Deadly Intent (2 page)

Broke and bitter, Ian and Earl had drifted apart, each looking for the next get-rich-quick scheme. A couple of years later, Ian heard Earl was back in jail, this time for killing a cop, and had been sentenced to die.

Ian wouldn’t have given Earl a second thought except that he had hatched up a clever little plan regarding Abbie, and he couldn’t put it into action without his old buddy. Getting in to see him, however, hadn’t been easy. Even though Stateville wasn’t a maximum-security prison, only

immediate members of the family were permitted to visit death-row inmates. It wasn’t until Earl’s wife, Anna, had told prison officials that Ian was an old friend, practically one of the family, that he had been allowed in.

After a thorough search, both of his body and his belongings, he was escorted down several narrow corridors and into a room with two booths separated by a pane of thick glass. A telephone hung on each side of the partition. Choosing the far booth, Ian sat down and looked nervously around him. The atmosphere was different in this wing, quieter and more somber. You could almost hear a clock ticking, even though he didn’t see any. Maybe the eerie feeling came from knowing that somewhere on this floor was the death chamber, patiently waiting for its next occupant. Ian shivered.

He had begun to sweat profusely, when he heard the rattle of chains approaching. A few moments later, Earl walked in, escorted by two guards. Surprisingly, in spite of six long years on death row, the man had held up remarkably well. His hair had turned a dull gray and was sprouting out of his head in spiky clumps. He was also heavier than Ian remembered, more solid under the faded, blue prison suit.

His hands and feet shackled, he shuffled to the booth and sat down. That’s when Ian noticed the small black book Earl had brought in with him and laid on the table. A bible. He had heard that some death-row inmates turned to God when all else had failed, but he had never pegged nasty, foul-mouthed Earl as a believer. Worried his hopes for some quick and easy money would collapse like a deck of cards, Ian searched the man’s face for a moment, waiting to hear the words fooled you coming out of Earl’s mouth. But if Kramer sensed his old partner’s anxieties, he didn’t let on.

Ian waited until Earl had picked up the phone with both hands before speaking into it. “How’re you doing, buddy?”

Earl glowered at him. “I’m on fucking death row. How do you think I’m doing?”

Ian relaxed. Now that was the Earl he knew. “I guess that was a stupid question.”

The halfhearted apology seemed to go over Earl’s head. “What the hell you doing here anyway? I thought after what Garcia threatened to do to you, you’d be halfway across the country by now.”

“I will be, soon.” Ian glanced at the two guards standing by the door. They were watching him but looked more bored than suspicious. He lowered his voice. “I have a proposition for you.”

“You’re gonna spring me?”

Ian laughed. “I thought a man with your connections would have already figured a way to get out of this place.”

“Connections don’t come cheap.”

Ian grinned. “In that case, you’re definitely going to like my proposition.”

Trying to appear as though they were having an ordinary conversation, Ian lowered his voice another notch and laid out his plan.

One

June 3

Princeton
,
New Jersey

“Way to go, Ben!”

Abbie DiAngelo sprung to her feet and clapped vigorously as the ball her nine-year-old son had just hit sailed over both the infield and the outfield, before falling two feet short of a home run.

“Go, go, go!” The crowd whooped and cheered as two runners came home and Ben reached third base in a spectacular slide.

The umpire threw his arms flat out, signaling Ben safe.

Grinning, Ben got to his feet and took a congratulatory hand slap from his third-base coach before glancing toward the bleachers. Abbie gave him the thumbs-up sign. In reply he tugged the brim of his helmet, but she knew that beneath all that composure, he was elated. His batting had been off lately, but thanks to Brady Hill, Campagne’s young sous chef who had once dreamed of playing for the Yankees, Ben’s technique had improved dramatically in the last two weeks, and so had his batting average.

Fifteen minutes later, the undefeated Princeton Falcons were making their way toward the stands and their proud parents. As Ben stopped to say a few words to one of his

teammates, Abbie watched him for a moment, feeling the familiar knot in her stomach. She was so proud of him, of the way he had turned out, warm, open and goodhearted. For a while, the fear of raising a child on her own had been so overwhelming she had actually questioned her decision to divorce Jack. But, as her mother had been quick to point out, staying in a bad marriage was often more detrimental for a child than going through a divorce. And if anyone knew how devastating a bad marriage could be, it was Irene.

Funny how her life had paralleled her mother’s in so many ways, Abbie thought. Both had made some bad choices, yet both had survived, concentrating solely on their child, and emerging from their respective ordeals stronger than ever.

His bat bag slung over one shoulder, Ben ran toward her. Except for his sunny disposition, which he had inherited from her, the nine-year-old was his father’s spitting image. He had Jack’s flaming-red hair and big blue eyes and the same sprinkle of freckles across his nose.

