Double Jeopardy

36

Viv, Carly, Primmy, Dino, and Lance sat in Stone’s living room, having an after-dinner cognac. Lance’s phone purred.

“Yes?” He listened for a moment. “Are we going to have this problem again? Is that the best answer you can give me? It better be.” He hung up. “Our security system has been reprogrammed, rebooted, and is now operational.”

“For how long?” Primmy asked.

“Don’t be a cynic, Primmy.”

“Your questions sounded pretty cynical to me,” she said.

“I have to sound that way for effect sometimes.” He thought about that. “Sometimes I think that half of what I say is for effect.”

“What is Stone doing right now?” Carly asked.

“Probably what we’re doing,” Dino said. “They’ll be fully battened down, though.”

“I think I’ve just fully realized that Tim is dead, and I’m not,” Carly said.

“Would you have it any other way?” Dino asked.

“I’d rather have both of us alive.”

Dino shrugged. “You have to take things as they come. Change them, if you can, but that can take a while.”

“Oh, Dino,” Viv said. “You always sound so wise on your second brandy.”

“Cognac releases my wisdom,” Dino replied.

“Sometimes,” Viv said.

Stone, Sally, and Ed had finished dinner, and Ed was checking a gunport. “Uh-oh,” he said.

Stone grabbed his rifle and went to his own port and peered out. “What’s that?” he asked.

“Flashing lights,” Ed said. “Like on a police car.”

“The only police cars on the island arrived after Tom Young came in on the chopper.”

“Well, they’re up and running,” Ed replied. “Here they come, and they’re cuffed.”

Stone looked out the port and thought he saw the twins being bundled into a car. “What will they do with them? The ferry’s down for the night.”

“I expect they’ve got other transportation,” Ed said. “A boat, or better still, their chopper.” As if responding, rotors could be heard turning. “They’re choppering them to their office. Let’s go.” He got up and opened the door.

“Go where?” Stone asked.

“I’m tired of staring at the outside of that house,” Ed said. “I want to see the inside.”

They got into Ed’s car and drove up to the house, which was brightly lit from indoors and out.

“You don’t suppose they have help in there, do you?” Stone asked.

“Who’d help the sons of bitches?” Rawls said. “Anyway, they’ve always done everything alone together.” He parked the car, and they got out. Ed walked up the front stairs.

“What about their security system?” Stone asked.

“I doubt if Tom gave them time to set it. Anyway, who’d hear it if it went off?”

“We would,” Stone said, covering his ears while Ed fiddled with the front door. It came open. “Not locked,” Ed said, then walked inside.

“Right behind you,” Stone said, following. They were first in a short hallway, then in what would, no doubt, be the living room. The smell of drying plaster was thick.

“Let’s take the ten-cent tour,” Rawls said. They went into the kitchen, the dining room, and into what would be a library or study, all with drying plaster. The library had rows of bookcases lined up and ready to be installed.

There was a broad central staircase, and Rawls led the way upstairs. “Hello? Anybody home?”

“I won’t fire until you do,” Stone said.

Rawls turned a corner and went through an open door. “And we’re in the master suite,” he said. It was only partly furnished, but neat.

“Interesting that there’s only one bed,” Stone said.

“Two,” Ed replied, “twins pushed together, inside a king bedstead. And electric beds, like at a hospital.”

French doors led out to a long, narrow porch on the side facing the road, wrapping around to the front of the house, then again, to the library.

“Pretty good field of fire from up here,” Rawls said, noting the relative positions of his house, porches, and dock.

They went back inside, and Ed opened a glass-fronted cabinet. Inside was a row of assault weapons and racks for handguns, plus shelves for ammunition, of which there was plenty.

“They’re prepared for a siege,” Stone said.

“More likely a slaughter,” Ed said.

They walked around the house once more, just to imprint the floor plan in their minds.

“How long you figure before they’re completely moved in?” Rawls asked.

“Well, let’s see,” Stone said. “The HVAC systems are working, the kitchen cabinets and appliances have been installed, and the plastering is complete, if not yet dry. The study cabinetwork has yet to be installed, and there will be at least a week of painting. I’d say two to three weeks, if they’re hurrying.”

“That’s about what I figure,” Rawls said.

“Why do you ask?”

“I’m opportunity oriented,” Ed said. “I look around me now, and what I see is opportunity, gradually vanishing as each job gets done.”

“Maybe the Maine cops have got something on them in the Jackson murders,” Stone said. “Something we missed when we walked around the crime scene.”

“I hope so,” Ed said. “That would sure make life easier for all of us.”

“I can’t hang around the whole summer waiting for a chance to exercise my right to self-defense,” Stone said.

“I’m less pressured and more patient than you,” Ed said back.

“I can’t argue with that. Do you have a plan?”

“Several. Outlines, of course; not fleshed in. Ways of approaching the job.”

“What do you think is the better plan?”

“I think we have to kill them before the house is finished,” Rawls said. “Can you stick around that long?”

“Probably not,” Stone said. “But I’ll do the best I can.”

“That’s good enough for me.”