Richard Stark - Dirty Money

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the authors imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.

Copyright 2008 by Richard Stark

All rights reserved. Except as permitted under the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, no part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior written permission of the publisher.

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ISBN: 978-0-446-53622-6

The Hunter

The Man with the Getaway Face

The Outfit

The Mourner

The Score

The Jugger

The Seventh

The Handle

The Damsel

The Rare Coin Score

The Green Eagle Score

The Dame

The Black Ice Score

The Sour Lemon Score

Deadly Edge

The Blackbird

Slayground

Lemons Never Lie

Plunder Squad

Butchers Moon

Comeback

Backflash

Flashfire

Firebreak

Breakout

Nobody Runs Forever

Ask the Parrot

This is for Dr. Quirke, and his creatortwo lovely gents

W hen the silver Toyota Avalon bumped down the dirt road out of the woods and across the railroad tracks, Parker put the Infiniti into low and stepped out onto the gravel. The Infiniti jerked forward toward the river as the Toyota slewed around behind it to a stop. Parker picked up the full duffel bag from where hed tossed it on the ground, and behind him, the Infiniti rolled down the slope into the river, all its windows open; it slid into the gray dawn water like a bear into a trout stream.

Parker carried the duffel in his arms and Claire got out of the Toyota to open its rear door and say, Do you want to drive?

No. Ive been driving. He heaved the duffel onto the backseat, then got around to take the passenger side in front.

Before getting behind the wheel, she stood looking toward the river, a tall slender ash-blonde in black slacks and a bulky dark red sweater against the October chill. Its gone, she said.

Good.

She slid into the Toyota then and kissed him and held his face in her slim hands. Its been a while.

It didnt come out the way it was supposed to.

But you got back, she said, and steered the Toyota across the tracks and up the dirt road through scrub woods. Was one of the men with you named Dalesia?

Nick. They nabbed him.

He escaped, she said, paused at the blacktop state road and turned right, southward.

Nick escaped?

I had the news on, driving up. It happened a couple of hours ago, in Boston. They were transferring him from the state police to the federal, going to take him somewhere south to question him. He killed a marshal, escaped with the gun.

Parker looked at her profile. They were almost alone on the road, not yet seven AM, she driving fast. He said, They grabbed him yesterday. They didnt question him yet?

Thats what they said. She shrugged, eyes on the road. They didnt say so, but it sounded to me like a turf war, the local police and the FBI. The FBI won, but then they lost him.

Parker looked out at this hilly country road, heading south. Soon theyd be coming into New Jersey. If nobody questioned Nick yet, then they dont know where the money is.

With a head gesture toward the duffel bag behind them, she said, That isnt it?

No, thats something else.

She laughed, mostly in surprise. You dont have that money, so you picked up some other money on the way back?

There was too much heat around the robbery, he told her. We could stash it, but we couldnt carry it. We each took a little, and Nick tried to spend some of his, but they had the serial numbers.

Oh. Thats why they caught him. Do you have some?

Not any more.

Good.

They rode in silence for a while, he stretching his legs, rolling his shoulders, a big ropy man who looked squeezed into the Toyota. Hed driven through the night, called Claire an hour ago from a diner to make the meet and get rid of the Infiniti, which was too hot and too speckled with fingerprints. Now they passed a slow-moving oil delivery truck and he said, I need some sleep, but after that Ill want you to drive me to Long Island. All my identification got wasted in the mess in Massachusetts. Id better not drive until I get new papers.

Youre just going to talk to somebody?

Thats all.

Then I can drive you.

Good.

She watched the road; no traffic now. She said, This is still something about the robbery?

The third guy with us, he said. Hell know what it means, too, that Nicks on the loose.

That the police dont know where the money is.

But Nick knows where we are, or could point in a direction. Are we all still partners? He shook his head. You kill a lawman, he said, youre in another zone. McWhitney and I are gonna have to work this out.

But not on the phone.

Parker yawned. Nothing on the phone ever, he said. Except pizza.

O nce or twice, Claire had gotten too close to Parkers other world, or that world had gotten too close to her, and she hadnt liked it, so he did his best to keep her separate from that kind of thing. But this business was all right; everything had already happened, this was just a little tidying up.

She drove them eastward across New Jersey late that afternoon, and he told her the situation: There was a meeting that didnt pan out. A guy there named Harbin was a problem a lot of different ways. He was wearing a wire

A police wire?

Which got him killed. Then it turned out there was federal reward money out on him, and it attracted a bounty hunter named Keenan.

She said, This didnt have anything to do with you in Massachusetts.

Nothing. This was just an annoyance, Keenan trying to find everybody at the meeting, so somebody could lead him to Harbin, which nobody was going to do. He got hold of some phone records, Nick Dalesia made two calls to our place here, that brought him around.

She glanced at him, then looked out at Interstate 80, pretty heavy traffic in both directions, a lot of big trucks, the kind of traffic where you didnt change lanes a lot. You mean, she said, the law might come around now, using those same records.

I dont think so, he said. Keenan was looking for connections. The laws looking for Nick, and theyll know hes too smart to go hole up with somebody he knows. They wont be spending time looking at phone bills.

Well, where are we going now?

Parker was rested, most of the day asleep, but this car still felt too small. Maybe it was because he wasnt at the wheel. He stretched in place and said, Keenans partner, a woman named Sandra Loscalzo, caught up with us in Massachusetts just before the job. McWhitney convinced her to go away, and when he got back to Long Island hed lead her to Harbin.

Whos already dead.

Yes.

And McWhitney lives on Long Island?

Hes got a bar there, and lives behind it.

And thats where were going.

And when we get there, the next part is up to you.

She frowned out at the traffic and the eastern sky darkening ahead of them. Is this something I wont like?

I dont think so. When we get there, I can go in and talk to McWhitney and you can wait in the car, or you come in, we have a drink, its a social occasion.