Lone Wolf #9: Miami Marauder Read Online Free PDF Page A

want to hear him.”
    “All right,” Calabrese said. He put the phone down delicately, walked past the puzzled guard, went into the room with the door open, said to Williams. “Pick it up,” and then turned, went back to his own room, picked up the receiver and listened. After a while he heard Williams say, “Hello.”
    “Hello David,” Wulff said, “where are you?”
    “Don’t answer that,” Calabrese said, cutting in, “don’t answer that at all.”
    There was another, slightly longer pause and then Wulff said, “How are you making it?”
    “I’m playing poker,” Williams said, “with two very tough guards, right now. I’ve just been raised back two times but I think I can stand it.”
    “That sounds good,” Wulff said, “how are you feeling?”
    “I’m feeling wonderful,” Williams said, “I’ve never felt better in my life. It’s what I’ve been waiting for, three-hand poker with a couple of really tough mob guys.”
    “All right,” Calabrese said, “that’s enough. He’s perfectly healthy, you see. We haven’t messed with him.”
    “He doesn’t sound too healthy to me, Calabrese,” Wulff said and then seemed to laugh. “He’s a lousy poker player.”
    “I’m not that bad,” Williams said, “I’m better than you think. I’ve got control and patience, anyway.”
    “Hang it up,” Calabrese said, “hang the phone up right now.”
    “All right,” Williams said, “I think I’ll just go back and raise him again. Why not? It’s only fifty cents,” and then Calabrese heard the phone clatter. Wulff said, “Where is he?”
    “I’m not going to tell you that.”
    “I think it’s time we met,” Wulff said. “I think it’s time for another face to face.”
    “That suits me. That’s what I’m waiting for.”
    “Good,” Wulff said. He breathed in harshly once, a sharp intake of breath, and said, “I’m coming, Calabrese.”
    “Not here you’re not.” He had worked this out carefully, meditated it through, strung it through the channels of possibility for hours; now Calabrese knew that he had been right all along. “Not in Chicago,” he said, “I don’t want it to be here. We’re going to make it in Miami.”
    “I don’t like Miami. It’s a sad, phony, hustler’s town. It’s not your kind of territory at all.”
    “But that’s where it’s going to be.”
    “Let him go,” Wulff said, “let him go and I’ll meet you anywhere you say. Otherwise it’s no deal.”
    “Oh yes it is,” Calabrese said, “it’s definitely a deal. I didn’t tell you about my surprise, remember?”
    “I remember that.”
    “I have a surprise for you. I think you’ll be pleased and interested if you’ll hold on a moment.” Calabrese put the phone down quietly, went out of the room for the second time and down the hall to the room where the girl was. Pushing the door open he found her in the same position, looking at him open-mouthed as he stared at her. “Pick up the phone,” he said motioning to the desk, “there’s someone who wants to talk to you.”
    “You won’t get away with this,” she said. “By now my parents have notified the San Francisco police and they’ve notified the Federal Bureau of Investigation. This is a federal crime; the FBI is in on it and they’ll get you. There’s still a death penalty for kidnapping.”
    “Oh for Christ’s sake,” Calabrese said, realizing that he had not been as irritated in this way since his wife had died twenty years ago. There was something about the capacity of women to complain which was infuriating; they were obsessive, single-minded creatures. Whatever you tried to do with them, whenever you tried to pursue a line of reasoning they would stick maddeningly at a single point. “Just pick up the phone and listen, will you?”
    He motioned toward the guard, the guard shrugged and came from his seated position, moving toward the girl in an off-handed, rather menacing way. Carefully, so as not to give ground