Nightwork, page 44
“I don’t know how you can do all this.”
“You’re doing a lot of the grunt work, which is appreciated. Making a lot of this—like the potato salad today—gives a chance for the flavors to blend. Plus, tomorrow’s for the fun.”
“I mean I don’t know how you can cook and host a party for a hundred people or more with all that’s going on.”
“If I don’t have it, people will wonder why. And when this is all done, it’ll stick out that I didn’t have it.” He took the pasta shells—al dente—from the stove and put them into the colander he had in the sink to drain for his shrimp salad supreme.
“I have a favor to ask you.”
“Besides peeling a million potatoes?”
“You’re doing a real good job.”
The eyebrow winged up an instant before she tossed a glare at him. “I know when I’m being patronized. What’s the favor?”
“Before I get to it, I’m telling you it’s not about taking choices away or protecting you. It’s more about protecting me if…”
“Scottish play, Booth.”
“Not that if. If LaPorte tries to implicate me. What you said before—about it being about you, that regrettable moment in New York. I’m playing on that. I’ve got a file I made up, with information on me—high school teacher me—and some others who have connections with some women he’s been with.”
She sat back, rubbed her nose with the back of her hand. “Oh, I see where you’re going. He’s kept files on men—you should add a woman or two in case some of his formers preferred women or fell for another woman.”
“That’s good.” He should’ve thought of it. “Okay.”
“He’s kept files, kept track because he’s an obsessive and vindictive personality. And if he tries to implicate you, that file just adds weight to my story.”
“Exactly. There’s more to the favor. I need you to be my alibi.”
“For what?”
“I need to go to Lake Charles, and I need you to stay here.”
“Wait a minute.”
“My alibi, Miranda. I have to go down, break into his house, plant the Goddess and the files and a few other things. At the same time, I have to be here. Right here. You can swear I was.”
“So your alibi can’t be there for the payoff?”
“I won’t be either. I’ll be back, I’ll be here. But it’s going to take time for me to get to DC, fly to New Orleans, drive to Lake Charles, do what I need to do, and get back here. I need twenty-four hours, and I’m asking you to give them to me.”
“This helps you.”
“Even more than peeling those potatoes.”
“When do you leave?”
“Sebastien and Mags are watching Russell. Russell booked himself a fancy suite in Georgetown, and Sebastien’s been in a couple times. He was in this morning while Russell was using the hotel gym. He checked Russell’s agenda on his laptop. He’s planning to hit tomorrow night.”
He poured the pasta into a bowl, added onion, celery, black and green olives he’d already prepped, then the shrimp he’d peeled and boiled.
“The night after this cookout? But—”
“So I need to leave right after everyone’s gone. I need to leave you with the cleanup, and I’m sorry about that. The timing’s going to work. It’s all going to work. If someone comes over or calls, you say I’m sleeping, or hungover, or taking a walk, whatever works. But I don’t anticipate anyone will. I’ll be back in twenty-four hours.”
“You’ve never told me how you plan to get into his house.”
“That’s the easy part. It’s nightwork I’ve planned for about twelve years now.”
“Will you go over it with me, so I can imagine it as it’s happening? So I can see you?”
“I can do that.”
“Then we have another deal. Start from the beginning, will you? Start with how you’re going to make sure Russell’s caught with the fake rock and whatever else he takes.”
With a nod, Booth began chopping herbs from his garden. “Okay. Here’s how it’s going to go.”
* * *
She thought she did well with the party, playing hostess when everything wanted to blur around her. She talked and ate and served and replenished. She watched Booth grill ribs and chicken and burgers as if it was just another summer party on a Sunday afternoon.
She played cornhole and bocce, screwed more beer and wine into ice-filled galvanized tubs. She dodged, as best she could, the broad hints and direct questions about her and Booth.
And finally took a break from it all in the shade with Tracey and a frozen margarita.
“No party like Booth’s summer bash.”
“I can believe it. People brought enough food to feed an army on top of what he made—which was enough to feed an army. I’ve never in my life spent that many hours in the kitchen.”
“You look so good together. No, no, I’m not asking,” she said when Miranda gave her a sidelong look. “I’m just saying. I know people have asked or pretended not to ask. Everybody loves Booth. You’re the first woman he’s had co-host this party, the first he’s been with this long. You extended your lease, but…”
Miranda looked over to where Booth tossed horseshoes. So relaxed, so calm, exchanging high fives with his partner when he tossed a ringer.
“We’re working a few things out. I have a feeling we’re going to lie around tomorrow like slugs, then work those things out.”
“I like both of you a lot, so I’m just going to say I know how I hope things work out.”
She handled it, Miranda thought, handled all of it—even though the last stragglers didn’t leave until after ten. She handled it until Booth came downstairs in a blond wig, with a goatee, and carrying a bag.
“Mags’ll be here in a minute to pick me up. Twenty-four hours, Miranda.”
“Don’t be late.” She grabbed him, held on. “Please don’t be late.”
“It’d be best if you stayed in the house. It’s supposed to rain anyway. We stayed in all day, slept in, cleaned up—sorry about leaving you with that.”
