Shadow Kill (Nick Teffinger Thriller) (2 page)

In it was a printout of the front page of a website for Susan A. Smith, Attorney-At-Law. The photo of the attorney unquestionably belonged to Del Rey Rain, the flight attendant. He rolled the papers up, tapped them on the desk and said, “I’ll be back.”

“Where you going?”

“To talk to the mark.”

“You think she’s the one?”

“I’m positive of it.”

“How?”

“I don’t know. I just do.”

The woman’s office
turned out to be an old but still-standing brick structure on the less-trendy edge of Wazee, three or four blocks from Coors Field in LoDo. It probably started life as a store or small manufacturing facility of some sorts before decades of abuse dragged it to near-death. Now, like more buildings than not, it was patched, upgraded, converted and reinvented. Burnt-orange designer awnings framed a weathered oak door. What the address lacked in prestige was balanced out with sunlight, parking and reasonably priced eateries.

Some day the area might be trendy.

That day wasn’t quite here yet.

Fire shot through Teffinger’s veins as he walked to the front door.

The woman’s eyes were dangerous.

They could shift his world.

They could make him be stupid.

They could make him do things.

They could make him feel things.

Screwed into the front door was a tasteful brass plaque:

Law Office of

Susan A. Smith, Esq.

The brass was darkened with age. It had been there for years, including the period two years ago when the woman was busy telling Teffinger she was a flight attendant.

He turned the knob and stepped inside.

What he expected was cramped dark wood, half-dead ferns and saggy bookshelves. What he got was a vaulted foyer, sunlight streaming from a skylight and rich Delano oil paintings on textured vanilla walls.

A contemporary receptionist desk was unoccupied.

Fresh tulips poked out of a crystal vase.

“Anyone home?”

No one answered.

He eventually found her in the upper attic storage area, sitting on the carpet with her back against the wall and her legs stretched out. A large storage box was at her side, pulled off a shelf of more of the same. The top was opened and several files were out. A band of sunlight sprayed through an open window, striking her thighs. She had her skirt hiked up to catch the rays.

She was shuffling through papers in a manila folder.

“So, you’re a lawyer,” Teffinger said.

The woman looked up.

Her eyes locked on his, first hard, then like a watercolor.

“Nick.”

“Not that it matters much anymore,” he said, “but why’d you keep it from me? The fact that you’re a lawyer?”

She set the file down.

“I’m sorry about the way things ended,” she said.

“Don’t worry about it.”

Her eyes darted.

“Do you hate me?”

He thought about it.

The answer surprised him.

“Sometimes,” he said. “But only in the middle of the night.”

“I almost called you a hundred different times,” she said.

“Why didn’t you?”

“Do you want the truth?”

He smiled.

“The truth in a lawyer’s office? Is that physically possible?”

She stood up, hesitated, and took a step to him. She put her arms around his waist and buried her face in his neck. She smelled like an oasis and the pressure of her thighs against his shot fire through his veins.

“Not calling you was the hardest thing I’ve ever done.”

“Then why didn’t you?”

“Because you scared me, Nick.”

“Bullshit.”

“I don’t mean in a mean way,” she said. “I’m talking about the opposite.”

4

Day One

July 8

Tuesday Morning

Teffinger sat down
on the floor, leaned back against the wall and said, “Technically I’m here on business. We have credible reasons to believe that a hitman—a hitwoman, actually—is in town to kill a target by the name of Susan Smith. We know of eleven women in town by that name and there are probably more. What I want to know from you is whether you’re the one she’s here for and, if so, why.”

The woman smiled, waiting for the punch line, then got somber.

“Are you serious?”

Yes.

He was.

“No,” she said.

“You’re not the one?”

She shook her head.

“If someone wants you dead, that’s the kind of thing you can feel.”

Teffinger shrugged.

“Maybe yes, maybe no,” he said. “Maybe it’s a brother or a girlfriend of someone you didn’t get off.”

“You mean revenge?”

“Sure, why not?”

She chewed on it.

“It doesn’t fit,” she said. “Revenge would come with warnings. It would be like headlights coming up a dark road.”

Teffinger raked his thick brown hair back with his fingers.

It immediately flopped back down.

“You’re a lawyer,” he said. “People tell you things they don’t tell anyone else. Maybe someone’s reconsidering whether they want someone running around who knows something about them.”

The woman shook her head.

“Theoretically it’s possible but I can’t think of any real life fits.”

“Maybe it’s not law related. Maybe you saw something you shouldn’t have.”

“No.”

“Did you take something?”

“No.”

“Are you into drugs?”

“Nothing you don’t already know about.”

“Do you own anyone money?”

“Yeah, Visa.”

“Are you pressuring anyone about anything?”

“No.”

“Did you break anyone’s heart?”

She paused and sighed.

“I’m not the target, Teff,” she said. “I’ll keep my eyes open but you’ll be better off on concentrating on the other Susan Smiths.” A beat then, “Tell me about the hitwoman.”

