The entrance to Sunset Park was just past the northwestern corner of the intersection, and he made the turn, driving the blue Taurus into Sunset Park. This place was frequented by hikers and dog walkers during the day and on weekends.
But this was a weekday and the sun was down. He should have the park to himself.
Olsen took the narrow road that skirted the large pond, looking for just the right place. He found an incline under a clump of trees, pointed the nose of the car toward the lake, and put on the brakes.
There was an island in the middle of the water with some Easter Island–type heads on it, and there were some geese. That was all. He got out of the car, went into the backseat, removed his briefcase, go-bag, Val’s handbag with her wallet and phone, and put it all on the ground.
Then he went around to the trunk, patted it, and said, “Val, I gotta be going. I just wanted to say nice try and good-bye.”
Her voice was muffled.
“Can you give me some water, please?”
“Okay. Sure. Just a minute.”
Olsen did a cursory search of the grounds, found a nice flat rock, weighed about ten pounds. He got back into the car, rolled down his window. He started up the engine, and, keeping it in neutral, he placed the rock carefully on the accelerator. Then he released the hand brake.
The car didn’t budge, so Olsen got out of the car, slammed the door, and gripped the doorframe with both hands. He dug his feet in, pushed, got the car rolling, and ran with it a couple dozen yards down the slope.
When the car had a good steady momentum, Lester reached through the window, grabbed the gear shift on the right side of the steering wheel, and threw it into Drive—and the car shot straight ahead.
Winded, Olsen put his hands on his knees and watched as the car bumped over the lip of the pond and drove well into the water before the engine stalled out and the car began to float.
He watched the car settle unevenly, then sink in twelve feet of pond water until there was no trace of it at all.
The car would be found, of course, eventually. But by the time that happened, before Val’s body was identified, he’d be long gone, in another country, with a new identity.
He was looking forward to that.
Olsen stood in place for a moment to reassure himself that no one was going to come running out of the bushes yelling for the police. And when he was sure he was in the clear, he walked to the edge of the pond, hurled his unregistered gun as far as he could throw it.
Then he gathered the small bags and began the three-mile walk to McCarran International.
Chapter 105
FOUR HOURS AFTER leaving Las Vegas behind forever, Lester Olsen disembarked from the small plane at Aspen–Pitkin County Airport. He walked through the concourse, glanced at CNN on the TV screens, and saw no mention of a Ford Taurus with a body in the trunk found in Sunset Park’s pond. With luck, the car wouldn’t be discovered for at least another twelve hours, or maybe for days, but either way, by morning, he would be traveling as Jay Darnell in the first-class cabin of a jet heading to Tokyo.
A car was waiting for Olsen at National Car Rental, and he paid for it with Jay Darnell’s Visa card. He punched Cooper’s address into the GPS, then got onto Colorado 82 East toward Aspen.
When he was in the inside lane, Olsen turned on the radio, listened to music without really hearing it. He was thinking ahead, making plans as he stayed on the highway that narrowed and crossed a bridge, still heading toward town. From the bridge, he could see across the valley and into the mountains surrounding Aspen, where he would close the biggest deal of his life.
He called Barbie and told her he would be there soon.
“I’m having drinks with Bryce right now,” she said. “We’re going to bed early. Right, sweetie?” she called out. “Want to go upstairs now?”
“How could he say no to that?” Olsen said. “See you soon.”
Olsen took directions from the voice on the GPS; it brought him to West Main, where he continued along a residential, tree-lined corridor and from there through the commercial area of town. After passing the historic Hotel Jerome on the left, Olsen turned onto North Mill Street, which wound up the hill toward Bryce Cooper’s home.
It was a beautiful drive, but Olsen was working. He had always been able to play multiple hands of poker, and he’d done the same with Love for Life. Barbie and Tule had been in play at the same time. He’d hoped to add Val to the array of games on the table, but he’d always known he might have to cash in his best hand on short notice.
