"Now, darling, these police are expert marksmen."
"Mr. Shivers," Keyes said, "you've been watching way too much TV."
Kara Lynn started to smile, then caught herself.
"In the first place, this gang doesn't ask for ransoms. They don't need your money," Keyes said. "And your daughter's absolutely right about the shooting. Once it starts, somebody's going to die. As for all those cops being crack shooters, I guarantee you that half of them couldn't hit the SS Norwaywith a bazooka at ten paces."
"Thank you, Mr. Keyes," Reed Shivers said acidly, "for your reassurance."
"I'm not paid to give pep talks."
"Dad—" Kara Lynn said.
"Sweetie, it's the Orange Bowl Parade.Forty million people will be watching, including all the top talent agents in Hollywood and New York. Jane Pauley's going to be there. In person."
Kara Lynn knew the forty-million figure was a crock.
"Dad, it's a parade, not a moon shoot."
Reed Shivers' voice quavered. "It's the most important moment in your whole life!"
"And maybe the last," Keyes said. "But what the hell. It'd be worth it just to see little Pumpkin's face in Peoplemagazine, right?"
"Shut up, you creep!" Pink in the face, Shivers bounced to his feet and assumed a silly combative stance. With one hand Brian Keyes shoved him back into the folds of the camel sofa.
"Don't be an asshole," Keyes said. "This is your daughter's life we're talking about."
Reed Shivers was so angry his body seemed to twitch. It was not an image the L. L. Bean people would have chosen for the spring catalog.
"If it's so damn dangerous," Shivers rasped, "why won't they just cancel the parade?"
Keyes chuckled. "You know Miami better than that. Christ himself could carry the cross down Biscayne Boulevard and they'd still run the Orange Bowl Parade, right over his body."
"Mr. Keyes," Kara Lynn said, "can I talk to my father for a minute, alone?"
Keyes walked out to the game room, which was walled in chocolate-brown cork. It was Sunday so there was nothing but football on the wide-screen television; Keyes turned it off. He counted sixteen golfing trophies in one maple bookcase. On the bar was a framed color photograph of Reed Shivers with his arm around Bob Hope. In the picture Shivers looked drunk and Bob Hope looked taxidermied.
Keyes went to the billiard table and glumly racked up the balls. Guarding the girl had been Garcia's idea; Keyes wasn't thrilled about it but he'd taken the job anyway. With Skip Wiley out of reach in the Bahamas there wasn't much else to do. No fresh tourist corpses had popped up and even the Trifecta Massacre had turned into a dead end, the bomber having made a clean getaway. Now it was a waiting game, and Kara Lynn was the bait.
Keyes scratched the cue ball just as she walked in. She closed the door behind her.
"Look, don't get mad, but I've decided to go ahead and be in the parade."
"Swell," Keyes said. "I hope your father knows probate."
"You're really trying to scare me. Well, I'm scared, okay? I honestly am." She really was.
"Then don't be stubborn." Keyes propped the cue stick in a corner.
"Look," Kara Lynn said, "if I drop out, they'll just get somebody else, one of the runners-up. Let me tell you, Mr. Keyes, some of those girls would ride in that parade no matter what. They'd pay to do it. So if I quit, it won't change a thing. The Nights of December will still have somebody to kidnap, or try to. It might as well be me."
"Besides," Keyes said, "it'll make great television."
Kara Lynn glared at him. "You think I like this whole setup?"
"Don't you want to be a star?"
"I'd much rather be alive." Kara Lynn shrugged. "My dad wants to see his little girl on NBC. Let him have his moment, Mr. Keyes. He says it's safe."
"Your dad's a real piece of work."
"I told you not to get mad."
Keyes smiled in spite of himself. It wasn't easy, being a tough guy. "Okay, I'm not mad."
"Good." Kara Lynn went to the bar and fixed herself a club soda. She tossed a cold can of Coors at Keyes. He caught it one-handed.
"I've never had a bodyguard before," she said. "How does this work?"
"Well, for the next week or so, it's just you and me, with some discreet assistance from Dade County's finest. The most important thing is that you're never alone when you're out of this house. We want the bad guys to see that you're not a sitting duck, that you've got protection—though I use the term loosely. You want to go shopping, I'll carry the groceries. You want to play tennis, I'll carry the rackets. You want to go to the beach, I'll carry the Coppertone."
"What if I want to go on a date?"
"No dates."
"Says who?"
"The eminent Orange Bowl Committee. They would prefer that you not go anywhere at night. I think that's a good idea."
"Oh, just a great idea."
"Your boyfriend can come by the house to visit. Watch TV. Play Trivial Pursuit. Smoke dope. Doesn't matter to me."
"Can we make love?"
Keyes reddened. "If you're quiet about it," he said. "I need my sleep."
Kara Lynn laughed. "I'm just kidding. I don't have a boyfriend; we broke up after I won this stupid contest. Mr. Keyes—"
"It's Brian, please. I get a new gray hair every time a pretty girl calls me mister."
"All right ... Brian, will you carry a gun?"
"Sometimes. And a nifty Dick Tracy police radio."
"What kind of gun?" asked Kara Lynn.
"Never mind." It was a Browning nine-millimeter. Keyes hated the damn thing. The holster bled all over his shirts.
"Can I ask you something?" she said. "I don't want to hurt your feelings, but when they told me about a bodyguard I expected somebody ... "
"A little larger?"
"Yeah. More imposing."
"Imposing is my specialty," Keyes said. "But you want to know why they didn't send a big gorilla cop instead of a skinny private eye."
Kara Lynn nodded. Her eyes were just dynamite.
Keyes said, "The eminent Orange Bowl Committee felt that it would be a catastrophe, image-wise, if it became known that the Orange Bowl queen was under police protection. The eminent Orange Bowl Committee felt that the scoundrels of the press would seize upon such a nugget and blow it way out of proportion. They feared that surrounding a beauty queen with heavily armed police would create the wrong kind of publicity. Detract from their splendid program. Make people too scared to come to the parade. So the civic fathers decided to hide the cops and hire a freelance undercover baby-sitter. Me."
"Unbelievable," Kara Lynn said. "Those jerks."
"I know you'd feel safer with Clint Eastwood," Keyes said. "So would I."
"You'll do fine."
"Your dad doesn't like me."
"But I do," Kara Lynn said, "and I'm the queen, remember? When do you start?"
"My stuffs in the car."
"The gun, too?"
"Would you forget about the gun!"
"As long as youdon't forget whose adorable little ass is on the line here." Kara Lynn patted her blue-jeaned rump. "Mine! I know you're no Dirty Harry, but promise me that you actually know how to use the gun, Brian. Promise me that much, please?"
The next day was Christmas Eve, and Skip Wiley assembled three-fourths of the Nights of December in his rented villa near Lyford Cay, on the outskirts of Nassau.
Tommy Tigertail had elected to stay deep in the Everglades, tending to bingo business, but Jesus Bernal and Viceroy Wilson had jumped at the chance to get out of South Florida, particularly since their photographs had been published on the front page of the Miami Sun.To be sure, neither picture bore much resemblance to the two men sitting on Skip Wiley's sundeck. The photograph of Jesus Bernal with a Snidely Whiplash mustache had been taken in 1977 after his arrest for illegal possession of a surface-to-air missile. He looked about fourteen years old. The picture of Viceroy Wilson was no better; it actually had been clipped from an old Miami Dolphins yearbook. Wilson was decked out in his aqua jersey and shoulder pads, pretending to stiff-arm an invisible tackier. He was wearing the same phony scowl that all the bubblegum companies want football players to wear in their pictures; Viceroy Wilson's real scowl was much more effective.