Cold Paradise (Stone Barrington 7)

“Tell you what,” Griggs said. “I’ll put a man on the house for a while. Nobody’ll notice him, not even Mrs. Harding.”

“I’d be grateful for that,” Stone said.

“Of course, I can’t keep people on this forever, if nothing happens.”

“I understand completely. I’m going to suggest to Mr. Shames that he invite Mrs. Harding to stay at his house. He’s going out of town for a while, but I’m sure his staff could make her comfortable there.”

“Good idea,” Griggs said.

“Maybe your man could stay in the house?”

“With Mrs. Harding’s permission, sure.”

“I’ll have a word with her.”

They reached the study.

“Liz is going to come back to the house with me,” Shames said. “She’ll stay with us, at least until I get back from the Coast.”

“Good idea,” Stone said. “Liz, the chief would like to have one of his men stay in the house. Is that all right?”

“Oh, yes,” Liz said. “That would be wonderful.” She went to a desk drawer, found a spare key and gave it to the chief, along with the alarm code.

“Well, if you folks don’t need me anymore, I’ll be going,” the chief said. “I’ll have a man here in half an hour.”

Hands were shaken all around, and the chief departed.

“I’d better pack some things,” Liz said, and left the room.

Shames turned to Stone. “It’s this Manning guy, isn’t it?”

“Very likely,” Stone said. “This has none of the markings of a random crime—nothing taken, only one room disturbed.”

“So, he’s tracked her down.”

“It looks that way.”

“I’m glad you’re staying on for a while, Stone. I feel better knowing you’re here to take care of her.”

“I’ll let Woodman and Weld know.”

“I’ll call Bill Eggers and arrange everything.”

“Thank you.”

Shames was quiet for a moment. “Stone,” he said finally, “you think he’s going to try to kill her?”

“I think if that’s what he had in mind, he’d already have tried. This was obviously to frighten her.”

“It worked,” Thad said. “She was a mess for a few minutes after we got here. There are some guns on the boat. I’ll have Juanito make them available to you.”

“I hope I won’t need a gun,” Stone said. “But you never know.”

Stone followed Thad and Liz back to the house, and when they were safely inside, he walked back to the yacht and his cabin. His adrenaline was still a little high, and he got out of his dinner jacket and the rest of his clothes and into a hot shower. He was drying himself when he heard a soft knock at the cabin door. He got into a robe and went to answer it.

He opened the door to find Callie Hodges standing there, in a silk dressing gown, holding a 9mm automatic pistol.

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