shoe shine stand with four seats was unattended and I plopped myself down and watched the world go by. It was a world Stone wasn’t part of.
And I wasn’t surprised, really. Not much by way of recon was necessary on this gig. It would take Stone about five minutes to map it all out, the Bix Beiderbecke Room right next to the steps up to the parking garage, Christ. It was too easy.
By now it was eight-thirty and George Ridge had not been on any of the four flights that arrived so far. The next one would be in at nine-fifteen. I stood and stretched, bones popping in my back. I folded the paper under my arm and walked a bit.
Speaking of video arcades, the airport had its own small one next to the gift shop. I peeked in, and Stone wasn’t there, either. I let out a short laugh at my own expense. As a detective, I made a good hitter. I fed some quarters into several of the machines; there was a Ms. Pac Man that I did pretty well on, but couldn’t make the scoreboard. I checked my watch. Not quite nine. I put some quarters into a game based on the cartoon character Popeye. It was pretty good-Bluto and Olive Oyl were on hand, behaving in character, namely Olive Oyl was a whiney bitch and Bluto was a brutal cheat. I got the hang of it quickly, and on my third quarter made it to the hardest level, a pirate ship. On my fourth quarter I made the scoreboard.
Hot damn, I said to myself, as I punched in three letters (all you were allowed): RYN, for Ryan. I was number two on the scoreboard.
Number one was STO.
I stared at it, wondering if it were some guy’s initials or… no, it couldn’t be Stone… could it?
I went back to my seat and hid behind the Times, waiting, the gun rubbing under my shoulder. People came and went. So did the nine-fifteen flight, which did not get in till nine-thirty. No Ridge.
Shortly before ten something disturbing happened: reporters began showing up. Print guys and TV teams from three stations, with minicams in tow. I began wondering what they were here for, and when the ten o’clock flight arrived, Ridge was on it, and they were on him.
My mouth went dry, seeing him again. The same handsome if slightly heavy-set man who’d come calling at my A-frame, every salt-and-pepper hair in place, though he looked tired, drained, even though he was moving quickly.
He had to. The press was swarming him. Ridge was accompanied by two men, who (like him) were dressed in London Fog raincoats over business suits; nonetheless, they had the rough-around-the-edges look of bodyguards, in other words cut from the same cloth as Jordan and Crawford. The bodyguards went to get the luggage while Ridge cut quickly through the reporters, smiling somberly, answering a few questions but not lingering.
He hadn’t noticed me, which was one small blessing. I hadn’t figured on the reporters. If I’d been thinking I would have known that the Quad Cities was just small enough an area, and Ridge large enough a local celebrity, for the “boating accident” of the day before to have attracted regional media attention. It had already gotten big play in the local papers, after all.
I followed on the heels of the reporters through automatic doors out into the chilly night and watched, with a sick sinking feeling, as Ridge climbed into a chauffeured limo, a sleek black stretch Lincoln. The bastard wasn’t even waiting for his luggage!
Weaving between cars and taxis, I ran across the several lanes that separated the airport from its vast parking lot, hurtled a low cement fence and was soon in the Sunbird, behind several cars in line, waiting to pay the parking fee. I kept an eye on that limo, saw it caught behind some traffic in the exit lane nearby. Another small favor.
I was able to slide in behind the limo at the stoplight, planning to keep at least one car between us for the ride to wherever we were going. Then, oddly, the limo turned almost immediately, wheeling into the airport Howard Johnson’s. We weren’t going far at all. George Ridge lived in a big, Frank Lloyd Wrightish home on the so-called Heights in Davenport, up above where Werner had lived, with a magnificent view of the Mississippi. He had not been home for several days, but rather than retire to his modernistic castle, he was being dropped off at a room at a Howard Johnson’s.
Interesting.
I moved along by, while Ridge got out of the limo, shooing it on its way. He stood there in his London Fog, on the sidewalk by the first-floor rooms on the west side of the motel. He withdrew something from an inside pocket; light glinted off it. Soon he was smoking. Then he put the flat silver cigarette case away. He was watching and waiting. Possibly he was watching to see if any of the media people had followed him.
I had pulled into one of the motel stalls and sat in darkness with the nine-millimeter in my lap. I was down a ways from him, but I could see him. I felt myself tightening like a fist, and made myself relax. It was hard to do. I’ve killed people before, as you may have gathered; and usually with utter dispassion. But George Ridge was someone I would enjoy killing. I was sorry only that I was limited to killing him once.
He was nervous. I hoped that was because he knew I was out here somewhere. He just didn’t know how close. That made me smile. He checked his watch. Then, quickly, he slid open one of the glass doors of the room just behind him and stepped in and slid it shut again.
I thought about that. I knew he wasn’t meeting a woman for an affair in there, at least it was unlikely; he was divorced, although I supposed a married woman might be meeting him here. More likely-much more likely-he was meeting with someone about tomorrow’s press conference. Where he’d cast his vote by way of a bullet delivered by a surrogate, putting an end to the candidacy of Preston Freed. Isn’t democracy grand?
The question was, when to go in? If he was meeting with, say, Stone, and I went in, the shooting could start before any questions got asked and answered. And in the motel setting, I’d have to use the suppressor, and that meant the relative slowness of working the gun’s action by hand after every shot. Well, I’d have to make the best of it.
I was about to get out of the car when a figure walked quickly by, in front of my parked Sunbird, heading in the direction of the room Ridge had slipped into. The man was heavy-set and balding but moved with an athlete’s grace. He was about six feet one and was wearing a long black leather topcoat and black slacks. He looked like something out of an Italian western.
He was Stone.
Older. Less hair, and what there was of it grayed, the widow’s peak a casualty of time; and heavier. Why hadn’t I thought of that? I was heavier myself, although not that much heavier. I had given the hotel desk clerks descriptions of Stone as I had known him perhaps a dozen years ago. I had not allowed for-and, in fairness to myself, could not foresee the exact nature of-the effect of time.
Stone’s hands slid open one sliding door. That meant he was expected: otherwise those doors would be locked. He ducked in there.
I crouched between two cars, nine-millimeter in hand, watching the glass doors, draped, shut, possibly locked now, perhaps ten feet away. I was trying to decide how to go in-the room number was no problem, it was posted above the glass doors, 114-when Stone came back out, moving quickly.
His face was white. Stone was naturally pale, but not that pale; and his eyes were round and wild.
He ran back the way he came, not past where I was now crouching, not seeing me, and moments later I heard a car start up and tires squealed and I glanced back and saw a sporty little cinnamon car-a Dodge, maybe- flash by, and he was gone.
The glass doors were not only unlocked, one remained open, the cold breeze making the blue drape flap like a ghost.
I stepped in quickly, fanning the nine-millimeter around, easing the door shut behind me with a gloved hand. Other than Ridge, the room was empty, but I checked the bathroom, including shower stall, and closet. Nobody there.
Just Ridge.
Ridge, who was on the floor next to the bed on his back, still in his London Fog raincoat, which was appropriate, because his throat was raining blood. He’d been cut from ear to ear, an obscene scarlet grin below the sorrowful frown and empty open eyes of the late George Ridge. The only real estate in his future would be a cemetery plot.
And there’d be no talking to him now; no questions, no answers.
Shit!
I wouldn’t even get to kill the fucker once.
