Shadow Games (21 page)

Cobey
glanced miserably down at the unmoving form of the man in white.

And then, just as the cop started shouting again,
Cobey
started running once more. Harder than he'd ever run in his life.

3

P
uckett called ahead for an appointment with Lilly Carlyle. She agreed to meet with him in a sandwich shop around the corner from her hotel.

When he arrived, two overworked waitresses were desperately trying to keep a crowd of impatient businessmen happy, Loop workers apparently putting in long hours, taking a dinner break between sessions in the skyscrapers.

Lilly Carlyle wasn't difficult to spot. She sat in the back, near a large window. She was the only person in the place, Puckett reckoned, who was wearing more than two thousand dollars on her back. Her beautifully tailored blue suit and high-necked white blouse and carefully combed blonde chignon gave her the look of an overweight but still attractive movie star who had peaked some years back. Puckett had seen many such melancholy creatures in Hollywood.

The first thing she said to him was, "You're late."

He checked his watch. "Three minutes."

"Five."

"Maybe your watch is wrong."

"Unlikely, given what I paid for it."

He sat down, looked at her, and smiled. "Are you usually this unpleasant?"

"I don't know about you, Puckett, but my time is valuable. Very valuable. So I naturally resent people who aren't prompt."

"In that case, I apologize."

"Apology accepted. Now, why don't you get to the fucking point?"

He saw a weary waitress drag by and he knew just how she felt. Five minutes ago, he'd been enjoying nighttime Chicago. Now he felt totally worn out. Lilly Carlyle was just as much a bitch as he'd always heard and it made his ass tired. Meeting people this unpleasant and despotic always made his ass tired.
Very
tired.

"Mind if I order a cup of coffee first?"

He signaled the waitress.

Lilly Carlyle picked up a package of gold Benson and Hedges 100's from the table, put one of the cigarettes in her mouth, and then picked up a very slender, elegant lighter and got her smoke going.

Ordinarily, Puckett was one of those nagging bastards who gave people a little speech when they lit up. He wasn't going to give Lilly Carlyle his save-your-lungs speech. In fact, he was probably going to start sending her a carton of cigarettes a day.

The waitress, a middle-aged lady with sad, nervous, brown eyes, took Puckett's order and then looked at Lilly Carlyle. "Anything for you, ma'am?"

"If there were, don't you think I'd say so?"

The waitress glanced at Puckett, sadder than ever, it seemed, and shuffled off.

"She's probably a nice, hard-working lady."

"Are you going to tell me that I should be nice to the little people?"

And then he said it—unprofessional as hell, but at the moment he didn't give much of a damn: "No, but what I am going to tell you is that you're a fucking, second-rate bitch agent with a second-rate stable of talent in a second-rate talent agency, so don't give me any more of your Beverly Hills bullshit or I'm going to say something we'll both be sorry for."

Even above the din of clanking dishes, even above the spit and hiss of background conversations, Puckett could be heard loud and clear.

Many eyes were on Puckett and Lilly Carlyle.

"Are you happy now? Is that what you fucking wanted?" he asked.

When she spoke, she whispered and blushed, obviously aware of all the attention he'd gotten them. "Why don't you try and calm down?"

"Why don't you try and shut the fuck up?"

So they sat there and glared at each other.

Once, she tried to get up and leave, but he grabbed her slender wrist and made her sit back down.

After a few minutes, people went back to their conversations—the stock market, the thieves running the government in Washington, D.C., the family member who was a) seriously ill; b) getting divorced; c) having trouble with his teenager.

Gradually, Puckett became embarrassed, as he always did when he lost his temper that way. Most of the time, he was a pretty cool and reasonable guy. But when he lost his temper...

"I'm sorry," he said. "I overreacted."

"I don't want any of your fucking apologies. I just want to get this over with."

The waitress brought Puckett's order. Lilly Carlyle glared at her. To her credit, the weary waitress was not intimidated. She glared right back.

Puckett sipped his coffee and nibbled at his
french
fries. He'd eat only a few and then congratulate himself for being such a wonderful guy.

"Did you know the Swallows girl, the one the police want to question
Cobey
about?"

"No," Lilly Carlyle said.

"Did you know that he was seeing her?"

"He never mentioned her to you?"

"You have no interest in
Cobey's
personal life?"

"None."

She was answering, but barely.

"Do you think there's any possibility
Cobey
might actually have killed her?"

"I don't know."

"If you aren't interested in his social life, why do you hate Veronica so much?"

"She's just some groupie he met in the bughouse."

"The bughouse?"

A smile of pure, malicious delight parted her soft and erotic lips. "The little darling didn't tell you that? That she was in the bughouse at the same time he was?"

Puckett shook his head.

"And guess why she was there? Because her very wealthy father arranged for her to be put in a mental hospital instead of being sent to prison."

"Prison? For what?"

