Hit List

33

The nurse, Carol, came back into Frances’s room, looking worried.

“What’s wrong?” Stone asked.

“A security guard has been found dead at a side entrance to the hospital,” she said.

“Uh-oh. Is there a vacant room on this floor?”

“There’s a storeroom, two doors down. It’s large enough to take the bed.”

“Let’s go,” Stone said, grabbing the bed and motioning for Carol to push the IV stand in one hand and the head of the bed in another.

Stone propped the door open and looked up and down the hallway. The cop on station wasn’t on station.

“It’s to your left,” Carol said, “two doors down.”

“What’s wrong?” Frances asked.

“Sig is in the building,” Stone replied. “Keep Trixie quiet.” He pulled the bed, aligned it with the door, and moved it into the hallway, making the turn to the left. He found the storage room door and tried to open it.

“You’ll need this,” Carol said, tossing him a key.

He unlocked the door and pulled the bed inside, switching on the light.

Carol took something off a shelf and held it up, a doorknob sign reading, MORGUE PICKUP. “I’ll put this on her door,” she said, disappearing down the hall. She came back, rapped on the door, and Stone let her in and closed and locked the door. He looked around at the supplies stacked neatly on steel shelving. He grabbed a sheet, shook it open, and spread it over the bed, covering Frances’s face. “Our last line of defense,” he said to her. “Keep your breathing shallow.”

He found a stool and sat against the wall, the shelving hiding him. “Carol,” he said, “go be seen on the floor. If anyone asks you where Frances is, direct them down to the morgue. She died of her injuries.”

Carol let herself out of the storeroom and closed the door firmly behind her.

Stone removed his pistol from the shoulder holster, checked that there was a round in the chamber, then thumbed off the safety.

“Please don’t shoot him,” Frances said from under the sheet.

“Not unless I have to,” Stone said. What that really meant to him was, I’ll shoot him if I get the chance.

Trixie made a grumbling noise.

“Please keep her quiet,” Stone said.

He heard rushing feet from the hallway. One man, he reckoned. He heard a door open, then a pause, then the sound of it shutting. He heard a man ask someone, “Where is the morgue?”

Frances heard it, too, and began to move under the sheet. “Sig,” she said, as loudly as she could.

Stone pulled back the sheet and clamped a hand over her mouth. “Quiet,” he whispered, “or he’ll kill you.”

She shook her head. He heard the footsteps moving toward the elevator, and a moment later it arrived, and the doors opened and closed. “He’s going to the morgue,” Stone said, “to make sure you’re dead.” He took his hand away.

“You don’t know him,” she said, shaking her head.

“I know him better than you do,” Stone said. “He’s not the first murderous ex-husband or boyfriend I’ve dealt with.”

“You think everybody is bad,” Frances said.

“I think bad people are bad,” Stone replied. “I could make a case that you are one of them, but I’ve come to think better of you.”

Trixie seemed to think something was wrong. Stone stroked her head, calming her. “Trixie knows him better than you do,” he said to Frances.

Someone rapped at the door. Stone walked over and put his ear against it.

“It’s Carol,” she said from outside.

Stone opened the door, and Carol flew into the room, propelled by a large man wearing a tweed overcoat and a matching hat.

“Sig!” Frances called out.

“I’m getting you out of here, babe,” Sig replied, keeping Carol between himself and Stone.

Stone raised his pistol and fired at Sig’s head. His hat flew off, and Stone saw blood on his forehead. He tried to fire again, but Sig had backed out of the room and slammed the door. “It was a scalp wound, not a head wound,” Stone said, half to himself.

“Sig!” Frances called again.

“Frances,” Stone said, “you might as well wear a sign around your neck saying, ‘Please Shoot Me.’”

Trixie was trembling violently; the gunshot had taxed her eardrums. Stone picked her up and stroked her, saying, “Shhhh.” She stopped trembling, and Stone put her back on the bed and got out his cell phone.

“Bacchetti.”

“It’s Stone. Larkin was just on the fourth floor, looking for Frances. We moved her to the storeroom. He’s wearing a tweed overcoat and bleeding from the scalp, where I shot him.”

But Dino had hung up. A moment later, Stone heard the elevator open and many feet in the hallway. Someone tried the doorknob, then hammered on the door.

“Stone, it’s Dino!”

Stone got the door open.

Dino looked around. “This was a smart move.”

“It was a desperate move,” Stone said. “He shot a security guard downstairs.”

“We’re on that,” Dino said. “You stay here, until I come back for you. Don’t open the door for anybody but me.” He left.

“The police will hurt him,” Frances said.

“He killed a security guard,” Stone said. “They don’t hand out lollipops for that.”

“He won’t hurt me.”

“What do you think he’s doing here?” Stone asked.

“He’ll have an ambulance waiting for me,” Frances said.

Stone slapped his forehead. “Of course.” He called Dino.

“What?”

“Check to see if there’s an ambulance waiting outside. He may be in it.”

“Got it.” Dino hung up.

Stone went to the window and opened it, letting in traffic noise. He heard a series of pops. “They’ve flushed him out,” he said. The popping stopped, and they could hear an ambulance siren start up, fading as it drove away.

Stone sat down to wait for Dino to return.