Don of the Dead (31 page)

The
something
was a person. A man, I thought, but it was kind of hard to tell. That's how fast he moved.

It was like a scene straight out of a Jet Li movie. The mystery man knocked the rifle off the hit man's shoulder. At the same time, he did a roundhouse kick and caught the hit man square in the chest. Mr.

Light-Hair-and-Sunglasses staggered but didn't fall. He took a poke at Mr. Mystery, who ducked under his fist, got in a right hook that snapped the hit man's head back and knocked off his sunglasses. He finished the slick moves with an expertly delivered karate chop.

Even from where I lay in the mud, I saw the whites of the hit man's eyes when they rolled back in his head. Right before he passed out.

By now, I was sitting up, my breath tight and painful, my astonishment, I thought, complete.

Except that astonishment turned to amazement and amazement morphed straight to flabbergasted when the mystery man skittered down the hillside and hurried over to me.

It was Dan.

He knelt down in the mud and reached for my arm, searching for a pulse. His hold was firm. His voice was even. "Are you okay?"

Was I?

I guess the fact that I started to laugh proved I was. Or maybe it just proved that I had finally gone over the edge where I'd been dangling since the day I met Gus. I couldn't stop.

"It's all right." Dan rubbed my back. Just like Quinn had done that day back at my apartment when I ran into the Albeit welcoming committee. "You're just a littleshocky , that's all. You'll be fine."

I swiped my hands over my cheeks. When I was done, they were wetter and stickier than ever. Mud.

Blood. Tears. It was an ugly mix and I didn't even care. I latched on to Dan, sure that when I made the move, he'd disappear in a
poof
that proved this was all just a figment of my warped imagination.

"What are you doing here?" I asked him. I looked over to where the hit man lay beaten and battered.

"How—"

"I came to see you. At your office. You weren't there but then I heard the shot. There's no mistaking the sound of an AK-47. I knew somebody was in trouble, I just didn't know it was you."

From a distance, I heard the wail of police sirens. "I called." Dan said it almost apologetically. "I didn't have much of a choice. I knew you'd need some help and I can't… " He hopped to his feet. "I can't stick around. You wait here. They'll find you. They'll take care of everything."

"But Dan… " If I'd thought about it, I would have convinced myself that my legs wouldn't support me. I didn't care. I had to get to Dan before he got away. I struggled to my feet, grabbed his arm, and refused to let go. "You're the Brain Man. How could you… How would you know… How did you do that?"

The light was failing but still, I caught the flash of Dan's grin. "There's a lot you don't know about me," he said. Right before he kissed me quick and disappeared into the evening shadows.

"
Imagine you getting caught in the crossfire between
two hoodlums!" Ella's voice wavered between out-and-out terror and motherly concern. "Thank goodness the police showed up before anything really serious happened to you. You're so lucky!"

Lucky?

Yeah, I guess I was.

Maybe I was in shock, too. That would explain why I felt like I was floating, like I was watching a scene happening to someone else.

Ella was on call that week for cemetery emergencies and she was already home when she heard from the Garden View security service that something was up and she had to get back as soon as possible.

She was dressed in blue jeans, sneakers, and a tie-dyed shirt. It was red and green and blue, and the colors swam in front of my eyes, twirling and swirling into a blur.

When she held out a different shirt to me, I accepted it automatically. We were in my office and for the time being—at least until the cops who were milling around outside and trampling the plants near the chapel showed up to have at me again with a barrage of questions like the ones they'd asked me when they arrived—there was no one else around. I stripped off my shirt and slipped into the T-shirt. It saidMONTICELLO JUNIOR HIGH
SPRING FIELD DAY
on it in big green letters and it was too tight in the chest and too big at the hips.

Still, it sure beat my own shirt. Or at least what was left of it. I hadn't even realized how bad I must have looked until I dropped the shirt on the floor and I saw that it was torn at the neck, muddy in the back, and stained just about everywhere with dark red dots.

Blood.

Albert's blood.

My stomach flipped. My head spun.

"Sit down. Quick." Ella rolled my desk chair up behind me and as soon as it hit the backs of my legs, I collapsed into it.

"Put your head between your knees if you have to." She pushed down on the back of my neck and have to or not, my head went down.

"Breathe deep."

I tried. Not easy considering that I was twisted like a pretzel.

"Relax, and let all that tension melt away. Let it out. Let it go. Be one with a peaceful universe. There you go. Better?"

I fought against the pressure of Ella's hand to sit upright, and when I was finally able to, I gulped in a breath. "Better. Yes. Really." I
was
better once I could breathe. "I just—" My shirt was still on the floor and I chanced another glance at it. My stomach wobbled. My ears buzzed. "I guess I'm just a little overwhelmed."