“Did you see that triple, Mom?” His eyes filled with youthful excitement. “And the double before that?”

Abbie’s first impulse was to give him a big hug. Just in time she remembered that now that he was nine, hugs and kisses were reserved for home, so she contented herself with tousling his hair. “I sure did. I’m proud of you, sport.”

“Jimmy says my three RBIs won the game.”

Not wanting to dampen his spirits, Abbie chose her words carefully. “You were awesome out there, but you remember what we talked about the other day? Baseball is a team effort. All the players contributed to tonight’s win.”

Ben nodded, if somewhat reluctantly. “That’s what the coach said.”

Abbie smiled as she savored this moment with her son; even though the dinner hour at Campagne was well under way and she ought to be getting back, she didn’t rush him. Brady would cover for her. “I think that triple deserves a special treat. What do you say we stop at Flo’s for an icecream cone before I drop you off at the house?”

“Before dinner?”

“Let’s live dangerously.”

Ben rewarded her with another happy grin. “Cool.”

Forgetting the “no touching in front of his friends rule,” Abbie draped an arm around his narrow shoulders and together they headed toward her red Acura SUV. Just then, a feeling she hadn’t had since her ex-husband had threatened to take Ben from her skittered across her skin. Mildly alarmed, she glanced around. A man stood a few feet away, one shoulder against the wire fence that partially circled the ball field. Although he wore jeans, a polo shirt and sneakers—the standard clothing for Little Leaguers’ dads—something about him didn’t quite fit. Maybe it was because he was alone. Or it could be the unsettling way he kept looking at her. Common sense told her he could be completely harmless, a fan of youth baseball. But in this day and age, with so many predators roaming the streets, it wouldn’t hurt to be cautious. If she saw him again at the next game, she would point him out to Ben’s coach.

Trying to shake her uneasy feeling, Abbie tightened her hold on her son’s shoulder, and didn’t let him go until they had reached the SUV.

Ian watched Abbie get into her car, a bright-red SUV, pleased to see that he had made her nervous. He loved to rattle people. It made whatever little surprise he had in store for them so much more gratifying.

From the restaurant, he had followed his stepsister to the

ball field and had quickly realized she had a son on the Falcons, the team currently in first place. Picking him out, however, had proved a challenge since none of the players had the name DiAngelo written on their shirts. It wasn’t until he heard Abbie cheer and call his name that he had finally spotted him, a freckle-faced, redheaded kid with a big, toothy grin. The back of his shirt bore the name Wharton in big black letters.

The boy had been a surprise. Abbie hadn’t mentioned him in the interview, and nothing Ian had read on the restaurant’s Web site before leaving Ohio had suggested she had a child. Or that she was even married. That thought didn’t thrill him. A man in her life would complicate things. On the other hand, he hadn’t seen a wedding ring on her left hand, so maybe she was divorced. Or widowed. Or maybe she was one of those flaming feminists who had gotten herself inseminated, just to show the world she didn’t need a man to raise a kid.

Either way he wasn’t complaining. So far, everything had gone pretty much according to plan. Even Rose, good, dependable Rose, had come through for him. She hadn’t exactly welcomed him with open arms, though. In fact, it had taken some doing on his part to keep her from slamming the door in his face, but in the end, she had let him in.

“I’m turning my life around,” he had told her with all the sincerity he could muster. “I’m getting out of this crummy town and starting fresh.” He had given her a long, sober look. “And I want you to come with me, Rose.”

He’d proceeded to tell her how he had located his stepsister and was hoping she would loan him some money—enough to rent a decent apartment and buy some new clothes so he could start looking for a job. He hadn’t told her anymore than that. Rose was funny that way. She was

too much of a straight arrow, and the less she knew, the better off he was.

At the word job, Rose had looked doubtful, and for good reason. In the past, his inability—or, as she put it, his unwillingness—to find a job had been the subject of endless arguments between them.

But even though he felt he was deserving of an Oscar for his performance, it had taken a while for Rose to warm up to the idea of leaving Toledo, where she was born and raised. It took her even longer to agree to finance their trip to Princeton, New Jersey.

“Look at it as an investment,” Ian told her as he rubbed her leg in that slow, sexy way she liked. “An investment in us.”

Those last words had worked magic. Rose had melted in his arms, and two days later, she had given notice to her landlord and to her boss at the beauty shop where she worked as a manicurist.

The bad news was that Rose didn’t have as much of a nest egg as he had hoped. And since he didn’t know how long it would take Abbie to come up with the money, they would have to watch their pennies. Even that crummy motel on Route 27 was a rip-off.

