“Shhhh.”
Kara Lynn Shivers stood at the French doors.
“Sugar doll! Come here and meet Mr. Keyes.”
Reed Shivers whispered: “Isn’t she spectacular?”
She was. She wore tight jeans, white sneakers, and a gray Miami Hurricanes sweatshirt. Kara Lynn Shivers greeted Brian Keyes with an expert smile. It was one of the best smiles he’d seen in a long time.
“So you’re my bodyguard,” she said.
“It wasn’t my idea,” Keyes said.
“I can think of worse assignments,” Reed Shivers said with a locker-room wink.
Keyes said, “Kara Lynn, I’m going to tell you what I told your dad: I think you ought to drop out of the parade next week. I think you’re in serious danger.”
Kara Lynn looked at her father.
“I already told him,” Shivers said. “It’s out of the question.”
“Do I get a choice?”
“Of course, buttercup.”
“Then I want to hear what Mr. Keyes has to say.”
Kara Lynn Shivers was quite beautiful, which wasn’t surprising; one did not get to be Orange Bowl queen by looking like a wood-chuck. What did surprise Brian Keyes was the wit in Kara Lynn’s gray-green eyes and the steel in her voice. He had expected a chronic case of airheadedness but found just the opposite. Kara Lynn seemed very self-assured for nineteen, and canny—light-years ahead of her old man. Still, Keyes was wary. He had stopped falling in love with beauty queens when he was twenty-six.
“One reason Sergeant Garcia asked me to keep an eye on you,” Keyes said, “is because I’m the only person who’s seen the terrorists face-to-face. At least, I’m the only one still alive. They’re treacherous and unpredictable. And clever—I can’t overemphasize that. These guys are damn clever. Now, your father’s right: there will be scores of plainclothes police all up and down the parade route. You won’t see them, and neither will the folks watching on TV, but they’ll be there, with guns. Let’s hope Las Noches know it; then maybe they’ll think twice before trying anything.”
“Dad, suppose something happens,” Kara Lynn said.
“We pay the ransom, of course. I’ve already called Lloyd’s about a kidnap policy and arranged the very best—the same one all the top multinationals have on their executives.”
“That’s not what I meant,” Kara Lynn said sharply. “Suppose there’s a shoot-out during the parade, with all those little kids in the crowd. Somebody might get killed.”
“Now, darling, these police are expert marksmen.”
“Mr. Shivers,” Keyes said, “you’ve been watching way too much TV.”
Kara Lynn started to smile, then caught herself.
“In the first place, this gang doesn’t ask for ransoms. They don’t need your money,” Keyes said. “And your daughter’s absolutely right about the shooting. Once it starts, somebody’s going to die. As for all those cops being crack shooters, I guarantee you that half of them couldn’t hit the SS Norway with a bazooka at ten paces.”
“Thank you, Mr. Keyes,” Reed Shivers said acidly, “for your reassurance.”
“I’m not paid to give pep talks.”
“Dad—” Kara Lynn said.
“Sweetie, it’s the Orange Bowl Parade. Forty million people will be watching, including all the top talent agents in Hollywood and New York. Jane Pauley’s going to be there. In person.”
Kara Lynn knew the forty-million figure was a crock.
“Dad, it’s a parade, not a moon shoot.”
Reed Shivers’ voice quavered. “It’s the most important moment in your whole life!”
“And maybe the last,” Keyes said. “But what the hell. It’d be worth it just to see little Pumpkin’s face in People magazine, right?”
“Shut up, you creep!” Pink in the face, Shivers bounced to his feet and assumed a silly combative stance. With one hand Brian Keyes shoved him back into the folds of the camel sofa.
“Don’t be an asshole,” Keyes said. “This is your daughter’s life we’re talking about.”
Reed Shivers was so angry his body seemed to twitch. It was not an image the L. L. Bean people would have chosen for the spring catalog.
“If it’s so damn dangerous,” Shivers rasped, “why won’t they just cancel the parade?”
Keyes chuckled. “You know Miami better than that. Christ himself could carry the cross down Biscayne Boulevard and they’d still run the Orange Bowl Parade, right over his body.”