“It’s nothing. People insisted on helping clean up when I just wanted them out.”
“We stayed in, we slept in, we had sex—I’d appreciate having sex. Watched movies, took naps. What did we eat?”
“Party leftovers.” Her breath wanted to back up in her lungs. “You never left the house, neither of us did. Don’t worry about that. It’s an if anyway.”
“That’s Mags,” he said when he checked his phone. “She’s picking me up down the road. I have to go.” He kissed her, ran a hand down her braid. “Get some sleep. See you tomorrow night.”
“God. Okay. Break a leg. Merde. Don’t be late.”
“I’ve got this,” he said, and left her.
She looked at her watch, and started the countdown.
* * *
He changed in Mags’s apartment into his work clothes, and was on his way to Lake Charles when Sebastien called the drop phone.
“Russell’s through the first layer.”
“Stick to the timetable, and let me know when you hit the alarms.”
“How close are you?”
“About twenty minutes out.” He looked at Jacques for confirmation.
“About. I’m sticking close to the speed limit. Driving like an old lady in bifocals.”
“I’ll let you know when we go silent.”
When he ended the call, Jacques looked at him. “You’re sure this one’s good enough to get in?”
“I laid it out for him. He wants the money. He’ll get in.”
But he started to sweat it when Jacques pulled up to the drop-off point.
“I’ve got to go silent from here. Drive around if you have to. I’ll signal when I’m in the clear.”
“Don’t worry about me. I’ve got you.”
He had just started to call Sebastien when the phone signaled.
“Thank you, Jesus.”
“Thank me, mon ami. Do you hear that?”
Through the phone, Booth heard the alarms, the sirens, and closed his eyes. “Yeah, I hear.”
“I wish you could see. Lights, so many lights. The house is bright as Christmas.”
“Where’s he?”
“He nearly made it out of the house. Nearly. The woman tackled him as he ran through the door, and now he’s on the ground with her gun pointed at his head. The police are nearly there. And you?”
“At the drop-off. Going silent. I’ll get back to you.”
“Trap that pig of a man,” Jacques said as Booth got out of the car.
“That’s the plan.”
He had a ten-minute hike and took it at a light jog. He could see it all in his mind, the various ways he’d planned it out over the years. Refined it after making this same trip every time he’d visited New Orleans.
Not for profit this time, he thought. Not altogether for survival. This was a very nice blend of payback and justice.
And whatever happened after, if the final part fell, he’d pay whatever price was demanded for delivering that blend.
When he reached the compound, he deactivated the sensors and climbed the wall in the gap between cameras. There was always a gap if you knew how to find it.
He reset the sensors and kept going, fast and steady.
He stopped and crouched at the first outbuilding—storage for the landscape crew that came twice weekly. Security lights beamed, added a wash to the gardens and grass. A fountain tinkled musically, and in the near grove of trees, an owl called.
He looked toward the gatehouse. Lights on there, as guards monitored the cameras on six-hour shifts.
Exterior and interior—except for certain, more private areas.
LaPorte’s bedroom suite, his treasure room.
He made the next dash with the map of the cameras in his head and from the shelter of trees studied the sturdy trellis of purple bougainvillea. A short sprint.
He bounced for a moment, then hit the remote that bobbled the power for two seconds.
When it steadied, he was climbing.
Weak spot. Second-floor terrace. French doors, locked, with a six-digit alarm code. He dealt with the dead bolt first, then the lockset. He suspected LaPorte programmed no more than thirty seconds for the alarm—one he’d learned changed every six days, one with a secondary four-digit backup. Maybe ten seconds for that.
He got to work, focused on the flashing numbers, then reset for the backup.
And took the moment.
Dark, silent house. LaPorte sleeping in his sumptuous bed in his sumptuous suite, perhaps with a sumptuous companion.
Tomorrow won’t be a good day for you, he thought. Not a good day at all.
He started out, scanned the hallway, stepped over the red beams of motion detectors, and made his way downstairs.
The office would be locked, of course, and there’d be the camera to deal with. But they wouldn’t record on the guard’s monitors. Those were for LaPorte.
He dealt with the lock, eased the door open, shut the cameras down. If LaPorte had insomnia, checked his office feed, it all went to hell.
He checked the bookcase behind the desk for a mechanism and ignored the line of sweat running down his back. It would be there. It had to be. Because there was a room behind this one, and this was the only way in, or out.
Too long, too long, he thought as he searched. He needed the cameras back on.
He glanced back at the desk, crouched down.
“Idiot,” he muttered, and pressed the button. The bookcase eased open to the vault door behind it.
“Okay, a little more time here.”
Once again, he got to work. He worked the tumblers, worked the grid. Tricky, tricky. He paused, circled his neck, and got back to it.
Longer, much longer than he’d anticipated. More than an hour inside, he thought. He needed to get the hell out. He could still run. Back to Miranda, ask her to run with him. Anywhere.
And once again, LaPorte would take his life, his choices, his fate away.
Not this time.
Two hours until sunrise, and he was close, too close to toss it in.
