Naked Frame (16 page)

"What are you talking about?"

"I'm talking about the fact that you
murdered Carly Cinaway for $100,000."

Rebecca stared at him in disbelief.

"The police have an eye witness—the desk
clerk. They also have your DNA at the scene. Two of your lovely,
long hairs were found in her hotel room."

"You pulled those hairs from my head while I
was passed out in my office. Then you planted them in Carly's hotel
room."

"Do you have any proof of that?" Big Bill
laughed. "And hiding the money in Gabby's saving account was just
lame. Didn't you realize it was one of the first places the cops
would look? What were you thinking?"

Gabby took out his smartphone.

Rebecca frowned at Gabby. "What are you
doing? He's lying."

Big Bill said, "Well, if you're not the one
who killed Carly, why didn't you call the police when you found her
body?"

"You know why."

"Oh, you mean because you thought the cops
were looking for you in connection with my murder?" He chuckled.
"Is that it?"

"Bastard." Rebecca searched the displays on
the wall. "You were watching everything. We're all just little ants
to you—living in your personal ant farm."

Big Bill laughed. "Oh, I like that. That's a
good one, Rebecca."

"You know who really killed her."

"Yes, I do. It was you."

"Did you record it? Let's see the video.
Show me the video where I killed her."

Gabby stepped closer to Rebecca. "Look." He
handed her his phone.

Rebecca could not believe her eyes. "Where
did this money come from, Gabby?"

Big Bill interrupted. "It's your payoff,
Rebecca. For killing Mrs. Cinaway."

"And who is supposed to have paid me?"

"My guess would be Harvey Hamstel. He was
worried that Carly would sue the company into bankruptcy over my
relationship with her daughter."

"Relationship? You were raping her."

"So, apparently Harvey paid
you to kill her. And now
he's
dead."

"Harvey Hamstel is dead?" said Rebecca. "Oh,
and I suppose I killed him too."

"The police will think so—after they find a
little silver charm on the floor of his kitchen, among the broken
glass—you know, from a charm bracelet, like the one you're
wearing."

Rebecca held up her left arm, checking each
charm on her bracelet. The pistol charm was missing. "You son of a
bitch. You took it off while I was passed out."

"But what I don't understand is why you
killed Calvin."

"I didn't," said Rebecca.

"No, not you, Rebecca. Gabby killed
him."

"Huh?" said Gabby.

"Maybe Calvin suspected Rebecca had killed
his wife, Carly, so in order to protect Rebecca, you shish kabobbed
Calvin with that big screwdriver. It must have taken a lot of rage
to jam it all the way through his body."

"I didn't do that."

"Tell it to the cops. They received an
anonymous tip that Calvin had been murdered."

"From you, no doubt," said Rebecca.

"And they found somebody's fingerprints all
over the handle of the screwdriver. And I happen to know they're
Gabby's."

Rebecca turned to Gabby. "Did you touch that
screwdriver?"

"No. Of course not." He thought for a
moment. "Unless..."

"What?"

"Unless that was the screwdriver I
accidentally knocked off the workbench this morning. I picked it up
and put it back."

"Crap, Gabby."

"Crap, indeed," laughed Big Bill. "But
that's a great story for the cops. Be sure to practice it, so
you'll sound believable."

Rebecca whipped out her pistol and pointed
it at Big Bill. "Laugh at this, you son of a bitch."

"Take it easy, Rebecca. You should be
thanking me for sending the police out to that marina to pick you
up before Bobby's guys had a chance to kill you."

"The cops couldn't find us," said
Rebecca.

"Yeah," said Big Bill, "congratulations. You
did a great job of hiding from them. I don't know how you pulled
that off."

"But how did you know Bobby took us to the
marina? Did you have a camera on Bobby's van?"

Big Bill grinned. "No. Just a tracking
device—thanks to a loyal employee at Café Nue."

Rebecca took another quick scan of the wall
displays. "So, you saved all the incriminating videos, and deleted
the ones that would prove our innocence."

Big Bill grinned. "We didn't do much
deleting. But we did a good bit of editing. Daniel is quite a wiz
at it."

