“I’ll tell you what,” he said at last. “There’s a rule against picking up passengers. But if you wait here until I’ve made my delivery at the end of the road…”
Ah-ha! She’d known he was heading for Billy Brent’s.
“What if I sat in back while you did the delivery?” she said. “Out of sight? I don’t want to get you in any trouble, but if I have to stay here much longer by myself I’m going to start hyperventilating. I can feel it coming on.”
The man looked even more unhappy; she tried the willing trick again.
“All right,” he finally said. “Climb in.”
“Oh, thank you so much!”
She took half a minute to retrieve her laptop from the trunk—if she ended up needing it, she wouldn’t want to walk back all this way—then she got into the truck.
FROM HER POSITION in the back, Mickey heard Dan O’Neill say “Just a minute” not more than three seconds after the courier spoke into the intercom.
She assumed that the relatively friendly greeting, as opposed to being tackled and patted down at gunpoint, meant he’d been expecting this delivery.
The gate opened, creaking a little in the process, and the truck started forward again.
She quickly finished the note she’d been writing and read it over.
Dear Courier,
Thank you very much for the ride. I didn’t want to inconvenience you any further, so I’ve gotten out.
I’ll just tell these people that my car broke down and I walked here to wait for the emergency road service.
I won’t breathe a word about your helping me, but I really appreciate it.
Your grateful passenger.
As the truck slowed to a stop, she snuck a peek out. And there was Billy Brent’s retreat. Or rustic mansion might be more accurate.
It was a big, sprawling, one-story cedar thing—new trying to look old—with such a large brick chimney that she imagined the fireplace was enormous.
A porch ran along the front of the place, and she’d love to get a shot of Billy sitting in one of its carved rocking chairs. But first she had to find him.
She waited a few moments, until the driver was on his way to the front door, then slipped the note onto his seat, scooped up all her belongings from the floor and slid the passenger-side door open.
The instant her feet hit the ground, she scurried over to hide behind the nearest big tree.
From that vantage point, she watched Dan O’Neill sign for the delivery and the courier return to his vehicle.
He read her note, looked into the back, then simply put the truck in gear and drove off.
She remained where she was, giving O’Neill plenty of time to go back to whatever he’d been doing. When she figured he had, she took a deep breath, then dashed for the building and plastered herself against its front wall.
So far so good. That just left making her way around the perimeter and peering through windows until she spotted Billy.
He could hardly refuse to talk to her once she had him in her sights. At least she hoped he couldn’t.
She started forward, but had only taken half a dozen steps before the silence was broken.
Her cell phone was ringing!
Frantically, she put the laptop and camera bag on the ground, then opened her purse and dug out the phone. Just as she was about to press the answer button so the stupid thing would shut up, O’Neill said, “Haven’t we met before?”
Dammit to hell.
She turned toward the front door.
He was standing on the porch with his gun aimed at her once more.
CHAPTER TWO
MICKEY GAZED at Dan O’Neill and his gun, trying to think of something brilliant—or at least semi-intelligent—to say.
Before she could, he said, “Go ahead and answer your phone. I’ll put my decision about whether to shoot you on hold.”
She gave him a look to say she didn’t find him even remotely amusing. Then, telling herself that in future she should think twice about sneaking into someplace where she knew an armed man was lurking, she pressed the phone’s answer button and said, “Mickey Westover.”
“Hi, it’s Eric.”
Terrific. Her boss. Who, an instant from now, would be asking how things were going.
“Hi,” she said, trying to sound surprised but unperturbed. “What’s up?”
“Oh, just calling to make sure you’ve connected with Billy Brent.”
She glanced at Dan and felt a twinge of relief when she saw that he’d tucked the gun away, even though she was pretty sure he hadn’t really been thinking about shooting her.
“We’ve almost connected,” she told Eric. “I’m at his place and he’s expected any minute now.”
“But you haven’t actually seen him.”
“No, he was out when I got here.”
“You did make a firm appointment, though.”
“Yes. Of course.”
When Eric didn’t immediately reply, she couldn’t stop her gaze from returning to Dan.
He rolled his eyes; she assumed it was the “expected any minute now” that he’d found a bit much.
As she pointedly turned her back on him, Eric said, “Mickey, I’m afraid this interview with Brent might have gone south.”
“Pardon me?”
“Someone just told me that he’s making an appearance on the Sherry Sherman Show tomorrow.”
“What?”
“Apparently, she announced it this morning. And if he intends to be in New York for that, he’s probably already on his way.”
Oh, rats. Surely Eric’s someone had misinformed him. Surely she hadn’t missed the interview boat.
She turned toward Dan once more, gracing him with a grade A glare as she said, “Mr. Brent’s associate assured me that he’d be here shortly. So let me just go check with him and I’ll call you back, okay?”
“Okay. But make it fast.”
“As fast as I can.”
She clicked off, then said, “You’re certain he’ll be here tonight?”
“Uh-huh. Why?”
The man was lying to her again. Billy wasn’t going to be here anytime in the near future.
He was en route to the Big Apple. And when she ended up home in San Francisco with no interview, she’d be so far into Eric’s bad books that she’d never get out.
If the Post couldn’t even count on her to file a story as mindless as this one, the next thing she knew she’d be kicked off Arts and Entertainment and assigned to writing obits. Assuming she still had a job at all.
But regardless of that, she wasn’t about to let Mr. Dan O’Neill think he was getting away with something.
“You’re absolutely positive,” she said to him, “that Mr. Brent couldn’t be…oh, maybe on his way to New York?”
Dan suddenly didn’t look quite so self-assured, which made her feel a little better. Why should she be the only one who wasn’t