Beyond the Rules (18 page)

“Clearly,” he said, and his droll tone let her know he immediately understood the implications.

“I’m heading toward Hank’s place. Nothing new other
than that…but I wanted you to know. Don’t trust the Pennsylvania cops.”

“I’ve got someone I can go to,” he told her.

“And Ingleswood?” she asked, shorthand he’d understand.
Have you stopped that damned reporter yet?

“Still working on that. I think we’ll be able to cover the situation, but it’s going to be costly.”

Great. More anti-Kimmer points, adding up in the big tally she’d started.

On the other hand, it couldn’t get too much worse, could it? Almost a cheering thought. “Gotta keep moving,” she told him. “I’ll stay in touch.”

“Do that.” And then, for the sake of his company, “Sorry you’re already scheduled. I’ll try you again next time.”

But when Kimmer hung up, she closed her eyes and bumped the phone against her forehead and fervently hoped there would even be a next time.

With Ari taking turns in the driver’s seat on an all-night drive, Rio hit the south end of the lake at midmorning. He dropped Ari off in Watkins Glen to yawn through the day and drive a rental home the day after, and then headed for Full Cry Winery.
That
, he told Kimmer in his mind,
is what family is supposed to be about
. As if he could have stopped Ari from pitching in to get Rio back here in a way that left him rested enough to drive safely onward to Erie—and would leave his back functional once he got there.

As if it would have stopped me even if he hadn’t.
No matter what Kimmer had said. Because she clearly didn’t get it: she, too, was family. And though he’d needed to go home and reassure himself that things were under control, he needed just as badly to get back here and be with Kimmer. Not so
much the white knight—Kimmer had her own suit of armor—as just making sure that for once in her life, she wasn’t alone in her trouble.

Okay, so it might take years for her to believe it. First step was making sure they had those years.

On the way to Hunter he detoured north to Glenora, winding the side streets long enough to hit Kimmer’s street. No traffic. He took the luxury of easing down the street, hesitating in front of the house without actually pulling over.

Forlorn, it was. The blackened porch, the broken front windows, streaks of soot climbing up the siding, curtains gone. The warped door didn’t quite close. The sharp scent of wet, charred wood reached him through the Element’s fresh air vents and the tickle of it in his sinuses triggered protective anger. All this over a nonexistent recording. All this for a man who’d come up here to use Kimmer, and who’d left knowing he would then betray her.

It suddenly made perfect sense to him.

Not family at all
.

Not that man. Not the others she’d left behind.

Kimmer wasn’t the only one who had a different world to learn.

Rio headed for Hunter. He drove just over the limit and passed the slow cars where he could, and when he unfolded himself from the driver’s seat, an innocent winery employee took one look at his expression and skittered to the other side of the small parking lot. He snapped his cell phone open and dialed Owen’s regular line. His secretary answered. “Rio Carlsen,” Rio said. “Here to see Owen. Now.”

“He’s—” The voice held denial. Rio didn’t let him finish.

“—going to see me or I’ll be standing outside that vini
culture development door making all sorts of noise,” Rio said. “He’ll know what it’s about.”

“So do I,” the secretary said with some aspersion in his deep tenor. “He’s at the winery office. I’ll let them know you’re coming.”

And by the time Rio made it to the winery barn, Owen was stepping out the front door. He didn’t even hesitate, but put a friendly hand of steel on Rio’s shoulder and steered him away from the entrance to walk the pine-bark path along the outside of the barn. “I’ve sent for Dave,” he said. “Everyone else is considerably farther away. He’ll work from within the Pittsburgh police department. He knows who to trust.”

“I’m going, too,” Rio said. “I need Hank’s address. Don’t tell me you don’t have it.” And then he stopped short. “What do you mean, ‘who to trust’?”

Owen glanced back at the winery entrance and relaxed slightly; they were out of earshot. Only if someone else came meandering around the path to enjoy the spring flowers blooming up against the barn would they need to move on. “It seems the system isn’t entirely free from corruption. There’s a bogus warrant out for Kimmer.”

“They didn’t get her?”

Owen’s mouth quirked in a brief, wry smile. “They did,” he said. “But not for very long.”