He told her.

She was going by the name Portia Montrachet.

She was attractive, blond, and had a Kanji tattoo on her neck.

He didn’t have a photograph yet but would by the end of the day.

“Where’s she staying?”

Teffinger frowned.

“I don’t want you trying to make contact with her.”

“I won’t.”

“Good.”

“What’s your plan to stop her?”

“That’s still a work in progress.”

“Let me help.”

“No.”

“Come on—”

“It’s a police matter.”

“It’s also a matter for Susan Smith,” she said.

“You already said you’re not the one.”

“True, but we both know I can make mistakes. Just being on the list gives me some entitlement, don’t you think? Besides, it will give us a chance to get reacquainted.”

Back at homicide,
Sydney had collected even more information on the Susan Smiths. With coffee in his left hand, Teffinger went through the files one by one, looking for a situation or personality trait or occupation that could possibly trigger a hit.

A few red flags rose.

The 28-year-old Susan Smith who lived on Clarkson was one. She had some minor scratches in her record, including a few that had landed her free room and board at the public’s expense for a short period of time. Currently employed as a Merry Maid, it was possible that she snooped around when she should have been cleaning and ended up taking something. Or maybe she found a more interesting kind of dirt, the kind that could be used for blackmail. It would be interesting to know whose houses she’d been in recently and whether any large sums of money had mysteriously appeared in her bank accounts.

He handed the file to Sydney.

“Take the lead on this one,” he said. “See if she got herself in over her head on something. Get her to say something that would support a warrant to get into her bank records.”

Sydney took the file.

“You’re weird today,” she said.

He raised an eyebrow.

“Meaning what?”

“Meaning your old flame.”

He shrugged.

“She said I scared her.”

Sydney wasn’t impressed.

“You’re a lot of things, Teffinger, but scary isn’t one of them.”

Two more files
caught his eye.

One was a lawyer who had been disbarred for three years for putting retainer funds into an operating account and then drawing on them as a loan, allegedly with intent to repay it next month. She was in year two of her disbarment period and, apparently, was talented enough to land an interim job as a legal assistant at one of Denver’s largest law firm, Tracer & Banks. In that position she’d have access to a lot of confidential information.

The other file of interest was for a model. Teffinger recognized her from some of the clubs around town. The word was that she had a cocaine habit and a penchant for screwing powerful people.

He handed the files to Sydney.

“Two more.”

She made a face.

“What are you going to be doing while I do all the work? Repeat,
all the work
.”

He stood up and headed for the coffee.

“I’ll be doing something I shouldn’t.”

5

Day One

July 8

Tuesday Afternoon

Working the net,
Teffinger found a real-life New York limited partnership by the name of 47Drop that was in the business of developing upscale residential high-rises in the heart of prominent cities across the country. He also located and printed out information regarding ownership of land and properties in Denver that would potentially be suitable for leveling and development of the types of structures that 47Drop maintained in its portfolio.

Then he headed home, showered, and put on his crispest white shirt, a lagoon-green silk tie and his most expensive summer-weight suit.

He put the files in a tan leather briefcase and drove out to Denver International Airport where he rented a white Range Rover.

From there he drove to the downtown Sheraton, snaked back and forth through the parking garage to see if Portia Montrachet’s rental was there—which it was—and then parked as close to it as he could.

He headed up to his room, 1216.

His ear went to the wall.

There was movement in the adjacent room.

The woman was there.

He opened his door three or four inches to be able to hear her when she left. Then he waited, with the jacket on and the briefcase sitting by the door where he could grab it on the way out.

Half an hour came and went.

The woman didn’t emerge.

Ear to the wall, Teffinger detected water running. She was showering.

Twenty minutes later she emerged.

Teffinger grabbed the briefcase, stepped into the hall and closed the door, jiggling the handle to make sure it was locked. Then he looked over, ostensibly surprised to see someone there.

He smiled but said nothing.

Instead he turned right towards the elevator bank.

The woman followed five steps behind.

Teffinger pressed the
down
button and faced forward.

He looked good.

He looked important.

He looked like money.

He looked like he was hung like a T-Rex on a Saturday night.

Come on, bite.

Seconds passed then the woman said, “In town on business?”

He looked over.

She was more than he expected.

He tried to appear unaffected by her goddess eyes and her goddess face and her ample goddess chest tucked under a sleeveless pink blouse.

“Yeah. You?”

“Same. Your eyes are two different colors. One’s blue and one’s green. I’ve never seen that before.”

He cocked his head.

“I think it’s from the New York water.”

“Is that where you’re from?”

He nodded.

“Right. How about you?”

“Same; New York. I have a flat over on 84
^th
.”

“Well, small world.”

“So they say.”

The elevator came, replete with half a dozen sardines already packed in and facing the front. They stepped in and did the same. At the lobby the woman said, “My name’s Portia. Why don’t you take me out to dinner tonight?”