He thought about his contract with Barbie, locked away in his box in Zurich. It implicated her and indemnified him against the possibility of Barbie getting weak or greedy after the fact.
Olsen tuned back in as the GPS voice said, “Turn right in one-quarter mile.”
He turned off the radio, slowed the car, and switched off the headlights as he turned up the long drive to Bryce and Barbie Cooper’s house. He saw the gleam of lights through the trees, then, as he rounded the turn, he saw the enormous mountain-style house that was cantilevered out over the hill, overlooking Independence Pass, Aspen Mountain, and the entire valley.
The syringe of potassium chloride was in Olsen’s shaving kit, a shot he’d be able to deliver while Cooper was asleep. The drug stopped the heart without a trace. Cause of death would be written up as cardiac arrest, and it was inconceivable that anyone would contest it.
Olsen was thinking of the millions he was about to receive as he pulled the car up to the Coopers’ garage. He shut down the engine and called Barbie.
“There are so many doors, Barbie. Where should I go? Give me a hint.”
“Where are you?”
“Between the guesthouse and the garage.”
“Stay right there. I’ll come get you. I cannot believe it,” she said breathlessly. “My prince has arrived.”
Chapter 106
I WAS HOME at my beach house with the air-conditioning on high, wearing a suit and tie for my nine p.m. teleconference with the COO of the Hong Kong office. We were getting into the nitty-gritty of the operations budget when I got an urgent text from Mo-bot saying, Turn on the tube. It’s about the Sumaris.
I typed, I was there when they went down.
Mo-bot returned fire in caps. GO TO CNN. NOW.
I told Fred Kam that I had to call him back in five minutes, then I switched on the tube. I found the story running on CNN under the banner Breaking News.
I was looking at one of those picture-in-picture views. There, on the small picture, was a large, bearded man identified as Colonel Balar Aram of the kingdom of Sumar. He was behind a podium that bore the emblem of the United Nations, and he was wearing a stiff, sand-colored uniform with ribbons over the breast pocket, stars above the brim of his hat.
Surrounding the small picture of Colonel Aram was a larger picture of a violent protest on a wide, dusty street. The crawl at the bottom of the screen said, Sumari protesters storm the American embassy in Larumin, capital of Sumar.
The street protest was moving toward a two-story gray building with an American flag flying over the door. The protesters were highly agitated; street-wide chains of angry men with banners reading Down with the U.S.A. Down with American pigs. As I watched, they began throwing stones and bottles at men leaving the embassy heading toward black cars.
I tuned into the interview. Anderson Cooper was saying, “Colonel Aram, you are head of Ra Galiz. That’s the special forces division of the Sumari military.”
“Yes, and in particular, we are the official guard to the royal family. Both Khezir Mazul and Gozan Remari are cousins to King Naraal, may he live forever, and the royal family has sent a formal rebuke to the United States for this outrage against our country.”
“As I understand it,” Cooper said, “Mazul and Remari are being questioned in the murder of a desk clerk in a hotel in Los Angeles—”
“That is a lie and it is an obscenity,” Aram interrupted. “Our people are principled. T
hey would never kill anyone unless it was on the battlefield. And never a woman. Khezir Mazul is a national hero, and his uncle Gozan is a learned man, a scholar. He has no violence in him.”
Aram continued, “The arrest and attempted expulsion from the U.S. is an outrage against a law-abiding nation. Prince Khezir and Prince Gozan will be released, not because of diplomatic immunity, but because the police cannot charge them. There is no evidence of any kind. This is just like when the Italian diplomat Carlo Rizzo was arrested on the word of a chambermaid.”
In the background picture, cars were being rocked on the street in Larumin, protesters trying to open the car doors. It was maddening. How had Mazul and Remari become the victims of this story?
Maybe that had been the idea from the beginning.
I’d been looking at the Sumaris as criminals attacking women of Los Angeles. But maybe they’d been playing on the world stage from the beginning.
Chapter 107
I CALLED LUKE WARREN and he answered on the first ring.
