Deep Breath (18 page)

9:00
P.M.

Her expensive shoes wrapped up inside the expensive suit she’d folded as neatly as she could in a bathroom stall, Georgia looked both ways, then stepped out into the street.

In the parking lot on the other side, she could see Harry talking to Hank, who sat behind the wheel of the car Harry had purchased. She’d wondered how he was going to get it home since he already had Morganna to take care of.

She also wondered what he was going to name the Jag. It was a tight little thing. Racy. Sleek. It reminded her of Marilyn Monroe, with its perfectly balanced curves and creamy blond paint job.

Hank raised his hand in farewell just as she stepped up onto the curb; he saw her and included her in his wave. She waved back, thinking Harry had a hell of a good thing going for him.

He’d told Valoren that he’d been working in engineering for eighteen months. He’d told her that he was on vacation, having a couple of weeks coming to him.

She thought for half a second that she should give up treasure hunting and take up project consulting just for the perks because she had seriously forgotten why she loved what she did.

She used to know, back when she did it for fun and profit rather than for personal reasons, which now had her up to her eyeballs in hot water.

Harry was waiting for her to open the lockbox. She had yet to come up with another viable excuse to delay. And since she was about ten steps from being out of time, she was left with little choice but to try and act her way out of the very thing he expected her to do. She walked up to Harry just as he slammed shut the trunk. Good. A reprieve.

She put the onus back on him. “Either you opened the box without me and have bad news, or you’ve changed your mind.”

He nodded, started walking toward the driver’s side door. “The latter. This isn’t the time or the place.”

Relief fluttered its wings all around her. She lifted the bundle she held. “What about my clothes?”

“Toss ’em in the backseat. I’ll put up the top.”

She stood back and watched while he did. “I like your boss.”

“Yeah. He’s a great guy.”

“Nice of you to let him take off in your ninety-thousand-dollar car.”

Harry unsnapped the cover locking the car top in its well and began to unfold the accordion-like frame. “I know where to find him.”

“Not a bad trade-off, I guess. A long vacation after less than two years on the job in exchange for use of the Jag.”

That shut him up. She went on. “Makes me wonder if what you do for him has anything to do with engineering at all. Especially if he recruited you out of the Rangers.”

He finished hooking the top into place. “Are you ready to go?”

Since he wasn’t going to address her observations, she supposed she was. She’d gotten the breathing room she needed and—

“Ms. McLain? Georgia McLain?”

She turned to see an older man hopping onto the curb and walking toward them. “Who’s asking?”

“My name is Marvin Katz. I am, or I was, Arthur’s attorney.” He held out his hand.

She shook it as Harry walked up behind her. “Can I help you with something?”

Katz referred to a business-size envelope he held in his hand where he’d apparently jotted his crib notes. “You are Georgia Tillie McLain? Daughter of Stanley Dean and Sheryl Annette McLain? Sister to Finneas Scott?”

All she could think of was how funny it was to hear her brother called Finneas. Until she heard Harry snicker and ask, “Tillie?” She elbowed him in the stomach. “That’s me.”

Nodding, the attorney reached into his coat pocket and handed her a business card. “I need to get in touch with your brother, as well.”

She was still wondering how he’d found her, but her stomach churned thinking of Finn. “Finn’s not available. It may be several days before I can get in touch with him.”

“Hmm. Well, if the delay can’t be avoided—”

“Sorry. It can’t.”

“Then could you be at my office tomorrow morning at nine? I’ll have to speak with your brother at a later date.”

Frowning, Georgia stared down at the business card. “What’s this about, Mr. Katz?”

He glanced over her shoulder at Harry, who started to back away. She reached out and grabbed him by his shirt. “Harry’s a friend of mine. I don’t mind him hearing whatever you have to say.”

“It’s in regard to the reading of Arthur Duggin’s will.”

“And that affects me how?”

“He has made a bequest to you.”

A bequest? To her? She didn’t understand. She already had the dossier. “Is it the correspondence from my father?”

