The Shadow Hunter Read online

  The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.

  Text copyright © 2000 Douglas Borton

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.

  Published by Thomas & Mercer

  P.O. Box 400818

  Las Vegas, NV 89140

  ISBN-13: 9781612185729

  ISBN-10: 161218572X

  For my father

  CONTENTS

  PROLOGUE

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  Chapter 49

  Chapter 50

  Chapter 51

  Chapter 52

  Chapter 53

  Chapter 54

  Chapter 55

  Chapter 56

  Chapter 57

  Chapter 58

  Chapter 59

  Chapter 60

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  PROLOGUE

  She had a gun in her purse, and she was ready.

  “I hate men,” Sheila Rogers said, gulping her daiquiri. “Know what I mean?”

  The dark-haired woman nodded. “I know.”

  “They’re pigs, is what they are. They use you and throw you away.”

  “Sure.”

  “Like, there was this guy I told you about. What we had was really special, and then all of a sudden it’s over, and he won’t even talk to me.”

  “That’s rough. Really.”

  The dark-haired woman had a name, which she had mentioned earlier when they’d met at the Roxbury, a club down the Strip, but Sheila had already forgotten it. She was no damn good with names.

  She wondered why the woman was hanging with her, anyway. They’d been club crawling all night, moving from the Rox to the Viper Room, then to Babylon and the Teaszer, and finally to Lizard Maiden at the west end of Sunset Strip. Along the way, Sheila had imbibed a variety of liquid refreshments, settling on daiquiris as her drink of choice. The alcohol had fuzzed up her brain, and she was vaguely aware that she was talking too much. She couldn’t seem to stop.

  “He was a really great guy,” she was saying aimlessly as she leaned on the mahogany bar. “I mean, he was a pig—he turned out to be a pig—but when we were together, it was like magic, you know? Like we were meant for each other.”

  “Yes.”

  “Like goddamn destiny. That’s what it was. What I thought it was.” Sheila shook her head slowly. “I guess I said all this stuff already, huh? Back at the Viper Room or somewhere?”

  “It’s okay. You can tell me again. Sometimes it helps to talk things out.”

  “What are you, Mother Teresa?”

  “Just a friend.”

  “Well, shit, I sure can use one of those. Lately…I’ve been kind of messed up.”

  “How?”

  “Over him. He—I don’t know, I can’t get him out of my mind. It’s been two goddamn months. You’d think I’d forget the son of a bitch by now. You’d think…”

  “Maybe you don’t want to forget.”

  “No. I don’t.” Sheila leaned closer to the dark-haired woman on the bar stool beside her. “Can I tell you a secret?”

  “Sure.”

  Sheila wanted to whisper, but she couldn’t, of course. Lizard Maiden, known to aficionados as the Liz, was not a place for subdued conversation. It was one of the raunchiest clubs on the Strip, a den of flashing lights and thunderous music from the live band, where the dance floor was always packed with swaying, spastic bodies, and along the bar and at the tables lining the walls, patrons leaned close together and shouted to be heard.

  “The thing is,” Sheila said, “I’m running around from club to club because I figure if I go to enough places like this, I’ll run into him.”

  “He comes here?”

  “Sometimes. Usually on a Friday night, or a Saturday.” Tonight was Friday. “I mean, he hangs at all the clubs, so I never know when I might see him. He’s a club crawler. I met him down the Strip at the House of Blues.” Sheila chuckled wistfully. “Appropriate, right?”

  “Even if you do run into him, how will that help?”

  Sheila looked away. “It just will, that’s all.” She shifted her purse in her lap and felt the weight of the pistol inside.

  “Maybe if you meet someone else, you’ll forget about him. There are other guys out there.”

  “Not like this one. He wasn’t just anybody. He’s famous. You’ve heard of him. Everybody’s heard of him.”

  “So who is he?”

  Sheila hesitated, reluctant to reveal much more. She studied her companion. The woman was a few years older than Sheila herself, maybe twenty-seven or twenty-eight, of medium height, slender and self-possessed. Framed by a fall of dark brown hair in a pageboy cut, her face looked pale and angular, her cheekbones high and strong. Her cool hazel eyes betrayed no hint of judgment or reproach.

  “Devin Corbal,” Sheila said finally. “That’s who.”

  “The actor?”

  “I told you he’s famous. He’s been in, like, six movies. Six. And he’s only twenty-three.”

  “And you went out with him?”

  “For two whole weeks.” Sheila frowned. “It was great. Me and Devin were, like, soul mates. For two weeks anyway.”

  She swallowed the rest of her daiquiri.

  “Two weeks,” she said again.

  The dark-haired woman dismounted her bar stool. “Save my seat for me, okay? I need to use the can.”

  Sheila nodded, lost in memories of Devin. She barely even noticed as the woman walked away into the surging crowd on the dance floor.

  “Need a refill?”