“Did you hear, Jack? About the protest at the UN special session?”
“I saw it and I think I finally get the whole Remari-Mazul crime spree. I think this was a publicity stunt,” I said. “See if you agree. They did the crimes without any fear of doing the time and now the United States is being accused of setting them up. We don’t have a particle of proof, so we’re being painted as villains.”
“The rapes? The assaults? This is good publicity?”
“Had you ever heard of Sumar before these guys came to LA?” I asked him.
“Not really. I wasn’t much of a student,” the captain said.
“Well, Luke, you’ve heard of Sumar now. Look what Remari and Mazul have brought home to their nation: Headline news. A beleaguered small country, a little-known hunk of rock, is victimized by the U.S.A. See? No one will remember what they were accused of and yet they’re in the big time now. Sumar will be recruiting their army on this bull crap for decades.”
Warren said, “Well, back here on the local scene, Mazul and Remari will be released in the morning. We have nothing on them. No confession. No evidence. No blond female complainants. No bodies. Even the drunken doorman has gone underground. We have nothing on them at all.”
“I’m sorry, Luke. They played all of us. They got us good.”
PART FIVE
A FAMILY AFFAIR
Chapter 108
BARBIE SUMMERS COOPER was wearing short black silk pajamas when she met Lester Olsen at the veranda doors to the main house. She gasped, clasped her hands together, threw open the doors, and then, with a little shout, she jumped into his arms and wrapped her legs around his waist.
“Oh my God. Our day has come.”
He kissed her on the lips, a seal-the-deal kind of kiss, and patted her behind.
“Has anyone told you lately how cute you look in black?”
“Why, nooo,” she said. “But I’ve heard that black is the new gold.”
“And in your case, a great huge pile of it.”
He lowered Barbie to the ground, said soberly, “Now, you’re sure you’re sure, cutie? Not having any last-minute change of heart?”
“Don’t make me laugh, Lester. How about you? Any regrets? Will you please come inside, dear? Please.”
Lester entered the house and found himself in a great room of magnificent proportions: high cathedral ceiling held up by impressive beams, anchored with a stone fireplace you could roast a steer in.
Barbie said, “What are we going to do, Lester? I mean, what do I do? What do you do?”
“Where’s Bryce now?”
“I put the Ambien into his choc’lit. Triple his normal dose. Then I took him upstairs. He should be asleep.”
Lester said, “See this?” He took a little kit out of his jacket pocket, unzipped it, showed her the hypodermic needle. “It’s loaded with potassium chloride. This will stop his heart mid-beat. Guaranteed.”
“Is that one of your money-back guarantees?” She grinned. “Because I have put in my time, mister. I’m ready to be cut loose. I guarantee you that.”
“Shall we say good night to your husband?”
The staircase gripped the high fieldstone wall and climbed to the second-floor mezzanine, which was a half-floor deep by the width of the great room. Olsen followed Barbie across the floor, feeling that he was crossing a bridge into his new life.
At the end of the corridor was a massive handmade wooden door, which Barbie pushed open with the palm of her hand.
Bryce Cooper was in the middle of an enormous bed near the windows, ensconced in soft bedding and a dozen European-size pillows. Across from him, an old cowboy movie played on a sixty-two-inch screen.
“Barbie,” Lester said softly. “Sit down on the bed and just make sure he’s good and asleep.”
“Oh, once he closes his eyes, Lester, he is gone,” she said.
“Perfect,” Lester said. He held the needle up to the light of the television as Barbie gently called out, “Sweetie, I’m turning off the movie now.”
A flashlight beam appeared without warning, the light coming from a dark corner between a cabinet and the wall. It shone in Olsen’s eyes, blinding him and almost stopping his heart.
“Who’s that?” Barbie yelped.
She switched on the lamp on the end table. A man was sitting in a rocking chair at the far side of the armoire. The man kept the flashlight on Olsen as he got to his feet.
