ReJoined Steele
Part Eleven
Harry finished his coffee and stood up. "Well, I suppose I'd best be on my way. Antony should be in position by now. I'll just get my jacket from the bedroom--"

Laura rose and followed him down the hall, watching as he put the jacket on, still trying to come to grips with Harry Chalmer's lack of sartorial splendor when compared to the man she'd known as Remington Steele. He didn't look rumpled, just at ease with himself, she decided. "I still think I should be there as backup," she told him, reaching up to smooth a lock of hair from his forehead.

"That's what Antony is there for," he reminded her. They had been through this the previous evening- and luckily for him, Tony had agreed with his decision to keep Laura away from the showdown.

She shook her head, intent on trying once more. "I don't trust Hepplewhite," she insisted. "A man like that is capable of anything."

"Which is why, if you don't hear from us in an hour-I want you to find Mike Jackson and tell him about Lucas Hepplewhite's past. And notify the police that he's got several stolen works of art in that house. Including the Bordeaux Triptych."

Laura's eyes widened as she brought her fingers to a point before her. "THAT Triptych?" she questioned. At his nod, she shook her head. "And you're passing up the finders' fee for that?"

"Oh, I'll get my fee- IF my plan goes as scheduled. If not, well, it won't really matter, will it?" He slipped a hand around her waist and pulled her close to give her a kiss. "You're not going to get rid of me that easily again, Miss Holt."

Laura's arms slid around him, holding him close, prolonging the kiss. "Be careful," she told him when the kiss ended at last.

"I will," he told her, his other hand caressing her cheek. "I will." He turned as if to go, then paused and looked back at her. "Wouldn't by any chance have a suitcase that I can borrow, would you?"
***

Lucas Hepplewhite sat in the car; his light blue eyes fixed on the road approaching the small airfield. He turned as the driver's door opened and Tony returned to the car. "The plane's still in there," Tony told him. "He hasn't left yet. Should be here any minute."

He'd parked the car in an area that, while giving them a good view of the road, kept them more or less hidden. "Good. I'm not a patient man, Mr. Roselli. I don't like waiting. But if I must, perhaps you can explain to me why he would use a small airplane to leave. Why not simply get onto a passenger jet and go directly to South Africa?"

Tony looked at the road. "It's harder to bribe people here than it is in Mexico. Slip across the border using a small plane just below radar in a remote spot, land at a pre-designated spot and catch a flight from there. He's done it before."

"Ahh. And you, Mr. Roselli. You said that you had been chasing this man for some time. Yet he didn't recognize you yesterday driving Miss Holt's car?"

"Well, we've never really met. I've always gotten involved AFTER he's struck. This was the first time I managed to get an early start."

"I see. And what -exactly is your line of work? Are you a police officer?"

"CIA," Tony confided. "That's how I knew about you. Knew that part of the agreement for your coming to the states was that they authorities would look the other way in regards to your past."

"I simply did my duty," Hepplewhite said with a shrug.

"To who? The Nazis? Or maybe your friends when you testified against them?"

"I did what was necessary to survive, Mr. Roselli. Something which I am sure you are familiar with."

Tony sat up. "Someone's coming. Looks like a cab. Better get into the hangar."

He and Hepplewhite entered the small hangar, remaining on the far side of the small single engine aircraft, out of sight as they heard a car drive up, the door open and close, and then drive away. "Let me make the first move," Tony whispered as the big door of the hangar began to roll aside.

Harry approached the plane and opened the left side door, his hearing picking up the sound of shoes on concrete as Tony moved into position between him and the doors. "Hello, Chalmers."

He turned around, looking at the man who had appeared from nowhere. "Tony, right? Laura Holt's chauffeur yesterday."

"Not quite. I think we need to talk."

Harry picked up his case. "Sorry, but I haven't much time. Have to be in Mexico by--" his voice trailed off as he heard the sound of a pistol being cocked to fire. "I didn't think you were a chauffeur," Harry muttered. "If this is a robbery, I'm afraid you're going to be disappointed."

"I don't think so." He motioned for Harry to move away from the airplane and around it to where Hepplewhite was waiting. "Got another friend of yours who wants to talk to you."

As soon as the old man's eyes met Harry's, he asked, "Where is my Royal Lavulite, Mr. James? Or perhaps I should call you Mr. Steele?" Hepplewhite corrected himself, tossing the newspaper in his direction.