  She glanced up and saw the bartender, a guy she knew by sight, though she’d forgotten his name. “What the hell.”

  The bartender poured another daiquiri. “Who’s your friend?”

  “Nobody.”

  “Ain’t seen her in here before.”

  “She’s just somebody I’ve been clubbin’ with.”

  “I remember when you and Dev went clubbing.” He handed her the drink. “Get over him yet?”

  “What’s it to you?” Sheila asked sourly.

  “Oh, nothing,” the bartender said. “He’s here tonight, that’s all.”

  Sheila looked up slowly. “He’s h
ere? Devin’s here?”

  He shrugged. “Just thought you’d like to know.”

  Lizard Maiden offered a unisex restroom in an alcove near the entrance. The dark-haired woman went past the door, then past a row of pay phones, and stopped at the end of the alcove outside what might have been a supply closet.

  No one was around. She reached into her purse, removed a cell phone, and speed-dialed the first number in the phone’s memory. The music was not so deafening here, and she could speak in a tone of voice that was almost normal.

  “Paul, this is Abby,” she said when the call was answered.

  “You still at Babylon?” Paul Travis asked.

  “No, we’ve moved on. We’ve been bouncing from club to club all night. She’s starting to open up, finally.”

  “Talking about the client?”

  “Yeah. She’s angry, and she could mean business. She keeps touching her purse in a way that makes me think she’s got more than mascara inside.”

  “If she’s carrying, you better watch yourself.”

  Abby smiled. “I always do. Look, I have to get back to her. I’ll update you at the next opportunity. Right now we’re at a place on the Strip called Lizard Maiden.”

  “Lizard Maiden?”

  “They call it the Liz. It’s just west of Bar One—”

  “I know where it is. It’s where he is.”

  For a moment Abby couldn’t process what Travis had said. “What?”

  “The client. He’s there. At Lizard Maiden. He showed up a half hour ago. He’s in the VIP Room, goddamn it.”

  “Bodyguards with him?”

  “Two.”

  “Get them on the phone and tell them we’re Code Red. If there’s a way to get him out of the club without being seen, have them do it. But don’t let them move him into the main room, or Sheila may spot him. Got it?”

  “I got it.”

  “I’ll stay close to her. Even if she sees the client, she won’t try anything.”

  “Make sure of it, Abby. Make damn sure.”

  The call ended. Abby stuffed the phone back into her purse, next to the snub-nosed Smith .38 she carried when on the job.

  Naturally Corbal was here. He had to be here, and not in some other club in another part of town.

  “Of all the gin joints in all the world,” she muttered, leaving the alcove.

  Still, it was no big problem. A complication, sure, but as long as she kept Sheila within arm’s reach, nothing would happen. Sheila Rogers was twenty-two, anorexically thin, and highly intoxicated—no match for Abby in any kind of fight. If Sheila made a move for the gun in her purse, Abby could drop her simply by closing off the blood flow in the carotid arteries of the neck. She had done that sort of thing before, in similar circumstances.

  She skirted the dance floor and approached the bar, and that was when she began to be afraid.

  Sheila wasn’t there. The stool she had been using was unoccupied.

  This was bad.

  Abby stood at the bar and signaled to the bartender. He bared his teeth in a predatory smile when he saw her.

  “Hey, sweet thing.”

  She ignored this. “Where’s the woman I was sitting with?”

  “Sheila?” His smile became a smirk. “I think she went to visit a friend.”

  Abby’s heart sped up. “What friend?”

  He leaned close. “Listen, forget about her. She’s a loser anyway. You don’t need to hang with her. I just wanted to get rid of her, so maybe you and me could get to know each other.”

  “So you told her Devin Corbal is here?”

  “How’d you know—”

  “Never mind. Where’s the VIP Room?”

  “Sorry, you can’t go in there. Celebs only. You know, I get off in a couple hours—”

  Abby reached out and grabbed his right wrist, applying painful pressure to the scaphoid bone below the ball of his thumb. “Where is it?” she hissed.

  The bartender paled. “Around back,” he said through gritted teeth. “That way.” He jerked his head to the left.

  She released his wrist. He rubbed it, gasping.

  “Jesus, lady, what the fuck’s up with you?”

  Abby barely heard him. She was already pushing through the crowded dance floor, praying she was not too late.

  Sheila’s pulse was roaring in her ears, and her eyes didn’t seem to want to blink anymore, and there was a hot, crawling queasiness in her gut.

  She knew what she had to do. She had rehearsed it, fantasized it, but in her fantasies she had never been shaking with fear, and her stomach hadn’t bubbled like this, and the music hadn’t been so loud, the dancing crowd so close and hot.

  She had the gun. She was ready. She had to be ready.

  He would be in the VIP Room. It was where he always went when he was here. He had taken her to that room one night. She remembered it well—a small room in the rear of the Liz, curtained off. A room without windows. A room that would offer no place for him to run or hide.