“I’m Bryce’s self-appointed bodyguard,” said the tall blond-haired man. “Don’t anyone move. I’ve got a gun.”
Chapter 109
SCOTTY PINNED BARBIE and Olsen with his flashlight beam. He had no backup and absolutely no authority to be in this house. Barbie could shoot him and be well within her rights.
Still, Pretty Boy Olsen had a syringe full of murder and would certainly send Bryce Cooper into the tunnel of death if he had two minutes alone with him.
The bedside lamp cast a romantic glow, but it left corners of the room unlit. If Scotty was going to survive this ad hoc rescue, he needed more hands—one to hold the gun, two to cuff Olsen, and another to call the cops.
Scotty saw how the situation could go wild in a hurry.
He said loudly, “Olsen, lie facedown on the floor. Barbie, interlace your fingers behind your head and do not move, understand me?”
Olsen wasn’t buying it. He said to Barbie, “Who is this guy?”
“He’s in computers. I don’t remember his last name. His first name’s Chris.”
Olsen made a move toward Barbie, casual-like, but this was no good. Scotty dropped the light, put his gun squarely on Olsen, and held it with both hands.
“I said get down, Olsen. Do it quick or I will fire and I won’t miss.”
Olsen dropped the needle and kit, leaned forward with his hands out in front of him as though he were going to kneel. But it was a feint. He snatched Barbie from behind, held her in front of him like a shield. She let out a surprise squeal.
“Feel like taking a shot now, cowboy?” Olsen jeered. “Put down your gun and let’s talk. This is a big pie. It can be sliced three ways and everyone will be happy.”
A lot happened in the next few seconds.
Scotty lowered the barrel of his gun and squeezed the trigger; the bullet struck Olsen’s foot. Olsen screamed, and Barbie spun away from him. Scotty fired again and Olsen dropped to the ground, grabbed his knee, and howled even louder, “You killed me. You fucking killed me.”
Scotty said, “You, Barbie. Down on the floor. Don’t make me shoot you. I will do it.”
Holding the gun with his right hand, Scotty pulled his iPhone out of his shirt pocket, typed in 911, but before he could press Call, there was a commotion behind him.
He turned to see Bryce Cooper shrug off the bedding, hoist himself out of bed with a gun in his hand; must’ve been under his pillow. Bryce stumbled toward Barbie.
“Baby,” he called out. “Come to me, baby girl.” He turned to Scotty and sai
d, “I’m Bryce and you’re a dead man.”
Cooper’s gun looked like an H&R .32 long-barrel revolver. Scotty couldn’t see if the safety was off. He knew that the guy was loopy from sleeping pills but that didn’t mean he couldn’t pull a trigger.
Scotty fired at the man’s hand, and the gun jumped into the air, landed on the carpet near Olsen. Olsen reached for the gun, then screamed as his fingers were flattened under Scotty’s foot.
Scotty scooped up Cooper’s gun and stuck it into the waistband of his jeans, and for the moment, the situation stabilized.
Scotty pressed the Call button on his phone, said to the 911 operator, “I need the police and a bus. Man down with two gunshot wounds. Yes, he’s breathing.”
He gave the dispatcher the pertinent details, then leaned against the inside of the bedroom door, kept his gun ready, and watched the show.
Chapter 110
I WAS PULLING out of our underground lot when Justine darted out of the elevator, ran in front of my car, and slapped the hood.
“Jack. Wait.”
I opened my door and got out. “Christ, I could have hit you.”
“Mo-bot just got a call from a hospital in Las Vegas. Val’s been in some kind of accident. I don’t know what, Jack. Was she working on something for us?”
“Get in. Hurry.”
Justine was pale as she worked the phone, cajoling, pleading, arguing, but all she got from the hospital was that Valerie Kenney was in the ICU.
I wove around clotted traffic, passed in no-passing lanes as if I had flashers and sirens, was close to panic as I sped toward Santa Monica Airport, all the while wondering what had happened to Val, whipping myself for letting her take on an undercover job before she was ready.