After checking in earlier today, Ian had borrowed Rose’s Oldsmobile and taken a drive to Palmer Square for a close look at Abbie’s restaurant. He had been impressed. The square was one of those fancy-shmancy shopping centers designed around a small park the locals called the Green, and surrounded by trendy boutiques and expensive restaurants.

From the restaurant, he had gone to the tax assessor’s office in search of his stepsister’s address, as well as Irene’s. Realizing he was from out of town, a helpful clerk

had taken out a tax map and showed him the location of both streets.

If success could be measured by the size of a house, then Abbie had done all right for herself. Her house was twice the size of the McGregors’ house in Palo Alto and was surrounded by several acres of land, most of it heavily wooded. Irene, on the other hand, lived in a well maintained but modest two-story home in a working-class neighborhood.

Pulling away from the fence, Ian walked toward the Oldsmobile. He had heard enough of Abbie’s conversation with her son to know that she was taking him for an ice cream and then home. She hadn’t said what she planned to do afterward, but his bet was she’d be going back to the restaurant for the dinner crowd.

With nothing to do, he drove back to Palmer Square, found a parking space in the small lot in back of the restaurant and waited. Sure enough, half an hour later, the red SUV pulled in.

Pretending to be reading a road map, Ian watched his stepsister get out of the car and hurry toward the restaurant. It would be a long wait until she closed up the place, but he didn’t mind. Ian was a patient man—when the stakes were high enough.

Two

June 3

El Paso, Texas

“No, Arturo.” Tony Garcia put himself between his older brother and the duffel bag on the bed. “You’re not going after McGregor.”

Arturo, a whole foot taller than Tony and a hundred pounds heavier, shoved him aside. “Who’s gonna stop me?”

“Me.”

“Lay off me, Tony, okay?” Arturo threw a handful of clothes into the bag. “I waited ten long years to make that son of a bitch pay for what he did, and by God, he’s gonna pay.”

“He’s not worth going back to prison for.”

“I ain’t goin’ back to prison.”

“You will if you kill him.”

Arturo came to stand in front of Tony. He was a huge man, with the strength of a bull and a temper to match. He looked even more menacing now that he had shaved his head and grown a goatee. “What I do to McGregor is my business, brother.”

Unfortunately, it wasn’t just Arturo’s business. Tony thought with a sigh. Not that he wanted to be his brother’s

keeper, but he had no choice. Six months ago, he had made a promise to his dying father to keep Arturo out of trouble and he intended to make good on that promise.

“Arturo, be reasonable,” he said, appealing to a side of his brother that didn’t exist. “It’s been ten years. Time to forgive and forget.”

Arturo glared at him. “If I did that, the whole barrio would laugh at me. I’d lose my edge.”

“So that’s what this is all about? Saving face?”

“It’s about getting my money back.” Arturo brought his face close to Tony’s again. “Thirty grand that little vermin took from me. I want it back, man.”

“Are you telling me all you want is your thirty thousand back?”

Arturo threw a pair of scuffed boots into the duffel bag. “That’s a start.”

“Then give me your word you won’t kill him.”

“That depends on McGregor. If he gives me no shit, maybe I’ll let him live. If he does...” He shrugged.

“And then what? You get caught and you go back to prison. What will happen to Ma if you’re sent away again? That last time almost killed her.”

“She’ll be okay. She’s got you.”

“No, she doesn’t.”

Arturo stopped, one hand on a T-shirt. “What the fuck you mean by that?”

“I mean that I’m not going to be here, Arturo. If you insist on going after McGregor, then I’m going with you.”

“I don’t need a fucking baby-sitter!” Arturo bellowed.

“Get used to it, because I’m going to be right there.” He punched the air with his index finger repeatedly, each time coming within an inch of Arturo’s nose. “In your face, keeping you on the straight and narrow. You got that, Arturo?”

Before Arturo could get a chance to close his mouth, Tony stormed out of his brother’s room, wishing he could just keep on walking and leave Arturo to his fate. But the truth was, Tony loved that big jerk. And he owed him for sticking up for him when they were kids, always coming to his defense and scaring the shit out of whoever had the audacity to throw a punch at the younger Garcia.

Raised in the barrio, both boys had been talked into joining a street gang at an early age. Tony had been fourteen and Arturo nineteen. Four years later, disgusted with all the violence, Tony had left the Blades and gone to work at his parents’ grocery store. He had even started taking a few courses at the local college. Arturo, on the other hand, already had his sights on becoming the gang’s next leader. Shortly after his initiation as the Blades’ new jefe, a well dressed, smooth-talking man had approached Arturo and told him he was a powerful drug kingpin and was looking for someone with balls to run his distribution center in Toledo, Ohio.