"I'll bet." Ella dug through the trash can next to my desk. She found the plastic grocery bag I'd used that morning to carry my breakfast to the office and she dug out the empty raspberry yogurt carton and the lifted-from-McDonald's plastic spoon. Gingerly, she picked up my shirt and dropped it inside the bag.

"Evidence," she said. "At least that's what I think the cops will say. They'll probably want to take your shirt to the lab and test it or something. You know, like they do on
CSI
. But that doesn't mean you have to wear it and it doesn't mean you have to look at it. Sorry about the T-shirt." She looked me over and frowned. "One of the girls left it here the last time they stopped after school to see me. It was the only thing I could find for you to wear."

Ella tossed the plastic bag—and the shirt inside—over near the door. She brushed her hands together, dragged my guest chair from the other side of the desk, and sat down, knees-to-knees with me. "You want to talk about it?" she asked.

I didn't. But I knew Ella wouldn't settle for that. Besides, I owed her. For the T-shirt and because she was genuinely worried about me. "Not much to say. It was late and I came in through the side gate. I stopped for a minute at Tommy's—" This wasn't the time to explain that part of the equation.

I didn't know where to start and besides, if I told the truth, Ella would think I was delirious and take me to the ER like she'd already threatened to do.

"I stopped for a minute," I said, picking up the narrative as seamlessly as I could. "That's when the shooting started. I didn't know what was happening." Not entirely a lie. "So I ran."

"Good thing you did. The police lieutenant I talked to said that man, the one who got killed… he said that man had ties to organized crime. Imagine!"

I could.

"And the other guy?" I'd been eager to find out what happened to the light-haired man in the sunglasses ever since the cops showed up and brought me over to my office. In true cop form, they weren't talking.

This was the first I had a chance to ask. Or at least the first I had a chance to ask someone who might actually answer my questions.

Ella patted my hand. "Don't think about it. It's over. You're right, according to the police, that horrible man was going to shoot you. I'll bet he knew that you saw him kill that other man and he wanted to silence you. Good thing he tripped and fell. He was out cold when the cops found him. They have him in custody and he's not going anywhere. And just in case you're thinking about it, you're not, either. You're coming home with me tonight. No arguments! Even as we speak, the girls are cleaning their room for you to use. Believe me, that in itself is a major accomplishment, and after I talked them into it, there's no way you can say no."

"I appreciate it. Really. But I've got things to do and—"

Relieved to hear me talking about what she assumed was everyday stuff and convinced that
it
proved that after everything, I was still the same old Pepper, Ella laughed.

"You are too good to be true," she said. "Thinking about work. Even at a time like this."

If only she knew that I wasn't thinking about the work she thought I was thinking about. I was thinking about TommyCavolo . I was thinking that I'd better find out how he figured in Gus's murder and why so many years later, somebody didn't want me to find out the truth.

Before that same somebody sent somebody else to try and kill me again.

"I know what you need. A nice, hot cup of tea." Ella popped out of her chair. "You'll be fine by yourself for a minute. I'll be right down the hall in my office getting the tea for you, and the police are outside." She promised she'd be right back and left.

"You okay, kid?"

I figured Gus was around somewhere. Luckily, he'd kept his mouth shut until Ella was gone and the door was closed behind her. I didn't think I could have dealt with the two of them. Not at the same time. Not that night.

I shrugged in answer to his question. The T-shirt tugged over my chest. "Idunno ," I told him because at that point, it didn't seem to make any sense not to be honest about the whole thing. "I know I wouldn't be all right if it wasn't for you. And Dan!"

I'd been so busy being dazed and confused, I'd blocked Dan's sudden appearance from my mind. It came back at me like a coldLake Erie wave, slapping me in the face. I looked at Gus in wonder. "What do you think that was all about?"

"You mean how he kissed you?"

It wasn't what I was talking about it, but once Gus mentioned it…

A flicker of heat sparked inside me.

Not something I wanted to think about with Gus watching me closely.

"I wasn't talking about the kiss," I told him and reminded myself. "I was talking about Dan and the whole Jackie Chan thing. Was that weird or what?"

"Some guys will do anything to impress a woman."

"I don't think that's what it was all about."

"Yougonna talk to him about it?"

"Maybe. One of these days."

"And that cop of yours?"

"Quinn is not
my
cop." I didn't add that I was glad he wasn't among the army of cops who had arrived, sirens blaring and lights flashing. He was probably atPietro's sharing the candlelight and dinner that was supposed to be mine with another one of his conquests. I suppose, after the way we'd said goodbye, it was just as well. The middle of a mob hit was not the right way to say hello again.

I twitched away the thought. My T-shirt strained. "For now, we have more important things to worry about."

"You mean Tommy."

I wheeled my desk chair back into place and hit the space bar on my keyboard. My computer screen flicked on. "What were those letters again?" I asked Gus. "The ones under the carving of the broken ring on Tommy's headstone?"