Great. She’d be on everyone’s radar if she’d had an encounter with a cop. “Then I need that address,” he said, “because she needs help.”

But when Owen merely looked at him in response, measuring his words, Rio’s hackles went up. He wanted a shave, he wanted sleep, he wanted a meal and a good Twinkies fix, but more than any of that he wanted—needed—to be headed straight for Kimmer. “I can get the information on the Web,”
he said bluntly. “I can stop at Erie and find an Internet café…I bet it’ll only take a white pages search.”

“And I’d prefer you didn’t,” Owen said. “This thing has spun entirely out of control. I’ve barely kept it out of the headline news. I’m sending Dave as a Hunter rep and we can’t afford to muddy the waters—”

“You mean the agency can’t afford it,” Rio said. “That’s what this is about, isn’t it? You want your brother down there because you know he’ll watch out for Hunter interests, and Hank Reed has already caused enough trouble. Notice I said Hank and not Kimmer.”

Owen raised a single imperturbable eyebrow, damn him. “If you knew my brother Dave, you’d know what an absurd statement that is.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Rio said. “He left the family business to do his own thing. So what. If he’s working for you, he’s working
for you
. I’m going. I’ll be working with Kimmer’s interests in mind.”

Owen stiffened slightly. Good, at least he was paying attention. “And should I ask if you’re still considering the offer to sign on with us?”

Yeah, the man was good. Rio got it. Rio got it quite clearly. But if Owen thought he could control Rio with that threat, he had another think coming. “That depends,” he said evenly. “I’m still assessing your field support.”

“Kimmer’s not on a Hunter assignment. In fact, she crossed state lines in express defiance of my wishes.”

“To clean up a mess that started because of an assignment she took against her wishes,” Rio snapped, quite suddenly aware of the inches he had on Owen, if not the weight.

And to his surprise, Owen merely sighed. “She said the same.” He shrugged. “And she was right, too.”

Rio’s eyes narrowed. He could have floundered for words, but kept his silence and his demanding stare in place.

“Don’t take me wrong.” Owen started them walking again, veering off the path to walk the soft green grounds on approach to the back of the viniculture development building. “My concerns about Hunter’s situation are significant. But I won’t leave Kimmer out to hang in the wind, either. That should be obvious enough, given that Dave is already on his way.”

“Don’t,” Rio said, hearing the dangerous edge to his own words, “
don’t
tell me that was some sort of test.”

“Test?” Owen glanced at him. “Not so to speak. Feeling you out…yes. If you’d been that easy to deter, you’re not the sort I want working with Hunter. And I’d want someone else at Kimmer’s back.”

“I thought you said there was no one else close enough.”

Owen raised that eyebrow again. “
I’m
here.”

Rio didn’t sputter. Not quite.

“Now,” Owen said, swinging wide around the building to reach the entrance. “Let’s get that address.”

She slipped through the trees between the barn and the pasture, feet assured. She knew just when to duck to avoid low branches in the darkness. She knew just when to hesitate to hear if anyone else might be out here. And she knew just where to bend back the best long, springy branches, releasing them to whip in the faces of those who might follow—but who seldom did since she’d already proven her timing and accuracy with those natural weapons
.

No. Not here, not now. It just seemed that way. The trees were the right mix of secondary growth hardwoods, the poison ivy scattered just thickly enough, the back of the barn the
same weathered wood of a building not quite kept up but still serviceable…and the partitioned goat shelter in which Kimmer crouched the same rain-softened mucky ground that would suck her sneakers right off if she didn’t step carefully.

And the smell, of course. That, too, was the same. A small herd of dairy cows, a yearly litter of pigs, the goats for milk and weed control. The one still in the pen with her had a big bell around its neck. She would bet there was another one out wandering the property, eating around the edges of the cleared areas but never too far from the leafy green alfalfa dinner serving.

Beh-eh-eh
. That was Rio’s voice in her head where it had no right to be. Kimmer scowled and pushed away the large brown goat currently nibbling on the edge of her borrowed jacket. “Stupid,” she muttered at it, and couldn’t have said which of them she was talking to. But she kept her voice low, for not so long ago a goonboy in garage coveralls and greasy hands had wandered out here to relieve himself and to walk what must have been a habitual perimeter, judging by the worn scuff of a path he followed. A multipurpose goonboy.