"I'm afraid I don't have them," Harry replied evenly.

Hepplewhite's breathing deepened. "Search him!" he ordered Tony, holding out his hand for Tony's weapon.

Tony grabbed Harry's shoulder and turned him toward the airplane's fuselage, then pushed him forward before patting him down. "He's clean, Mr. Hepplewhite. Of course, they could be in the lining of his coat- Take it off, Chalmers."

Harry shrugged out of the jacket, the returned his hands to the metal skin of the plane. "You won't find them, gentlemen," he told them. "I gave them to a courier last night. By now, they should be safely back in South Africa."

"NO!" Hepplewhite cried out. "You're lying. You MUST be lying! I will NOT be cheated out of the very thing that I've spent the last seventeen years of my life trying to retrieve!" He lifted the gun and took careful aim in Harry's direction. "You would not have trusted them to anyone else. Now tell me WHERE the gems are!"

Harry glanced at Tony out of the corner of his eye as he turned around. "As I said, South Africa. Where they belong."

"Say your prayers, whoever you are. Because you are about to meet your Maker."

Before Tony could move, Hepplewhite fired the gun once, and Harry slid to the ground, his hand over the spreading red stain on his white shirt. Tony knelt beside him. "Chalmers? Where are the gems?"

"Told-you," Harry said, then drew a final, shuddering breath and lay still.

Tony closed the dead man's eyes. "I'll search the suitcase," he offered, rising to his feet as he spoke to get Hepplewhite's attention off of Harry. "He might have put the gems in there."

"No," Hepplewhite said, his voice loud in the hangar. "He would have kept them on him-or given them to someone he trusted implicitly. And there is only person in Los Angeles who fits that description: Laura Holt."

Tony glanced at Harry, saw the change in breathing. "What? I told you, he duped her. She doesn't have the gems. Look, Chalmers might have been telling the truth. He gave them to someone who took them to South Africa."

"And let them out of his sight? I do not think so. You argue as a man who is infatuated, Mr. Roselli. Could it be that you wanted him out of the way for other reasons than you gave me?"

"What are you talking about?"

"Miss Holt is a very attractive young woman. I could understand your desire to- get rid of the competition."

"No," Tony said, laughing nervously. "She doesn't mean anything to me," he said as Hepplewhite brought the gun up again. "Hey. What about my money? The job you promised?"

"I already have enough security people. I've no need for more. Especially not for someone as mercenary as you obviously are. As a soldier, I fought for what I believed in. You, obviously, are loyal only to yourself."

"The same thing your friends probably thought about you when you sent them to prison after the war," Tony accused. Hepplewhite's finger tightened on the trigger. OOPS. Wrong thing to say, Roselli. "You won't get away with this."

"Get away with what? You cornered him here, shot him and were wounded yourself in the struggle before he died. Too weak to seek help, you expired as well. I'm sure that Miss Holt will be quite distraught to learn of your deaths. So distraught she will tell me what I want to know."

"And if she doesn't?" Tony asked, his hands in the air.

Hepplewhite lifted his shoulders. "Then she will join you and her former employer a bit earlier than she would expect to."

Tony had been backing away, leaving Harry's "body" on the floor behind Hepplewhite. If Hepplewhite fired a second blank, he would know that he'd been tricked. Tony didn't have a dye pack under his shirt.

Harry was about to move, tensing to roll to his feet, when he saw Laura behind some oil drums. She'd followed him even though he'd told her not to. But hadn't he expected her to do exactly that? He asked himself. Looking past Hepplewhite, he saw that Tony couldn't see Laura from where he was standing.

Laura needed a diversion to get across the empty floor. Harry moaned, gaining the old man's attention once more. "I thought you said he was dead?" he asked Tony, moving toward the injured man, keeping Tony in his sights as well. He looked down at Harry. "Can you hear me?"

"The gems," Harry muttered in a whispery voice, forcing Hepplewhite to bend closer. "The gems are--" he never had to finish the sentence as Laura came up behind Hepplewhite with a length of pipe in her hands, pressing it into the man's back.

"Give the gun back to Tony, Mr. Hepplewhite," she said, jabbing the pipe deeper into the man's fragile backbone. "Now."

