Page 10 of Near Miss

Herb Fisher greeted the two new guests, but he didn’t look all that glad to see them, and he quickly moved on to speak to others. Molder looked unhappy about that, and his girl looked curiously at him. He took her elbow and moved her toward the piano, but Stone and Matilda both turned away as he approached, leaving his date with more questions to ask. Molder guided her angrily to the bar.

“Perfect,” Matilda said. “Did you see his face?”

“I sawherface,” Stone said.

Dino and Viv arrived and came over to the piano. Kisses and an introduction between Matilda and Viv followed.

“I see your cad of the other evening,” Dino said to her.

“That’s why he’s here,” she said. “To be seen. He’d like to be thought of as part of this crowd.”

“Did you see anything more of your tail?” Dino asked Stone.

“Nope. He found somebody else to bug, I guess.”

“I have a feeling you may see him again,” Dino said, “and it won’t be pretty.”

“You could be right.”

“Are you packing?”

“Not exactly,” Stone replied.

“That’s what I thought. I’ll be scraping you off the sidewalk somewhere soon.”

“I perceive no threats here,” Stone said. “Not even from the cad.”

Stone explained to Matilda what they were talking about.

“Describe the man,” she said.

Stone did so.

“That sounds like a man who works at Trench’s gym,” she said. “Trench calls him ‘Huff.’ ”

“You’ve met this Huff?” Stone asked.

“I picked Trench up at his gym once,” she said. “He was talking to Huff when I walked in. There was a perfunctory introduction.”

“I’m betting a perfunctory introduction is the only kind you’d want with a guy like Huff,” Dino said.

Chapter 7

Trench Molder stepped out of the living room in Herb Fisher’s apartment and into the guest room where coats were piled on the bed. He called a number on his burner phone.

“Yes?” Huff said.

“I’m at a party in a building a few blocks from you,” Trench said, giving him the address and location. “Barrington is here with Matilda, and it looks like they’re dug in for a while. I was thinking you might not need to wait a few weeks after all. What say you?”

“I can be there in twenty minutes.”

“The green Bentley with the driver is parked across the street from the front door. You might have to deal with that, too.”

“I can handle it,” Huff said.

“Hurry up, then.” Trench hung up his burner and returned tothe party. The room had heated up, and someone had opened a sliding door to the large terrace on the front of the building. Trench took his date’s elbow and steered her outside. “Let’s get some air.”

They walked to the front of the terrace and sat down on a padded bench next to the parapet.

---