Please don’t get lost, Irene Glasson. I need to get away from this place.
She finished the cigarette and started to grind out the butt in the makeshift ashtray. But her fingers were trembling so badly that she accidentally knocked the tin can onto its side. Dead matches and butts spilled out.
Thankfully, they didn’t fall onto a pile of straw, but the very idea of all the used smoking materials in such close proximity to the flammable items that cluttered the warehouse made her shudder.
Hastily she bent down to scoop the discarded matches and butts back into the tin can. The safest thing to do was dump them into the water.
She went out the freight door and walked a short distance along the dock. There was enough light from the lantern and the moon to allow her to see what she was doing.
She tipped the can upside down and dumped the contents into the black water.
Only about another half hour to wait—another half hour and she would have earned the rest of the money she needed to start a new life in L.A.
What a joke, she thought. This was her first and only real acting job, unless you counted all the sex scenes she had starred in over the years. She had given some very fine performances in the gardens of the Paradise Club and in various hotel room beds. The vacationing stars and directors and studio executives had all made promises, and they had all lied.
At least she was going to get paid for this night’s work. All she had to do was stick to the script.
She heard the creak of wood behind her. A footstep. It was the only warning she got.
Panic flashed, threatening to choke her. She started to turn but it was too late.
The blow to her head stunned her. She was dimly aware of tumbling off the dock into the water.
She fell endlessly into darkness, and then there was nothing.
Chapter 25
“There’s a clearing around the front of the warehouse,” Irene announced from the driver’s seat. “One car. It must be Daisy’s.”
Oliver stayed where he was, crouched behind the front seat, and tried to visualize the scene in his head.
“Any sign of Jennings?”
“My headlights are shining directly on her car. Doesn’t look like she’s in it. There’s some light coming from inside the warehouse, though. A lantern.”
“I’m going to take a look. Stay here. Keep the car running, headlights on, until I get out. The glare will blind anyone who might be watching from inside the warehouse.”
“What, exactly, are you going to do?” Irene asked.
She was worried, he thought. He rather liked the idea that she might be concerned for his safety, but it was far more likely that she was afraid he would ruin her chance at the big story.
“I just want to check out the area,” he said.
“Are you sure that’s a good idea?”
“It struck me as a better idea than walking straight into an ambush. If everything looks legit, I’ll wave you in. Got that?”
“Yes.”
She did not sound happy about the plan but she had agreed to it. That was good enough, he decided.
He cracked the door open, grabbed the cane, and worked his way out of the back seat and into the shadows at the side of the narrow road. The maneuver sent a couple of shock waves through his leg. His forehead was suddenly damp with sweat.
He breathed into the pain. It receded somewhat.
He was really out of shape, he reflected. There had been a time when he could maneuver his way out of a locked trunk or a steel cage. Underwater. Bound hand and foot.
But in spite of the damned leg he was strangely energized. It had been two long years since he’d experienced the old thrill. And this time it was the real deal. No magic involved.
He had Irene to thank for the druglike rush of excitement that was coursing through him. He would pay a price later. The leg was going to bother him more than usual for a couple of days but it would be worth it. He had a bottle full of aspirin and some excellent whiskey waiting for him at Casa del Mar.
Irene had lowered the window on the driver’s side of the car. He spoke to her from the shadows.
“Are you all right?” she asked uneasily.
Irritation crackled through him.
“I’m fine,” he said. “Give me a few minutes to go around behind the warehouse and make sure there isn’t anyone except Jennings inside. Douse the lights and the car engine as soon as I give the signal. We don’t want to attract any attention if we can avoid it.”
“There was no traffic on Miramar Road.”
“You never know. If a couple of kids out for a late-night cruise happen to see the lights, they might get curious.”
“All right,” she said.
“Remember, stay in the car until I wave you in. If anything looks like it’s not going well, get the hell out of here, understand?”
“Yes, yes, I’ve got it. What about you?”
“Appearances to the contrary, I can take care of myself.”
He did not wait for her to acknowledge the order. He was accustomed to people doing what he told them to do. He’d had a lot of experience in the role of boss, first onstage, where even small mistakes in a carefully staged illusion could destroy a career or get someone badly injured, even killed. Now, as the owner of a hotel that catered to a fickle and often bizarre clientele, he’d managed to keep a lot of people employed during the worst of the hard times.
The country was finally emerging from the aftermath of the crash, but his staff was loyal. No one had left to seek other opportunities.
So, yes, he’d become accustomed to people doing what they were told.
He reached inside his jacket and took the gun out of the holster.
Cane in one hand, weapon in the other, he continued toward the warehouse, hugging the deep night just beyond the headlight beams. He knew from his experience establishing lines of sight on a brightly lit stage that the audience never noticed the assistants dressed in black who worked in the shadows.
