The Dark of Day (48 page)

Her scream stopped as her breathing was cut off.

He kissed the side of her face, letting his lips linger there. “Alana wanted the audition tapes. She wanted me to tell Harold to give them to her. She thought he was my friend, and he'd do it for me. He told me to go to hell. When I told her that, she didn't believe it. She thought I had some influence over him. I'm not in the porn business, but she was threatening me, and I knew it would get out. She would have told someone. I'd have lost The Aquarius. I'd have lost everything. Do you see? I couldn't let it go on.”

C.J. dragged in a breath. “Billy, please.”

“That damned statue. The base was plaster. It fell apart in the ocean. I didn't think about that, but you would have. You'd have used marble.”

“Billy, there's no evidence. There's nothing. The statue is gone. Whatever you did, nobody can prove it.”

“Can I trust you not to say anything? Can I,
chica?
Would you do that for me?”

“Of course I would. Yes, Billy. I won't say anything. How could I? We mean too much to each other.”

“My sweet, sweet liar.” His lips were at her ear. “You just broke up with me. Goodbye, Billy. It's over. You wanted Rick Slater. Yes, you did. When I saw you and him together, I could smell the sex between you. What a slut you are. But I liked that about you.”

Her shoes slid across the floor as he dragged her across the room.

“I promise you one thing. It will be quick. No pain.”

When she tried to speak again, his arm tightened, choking off her words.

Billy said, “Yes, Detective, when she came over tonight I could see she was depressed. She'd been offered a job on CNN, and she gave it up. She said she couldn't handle it. I went to the kitchen to make us some drinks, and when I came back, she was in the pool. I never heard her calling for help. I think she didn't want any help. I think she just wanted to end it.”

C.J. grabbed for the back of a chair as they passed it, but she couldn't hold on. They had reached the last of the sliding doors leading out to the terrace. The pool glowed blue through the glass.

He would drag her outside, put her head under, and wait for her to drown.

“It's so sad. I loved her.”

The edges of her vision softened, and she started to drift. Was this what it was like, dying? This easy surrender, this letting go? She wouldn't feel the water, wouldn't feel anything. No pain. It was what Paul had said. This won't hurt. You'll like it.

How strange. She could see Paul's face over her, and his hands were on her throat, squeezing gently, then harder, harder, and his knee was pushing her legs apart. But she didn't want it. She didn't want this.

C.J. twisted her head and was rewarded with a small gasp of air. The will to live surged through her like a jolt of pure oxygen. She would not die, not like this, not a quiet victim, not letting it happen without a fight.

C.J. dug her fingers into Billy's arm, but the sleeve prevented her nails from getting through. She tried to reach up and claw his eyes, but he jerked his face out of the way and tightened his grip.

She bucked and twisted and kicked her feet. They came off the floor as she hung onto his arm.

Billy stopped at the panel of light switches and reached around to turn off the pool lights. She knew what he wanted, to drown her in darkness where no one could see, and to turn the lights on again before he called the police.

“No!” C.J. lifted a knee and with all her strength brought her heel down on his instep.

He screamed and bent over, and in that brief moment she wrenched herself away from him. She sped through the living room, calculating that it wouldn't do any good to reach her keys because he could drag her out of her car before she started the engine. She grabbed a brass bowl off the coffee table and threw it at him. As it clanged on the floor, she abruptly turned left into a long hallway, past the media center, past a bathroom, past the downstairs guest suite. Another turn, she would be at the side door.

It was locked. Billy was moving toward her; reaching. She felt his hand slide off her shoulder, felt some of her hair rip from her scalp. She could hear her own ragged breathing.

The hall led left again. Stairs going up. Another door to the garage, a dead end. The kitchen with the gleaming stainless steel and long, black granite counters. A knife block near the stove.

C.J. reached for the handle of the chef's knife and turned to face him. Billy stopped, one hand on the refrigerator for balance. The knife bobbled out of her hand. “Oh!”

He came for her. She grabbed the knife block and threw it. Then blindly reached toward the island in the center of the kitchen and grabbed a bottle—his Dutch gin—and threw that. The bottle smashed on the tile floor. Billy was running, couldn't stop in time, and stepped into the broken glass.

“Ahhhh!” One of the shards had gone into his foot. He bent to pull it out, then his eyes were on her again. “Bitch. You can't get away.” But she was already gone, moving past the dining room and into the living room, where the white floor was a vast expanse of winter tundra, a rectangle of bright red at the other side, the front door. She skidded into the door and pulled on the handle, looking over her shoulder.

Billy was limping badly, and his teeth were bared. He had left a trail of blood behind him.

She couldn't get the door open. She swerved away from him. He caught her by the stairs, tripped, and they both went down. She couldn't scream. Billy's hands were on her throat.

rick Slater stood on the front porch staring at the red entrance doors of Billy Medina's house. He pressed the button again and heard the chimes. Edgar Dunn's old Buick was in the driveway. C.J. had to be here. Rain bounced off the black slate in the circular driveway and slanted through the landscaping lights.

He put his ear to the door. Nothing. Had they gone out? Were they upstairs in bed? That thought gave him pause. He stood there, undecided, then walked into the rain and went around the side of the house. Before he reached the back terrace, his shirt was soaked and clinging to the pistol he'd stuck into his waistband. The surface of the pool seemed to vibrate in the rain. He stepped under the patio roof. The back wall of the house was mostly glass. The inside lights were on. Billy Medina had a lot of square furniture, low black sofas and chairs, and most of it was turned to face the windows. Lamps arched over the sofas on curved silver poles. Rick saw a marble statue shaped like a woman. He didn't remember it from the last, and only, time he'd been here. He saw the stairs, which floated on metal supports. A balcony above the stairs. Nobody up there.