  As she left the dance floor, she reached into her purse and withdrew a Llama .45, fully loaded, the safety off.

  The VIP Room was just ahead, unmarked, screened off by a curtained doorway.

  She would enter that room and shoot Devin Corbal right in his lying heart. Teach him a lesson for treating her like some whore. Show him she hadn’t been kidding around when she warned him he’d be sorry.

  Briefly she wished she had time for a hit of coke. She carried an insulin needle in her purse and a small bag of the white powder. She could duck into the restroom, mix the coke with water, draw it into the syringe, and then inject herself in the crook of her arm…

  But she knew that if she took the time to do that, she would lose her nerve. She had to kill Devin now, before she thought about it too much. It was now or never.

  “Now or never,” she muttered to herself, boosting her courage.

  Go for it.

  Sheila took a breath, then pushed through the curtains into the VIP Room, the gun leading her.

  The room was empty.

  Unfinished drinks were scattered around the tables. Snack foods, still warm, lay on platters. Two chairs had been kicked back from the tables at awkward angles, as if whoever had been in here had departed in haste.

  “They cleared him out,” Sheila whispered, piecing it together. “He was in here and…they cleared him out.”

  But he hadn’t gone out via the dance floor to the front entrance. She would have seen him.

  The back way, then.

  She left the VIP Room and looked down the hall. At its far end was a dim, flickering exit sign.

  Then she was running down the hall, the din of dance music diminishing behind her. She pushed open a metal door and found herself at the top of a short flight of wooden steps descending into an alley. Her gaze took in the high brick walls, the sloping shoulders of the Hollywood Hills rising to the north, the haze of neon glare and smog that hid the stars, and, ten yards away, moving fast—Devin Corbal.

  In the light from a billboard overhead she saw him clearly. He was tall and lean, dressed in an open-collared shirt and faded jeans, and he was being hustled out of the alley by two grim-faced men in dark suits who must be his bodyguards.

  They hadn’t looked back. Hadn’t noticed her on the stairs.

  From this vantage point she could see Devin’s broad back, a perfect target.

  Her gun came up. Finger on the trigger.

  One of the bodyguards saw her, too late.

  Sheila fired once—twice—and then something hit her hard from behind, driving her forward, down the stairs in a tangle of flailing limbs.

  She had an impression of dark hair and furious hazel eyes, and then there was an elbow coming up fast to slam the base of her jaw, and she went limp and felt nothing at all.

  Abby clawed Sheila’s gun out of her slack fingers and batted it away, then pinned her to the pavement at the bottom of the stairs. She held her down until she was certain that Sheila had blacke
d out from the blow to her jaw.

  Then she looked at Devin Corbal. He lay motionless on the ground. One of his bodyguards performed frantic CPR while the other yelled into a cell phone, “Get the car back here now, right now!”

  “We need an RA!” the first bodyguard shouted. Rescue ambulance.

  “RA’ll take too long, we can drive him to the ER ourselves.” Into the phone again: “Where the hell is the car?”

  But the car wouldn’t help. An ambulance wouldn’t help, nor would an emergency room. Nothing would help. Abby knew that.

  She saw the lake of maroon blood that seeped from between Devin’s shoulder blades. She saw his eyes, open, staring.

  Sheila had fired twice. One shot had gone wild, but the other, by skill or luck, had hit Devin Corbal squarely in the back and killed him instantly.

  The bodyguard performing CPR finally reached the same conclusion. He stood slowly, shaking his head.

  “We lost him,” the man said. “Goddamn it, we lost him.”

  No, Abby thought. You didn’t lose him.

  I did.

  1

  Hickle watched her as she ran.

  Her hair fascinated him. It was long and golden, blown in wild trammels by the sea breeze. It trailed behind her, a comet’s tail, a wake of blond fire.

  She was crossing directly in front of him now. Instinctively he withdrew a few inches deeper into the overhanging foliage that screened him from view.

  She pounded past, plumes of sand bursting under her bare feet. Her long legs pumped, and her slim belly swelled with intakes of air. Even from a distance of twenty yards he could see the glaze of perspiration on her suntanned skin. She glowed.

  Months earlier, when he had first seen her, he had wondered if her radiance was a trick of the camera lens. Now that he had observed her in person many times, he knew it was real. She actually did glow, as angels did. She was an ethereal being, tethered lightly to this world.

  Soon he would cut the tether, and then she would not be part of the world at all.

  He could have done it now, today, if he’d brought the shotgun with him. But there was no hurry. He could kill her at any time.

  Besides, he enjoyed watching her.

  She continued down the beach, followed by her bodyguard. The bodyguard always accompanied her when she went jogging, and never once had he even glanced into the narrow gap between two beachfront houses, where a trellis of bougainvillea cast a shadow dark enough to conceal a crouching man.