"

   "Tommy said that, too."

   "I don't
care
about Tommy Brandon, okay?" The words were out of his mouth before he knew it.

   Fiona sat up straight.

   "Sorry . . . I . . ." He pointed to the camera, unable to make eye contact with her.

   "What . . . is going on?" she asked.

   After a moment, she obliged him, advancing the images. Another several photos, all taken within a few minutes of one another. Bartholomew and O'Brien boarded and rode a chairlift together. "Oh, shit," Walt mumbled.

   "Sheriff?"

   "The only reason you ride a twenty-minute chairlift with someone like Bartholomew is so that no one can listen in," he said.

   "He threatened him," she said. "That's what Tommy said happened: The big guy told the younger one that if he made any trouble for the conference there'd be hell to pay."

   "Thing is . . . ," Walt said, "it only takes about thirty seconds to do that. So why all the cloak-and-dagger involving the chairlift? That's a lot of trouble to go through—a long ride to share with the guy—if all you're going to do is try to scare him."

   "So?"

   "So I'm going to find out."

Twenty minutes later he and Bartholomew occupied the front seat of Brandon's BCS cruiser, which was parked in a Sinclair gas station across from the employee dormitories a few hundred yards from the site of the First Rights demonstration.

   Walt introduced himself and shook hands with Bartholomew, a small man with an erudite face despite a grunge appearance. He emphasized that the man was here of his own free will and was under no legal obligation to cooperate.

   "We're cool."

   "I heard you took in the view from the top of Baldy this morning," Walt said.

   Bartholomew grimaced.

   "It's a small town. I also heard Dick O'Brien took that ride with you."

   Bartholomew studied the car's ceiling fabric. He released a long exhale.

   "I like Dick O'Brien—I've worked with him on the conference for the past four years. I don't want to make accusations against a friend of mine, without a complaint to back it up."

   "No complaints," Bartholomew said.

   Walt considered leaving it there—he'd done his duty. "If he threatened or extorted you, Mr. Bartholomew, it's my obligation to inform you that we will and can protect you against any such malfeasance."

   "Such a big word for an Idaho sheriff. But then again, Sheriff Walter Fleming, you're not your average county sheriff, are you? Quantico trained. Your college degree at Northwestern on a full ride. Former two-term president of the state's Sheriffs' Association. Currently serving on the National Association of Counties. Your father, a former FBI special agent."