He backed it up a few yards. Then he repositioned one of the unconscious guards in the driver’s seat and strapped him in with the seat belt. He jammed the guy’s shoe into the side of the accelerator, and the engine roared. He shut the door, reached in through the window, and shifted the automatic transmission lever into drive.
The car lurched forward and gathered speed. It hit the
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plenty of momentum, punched through, and i out over the long drop-off.
; a lot of noise going down, tumbled and flipped I times. Santos was able to follow the car’s fall most way, until the car’s lights went out, probably be; the battery had been knocked loose.
amigos.
i not totally foolproof, but nobody would have any i to look past the obvious: The driver for a corporate sident, on the way home in the dark on a mountain had seen a deer or coyote or some other animal, on his brakes, and too bad, had skidded right cliff. Yes, a trained accident investigator might i that the safety railing was perhaps not damaged as i as a high-speed impact would warrant. But a Cali- i Highway Patrol officer would see skid marks that the limo’s tires, indicating that he had tried to e men would have died from injuries sustained in ck, and there would be no sign of drugs or other i that could not have come from the impact, Santos I certain of that.
; happened. A real CHP officer with any time ; job would likely have seen a dozen incidents just s, and if that was what you were looking for, men ; was what you would see. There would be no reason
anything else.
aybe die insurance company would send an expert to check on things. Even so, such an investigation I take time, measurements had to be made, tests run, written, and even then, a conclusion would not be
o, Mr. Acidente Experto, why is it you think this was ,J an accident? fjWell, the guardrail did not show damage consistent jtth a high-speed impact.
$ Perhaps the metal in this rail came from a particularly irong batch? ?:Not according to my tests.
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Yes, but-how do you know how fast the car was going when it struck the guardrail, eh?
The length of the skid marks is indicative of substantial velocity.
Ah, but putting on the brakes slowed the automobile down, no? Perhaps enough so that the impact was considerably lessened? Is this not possible? . Yes, it is possible…
As he hiked back toward where he had a hidden car waiting-one with license plates he had swapped with a car in the long-term parking lot of the aeroporto in San Francisco-Santos smiled to himself. If, a week or a month from now, the authorities did somehow become convinced that the limo’s destruction had not been an accident, that would not matter. By then, the information he had been sent to collect would have been used. How? He didn’t really know or care, that was not his problem. He had been sent to get it, he had gotten it, end of story. There was no way to tie him to the incident in any case. He had bought the car under a false name. Nobody knew him here, and nobody who might have seen him would know who he was or where he had gone. He was just another black man, and they all looked alike to whites, no?
He would call Jasmine when he got back to San Francisco, using a disposable mobile phone. A short message telling her answering service the job was complete. That would make her feel better. Missy was wound too tight. The only time she loosened up was in bed, and even then, she never let everything go; there was always a part of her still in control. He intended to get past that eventually. Bring her to pure animal pleasure, no mind left, just howling and quivering in ecstasy. It might take a while, but he didn’t mind-getting there would be half the fun.
And once he had her there, she would be his slave. Then he would dump her and find another. The world was full of women.
1O
ton, D.C.
. was expecting the postman; the most recent order of ivory slabs for her scrimshaw should be here about so when the doorbell rang, that’s who she thought [was. Not that she had gotten much scrimshaw done the baby was born, bits and pieces while he was ng, mostly. Nobody had told her what a full-time ic small human child was.
: opened the door, but instead of the postman, Guru I there.
old lady smiled at Toni’s startled expression. 3, best girl. Surprise.” i**Guru! What are you doing here!” |*Waiting to be invited into your house.” feToni opened the screen door and held it wide. “Come t; come in!”
a-which in Bahasa Indonesian meant “teacher”- up her suitcase and moved past Toni into the She also carried a heavy, wooden cane. |The old woman, whose name was DeBeers, was com
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ing up on her eighty-fifth birthday. She’d had a stroke back when Toni was five months pregnant, and was supposedly recovered completely. Toni had seen her when she’d taken the baby back to show off to her family six or eight months ago, and Guru hadn’t been using a cane then.
But before she could ask, Guru read her mind: “The stick is for defense, not for walking. Do you think I could ‘come all the way from the Bronx on a train unarmed? Did I not teach you better than that?”
Toni laughed. Of course not. Pentjak silat was a weapons-based art. You only used your hands if you didn’t have anything else available. Guru used to say, “You are not a monkey, use a tool. You can fight with your hands. You can also butter your bread with your finger, but why would you if there is a knife handy?”
Toni waited until Guru had put her bag down and found a seat on the couch. “I’ll go make the coffee,” she said.
“That would be nice,” the old woman said. “You have any of my nephew’s Javanese beans I sent you left?”
“Sealed in a vacuum bag to keep them fresh,” Toni said.
“You are a good girl. How is our baby boy?”
“He’s terrific. Taking his nap right now, he’ll probably be awake soon.”
“This is also good.”
Toni hurried off to grind the coffee beans and put them into the gold mesh filtered drip pot. She used bottled water -Guru was particular about her coffee-and once everything was going, she hurried back into the living room.
“I am happy you are here,” Toni said. “You should have called. I would have come to the train station and collected you.”
“And miss the look on your face when you saw me? No.”
Toni smiled again. Guru had been family since Toni had begun learning the martial art of silat from her more
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(sixteen years ago. Toni had been thirteen when she’d ib the old lady, past retirement age even then, clean up |front stoop with four thugs brave enough to threaten pipe-smoking granny. Guru had come from Java li her husband as a young woman, raised a family, and widowed before Toni had been born. Her husband f taught her the family martial art usually reserved for
, and she in turn had passed it along to Toni. I would not be polite to ask the old woman why she 1 come nor how long she planned to stay, but as usual, i was ahead of her. She said, “I will take care of the while you work.”
you, but, uh, I wasn’t planning on going back rk,” Toni said. “Not for a while, at least.”
i change, best girl. I think maybe you will go back soon.” i don’t see how-”
; phone jangled. Toni was tempted to ignore it, let | computer take a message, but Guru waved at her. should answer that,” she said. “I will go and check ; coffee.” She smiled. Foni shrugged. As she reached for the com, she saw ¾JD.
*ey, Alex. What’s up?”
Trouble here in River City,” he said. “Got a major ut on the web. It’s like somebody poked a stick in est of fire ants, they’re running around, mad as hell, ng everybody close. You know, I wish your mother n’t gone home, I could sure use your help on this.”
in stared into the kitchen at Guru, who was pouring I coffee from the pot into a carafe, humming to herself, ‘/had to be a coincidence. Had to be. iut deep in her soul, Toni didn’t believe it. What she eved was, Guru had knownl s She couldn’t have known that Alex would say that. And there she was, making coffee, as if Toni had called asked her to come up and watch the baby. She had i here, knowing Toni could use her help.