When he got close to Daisy’s car, he saw that Irene was right. There was no one sitting in the vehicle. He took a chance and moved to stand next to the driver’s door. Nobody was hiding in the rear seat.
He eased his way around to the rear of the warehouse. The full moon, combined with the lantern light spilling out through the open freight door, allowed him to see the old dock and the squat shape of the boathouse.
He flattened his back against the wall at one side of the freight door.
“Daisy Jennings?” he said.
There was no response.
He raised his voice a little but kept his tone cool and unthreatening. “I’m Oliver Ward. We’ve met. I insisted on accompanying Miss Glasson tonight. I didn’t want her to take the risk of coming alone. I’m sure you can understand. Sorry for the change of plan but I brought a hundred bucks with me. I hope that will serve as an apology.”
Nothing.
Gun extended, he leaned forward slightly and took a quick look around the interior of the warehouse. The lantern provided enough light to reveal that there was no sign of anyone inside. It also revealed the handbag sitting on a wooden crate.
Not good, he decided. Daisy Jennings should have been greeting him and his hundred-dollar apology with open arms.
Time to leave.
He grabbed his cane and started back around the warehouse. His only goal now was to get Irene as far away as possible.
The moonlight glinted on a small object on the dock. He had not noticed it earlier. He told himself it wasn’t important but he paused anyway, hooked the handle of the cane over his arm, and took out the flashlight. He switched it on and pinned the object in the beam.
A woman’s shoe lay on its side.
He went a little closer and aimed the light at the water.
The body bobbed just under the
surface.
Daisy Jennings.
A setup, just as he had feared from the start, but the victim was Jennings. Evidently she really had known something that could have hurt Tremayne.
He turned off the flashlight and dropped it into the pocket of his jacket. Cane in one hand, gun in the other, he made his way as swiftly as possible around the side of the warehouse.
The growl of heavy motorcycle engines approaching at speed on Miramar Road reverberated through the night.
There was no good reason for motorcycles to be prowling the empty stretch of road at that hour.
It looked like the cleanup crew was about to arrive.
Chapter 26
Irene heard the thunder of motorcycle engines on Miramar Road and knew that Oliver had been right. It was a setup.
She did the first thing she could think of—she killed the headlights. She kept the Ford’s engine running, ready for a fast getaway, and watched the shadows around the front of the warehouse, willing Oliver to appear.
He did. She could see him silhouetted against the lantern light. But he wasn’t coming toward her. He was signaling her to get out of the vehicle.
Light sparked in her car mirrors. The motorcycles had reached the entrance of the dirt road that led down to the warehouse. She realized that her Ford was directly in their path.
She turned off the engine, grabbed her handbag, jumped out of the front seat, and ran toward Oliver. She stumbled a little on the uneven road.
“Careful,” he shouted.
By the time she reached him, he had the front door of the warehouse open. She rushed inside. Oliver followed.
“Turn down the lantern,” he said.
She heard him slam the old, rusty bolt home, locking the door. Unfortunately, that left the two windows. Both had been shattered long ago, leaving only a few shards of glass in the frames.
She hurried to the lantern and put it out. At least they would no longer be silhouetted in its glare.
She whirled around to see what was happening. The headlights of two motorcycles were halfway down the warehouse road. They were forced to halt behind her Ford.
The engines roared, the riders enraged by the obstacle.
“Your car is blocking their path,” Oliver said. He spoke from somewhere near one of the empty windows. “They’ll have to get off their motorcycles if they want to come any closer. That will even the odds a little. Get down. Stay away from the windows.”
She lowered herself to her hands and knees. In the glare of the motorcycle headlights shining through the windows, she saw the silhouette of Oliver’s gun.
She fumbled with the catch of her handbag. Her fingers closed around the grip of the small pistol she kept inside.
“I’ve got one, too,” she said.
“Of course you do,” Oliver said. He sounded resigned. “Ever fired it?”
“No. How hard could it be?”
“You’d be surprised.”
“There are bullets in it,” she said, offended by his tone.
“That helps.”
She ignored the sarcasm. “Do you really think they mean to kill us?”
“Damned if I know,” he said. “But whatever they came here to do, they intend to do it to you. They don’t know I’m here. Not yet, at any rate. That gives us an edge.”
“Daisy Jennings?”
“She’s dead in the water out back.”
“Dear heaven. Another drowning. Just as you predicted.”
There was some shouting from outside. Two men, Irene realized. One man yelled at the other.
“Do it. Hurry.”
“One of them is off his motorcycle,” Oliver reported. “He’s coming toward the warehouse. He’s got something in his hand.”
“Gun?”
“Yes, in one hand,” Oliver said. “That’s not what’s worrying me. It’s what he’s got in his other hand that could be a very big problem. I just saw a flash of light. The bastard lit a fuse. Stay down.”
A rapid staccato of gunshots roared in the night. Irene heard some of them thud into the wall behind her.