“The paperwork that outlines the bequest is at my office.”

Harry stepped up then. “But you don’t need the paperwork to tell Miss McLain what it is.”

“No, but I do have a letter from the general that I’m required to give you at the time the will is read.”

Georgia couldn’t even focus. She only knew one thing. “I can’t be there in the morning. It’s impossible.”

“Hmm. That does complicate things.”

“Give her the letter tonight,” Harry put in. “We can go to your office now.”

“It is rather late, but I suppose that solution would work.”

“Then let’s go.” Harry took both the business card and the clothes Georgia was still holding from her hands. The clothes he dropped through the open window into the backseat.

The card he simply flicked once. “We’ve got the address, we’ll meet you there.”

9:40
P.M.

Katz’s office was a short drive from the gallery in Oak Lawn, a trendy neighborhood of old homes converted into creative studios and office space.

Harry pulled into the driveway behind Katz’s Volvo and stayed in the car while Georgia and the attorney went inside.

He could have insisted on joining her, but she hadn’t asked, and he was glad. He needed to contact Simon and let his partner know that he and Georgia were on the way back.

The lockbox content was now a moot point. And a big fat albatross of one at that. Georgia wasn’t going to want to open it since doing so would put her in the position of having to feign distress she obviously didn’t have energy to feign.

And he wasn’t too thrilled about having to falsely console her false angst and swear to find another way to take Charlie down. Harry’s energy was better spent working to do just that.

He waited until he saw lights inside come on with a warm golden glow before reaching beneath his seat into the compartment that held his satellite phone. He dialed the ops center, asked to be put through to Simon.

“And it’s a goddamn boring night here at Waco Phil’s, so give me something to talk about lest I start dreamin’ about your mama.”

Harry rolled his eyes. “Guess a trucker’s life’s not for everyone.”

“Rabbit, that is a mouthful and a half. Though I have caught up on my
Buffy
DVDs. I’m up to season four.”

Harry tried not to laugh. He figured he didn’t have a lot of time. “I’ll be there before dawn. What’s the plan?”

“Lose your car at the airport. There’s a beater there with your name on it.” He told Harry where to find it parked and where the key was stashed. “Remember the wrecking yard?”

“Half a click south.”

“Right. Leave the car there and then use the brush along the road for cover. Oh, and there’s a shield and ID stashed with the key.”

“Yeah? Who am I?”

“FBI, boo. We’re staking out the lot. Top secret. Locals are probably waiting for a heroin bust.”

This time Harry did laugh. “You’re a mean man, Baptiste.”

“Just dumping another load of bad shit onto the rep of my favorite agency.”

Simon definitely had tales to tell. But old home week was over. The light inside the house had gone off. “Look for us around one.”

“Just don’t forget the secret knock,” Simon said, and rang off.

Harry had just shoved the phone away when he looked up to see Georgia coming down the front porch steps two at a time. He pushed open his door and got out, meeting her halfway across the yard and walking her to her side of the car.

She didn’t say anything. She didn’t reach out, didn’t respond when he touched her shoulder, when he reached for her hand. All she did once he’d opened her door was slide into her seat.

She clutched an envelope in one hand. “Can we go, please?”

“Sure,” he said, closing her door and heading back to his. He cast her a quick glance as he backed out of the driveway, his arm along the seat. “You okay?”

She nodded, shook her head, let it fall back against his hand. “I don’t know. Is shock good or bad?”

“Depends. Is it the kind of shock where I need to grab a blanket from the trunk, lay you down, elevate your legs? Maybe loosen your jeans, since they look pretty tight?” He caught the hint of a smile and it lightened the weight of worry on his heart. “Or is it something you’ll get over here in a few and can then tell me about?”

“The latter. Just…give me a few minutes.”

He did, maneuvering his way through the neighborhood, into the city and out again, picking up the main artery south to Waco, then cutting east on a lesser traveled road. He couldn’t say he’d ever been happier to leave a place behind, and had to imagine Georgia felt much the same.