"Any reason why I shouldn't put a bullet in
your head?"

"If I really thought you were capable of
murder, I wouldn't have let you in here. Oh, and if you're having
any crazy thoughts about erasing my little video collection, forget
it. All of my videos are automatically backed up to a remote
server. Not only that, Daniel is prompted for his password every
four hours. And if he doesn't enter it, a prewritten email will be
automatically sent to the cops with a password and link to my
remote backup database."

Rebecca studied the display of Kimberly in
her bedroom. "So, I guess you know what your lovely young wife has
been up to. And Joey Ketrousie."

"Yes, I do. And they're going to pay dearly
for their disloyalty. Believe me."

Out of the corner of her eye, Rebecca saw
Daniel moving. He was going for a pistol in the drawer. But she
kept her gun pointed at Big Bill.

Gabby was on top of Daniel immediately. He
jammed the electrodes against his neck and pushed the fire
button.

Daniel lost control of his muscles. He
dropped the gun, and fell out of his chair.

Gabby snatched the pistol, and stored it in
his waistband.

"Be careful with that thing," said Rebecca.
"And tie him up."

Gabby looked around for rope.

"Use one of those cables in that box over
there."

He went to the box and picked out one.

Daniel was attempting to stand up.

Gabby zapped him again, and used the cable
to tie him up like a rodeo calf.

"Nice job," said Rebecca. "Now you can tie
up Big Butt."

"You little bitch!" Big Bill stood up, ready
to lunge at Rebecca from his platform.

She cocked her pistol.

"We've already been through this. You won't
shoot me."

Rebecca fired just about his left shoulder,
shattering one of the computer displays on the wall.

Big Bill sat back down.

Gabby brought the cables over and tied Big
Bill to his chair with several cables.

Big Bill said, "Now I need to take a
piss."

"Who's stopping you?" said Rebecca.

Big Bill's face turned bright red with
anger.

"Let's go," said Rebecca.

Big Bill said, "Are you crazy? In less than
four hours the system is going to prompt Daniel for the password.
If he doesn't enter that password, all of my videos are going to
the cops."

Rebecca picked up the box of cables. "We'll
be back." She and Gabby began to walk down the hallway.

Big Bill yelled, "What if you don't make it
back in time? You're gonna be so dead. Be reasonable. Come back
here and untie us. Let's work out a deal."

Rebecca pushed a release button beside the
door and it opened.

Big Bill screamed, "You're both gonna get
the death penalty!"

Rebecca blocked the door open with the box
of cables. They stepped outside.

As they walked toward Gabby's car, Rebecca
said. "You got a handkerchief?"

"Yeah."

"Can I borrow it?"

"Sure." He took it out of his pocket and
handed it to her.

"Now, the gun."

"Aw, come on, Becca. I need my own gun."

"Give me the gun."

Gabby pulled it out of his waistband and
gave it to her.

Rebecca wiped it clean with the handkerchief
and threw it into the darkness. "We don't know where that gun's
been or who it might have killed."

"I hadn't thought of that. Thanks for
keeping me out of trouble."

"Oh, yeah. I'm doing a great job of keeping
you out of trouble."

They laughed.

"Have you got a plan?" said Gabby.

"I'm working on one."

"Good. Because I think our time is about to
run out."

CHAPTER 37 - Wednesday, 12:03 a.m.

Kimberly recognized the ringtone as
Wiley's.

"I told you not to call me again tonight.
It's after midnight."

"I just had to talk to you, Baby."

"Okay. What is it?"

"I need you."

"Wiley."

"No, really. I want you so bad I ache."

"Not tonight."

"Please."

"All I can do is...you want to play the
game?"

"Come on, Baby."

"I'm sorry, Wiley. Do you want to play or
not?"

He did not respond.

"Well, okay. I'll talk to you tomorrow."

"No. Wait."

"What?"

"I want to play."

"Okay," said Kimberly. "Get loaded."

"I'm already loaded."

"You know what I mean."

"Just a second. I'll be right back."

Within thirty seconds he was back to the
phone.

"Okay, this time, get ready for a double
orgasm."

"What do you mean?"