“Cover fire,” Oliver said. His tone was devoid of all emotion.
“Cover for what?” Irene asked.
A fiery object sailed through one of the empty windows and landed on the floor. It exploded on impact. Flames leaped.
“Cover for a firebomb,” Oliver said.
His gun roared once, twice.
“The bitch has a gun,” one of the motorcyclists screamed. “No one said she was armed.”
“Oliver,” Irene said.
He fired two more quick shots.
There was another scream from outside the warehouse, an unmistakable howl of agony.
One of the motorcycle engines roared furiously in the night.
“Dallas, I’m hit,” a man yelled. “Wait for me.”
The single motorcycle howled away on the dirt lane, the sound of the engine fading rapidly.
“One down,” Oliver reported. “The other one is leaving. We have to get out of here. Rear door.”
The hungry flames had begun to consume everything in their path. The heat was mounting but Irene knew that the real danger was the smoke.
She dropped her gun into her handbag, leaped to her feet, and ran for the wedge of moonlight that marked the freight door.
She heard the heart-stopping thud behind her and knew instantly what had happened. She stopped and whirled around.
In the blazing light she saw Oliver sprawled on the floor.
“Oliver.”
“Go.” The order was ice-cold and infused with savage determination. “Get the hell out of here.”
“I’m not leaving without you.”
She rushed back to him and grabbed his arm.
“Damn it, Irene—”
She crouched and got her shoulder under his arm. Calling on every ounce of strength she possessed, she straightened.
Somehow, between her desperation and the leverage he was able to apply with his undamaged leg, he was able to regain his feet. She grabbed his cane and handed it to him.
Together they made their way toward the freight door. Oliver’s limp was worse than ever—he was staggering now, forced to lean on her to keep himself upright. She knew he must have been in agony but he did not say another word. Neither did she. There was no point. Either they both made it out of the inferno or they didn’t.
They passed the crate where Jennings’s handbag sat.
“Get it if you can,” Oliver said, his voice harsh.
She snagged the strap of the handbag with the same hand she was using to grip her own bag.
Oliver regained some ability to keep his balance. He no longer needed so much support from her. They got through the loading dock doorway and kept going. Irene knew they had to get as far away as possible before the warehouse collapsed in flames.
They made their way around to the front of the burning building and into the clearing.
The fiery light revealed a man in a leather jacket crumpled on the ground. At first Irene thought he was dead. But when they got closer, she heard him groan.
“Help me,” he gasped. He levered himself into a sitting position and clutched his shoulder with one hand. “You can’t leave me here.”
“Sorry,” Irene said. “You created the problem. You’re stuck with it.”
“Please,” he gritted out. “Never meant to kill you, just scare you. Didn’t know the place would go up like a torch. You gotta help me.”
“Let’s get him into the front seat of the car,” Oliver said.
Irene stared at him, astonished. “Why? He just tried to murder both of us.”
“No,” the man yelped. “Didn’t mean to kill anyone.”
“We’ve got questions, and at the moment this bastard is the only
one available with answers,” Oliver said. “I’ll keep an eye on him from the back seat.”
“Bad idea,” Irene said. “He has a gun.”
“No gun,” the man assured her. “Dropped it when you shot me. Name’s Springer. I’ll tell you anything you wanna know. Just get me to a hospital. Please.”
“There’s the gun,” Oliver said. He steadied himself on his cane and pulled a handkerchief out of his pocket. “Use this to pick it up. The cops might be able to get some prints off of it.”
Irene used the handkerchief to scoop up the gun. It was still warm. She wrapped it in the square of white linen.
“Got it,” she said.
“Search him,” Oliver said.
She found a knife strapped to Springer’s leg.
“Forgot about the blade,” Springer muttered.
“Sure you did,” Irene said.
“I’ll take that,” Oliver said. He grasped the knife in his free hand and looked down at Springer. “Neither of us can get you on your feet. Can you make it to the car on your own?”
“I think so. Yeah.”
Springer managed to haul himself upright. Irene opened the passenger side door. Hand clamped to his shoulder, Springer crawled into the seat. Irene closed the door.
Springer groaned and passed out.
Oliver opened the rear door and climbed into the back of the Ford. He leaned forward and clamped a hand around Springer’s wound.
Irene got behind the wheel. She fired up the engine, put the car in gear, turned around in the clearing, and started up the dirt road. Rocks spit under the tires.
“What are we going to do with Springer?” she asked.
“We’ll take him to the Burning Cove hospital. I’ll call Detective Brandon and let him know what happened. If Springer makes it through the night, Brandon should be able to get some answers out of him.”
“What about the fire?”
“We’ll stop at the first place we see that might have a phone, and notify the fire department. With luck the clearing around the warehouse will keep the fire from jumping up the hillside. There’s nothing but water at the back.”