It might have been the color that caught his attention, a smear of red showing through two of the sofas where they'd been angled into a square. He walked farther to his left, saw more blood. Followed it with his eyes and saw two people on the floor at the bottom of the stairs. Billy Medina and C.J., and she was struggling to get away.

Stepping back, Rick put two bullets into the window. They made two neat holes. The heavy, hurricane-proof glass wouldn't shatter. He aimed at one of the sliding doors and took out the lock. The bullet sparked on the metal. He shoved on the frame.

As he sped across the room, he focused on Billy Medina. Time expanded. He reached them, raised his right arm, and smashed the butt of the pistol against Medina's head, down low where the bone curved into the spine. As Medina collapsed, Rick dropped the gun, grabbed Medina's shoulders, and threw him off C.J. He drew back his fist. Medina wasn't moving.

Rick left him there and shouted, “C.J.!”

She was coughing, wheezing, taking huge gasps of air. He sat her up and propped her against his knee. He pushed her hair off her face, felt her back, her neck. Red marks flamed on the delicate white skin.

“I'm fine. I'm okay,” she whispered.

He picked her up off the floor and took her to the nearest sofa. She put her arms around him and held on. “Rick! I thought—I thought I was dying. I found out—he killed Alana.”

“I know. I know.” Rick smoothed her hair. “I just had a run-in with Dennis Murphy. I had to beat the shit out of him to get the truth. I knew you'd be here. Judy Mazzio told me. I was worried about you and Medina, so I came over.”

C.J. looked past him at the man on the floor. “Is he dead?”

Rick could see Medina's chest rising and falling. “He's alive, but his foot's cut. He's bleeding pretty bad. What happened?”

“I threw a bottle, and he stepped on the broken glass.” C.J. continued to look at Medina. “Call nine-one-one.”

“Why? Let him bleed.”

“I need him alive,” she said. “You're still a suspect until we can show why not.”

“Shit.” Rick stripped off one of his shoes, then the sock, which was still wet from the river. He wrapped it around Medina's ankle, knotting it as tightly as it would go. He pulled Medina closer to the stairs, positioning him so his bloody foot would be on one of the steps, above the level of his heart.

He made the call. He gave his name and told them to send an ambulance to Guillermo Medina's house on Star Island. He didn't have the address. The dispatcher said she could look it up. He told her to hurry, a man had stepped on some glass and lost a lot of blood.

Rick found his pistol and dropped it into the thigh pocket of his cargo pants. He sat on the sofa next to C.J. to put his shoe back on, lacing it tightly, jerking hard on the shoelace. He was angry, not with her, but the rage was close to making him want to go pound Medina's head into the floor.

C.J. said, “Where is Dennis Murphy now?”

“I left him duct-taped to a tree by the Miami River. Billy told him to follow me. I think they were planning to send me where they sent Alana. Should I tell the cops to go pick him up now, or wait till we explain about Billy?”

C.J. stared at him, then said, “Is Dennis badly injured?”

“Not really.”

“We should tell them when they come for Billy.”

Rick said, “Dennis told me that Billy wanted Alana Martin out of the way because she was threatening to link him to Harold Vincent. Is that right?”

“Yes. My God. What a fool I've been.” With a little moan, C.J. put her hands lightly on her neck.

“You're going to hurt later on,” Rick said.

“I'm fine. If you hadn't come when you did, I wouldn't be.”

Rick kissed her arm where he'd seen the bruises. “I should have come after him last night.”

“No, I told you, it wasn't Billy.”

“Who, then?”

“Paul Shelby. I went over to his office, and we argued—It's not worth talking about. You won't put that in your story, will you?”

Rick shook his head. “No. I'm going after him for the girls that Milo bribed him with. Billy Medina had to be in on that, too. Shelby is going down.”

C.J. held Rick's hand tightly. “Write it, Rick. Show Paul Shelby for the snake he is. That's what I want.”

“You got it. He's over at Milo's tonight. Yeah. Another of their so-called business meetings. I have a contact in Milo's house. Seems Milo gave everyone the night off. Shelby's wife and kids are out of town. What a coincidence.” Rick reached for his phone again. “I'm going to send Carlos over there to take some pictures of Shelby's car. If we can get him coming out, even better. I want to go after the girl, persuade her to talk, pay her if I have to. It's the proof we need to nail Shelby to the wall.”

“What girl?”

“I don't know. Whatever girl Milo set him up with.” Rick put the phone to his ear.

“We have to stop him,” C.J. said.

“Hold on. Let me talk to Carlos.”

“Rick, we have to stop him!”

He held up his hand. “Carlos, it's me. There's a lot happening tonight, man. I'll fill you in later, but get right over to Milo Cahill's place. Shelby is there with a girl—” Rick watched C.J. pick up her purse and walk toward the door. “C.J.! What are you doing? Hold on, Carlos.”

“I have to go to Milo's. I have to go.”

“Carlos, I'll call you back.” He caught up with C.J. and held onto her arm. “You can't leave. I want the paramedics to check you out.”

“I'm fine. Get out of my way, Rick. I have to go.”

“If you go over there now, they'll deny everything.” He blocked C.J. when she tried to go around him. “There's nothing you can do. The girl is over eighteen.”

“What if it's Kylie? Milo got her an apartment and a job. She trusts him. She had to work tonight, but she didn't go in. I tried to call her and got no answer. Where is she? Where?” C.J.'s voice was trembling.