She waited until they’d been on the road for fifteen minutes before she said anything about what had happened. And then what she said left him speechless. “He willed me everything. Well, half of everything. I’m assuming he left the rest to Finn.”

“Everything? As in, everything?”

“Yep. The proceeds from the sale of his properties. His investment portfolio. His liquid assets. I quit counting the zeros at seven.”

“This is the general you’re talking about?”

“No. Mr. Katz.” She propped her boots on the dash, a really bad habit that was hell on Morganna’s interior. “Yes, the general. I met the man once. Finn’s never met him at all. And
I
wouldn’t have had reason to if not for my father’s insistence that I find out the truth about TotalSky.”

Harry frowned, his thoughts clicking. Nothing he knew about Arthur Duggin’s life would lead him to believe the man’s net worth had reason to run that high. Granted, he didn’t know much. And seeing the spread south of Waco and the Highland Park estate had sent his rabbit ears twitching.

It was obviously a clue he should have followed up on. Either the general had been living above his means, or he had a means Harry needed to look into. “So what’s with the envelope?”

She held her fists wedged between her knees. “It’s a letter. Supposedly explaining everything.”

“Are you going to read it?”

“It’s too dark.”

He reached beneath her raised thighs and opened the glove box. The light came on automatically, shining down on the Mediterranean blue carpet. “It’s a map light. Bright enough to use to read anything.”

She didn’t move. She just stared ahead into the darkness. “I don’t know if I want to.”

“You’re not curious?” He sure as hell was.

“I don’t like it. The whole thing. It’s not right.”

“That you’re suddenly a millionaire?”

She gave a hoarse cackle. “It’s a joke, you know. It has to be. I’ll open this letter and there will be all sorts of stipulations attached.”

“Did Katz tell you there were any?”

“No.”

“Then there aren’t.” Harry flashed on his high beams, illuminating the long dark road ahead. “He would’ve been legally bound to spell it all out.”

“Are you suddenly an attorney as well as a mysteriously well-compensated engineer?”

“No. I’m someone with enough common sense to see that you’re putting off the inevitable because you’re afraid you won’t like what you find out.” And if that wasn’t an identifiable human trait, he didn’t know what was. “Just rip off the bandage and get it over with.”

And she did.

11:15
P.M.

Georgia’s hands shook as she unfolded the two handwritten sheets. She dropped her feet to the floor and hunched forward, glad that Harry had put up the car’s top. She was quite sure the wind would’ve whipped the reasons for her new tax bracket right out of her grasp had he not.

She shoved the envelope into the glove box and ran her index fingers over the back side of the fold to straighten the paper. The general’s handwriting was bold, the letters formed with large loops and sharp slashes. “
‘Dear Georgia. I hope you don’t mind me calling you Georgia even though we don’t know one another well.’
Hey, Arthur, whatever floats your boat.”

Harry chuckled. “You never mentioned you two were on a first name basis.”

Georgia spared a quick glare for Harry. “My world is upside down. I have no time for what you try to pass off as humor.” She took another breath and forged on. “
‘You are, after all, the closest thing I have to a family of my own.’
What a load of crap.”

“How many times did you say you visited him?”

“One. Just one. When I went to ask him for the dossier.” When she had pleaded her father’s case and received a lecture suggesting an attitude adjustment in response. “I don’t even get where he’s coming from.”

Harry rolled his window up an inch. “Uh, maybe you should read further before jumping to that conclusion? Just consider it another bandage, and rip.”

She rolled her eyes. She hated it when Harry made sense. Hated it even more when he saw through her delay tactics. She smoothed her fingers over the crease again.
“‘I know you’re doubting my sincerity, and I don’t blame you. We never did come to a meeting of the minds. That’s something I regret, but which I also fully understand. Were I in your position now, I would no doubt find my affection for you rather odd.’”

She lifted her gaze, stared straight ahead into the darkness beyond the reach of Morganna’s lights. Great. Now
she
was referring to the car by the name Harry had christened her. That seemed even more twisted than using the gender specific pronoun. Cars were objects, not people—

“Georgia?”

