The Last Day. Goodbye Kiss

46

TURTLE ISLAND

GULF OF THAILAND

182 DAYS LATER

JON STONE gazed out over the azure gulf and dreamed of ships at sea. Sailing ships of the late 1700s; not these silicon-chip water-rockets any geek could sail, but wooden ships built by hands and sweat, and sailed by men who lived by their belief in monsters. Jon imagined his ship rounding the point, a forty-gun frigate, himself a lieutenant in the Royal Navy, bound to the mast by duty and honor here on the far side of the world. Those were days of beauty, and Jon Stone wished he had been part of it.

The dude’s house had put him in the mood; top-of-the-line, no-expense-spared new, for sure, but with a wild, primitive freedom that screamed for those earlier times. The walls were these big plantation shutters that could be pushed aside so the inside and the outside were one, opening the house to the sea and the jungle and a warm breeze that smelled of flowers caught in a woman’s hair: a neo-plantation tropical palace overlooking the Gulf of Thailand-the beautiful chaos of the jungle bowling away to a coconut orchard, the orchard giving way to an immaculate white beach and the blue-on-blue sweep of ocean and sky, all of it like a rich boy’s fantasy of Tarzan’s tree house, maybe, or one of those African manors where British admirals retired.

Jon so totally dug it.

Jon Stone was thinking about the ships when a single muffled wump from the far side of the house broke the silence, just the one sound, like a baseball bat smacking onto a bed.

Stone sighed, knowing his time here was short.

He said, “I dig this house, man. I could live here.”

Jon spoke clearly but did not expect an answer. It was a big-ass house with no one around to hear.

Jon walked through the open wall to the edge of a beautiful limestone deck and squinted down at the beach. Another three or four days, the beach would be jammed with bands and insane women.

“Full moon parties, bro. Cat in Big Buddha, he said they have’m every full moon. Seven, eight thousand people show up, all these bands and shit-food, booze, whatever. It’s these tourist chicks. The chicks go wild, he said; just the one night, these crazy chicks thinking, What, what happens here stays here? Oh, man. We should stay, bro.”

But no one answered, not way up there in the jungle. It was a long way to town.

The latex gloves made his hands sweat, so his hands were itching. Jon checked his watch, then started back through the house.

A staff of four usually worked at the house. A cook, some butler dude, a maid, and a full-time gardener. The gardener had two extra guys come to help with the big stuff every Tuesday. Every Friday a pool guy came to bleach the infinity pool, and an extra housekeeper came to help with the floors. Jon had patterned their movements for three weeks and arranged events so none of them would show up today.

No visitors, no employees, no witnesses.

Gordon Kline had been calling himself George Perkins when Jon’s boy caught the scent. Told the locals he retired after selling off thirty-two McDonald’s franchises up in Alberta. Cats down in town were used to stories like that from rich Europeans and Norte Americanos, most of them perverts come down to scarf the little Thai boy toys, and that’s what they figured for the man who was calling himself George Perkins. Only Perkins had been keeping a way more dangerous secret than pedophilia.

Jon took the long way back to Kline’s office, like walking with the MTV crew who let rap assholes and overpaid jocks brag about their cribs. Sixty-inch plasmas in every room, a beaten copper bar that had to be twenty feet long, a temperature-controlled triple-glazed wine room the size of Jon’s bedroom; this monster saltwater aquarium drifting with neon fish. Jon had always wanted a big-ass aquarium like that. Dude had a black Hummer, a maroon Bentley Continental, and a pale green Maserati Quattroporte right outside the double-wide front doors. Jon grooved on the Maserati. He could see himself tooling down to the beach in that bitch. Tooling back to the house with a couple of crazy-ass Aussie chicks.

Jon took out his gun, letting it dangle at his side.

A hundred twenty million could buy damn near anything, but not everything.

Jon found the office. Dude’s body was facedown on a beautiful leather couch, an arm and a leg dangling over the side. A single round in the side of the neck had almost decapitated the sonofabitch. Blood was still pooling on the floor.

Jon said, “All set, Mr. Katz?”

“Almost.”

Pike was using a passport that identified him as Richard Katz of Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Jon’s own passport showed the name Jon Jordan, also of Milwaukee. Business partners on holiday together, let the locals think what they want.

Pike was behind the dude’s desk, adding a laptop to a cardboard box already filled with computer CDs, papers, and a couple of hard drives. Account information where he had stashed the Vahnich money. A hundred million and change.

Stone looked at the body and lifted his pistol.

“Piece of shit.”

Jon Stone fired two shots into what was left of the head. Pike kept going through the desk even with the shots loud as bombs.

Pike, over his shoulder, said, “Stop.”

“Fuck him. You should have let me have him. I could have kept him alive for weeks, traitorous fuck.”

Stone shot the body again.

Pike said, “Jon, please.”

Stone lowered his gun. He tapped it against his leg, irritated because he was frustrated. Jon would have skinned the sonofabitch alive, a fuckin’ American doing business with terrorists; snipped off the fucker’s fingers and toes a joint at a time, then carved the living meat right off his bones. Well, okay, maybe not-Jon wouldn’t have done those things, but it was fun to think about, and he had thought about it every day since Pike told him to find the sonofabitch. Jon Stone had been a soldier, a mercenary, a private military contract broker, and even an assassin, but he was also a patriot.

Pike’s gun was on the floor by the couch. Pike had popped the fucker, then tossed his gun, which was how they planned it. Their weapons were local junk Jon picked up for the job; use’m then lose’m, which was easier than sneaking firearms into the country.

Pike came around the desk with the box.

Jon said, “Got everything?”

Pike grunted. What passed for a yes.

Stone kept thinking about the incredible view and how much he liked the house. Every full moon, the beach filling with out-of-control chicks.

Stone tapped his pistol.

“What the fuck, bro? Let’s keep it. Wouldn’t be like we’re stealing it from worthwhile people.”

Pike studied the room to make sure he hadn’t missed anything.

“It’s going home. Pitman might be able to do something with the hard drives.”

Stone tapped his pistol again, then glanced at Pike’s gun, thinking it would be easy-double-tap center-of-mass, and the box would be his. Spend the rest of his life in this fine, fine house.

Stone said, “Fuck it.”

He raised his pistol and shot the body again, a single shot, square up the dude’s ass. Then he tossed his gun onto the body.

Wouldn’t be right, keeping this money, but it was fun to think about. Jon had made a fortune off Pike’s contract anyway, and Pike hadn’t taken a dime. Wouldn’t. Though he made Jon help him find Kline. For free. That part of it sucked.

Pike said, “Hold this.”

Pike pushed the box into Stone’s hands, then went back to the desk. Pike took something from his pocket. Stone wondered what in hell Pike was doing, then saw it was a snapshot of the girl. Larkin Conner Barkley. Pike propped the snapshot against the dude’s humidor so she was facing the body. Pike was a strange cat.