Page 90 of Tightrope

“Or something,” Lorraine said.

She raised the gun she had concealed behind the car door and pulled the trigger twice.

The shots caught Ray in the chest. He staggered back a few steps and sagged to his knees. He clutched at his chest. His mouth opened but no words came out. He toppled sideways and did not move.

“Amateur,” Lorraine said.

She slid the gun back into the holster, closed the rear door, and got behind the wheel. She drove off slowly, aware of the delicate machine on the rear seat of the sedan. The contract called for a functioning Ares. There would be no payment if the damned thing was damaged in transit.

When she reached the paved stretch of road that would take her back to Burning Cove, she breathed a sigh of relief.

She did not see the roadblock until she came out of the last curve before Cliff Road. The car parked across the pavement bore the logo ofthe Burning Cove Police Department. The vehicle and the uniformed officers standing near it didn’t worry her nearly as much as the sleek Packard parked at the side of the road. Two men dressed in dark suits and fedoras lounged against the fender.

Matthias Jones and Luther Pell were supposed to be dead.

This new development went a long way toward explaining why her nerves had been so badly strained in the past few hours. She thought about the body she had left on the road a few miles back.

Time to rewrite the script. Again.

Cue: Woman screaming.

Chapter 49

Raina put down the phone, visibly relieved.

“That was Luther,” she said. “It’s over. He and Matthias are safe and there has been an arrest, but the case has taken another screwy turn.”

“Describescrewy,” Amalie said.

She and Raina were in Luther’s private booth overlooking the tiered seats on the main floor of the Paradise. It was one thirty in the morning and the club was crowded with the usual assortment of glamorously dressed people. The orchestra was playing a hot dance number. A sprinkling of celebrities glittered in the discreetly illuminated star booths; tinsel on an overdecorated Christmas tree.

“Get this,” Raina said. “Two people showed up at the bridge to buy the rotors. One is evidently a guy named Ray Thorpe. The other was none other than Lorraine Pierce.”

“Lorraine Pierce?”Amalie thought she had been prepared for a dramatic revelation but this was more than she had expected. “The gossip columnist?”

“Yes.”

“Okay, that qualifies as a shock.” Amalie paused. “Or maybe not. I never did like the woman. What about the rotors?”

“Luther and Matthias retrieved them and the Ares machine at the roadblock,” Raina said. “But here’s where things get screwy. Evidently, when Lorraine hit the roadblock, she threw herself, sobbing hysterically, into the arms of the police. Luther says Pierce claims that she was an innocent hostage who was forced to play a part in the scene at the bridge. She says Thorpe gave her a suit of men’s clothes and told her to keep her mouth shut.”

“He tried to make it look like she was working for him?”

“That’s her story.” Raina smiled a grim smile.

“What is Ray Thorpe saying?”

“He’s not saying anything. He’s dead, or so Pierce claims. They’re searching for the body now.”

“Hold on.” Amalie waved her hands. “You’re losing me here.”

“Lorraine Pierce told the police that she managed to get hold of Thorpe’s weapon when he stopped the car. She was sure that he intended to get rid of her because she was a witness. She shot him instead. Self-defense.”

“Who was Thorpe?”

“Pierce claims that he worked security at Silver Horizon Films.”

Amalie considered that briefly. “When you think about it, a job in security at a film studio would have made a very good cover for an international gunrunner based in L.A. He would have had access to all sorts of resources, like trucks and shipping containers. A crate full of weapons could have been passed off as props for a gangster film.”