She squeezed her eyes closed. “I don’t want to know about his affection for me. I want to know about his betrayal of my father.”

Harry held out his hand. “Give it here. I’ll read it.”

“You can’t read and drive at the same time.”

“So you do know all my deep dark secrets.”

It was more like she didn’t want him knowing hers. “I’ll read it. You keep your eyes on the road so you don’t hit any bunnies or skunks or puppies or anything.”

“Puppies?”

She ignored him and cleared her throat.
“‘When you came to me three years ago after your father’s death, I wasn’t surprised. Stanley was the last to agree to our proposal, and was never completely gung-ho once our alliance set things into motion.’”

A sickening sensation settled in her stomach, but she continued to read, drawn toward the oncoming train. “‘
He told me that you and your brother were the reason for his decision to go forward with our plan. He felt it was his only way to give back all that had been taken from the two of you. I promised him then that I would see to your
future should anything happen to him. As we both know, it did
.

“‘By now, you’re wishing I would get to the point. Once I explain, you’ll understand why I could not give you the dossier when you asked. You see, Stanley was as much a part of the TotalSky scandal as I was. But we were not alone. As I swore to your father to look after you, I swore to the others I would never speak to anyone of the deal we had made
.

“‘I was honest with you about the file’s contents. Nothing inside would change the public’s perception of your father. The extent of your father’s involvement was spelled out in the charges against him, though the details are not mine to reveal. I give you that much only to explain my bequest. I hope that knowing he was looking out for your well-being will ease the sense of betrayal you must feel.’”

Betrayal? Was he kidding? What she was feeling was rage. The man was a fucking liar. Her father had told her not to let the truth go unknown. He had to have known what Duggin would try to pull.

She slammed her feet against the floor, looking for the brakes. “Stop the car. Now.” Harry began to slow, edging toward the shoulder at a snail’s pace. “Hurry up. Stop the car.”

“I’m stopping as fast as I can, sweetheart. Morganna needs more than a dime.”

By the time he had the car off the road, she had her door open and was running around to the trunk. Ugh. She didn’t have keys! She scrambled around the side, slipping and sliding on gravel, reaching his door just as he opened it.

“Open the trunk. I need my duffel.”

“Georgia. We need to talk.”

They could talk later. She had three years of her life, her father’s reputation, her brother’s head on the line. “Harry, please. This is important.”

“So is what I need to tell you,” he said, sliding the key into the lock, turning it, lifting the trunk’s heavy lid as if purposefully moving in slow motion.

“Tell me later,” she said, shoving the lid up and out of his hand and diving for her duffel. She loosened the straps, pulled back the flap, opened the bag wide, and reached for the satchel containing the portfolio and the dossier inside.

She came out with the first and the second. She was missing the third. She tossed the satchel and leather binder to the road and dragged her bag closer, rifling through T-shirts and jeans and undies and the dress for which she still needed to repay Harry and…nothing. It wasn’t there.

“It’s not here,” she cried, turning to look up at him. “I had it. I found it. It’s gone.”

“I know,” he said. And he didn’t even ask what she was talking about.

“What the hell do you mean, you know? How can you know? When—” She cut herself off. She’d left the bag in the trunk, left Harry at the car when she’d gone into the gallery’s rest room to change. He’d fucking searched her things?

How dare he! How
dare
he. How dare he take what was hers! It didn’t matter that she’d stolen it, never told him, deceived him into having his boss spend thousands of dollars on a box full of worthless papers because it
might
be there.

What mattered was that he’d been equally dishonest with her…and she’d never suspected. Except she had, hadn’t she? She’d suspected more than once that he wasn’t the engineer he said he was.

She rubbed her fingers over her forehead, squeezing her headache out through her ears. “Where is it? No, wait.” She held up one hand. “That’s not what I want to know. Why, Harry? Tell me why.”

He stepped back, snagged the portfolio and satchel from the ground, tossed it on top of her things, then slammed shut the trunk. “I told you, Georgia. We need to talk.”