Rising seven stories above the Chesapeake Bay, the Chamberlin Hotel spread its Georgian-style arms before historic Fort Monroe, welcoming visitors like a stately old grandfather. To John, his mother, and generations of Hampton residents since the late 1800s, its sumptuous Chesapeake Room had been the place for special anniversary dinners, weddings, and proms. In the 1920s it had burnt down and been rebuilt, and it went bankrupt after Nine-Eleven. Last year it reopened as senior living for retired military—although it probably wasn't your average veteran who could afford the four thousand dollar a month rent. But the waterfront dining room was once again open to the public, and John was counting on that to help him nail George Clay for Bill Pride's murder.
The Army was supposed to leave the base next year, but for now, John still had to submit his photo ID and proof of insurance in order to reach the old hotel. That would be a problem if the next twenty-four hours didn't go well, but he had no way to avoid it. He'd swapped his 442 for a rented minivan in Richmond and hit his credit card up for a large advance; this trip had to be cash only.
He purchased a gift certificate for dinner for two at the restaurant, stipulating that it be valid only for tonight and tomorrow night. He resisted the urge to linger and enjoy the view from the enormous bayfront windows; it was best that no one in the restaurant remember him, if at all possible.
He headed back out to the minivan, left the base, drove up Mallory, and then hooked left to First Street. A pass by Clay's revealed both the white Ford 250 and the black Shelby Mustang in the drive. He drove a little farther up and slid into a two-hour parking space with a good view of Clay's house. He hoped Clay would need to go somewhere in that time; if he didn't, John could pull out and park at the marina and watch the road rather than the house.
After about forty-five minutes the Mustang backed onto the street with Clay behind the wheel and another guy in the passenger seat. John started the minivan and pulled out, hanging back until he could pick up a cover car. He tailed them to the Taco Bell on East Pembroke, and then to a tiny tanning parlor on Mercury. John pulled into a strip mall across the street, parked where he had a good view of the Mustang, and sat drumming his fingers on the steering wheel. He wasn't having good luck so far.
At length Clay and the other man came out and got back in the car, and John followed them into an old residential area off Grimes. They parked in front of a tiny house with dark gray siding.
John drove by on the cross street and hurried around the block. He hovered at the corner wondering just how long he could sit here and peek down the street without someone taking notice. Clay and the other man got out of the Mustang and the two men went into the house.
The door to the gray house closed behind them; all the blinds were down. John tooled down the street to the house and stopped next to the Mustang. The driver's side window was one third of the way down.
He jumped out of the minivan and sprinted around to the driver's side of the Mustang. If Clay thought the gift certificate had fallen out of his passenger's pocket, chances were he'd help himself to it. And if the passenger found it, he'd think it was Clay's and hand it to him. John fished the gift certificate out of his own pocket and folded it down to jeans-pocket size. He crinkled it up a little. Clay had locked the driver's side door, but John was able to flick the envelope into the passenger seat with his first two fingers as if it were a miniature Frisbee.
He dashed back to the minivan and took off.
***
After a lunch-and-bathroom stop for himself, John settled back down on First Street down from Clay's eyebrow house to see if Clay would take the bait. The Mustang had beaten him back there and sat parked again in the front drive.
If Clay did take the bait, John hoped it would be after dark. There weren't a lot of tall shrubs around here. Any of the neighbors could happen to glance out and catch him breaking into George Clay's house.
The afternoon sun rotated overhead, trying its best to creep under the low "eyebrow" on Clay's second story and into the upstairs windows, and it turned John's rental van into a miniature oven. John thumbed down the window in front and busied himself in the back with what he hoped were Clay's floor plans. An online search of Key West style houses had revealed a book of floor plans which, as it turned out, had been available in a book right down Broad at John's local Barnes and Noble. One house, the "Duval," was the spitting image of Clay's house, right down to the pale green paint, olive shutters, and gingerbread trim.
Looking the book up online had been a bitch. Porn ads kept popping up on his screen every ten minutes. His PC must have caught a virus, but he hadn't had time to deal with it. He'd tried to use Lizzie's laptop, but it had disappeared from its customary place on her desk.
At dusk, a pair of headlights snapped on in Clay's tiny, scrubby front yard, and the black Mustang once again hit the street. John followed slowly and at a distance, just long enough to confirm that Clay was, in fact, picking up a nicely dressed young woman and heading across the bridge at the eastern end of Mercury onto Fort Monroe. Time to get to work.
He'd scouted out the telephone box for Clay's neighborhood earlier. He drove back up First Street and hesitated. Was it better to cut the phone lines—disabling the security system this nearly million-dollar beach house surely must have—right now, and use every second of the two or so hours he figured he had? Or was it better to wait until it was pitch dark and then have to rush? John opted for the pitch black; better to avoid being seen. Cutting the phone line was easy and quick.
He hated the idea of parking across the street right in front of houses bigger and fancier than Clay's, but realistically he had no other option. If he parked in Clay's drive someone might write down his plate number.
He gathered his bag of stuff—a flashlight, wire cutters, lock picks, screwdrivers, cell phone, pliers, a wrecking bar, and the listening devices he had purchased. He pulled his gloves on and crossed the street. His heart pounded, and he even felt a little dizzy. He entered from the back; from the beach no one would see him but the baby blue crabs that scuttled along the beach at night.
