Shoot Him If He Runs (Stone Barrington 14)

Then lights came on in the Weatherby house.

“Did you notice,” she said, “that, in each house, three or four lights came on at once?”

“You’re thinking they’re on a timer?”

“That’s what I’m thinking. Isn’t it odd that both houses came on almost simultaneously?”

“Not very odd,” Stone said, “if they’re both set to come on as it gets dark. Maybe, instead of timers, they work on light sensors. You want to hang around and see if they go off when the sun comes up? I’d rather go get some dinner and, eventually, some sleep.”

“You’d never make a CIA agent,” she said.

“What, doesn’t it say anything about dinner and sleep in the official spy handbook?”

“Come on,” Holly said, opening the car door.

“Where are you going?”

“I want to peek through some windows.”

“Do you have any memory at all of what I just said a minute ago about alarm systems and security cameras?”

“Oh, come on, Stone; don’t be such a wuss.”

“Tell you what, you do the spy thing, and I’ll play the part of the getaway driver. If any alarms go off, you run like hell for the car, and you might catch up with me.” Stone started the car, put it in gear, made a U-turn and stopped, keeping his lights off. “Don’t delay, or you might have to hoof it down this mountain.”

“You move from this spot and I’ll kill you.”

“Don’t give me that; you’re unarmed.”

“I’m a trained killer; I don’t need guns.”

“Hurry up!” Stone left the engine running.

Holly took a small flashlight from her handbag, got out of the car and trotted up the drive toward the Pemberton house.

Stone waited and watched; he could see her silhouetted against the lights of the house. She looked in a couple of windows, then he was astonished to see the front door open and Holly go inside. He could see her moving about from room to room. Stone waited for the alarm to go off, but nothing happened.

Holly left the house, came down the driveway, then trotted up the road to the Weatherby driveway and disappeared. Stone took deep breaths and tried to remain calm. He glanced at his watch; she had been gone for nearly fifteen minutes.

Suddenly the car door opened, startling him, and Holly got in.

“Okay, we can go now,” she said.

“You scared the shit out of me,” he said, putting the car in gear and starting down the mountain. “What the hell were you doing inside that house?”

“Well, somebody got here ahead of us and forced the front door-both front doors, in fact.”

“Yeah, I think duBois got here first.”

“I’m glad he didn’t get here simultaneously.”

“Me too.”

“What did you find inside?”

“Two unoccupied houses,” she said. “Three, with Robertson’s. The Pemberton place had men’s and women’s clothes and some canned food, but the Weatherby house, though it’s furnished, seems never to have been occupied at all.”

“Maybe they’re not in the country.”