When the last tumbler fell, he pulled open the door.
Of all the rooms of its kind he’d seen, this was the most plush. A palace designed for one man, one ruler, one tyrant.
The red beams crisscrossed the room.
Booth took out a phone, recorded it, every inch. The gold, the ivory, the porcelain and marble. The jewels, the art. Priceless antiques, exquisite lamps. Ming vases, figures carved in alabaster.
He looked at the painting he’d stolen, the glory of that Turner sunrise. He took a photo of it, and of the sculpture that had cost him all those years with Miranda.
He recognized other pieces taken from museums, private homes, rooms like this one. Some of those thefts had cost lives; he knew that, too.
He danced over, under, around the beams to an empty pedestal.
He noted the single downlight that would illuminate it. He wondered if LaPorte had had it custom made in anticipation.
Booth took out the Goddess, set her on the marble. “Only for a little while,” he murmured. “He won’t keep you here. I swear it. He won’t keep any of you.”
He made the next recording, took another photo.
Then stepping out, he locked the vault, recorded, closed the bookcase, recorded.
He retraced his steps, just a shadow drifting through a dark house. When he climbed down, he hit the remote for his quick sprint.
When he landed on the far side of the wall, he checked the time.
Two hours forty-three. A solid forty-three longer than planned. He might be a little late after all.
Once he signaled Jacques, he started his jog back as the sun broke the night and bloomed rosy in the east. Birds woke to sing to it.
When he checked in with Sebastien, he learned Russell sang with them.
“You took your time, cher,” Jacques said when Booth got in the car.
“Just a little extra complication, but we’re good.” He set the phone between them. “It’s all on there. You can do your magic.”
“Can and will. Why don’t you drive, and I’ll start now?”
“You can do it from the car?”
“I think by the time we get home, the police, the FBI will have a very nice gift, wrapped pretty and tied in a big, fat bow.”
“Pull over.”
* * *
At midnight, Miranda walked the floor. He was late, damn it. Already an hour late. Mags had assured her he was fine, had boarded the flight from New Orleans to DC, and wasn’t currently in custody.
But all she could imagine was him being dragged off the plane at the airport, cuffed and charged.
Otherwise, he should be back. They said everything went according to plan, but this wasn’t the plan.
Then she heard the door open. She raced downstairs, and there he was, holding a very sad bouquet of flowers in cellophane.
“You’re late,” she said, then sat down on the steps and burst into tears.
“Don’t, don’t. Please. I’m sorry. And the flowers are really lame. Mags told you everything was fine, didn’t she?”
“But you weren’t here. Give me those damn flowers.” After snatching them, she buried her face in them and shed more tears. “Are the cops on their way?”
“Not here,” he said, and smiled and brushed away her tears. “Everything’s fine. Everything worked. Not only did Russell roll, but there’s the money trail, and the anonymous tip—a recording of LaPorte’s treasure room, the Goddess. There’s also another payment he made, to another account they won’t be able to track back. Looks like the Chameleon to me. He hired him, right? But the deal went sour, so he hired Russell.”
“But the Chameleon put the fake in place, then set LaPorte up. He sent the recording.”
“Renege on a deal,” Booth said cheerfully, “pay the price. I really want a Coke. Let me get a Coke, and I’ll walk you through the whole thing.”
“You’re not even tired.”
“Pumped. Really pumped.” He could have danced his way to the moon and back. “Might sleep for a week once I crash, but pumped. Let’s have a Coke.”
“I’m having wine. I didn’t want to drink anything in case I had to bail you out, or bake a cake—my first—with a file in it.”
In the kitchen, he opened the doors to let the night in.
“I needed to make sure it all worked. At LaPorte’s, in DC. A lot of threads, Miranda.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about. We’ve been home all day. It rained all morning and into the afternoon.”
He poured her wine, opened a Coke for himself. “Anybody call, come by?”
“Cesca called midafternoon, just to say what a great party. I told her you’d fallen asleep watching Casablanca, and I might take a nap myself.”
“I don’t see me falling asleep during Casablanca.”
“You were really tired after all that sex.”
He grinned. “Okay then. The cops might come by. I’m thinking not for more than a tie-up, since it’s all right there, every step he took, and the files he kept on me, you, others. We’re the latest, which is why—if he tries to push it on me—he chose us.”
“I’m not worried about it. I’m really not. I’m going to put these sad, sweet flowers in water.”
“He had this emerald ring that would look great on you—a little flashy at about ten carats, but you could pull it off. I resisted it.”
“Good choice.”
“I’ve been in the house twice before.”
“I know.”
“No, you don’t. I’ve been in the house twice when he wasn’t there. To see if I could get in, to see the setup. He didn’t have the vault last time, or the desk button, but it’s been a few years. So it took longer.”
“You’ve broken into his house before?”
“Practice runs.” He drank some Coke. “And he’s really beefed up his personal museum. There’s a diamond, Russian white, beautiful teardrop pendant. I don’t know who did that job for him, not for certain, but I know the woman it belonged to was beaten to death for it.”