An impressive rear deck greeted him—exactly like the one he'd looked up, a welcome sight. Short stilts lifted the house above the sand. A small patio snugged under the second-floor gallery with a spiral staircase to the right and a sunroom to the left. A big deck extended beachward from there, partially covered by a little roof on the left under which parked a bar and grill. Clay even had a small pool and a hot tub out there. Stairs descended to the beach.
The lock picks had been Pride's; the instruction in using them, also Pride's. John used them on the double doors to the sunroom, noting with satisfaction the home security sticker next to the doorknob.
The first order of business was to install a bug in every room that had a phone. John had brought three; the house had two phones. He checked behind him as he went from room to room for telltales—little threads lying anywhere in this showplace of a house, toothpicks that tumbled anywhere, or little pieces of clear tape bridging doors to doorjambs. Clay had a piece of tape on the sunroom door; John restuck it. He would go out a window instead.
He avoided placing bugs in the telephones. Today's phones could practically dial themselves; no doubt the electronics would be too complicated, and John wanted to catch cell phone calls, too, if he could. So, he opted for the electrical outlet closest to each phone, careful not to turn on any light a neighbor might notice from outside. The bugs would transmit to a voice activated recorder he would conceal down the street.
Finished, he checked his watch. "There's stuff you need to know about your dead sergeant," the anonymous caller had said that miserable night at Siné that had landed him in the hospital for almost three months. What had George Evan Clay had on Pride?
John started a systematic search of the house, room to room, any place where tapes, photos or important papers might be kept. He tried to work fast, but every drawer he opened had to be checked for tapes or threads first, then a cell phone picture taken so that he could put the contents back exactly as they had gone in. John took every drawer he searched out and checked the underside in case anything might be taped to it. He checked closets, behind picture frames, and the edges of any carpets—anything that might conceal a safe.
Downstairs, the house was textbook—just like the plans he'd studied in the car, except Clay had added a gas fireplace in the great room. He worked his way through the two covered porches, the great room, the kitchen, the downstairs bathroom, and the downstairs bedroom, which Clay had filled with workout equipment. Nothing. John knew that drug houses often contained secret rooms for contraband, but try as he might he couldn't locate a likely entrance to one.
He checked his watch again. Twenty minutes left. Maybe. It was the only chance he expected to have at the house. He started upstairs. A large white cat, producer of the mess in the trash, met him halfway up, meowed once, and followed him the rest of the way.
Clay had only three rooms upstairs: his bedroom, which John made short work of—tastefully appointed furniture, fabulous bayfront view—a bathroom, and a huge loft with sitting room furniture and the largest flat screen hi-def, complete with video games. The only difference John found here from the plans he'd looked up was that the washer and dryer were tucked into the left front corner of the loft space instead of the right.
He felt his spirits rising as he searched. He'd had to think of this as more madcap than stupid, in order to plan it, but stupid it certainly was. Feloniously stupid. A sort of giddiness stole in, though, the longer he worked. He felt lighter with every room he cleared.
Until he caught sight of headlights turning into the drive out front, and froze. He killed his flashlight. Why hadn't he done the upstairs first?
If he headed down now, Clay would catch him in the hall. The lock turned in the front door, the lights came on downstairs, and peals of female laughter resounded from the foyer, John jumped behind the couch, pulling his bag of equipment with him. Sweat beaded his forehead.
He felt something tickle his ankle. The white cat had followed and was sniffing his shoes. It looked at him and meowed again.
Loud kissing sounds echoed up the stairwell, along with thumps on the wall and more giggles.
John batted the cat away. "Get out of here. Go on," he whispered. He pictured himself being led away in handcuffs by Hampton PD, and his stomach did a queasy flip.
Finally, the girl said, "No, baby, no, not yet. I gotta take a shower. I went to the beach today—I'm a mess!"
A guy, presumably Clay: "I don't care, I like it dirty. And you do, too. C'mon, baby!"
"No, we were playing volleyball, I'm disgusting! I'd have showered earlier if I'd known you were gonna call. Besides, you're gonna like what I slipped in my purse to put on after."
"Aww, come on, I'm just gonna take it off anyway!"
Shit! John ducked down as the girl laughed and pounded up the stairs. Lights came on all around. In a moment the upstairs shower started.
Slow footsteps came up the stairs behind her. John held his breath as a heavy masculine tread passed through the loft area. He heard a rhythmic squeaking, and wheels rumbling across the floor. He peered around the arm of the couch. The dryer perched on wheels, and Clay was pushing it across the floor. The cat appeared suddenly around the corner of the couch and touched its cold nose to his. A brush of its whiskers almost made John sneeze.
Behind the dryer a small door reached only halfway up the wall. Clay opened it and ducked inside.
So that was it.
John gathered up his tool bag, crept down the stairs, and let himself out into the night. Back into the end of the street to resplice the phone wires he'd cut. First Street was deserted. No one would see him in the dark.
He'd scoped it out earlier: The marina had a ship's store with a paper box that made a good place to hide a small voice-activated recorder. In a few days he could drive back, swap out the recorder for another one, and listen to everything that went on in the house on his way home. And he'd look like he was just buying a paper.
John drove up, put coins into the paper vendor, and opened the door to find an obliging amount of paper litter in the bottom, which covered his recorder quite nicely.
Perfect.