She looked beyond the barn to that which made this property utterly unlike the small farm on which she’d grown up. The huge Quonset building, shiny metal through the leaves. Ugly in shape, ugly in color…a big human blotch upon the land. As was the junk lining the sides. Hank’s scrap and scrounge business must have been going strong even before the BGs spotted him as a likely mark for their chop shop location.

She doubted they’d realized that Hank’s world was so entirely about
Hank
that he’d kill one of them and then convince himself he could get away with it by waving his troublesome sister in front of their eyes. But she’d played the part of dis
traction long enough. It was time to put an end to this thing. If that meant putting an end to the goonboss, all the better.

Especially since she doubted she could dig her own way out of this trouble—with the cops, with Owen—without that big payoff.

Against her hip, something vibrated. Cell phone. Normally in a pocket, but she’d loaded every pocket she had with every weapon she could fit and had resorted to her belt clip for the phone. SmartCarry holding the .38, the trooper’s Glock in a back pocket and good only for the remaining bullets, her club and toothpick knife and brass knuckles, a small stun gun and a larger knife strapped to her jeans at the outside of her calf. Loaded for goonboy. Kimmer pushed the goat’s questing nose away from her back and retrieved the phone, flipping it open to check the caller ID and more than a little smug at the full charge the battery carried.

Rio.

For once she wished the phone wasn’t enhanced, so technologically spiffy. It told her quite bluntly that Rio was at Full Cry Winery. She couldn’t even pretend that he might be on his way. That she wouldn’t be alone in this.

Not a chance. For one thing, she’d told him not to come—to stay with his family. For another, there was no way he could get back down this far unless he’d suddenly taken up piloting his own small plane. He’d taken two days to get up there, being careful of his back so he could still be of some good to them when he got there. Under most circumstances he was the same strong, deceptively capable man she’d thought him when she’d first seen him at the little roadside gas station last fall. Taller than most who considered themselves tall, striking of feature and build…and yet he’d carried himself so casually, so relaxed. He’d taken her by
surprise when he’d easily handled one of the men sent after his cousin Carolyne. Quick and decisive and effective…and then, when he’d taken his cousin in hand, right back to easygoing. But soon enough Kimmer had learned he paid a price for those moments of chivalry. That he’d always pay that price, as little fuss as he made about it.

And quite suddenly she missed him—fiercely, as she seemed to feel everything these recent days. She wished he were here.

But she couldn’t talk to him. She couldn’t let it mess with her head…and she couldn’t risk being overheard. She’d let voice mail pick up—which it did even as she made the decision, telling her just how long she’d been lost in thought.
Stupid
. Not alert to her surroundings, not even aware of the—

Goat.

She snatched her hand back too late. The goat targeted the phone, all grab and no finesse, knocking Kimmer back a step in the muck. It lifted its head to that cocky angle goats seemed born to assume, staring at her with its eerie light brown eyes, rectangular pupils distinct…phone clenched in its jaws.

“Give that back!” she snarled at it, a phrase most goats heard from kidhood. Still staring at her with its accusing, indignant gaze, the goat gave a quick sideways chew, determined the phone to be of no interest and dropped it in the muck. Kimmer waved her hands in its face and it bounded away, lifting its tail to drop a few fresh pellets in its wake.

Gingerly, Kimmer plucked the phone from the nastiness in which it resided. No need to worry if the muck had wrecked it; the goat had done that for her. Cracked and nonresponsive, the phone display flickered once and went out for good.

No phone.

She felt the urge to close her eyes and mutter a few good strong anti-goat invectives, but resigned herself to the situation, bouncing back as she ever had. If she had to retreat and find a pay phone, she would—supposing it didn’t rain and bog her Miata down in the back pasture where she’d stashed it.
Doesn’t matter. I’ll make it work. I won’t give up
. Giving up was a luxury she’d never had.

Kimmer lured the goat back over with a few greens plucked from beyond the pen, and wiped the phone off on its coat. She couldn’t leave the phone here to be found, but didn’t want any residual smell to give away her presence. Once she left the pen, she’d rub her shoes off with grass. For now, she tucked the phone away on its clip and sighed.