Wyatt - 03 - Death Deal Read Online Free PDF Page A

of his ex-wife. Stolle made a show of writing
these on the pad and putting the paper into his pocket.

    Now, he said, I want you to
listen to something.

    He opened the drawer, pressed
rewind, pressed play, and their voices swelled from concealed speakers, filling
the tiny office. The mans face suffused with anger. As he came out of his
chair, Stolle waved an automatic pistol at him. To reinforce the point, Stolle
drew back the slide, jacking a round into the chamber. It was an oily click,
sharp and nasty. Sit down. Youre also on camera.

    You bastard.

    Youre the one who wants to kill
his wife, Sunshine. Give us your wallet.

    The man tossed a fraying wallet
across the desk. As Stolle guessed, there was big money in it. Not the five
thousand upfront fee the man had mentioned, but seven hundred and fifty dollars
good-faith money. He pocketed it, tossed back the wallet.

    This is as far as it goes, he
said. I keep the audio tape, the videotape, insurance in case you do anything
stupid. I also know where you live. Take my advice about the wifegrin and bear
it. I did.

    You bastard.

    Only the one payment, and youve
already made it. Im not greedy.

    The man got up. He looked paler,
weaker. Maybe hell get his courage back and try knocking her himself, Stolle
thought. He could warn her. Then again, it was nothing to do with him.

    The man stopped in the doorway. He
looked compressed and dark again. Was that bullshit, what I heard, that you
get rid of people for a fee?

    Stolle rocked back in his chair,
grinned, laced his fingers behind his head. Youll never know.

    * * * *

    Five

    In
fact, Stolle had carried out four contract killings in the past three years: an
errant wife; a junkie whod got a company directors daughter hooked on crack;
an investment banker whod developed a conscience during a Royal Commission; an
armed hold-up man suspected of killing a cop. Two had looked like accidentsthe
banker, the junkie. The wifes murder had been attributed to a burglary gone
wrong, the gunmans to an underworld score settling.

    The point was, Stolle did referral
killings only. His clients didnt know who had been hired and he never met them
face to face. When he was wearing his private investigators hat, he liked to
meet his clients. He liked the fact that they needed him, and there was always
something more than the cash in it for him. But he wasnt interested in meeting
clients when he was wearing his killers hat. He wasnt interested in their
fear, greed, anger, their banal motives.

    It was satisfying work, but he wasnt
making a career out of it. Four jobs in three years was about right for him.
The background research, the wait for the right moment, the swiftness of the
hitall those things were satisfying but they were no match for the singular,
prickling sensation he felt in his nerve endings when he was doing what he did
best: tracking somebody.

    He didnt even have to be in the
field to experience it. A lot of the work was spent sitting on his backside,
reading faxes, leafing through files, peering at computer or microfiche
screens. When rumours first surfaced that things were crook in the National
Safety Council, hed been hired by an investment company to do a background
check on John Friedrich. He discovered that there was nothing on paper for
Friedrich before 1975. He reported back to the client, the client pulled out of
a deal with Friedrich, and Stolle earned himself a handsome bonus.

    Most of his work entailed finding a
spouse, a lover, a creditor. There was a standard approach and it worked
eighty-seven per cent of the time. He started at the end: where was she last
seen, and who was with her? He handed out pictures, he talked to family,
friends, enemies, hotel and motel staff, taxi drivers, bus drivers, reservation
clerks. He looked at passenger lists. If that failed, he followed the paper
trail: credit card receipts, parking fines, passport applications, travellers
cheques. If people changed their ID, he dug deeper. There