"I'm loading two bullets."

"Oh, yeah, Baby. That
will
give me a double
orgasm. Do it."

Kimberly could hear the chamber spinning.
The click. "Oh, Baby. I'm already wet."

"I told it was going to be great."

She heard him spin the chamber again. And
again the hammer hit nothing. "Keep going, Lover. I'm almost
there."

She heard the spin...and a big bang. Then a
thud.

"Wiley? Wiley, are you okay?"

No answer.

CHAPTER 38 - Wednesday, 12:07 a.m.

On their way to the car, Rebecca said, "Did
you see Phillipa Thagery on one of those monitors?"

"Yeah. It looked like she was in her
lab."

"Right. And she had this rat—it was either
dead or sedated, because I saw her put this silver, gun-looking
thing up to its head and shoot it a couple of times."

"That could have been the thing that was
used on Carly's head," said Gabby. "Maybe Phillipa was the one who
killed her."

"That's what I'm thinking."

They jumped into Gabby's car. He turned it
around and drove down the dirt road toward the highway. "Oh, did
you notice that man in the lab with Phillipa?"

"No."

"A big black guy came in and started making
out with her. He was wearing a uniform. Maybe military."

"Okay. So, there's another possibility,"
said Rebecca. "This military guy—whoever he is—might have killed
Carly for Phillipa."

"How are we ever going to figure all this
out, Becca? We've got too many might's and maybe's. Just too many
questions."

"Well, we're about to get some answers."

CHAPTER 39 - Wednesday, 12:19 a.m.

Gabby drove up to the security gate. "We're
here to see Phillipa Thagery."

The guard leaned out over the half-door.
"I'm sorry, but visitors are not allowed after 5:00 p.m."

Rebecca slid over close to Gabby and looked
up at the guard. She saw the name on his badge. "Henry, we're old
friends of Phillipa. Couldn't you please make an exception?"

"No, Ma'am, I'm sorry. It's a very strict
rule. I'd lose my job if I let you in."

"We understand, Henry," said Rebecca. "It's
not your fault."

Gabby was about to back out of the gate and
leave when Henry said, "I shouldn't tell you this, but Ms. Thagery
usually makes a fast food run at about this time. She'll probably
be driving out of here at any minute."

Rebecca said, "Oh, that's great. Maybe we'll
grab a bite with her. Thanks so much, Henry."

Gabby backed up the car and drove away.

"Let's park somewhere in the dark. We don't
want to spook her. If we're lucky, Henry will forget to tell her
about us," said Rebecca. "Oh, and did you notice Henry's
uniform?"

"Yeah. It was like the one Phillipa's friend
was wearing."

"Right. He's not military. He works here as
a guard."

They sat in the car waiting for twenty
minutes.

Gabby said, "Maybe she's not going
tonight."

"There she is."

They saw Phillipa walking to her car. She
got in and drove out the gate. Henry could not have told her
anything, since she didn't even slow down.

Gabby followed her car at a distance. He and
Rebecca bet on where she would go. Gabby chose McDonald's. Rebecca
went with Wendy's.

But they were both wrong. Phillipa drove
into a ritzy neighborhood.

She pulled into a gated driveway, rolled
down her window, and swiped a key card. The gate opened and she
drove in.

"Well, isn't this interesting?" said
Rebecca.

The name on the gate: Smotherburn.

CHAPTER 40 - Wednesday, 12:36 a.m.

"Are you sure you want to climb this fence?"
said Gabby.

"Yes. We've got to see what's going on in
there."

"Here comes a car."

They snuggled up to the metal fence, hiding
in the shadow of a brick column.

It was a taxi. A man wearing a hooded
sweatshirt got out, and the cab drove away. The man took out a key
card and swiped it. He walked through the gate and up the driveway
toward the front door.

"Now's our chance," whispered Rebecca.

She and Gabby slipped in just before the
gate closed. They stayed back a few yards, hiding behind a
tree.

The man rang the doorbell and waited.

He rang it again.

Finally the door opened. It was Kimberly.
"What the hell?"

"You thought I was dead,
didn't you? You
hoped
I was dead."