"Sweet Veronica stabbed the family maid. Three times in the back. Said that the maid was hiding Martians in the closet."

"If they were both in the bughouse, that probably gives them something in common. A kinship."

"'A kinship.' How quaint you are, Puckett. Apparently you don't know much about groupies. When she was thirteen years old, Veronica managed to get into the dressing room of
a rock star who was very much into youngsters. He didn't care which sex and he didn't care who knew. He deflowered her right there in his dressing room and then invited the other six members of the band to join in.

"When her father found out about it, he was outraged. Unfortunately, he couldn't get his pure little daughter to help the police arrest the rock star. So he went free and little Veronica was no longer a virgin. Does she sound like the happy homemaker
Cobey
is looking for?"

Her icy hatred of Veronica—and most others, for that matter—was impressive in a terrifying, implacable way. Through long and careful practice, she had turned herself into something that bore great resemblance to...but was not quite...human.

"
Cobey
disappeared several years ago."

"Ah, the famous disappearance. What would all those tabloids do without it? 'Child Star Runs Off To Have Sex Change Operation!' 'Child Star Dying In France Of AIDS!' 'Child Star Weds Dying Screen Beauty!' She smiled icily. "Personally, I thought he might have been abducted by a UFO."

"So you have no idea where he went for—how long was it?"

"Nine months."

"You have no idea where he went?"

"No. And I don't care where he went. All that matters is that the networks are interested in him again."

"How will the murder of this girl affect him?"

"If he didn't do it, he should be fine. The publicity may even help him in a perverse sort of way." She glanced at her very expensive, solid gold wristwatch. "Are you finished? Because even if you're not, I am, Mr. Puckett."

She stood up. For a woman of her formidable size, she was quite attractive. Until you looked closely at those dead, dead eyes. Then she scared the shit out of you.

"I remember how scared
Cobey
was when I brought him back from St. Louis," Puckett said. "I figure he's equally scared now. He could use a little help."

"Puckett, the Boy Scout. How noble."

And then she was gone.

Puckett sat and finished his coffee.

After a time, the weary waitress came over.

"Your wife left, huh?"

"Oh, she isn't my wife."

The waitress smiled. "Good."

"Good?"

She poked him on the shoulder. "You look like a nice, sweet guy. I was thinking you deserve somebody a lot nicer than she is."

Puckett laughed—and decided to double his tip. Not only was the waitress good at her job, she was also damned perceptive.

Cobey's
Tapes

In re: Lilly Carlyle

You should have seen her face the day I came back from Dr. Silverman's and told her that he'd be calling her in a day or so. I was twelve years old at the time and had been living with Lilly in the big Tudor house just outside Bel Air for six years.

"Me? What for? What does he want?"

Even then, I think, she suspected what he was going to say. Dr. Silverman had been hypnotizing me, taking we a lot deeper than the previous shrinks had, and I was starting to remember things...

The day he called, I listened in on one of the extension phones. To be honest, I listened in on most of her calls, just the way she listened in on most of mine...

"Ms. Carlyle, I really think we need to set up an appointment."

"We? Meaning you and I?"

"You and I, yes. That's right, Ms. Carlyle."

"Dr. Silverman, I am paying you a great deal of money to find out why
Cobey
doesn't sleep well or eat well lately. I don't see what that has to do with me."

"It has a great deal to do with you."

Long pause. "Meaning what, exactly?"

Long sigh. "Meaning, Ms. Carlyle, that that's why I want you to make an appointment and come in and see me."

Long pause. "Exactly what are we talking about here, Dr. Silverman?"

"Well," said Dr. Silverman, and I could tell he was starting to lose some of his professional niceness, "to start with, we're talking about breaking the law."

"Breaking the law?"

"I know what's been going on out there, Ms. Carlyle."

"Out where?"

"In your home."

"Dr. Silverman, you seem to be forgetting the very first thing I told you about
Cobey
."

"And that was what, Ms. Carlyle?"

"That he lies. All the time. About everything."

"I see."

"That sounded awfully smug. 'I see.'" I'll bet God sounds just the same way when He's being smug."

Long pause. "I don't think
Cobey's
lying about this, Ms. Carlyle, and, to be frank, it's foolish of you to pretend that he is."

"And just what is it that he's accusing me of?"

"He's not accusing you of anything. But under hypnosis—"

"Hypnosis!" And then she cackled that dismissive Lilly cackle of hers—the cackle known to studio heads, directors and actors throughout La-La Land. "Hypnosis! It's quackery, Dr. Silverman. In fact, I'm getting so pissed off that you'd even waste my money with it that I'm thinking about canceling
Cobey's
next appointment and taking him somewhere else. How do you like that, Dr. Silverman?"

"I could always go to the authorities, Ms. Carlyle."

"You just fucking try it, pal, and you'll have my lawyers all over you."

Long pause. "
Cobey
needs help...after everything that's happened."