Hepplewhite slowly handed the gun back to a relieved Tony. Laura dropped the pipe. "I knew you were involved in all of this," he told her, turning to look at her as Tony helped Harry to his feet. "He did give the gems to you, didn't he?"

"He told you what he did with them," Laura said. "Gave them to a courier. They're back where they belong now."

"They belong with me," Hepplewhite told her. "They are the last link to my wife. The last chance I have to keep the promise I made to her." He looked a broken, tired old man, defeated by life. "You reminded me so much of her. So much." For a moment, Laura felt sorry for the man.

"Mr. Hepplewhite--"

He put his hands together. "You must forgive me, my dear. I am an old man who has made many mistakes in his life."

Harry started forward to stand beside Laura, some special sense suddenly alerting him that something was wrong, only to stop as a bullet flew past his ear. "Damn!" Tony muttered, diving for cover along with Harry as Hepplewhite grabbed Laura's arm in a surprisingly strong grip and moved toward the door.

"This way, Miss Holt," he said as a small derringer appeared in his hand. He placed it against her neck. "It's small, dear, but quite deadly at close range. Don't struggle- unless you're ready to die." Laura glanced back to where Harry and Tony were pinned down by Hepplewhite's men as she was pulled out of the building and toward the limo that was just stopping outside.

"Don't happen to have any real bullets for that thing, do you?" Harry asked Tony as they sat with their backs against some machinery. He turned and looked toward the doorway as Tony dug in a pocket and found a full clip, quickly reloading the gun in his hand. "Bloody hell," he muttered, ducking as another bullet flew past and hit the wall behind him. "She's not there," he told Tony. "She and Hepplewhite are both gone." They heard the car's engine fading into the distance.

Both men looked at each other, then peered over the machinery. "Laura?" Harry called, getting to his feet and looking around. "Laura?!"

"What the hell was she doing here?" Tony asked, his gaze accusing.

"You know Laura, always having to prove to herself that she's as good as anyone else! I asked her to lay low, to stay out of it."

"He'll take her back to his place," Tony said, starting toward the door closest to his car. "Let's go." When Harry didn't move, Tony stopped. "You coming or not?"

"They won't be able to go back there," Harry informed him. "I made a phone call while I was on my way here- told the police that Hepplewhite was in possession of stolen art and gems. The place is no doubt crawling with them by now."

"Just GREAT!" Tony exploded. "You just couldn't wait to get those fees, could you? Now, there's no telling WHERE they're headed!" He sat back. "What are we going to do?"

Harry picked his jacket up from the floor and brushed the dust from the leather. "Not much we can do- except wait for him to contact us."

"Chalmers, the man's insane. You really want to leave Laura in his hands?"

"Then you come up with something better, Antony," Harry replied. "Yes, I'm worried. But Laura's proven on more than one occasion that she can take care of herself. He wants those gems. And he believes Laura is the best way to get his hands on them."

Tony watched him for a moment, not liking the look in those blue eyes. "You're planning something again, aren't you?"

Harry smiled as an idea began to form. "What was the name of the man Hepplewhite called to prove the gems he has are fakes?"

"Davis. Couldn't be far from Hepplewhite's. He got there pretty quick."

"Davis," Harry mused, then turned toward the side door. "Let's go. We have some calls to make."

Tony shook his head, certain he wasn't going to like what the man had in mind. "You know, it might be nice if you'd let someone else in on this little plan," he said as he followed Harry outside.

Afterwards, neither man was certain if they heard the gunshot before the car exploded into a ball of fire. Harry and Tony were both thrown to the ground by the concussion from the blast.
***

The chauffeur turned to look at his employer. "We can't go back to the house, sir," he said apologetically.

"Why not?"

"Because moments after we left, the police arrived. They were given a tip about stolen goods, I believe."

Laura saw Harry's hand in that, and winced as Hepplewhite's eyes narrowed. She didn't want to be in Harry's shoes when this man caught up with him. "Then go to the safehouse," Hepplewhite ordered. "Quickly."

"What are you going to do to me, Hepplewhite?" Laura asked in an angry voice.

"Why, you're the bait, my dear, in this little game. I've an idea that those two gentlemen will do whatever it takes to get you back in one piece. Even steal the Royal Lavulite again."

To Be Continued>>>

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Original content ©1999 by Nancy Eddy