Sunset Express

He was sitting on the couch with his hands in his lap and his hair wet and spikey. He still looked scared, but now he wasn't looking panicked. 'Yeah. Up in the nightstand.'

Joe drifted up the stairs.

'That the only one, Luke? You wouldn't have any surprises tucked away, would you?'

He shook his head, eyes jumping with the certain knowledge that surprises would get him killed. 'That's all. I swear.'

'Are you expecting anyone?'

'No.'

'No one dropping around to pick up a little smack? No girlfriends? No repairmen?'

'No. Honest.' A dope-dealing ex-attorney saying honest.

'Okay. I am now going to tell you exactly what I want, and you're going to tell me how to do it. Okay?'

He looked worried. 'If I can.'

Ray whirled away from the big-screen, loud and angry and snapping, 'What did you say?'

Lucas Worley jumped as if he'd been slapped. 'I'll tell you how. Sure. Whatever you want.'

Ray's eyes narrowed, and he turned back to the big-screen, mumbling.

Joe Pike came back down the stairs with a pistol. 'Clock nine.'

'Anything else?'

'Nope.' He sat by Ray.

I said, 'Okay, Luke. Here's my problem. I suspect that your mentor, Mr Green, is suborning testimony. I think he may even be involved in murder, only I can't figure out why a man in his position and of his stature would risk his ass by so doing. Do you understand that?'

Worley wasn't just looking at me; he was watching my lips move, careful to get every word. He blinked when he realized that I'd quit speaking, then shook his head. 'Of course, he wouldn't. That's dumb.'

'That's what everyone says.'

'It's true. If he's caught he'd be throwing away his career.'

I smiled at him. 'Sort of like you.'

Lucas Worley swallowed, then shrugged. Like he was embarrassed. 'Yeah, but I was just a lawyer, and I never liked it much. He's Jonathan Green. He loves it.'

'Well, you're going to help me find out if it's dumb or not. Would Jonathan enter into a verbal agreement with a client?'

Worley grinned. 'You've got to be kidding.'

'Okay, so everything would be written.'

'Absolutely. But no one is going to admit to a crime on paper. You're not going to find a paper that says "I will do murder for X dollars."' He was smiling at the thought of it. 'Such a contract isn't enforceable, anyway. You couldn't sue somebody because they didn't perform an illegal act. You'd be incriminating yourself in conspiracy.'

'So Jonathan wouldn't put anything in writing that he couldn't support in a civil action.'

'Not a chance. No lawyer would.' He spread his hands. 'Look, you're not going to find anything incriminating there. I promise you. Jonathan isn't that stupid.'

That's not your concern. Your job is to get me access to all the contracts between Teddy and Jonathan. That is the sum total of your value to me.' I nodded toward Joe and Ray. 'You know that much, don't you?'

The worried look came back. 'Hey, I said that I would. We can't just walk in there in the middle of the day. There're people.'

'When do the people go home?'

'The office closes at six, but some of them stay late. Christ, we used to work until ten, eleven at night. Sometimes later.'

Joe said, 'How many people?'

'A few. It's a big office.'

I said, 'But most of the people go at six?'

'Yeah. There shouldn't be more than eight or nine there later than that.'

'You have a card key to get in?'

'Oh, yeah. I kept it.'

'How about the elevator to Jonathan's floor?'

'The card key accesses the parking garage, the elevator, everything.'

I thought about it. 'How long would it take you to get into the files?'

Lucas Worley stared at me about six seconds too long. 'I dunno. It could take a while.'

Ray Depente pushed up from his seat and drew out the and stalked over like he'd just hit the red line on the biggest bunch of bullshit he'd ever heard. 'I'm killin' this fuckwad right goddamned now! Weasely muthuhfuckin' bullshit, take a while my ass!'

Worley threw himself to the side and covered his head, screaming, 'Twominutes! Icandoitintwominutes, swear-tochrist! It'sallondiskandlcangeteverycontractinthegod-damnedoffice!'

Ray stood over him, breathing hard and pointing the big.45. Across the room I could see Pike shake his head as he flipped through a magazine. Modern Living. Ray smirked and went back to his seat.

I said, 'That's better, Luke. I think you and I are going to work this out just fine.'

We had Worley describe the layout of the contracts department, and how we could get in and get out, and then we settled in for the afternoon. Pike left for a time, then returned with a small blue gym bag.

We listened to Lucas Worley's CD collection until five forty-five that evening, and then the four of us wedged into Worley's Porsche and drove to Green's building on Sunset. We bypassed the public parking entrance and used Worley's card key to access tenant parking. It was fourteen minutes after six when we worked our way beneath the building, and Worley said, 'You see all these cars? There're still plenty of people working.'

We found an empty spot as far in the back as possible, pulled in, cut the engine, and waited. Secretaries and office workers and blue-coated security people and attorneys of one stripe or another trickled out of the elevators and, little by little, the offices above us emptied. By seven-forty the trickle had dried and there were only six cars left, every one of which Worley recognized. He said, 'The 420 belongs to Deke Kelly and the white Jag belongs to Sharon Lewis. They both work in Contracts. The little Stanza over there works in Contracts, also, I forget the kid's name. He was new. Sharon's assistant.'

Pike said, 'Contracts is on the third floor.'

'That's right. Just like I said. 'We'd had him describe it five times. He'd even drawn a little map.

I said, 'And Jonathan is on the fourth.'

Worley nodded. 'Yeah, but we won't have to go up there. All we have to do is go to Contracts. They have everything in their computers.'

'What if Jonathan wanted something kept secret?'

Worley shook his head. 'We can still access it from Contracts. The whole office is on the same computer net. Jesus, I should know. I helped design the system.'

I looked at Pike and Pike shrugged. 'Whenever.'

Worley looked worried. 'But what about the people up there?'

'What about them?'

Worley was looking even more worried. 'You aren't going to kill them, are you?'

Ray glared at him. 'That up to you. You get outta line, we be killin' people now till next Tuesday.'

Pike looked at me and I rolled my eyes. Jesus, what a ham.

I pushed Worley out of the car and we walked in a tight group to the elevator, Pike with the gym bag, Ray with a hand on Worley's shoulder. Our footsteps were loud and gritty. 'You said two minutes, and that's all you're going to have, Luke. Don't mess up.'

Lucas Worley didn't answer. His eyes were blinking fast, and he kept wetting and rewetting his lips. Fear.

We got into the elevator and rode up to the third floor. If the doors opened and someone we recognized got on, I planned to say that I had come to see Truly and Jonathan and brazen it out, but when the doors opened on the third floor, the reception area was empty. The cleaning crews wouldn't be in until nine. The door to Contracts was on the left side of reception, opposite a pair of rest rooms. Joe checked the men's room and Ray the women's. They both reappeared, shaking their heads. Clear. Pike opened the gym bag and pulled out a single gray cylinder. Worley said, 'What's that?'

I pushed him toward Ray without answering. 'Okay, Luke. Here we go.' Ray pulled him to the men's room.

I pulled the fire alarm at the same time that Joe Pike used Worley's card key to open the door to Contracts, then yanked the fuse on the smoke canister and tossed it through the door. He held the door long enough to yell, 'We have a fire in the building! Please use the main stairs and go to the street!' The main stairs fed into the ground floor lobby and were off the reception area. There were utility stairs in the rear of the Contracts department that would lead down to parking. That's how we planned to get out.