The Assassin (Badge of Honor 5)

O'Mara saw them coming and opened the rear door of the car. Larkin smiled at him, and then pulled open the front door and got in the front seat. Matt had no choice but to get in the back.

O'Mara walked quickly around the front of the car and got behind the wheel and drove off.

"Mr. Larkin, this is Officer O'Mara. Tom, this is Supervisory Special Agent Larkin of the Secret Service."

"Good morning," Larkin said, and then turned on the seat to face Matt. "I understand you're pretty close to Denny Coughlin."

The announcement surprised Matt.

"Yes, sir, I am."

"First chance you get, give him a call. I think he'll tell you I'm not the arrogant prick your boss apparently thinks I am. Not that Wohl has a reputation for being a shrinking violet himself."

"May I ask how you know Chief Coughlin, sir?"

"Ten, twelve, Christ, it must be fifteen years ago, there was a guy making funny money on Frankford Avenue. Wedding announcements in the daytime, funny money at night. First-class engraver. We had a hell of a time catching him. Denny was then working Major Crimes. Good arrest. We got indictments for twelve people, and ten convictions. He' s a hell of a good cop."

"Yes, sir, he is."

"So am I," Larkin said. "Am I going to have to have Denny Coughlin tell Wohl that, or do you think we can make friends by ourselves?"

"Sir, I think that you and Inspector Wohl will have no trouble becoming friends. Sir, can I ask how you knew I know Chief Coughlin?"

"Our office here keeps files. One of them is on you. You're a very interesting young man, Payne."

Matt would have loved to have an amplification of that, but he suspected that none would be offered, and none was.

"Does Chief Coughlin know you're in town, sir?"

"No. I thought I would put that off until I met your Inspector Wohl," Larkin said, and then turned to O'Mara: "Are you speeding, son?"

O'Mara dropped his eyes quickly to the speedometer, before replying righteously, "No, sir."

"There's a Highway car following us," Larkin said. "If you're not speeding, what do you think he wants?"

Mat laughed. "He's there in case we get a flat or something," he said.

Larkin looked at him and smiled. "That's what the file said," he said. "Wohl is very careful, very thorough. And very bright."

"You have pretty good files, Mr. Larkin," Matt said.

"Yeah, we do," Larkin said.

THIRTEEN

It took Vito Lanza several seconds to realize where he was when he woke up, several seconds more to reconstruct what had happened the night before, a few seconds more to realize that he was alone in the revolving circular bed, and a final second or two to grasp that the revolving bed was still revolving.

It didn'tspin around, or anything like that, you really had to work at deciding it was really moving, but it did move, the proof of which was that he was now looking out the window, and the last he remembered, he had been facing toward the bathroom, waiting for Tony to come out.

The bed was also supposed to vibrate, but the switch for that was either busted, or they didn't know how to work it. They were both pretty blasted when they tried that.

He'd had too much to drink,way too much to drink, there was no question about that. He'd had a little trouble getting it up,that much to drink, and that hardly ever happened. And much too much to be doing any serious gambling, and he'd done that too.

It had started on the way up. Tony had said she hadn't had anything for breakfast but toast and coffee and was getting a little hungry, so they stopped at a place just the Poconos side of Easton on US 611 for an early lunch. And he'd fed her a couple of drinks, and had a couple himself thinking it would probably put her in the mood for what he had in mind when they got to the Oaks and Pines Resort Lodge.

He had half expected the coupon Tony's Uncle Joe had given them for the Oaks and Pines Resort Lodge to be a gimmick; that when they got there, there either wouldn't be a room for them, or there would be "service charges" or some bullshit like that that would add up to mean it wasn't going to be free at all.

But it hadn't been that way. They didn't get a freeroom, they got a freesuite, on the top floor, a bedroom with the revolving bed and a mirror on the ceiling; a living room, or whatever it was called, complete to a bar and great big color TV, and a bathroom with a bathtub big enough for the both of them at once made out of tiles and shaped like a heart, and with water jets or whatever they were called you could turn on and make the water swirl around you.