Distant Memory (15 page)

“Which includes you?”

“Which includes me,” Nick said. “Come on, I want you to see the rest of it.”

“Will the truck be okay parked on the street here?”

“For a while. I can’t leave it very long or the neighbors will start complaining. They’re fussy about such things.”

Nick slipped out of his seat and quickly made his way around to Lisa’s door, which he opened with a flourish, offering his hand as an escort might offer his to a noble lady in a carriage. Lisa took his hand and slipped from her perch in the high cab to the step. Her body was stiff, and her ribs reminded her of her sensitive condition. Her face registered the discomfort. She took a deep breath, held it for a moment, then released it.

“Do you want me to carry you to the house?” Nick asked with a sympathetic smile.

“That would probably hurt more. Does the ibuprofen offer still stand?”

“Absolutely. It’s the gentlemanly thing to do.” Lisa let Nick help her down. Once on the ground, she stretched gingerly, keenly aware of every bruise and ache. Despite her stiffness, the short walk from the truck to the house felt good. She had spent the better part of the day in the cab of the truck, getting out only for lunch and her little excursion into the dilapidated church.

A large pair of double doors opened into a wide, hardwood-floored entrance hall. A few steps later she stood in the living room. Everything looked new—the white leather furniture, the glass top coffee and end tables, the charcoal gray carpet. The impression was more like a model home than a house in which someone regularly lived.

“Wow,” Lisa said with genuine surprise. “You keep a clean house.”

“Since my sister makes only the occasional visit, it’s just me here, and I spend most of my time on the road. I also have a maid who comes
in to vacuum and dust once a week. She would have been in yesterday.”

“It’s certainly better than the Pretty Penny Motel,” Lisa said.

“You won’t get any argument from me on that,” Nick said as he crossed the living room. Cobalt blue drapes hung along the wall. Nick went to the left end of the curtains, found the drawstrings, and pulled the drapes back. The thick curtains parted to reveal a magnificent view of the ocean that surged and sparkled in the August sun. “Ta-da!” he pronounced holding his arms out and striking a dramatic pose.

“Amazing,” Lisa uttered softly. The deep blue of the ocean, the azure sky, and the white rollers churning toward shore painted a striking picture. Sea gulls, their white and gray bodies in contrast to the crystalline sky, danced their waltz of flight, balancing in the wind, hovering over the water as if suspended by invisible strings. “It’s beyond beautiful.”

“It is, isn’t it?”

“You actually leave this view to drive around the country in a truck? I would stay here forever, gazing out the window.”

“Tempting as that is, I enjoy my work. There are other beautiful things in the world besides the ocean.” His voice trailed off, and Lisa caught him staring at her. An unwanted sense of discomfort stirred in her. A second passed like an hour before Nick said, “Let me show you where you can rest. I bet you’re exhausted.”

Lisa nodded quickly. “I am. All I’ve done is sit in a truck, but I feel like I’ve been working all day.”

“Riding can be tiring, especially after all you’ve gone through. Can you make it up the stairs all right?”

“I’m sore, not crippled,” Lisa said more sourly than she meant. She quickly added, “But thank you for your concern.”

“Shall we?” He motioned toward a set of stairs that separated the living room from the dining room.

Lisa followed him, trying not to show how much pain the climb was causing her. At the top of the stairs was a balcony that looked down on a portion of the lower floor. From it she could see the room she had just left as well as the dining room and a breakfast nook.

“The bedrooms are split,” Nick said. He pointed to the left. “That’s my room. It’s the master bedroom. I’m going to put you in my sister’s room, over here. It’s a good size room with a hall bath right next to it. You should be comfortable.”

The bedroom, like the rest of the house, was large and nicely decorated. Art hung from the walls, and a large bed made of oak dominated the room. A dresser was on the far wall, and a window looked out over the rear roof and the ocean. Lisa could imagine herself sitting in its cushioned window seat and gazing hour after hour at the captivating ocean.

She felt again the sadness that had plagued her since awaking that morning. This was not her home. Worse, she didn’t know if she even had a home of her own. Surely she did, but where? What was it like? Did it have a beautiful view too, or was it sandwiched in the midst of identical looking cookie-cutter houses? A vague sensation of memory wafted through her subconscious, but it left as quickly as it had arrived. It took a moment for her to realize that Nick was still speaking.

“And over here is the closet.” Nick opened a pair of louvered bifold doors. “Help yourself to any clothing you find in here. My sister is about your size, so everything should fit.”

“She won’t mind?”

“Not at all,” Nick said quickly. “She is one of the kindest people on the planet. If she knew you were here and thought that I hadn’t offered these things to you, she would fly out and kick me around the block—and this is a big block. So help yourself.”

“Thank you.”

“I’m not sure what she has in the dresser, but you can look. The same offer stands for anything else you find in there.”

Lisa just nodded. The thought of wearing another woman’s clothes
made her uncomfortable, but she had little choice. At the moment, she was wearing her only possessions.

There was an awkward silence.

“If you need anything, there is a store nearby. We can get you whatever you want.”

“I’m okay for now,” Lisa said. Nick seemed embarrassed.

“Well,” he said quickly. “The medicine cabinet has some pain relievers in it and whatever else my sister may have left. Use what you need.”

“When was the last time your sister was here?”

Nick shrugged. “About six months ago I guess. Why?”

“Just wondering.”

Turning toward the door, Nick said, “I have some calls to make, then I’m going to take a little nap.” He thought for a moment, and then said, “There’s not much food in the house. We’ll go out for some dinner later … if you feel up to it, that is.”

“That would be nice. I think I’ll rest, then shower.”

Nick nodded and left, closing the door behind him. Lisa found herself once again utterly alone.

“We’re losing time,” McCullers complained.

“It couldn’t be helped,” Massey countered sternly. “Landing a helicopter in the middle of the road might have been a little obvious, don’t you think?”

McCullers ignored the snide remark. Massey was a royal pain, but he had been able to do what McCullers could not—find his target. That fact alone bothered him. He was supposed to be the professional, and here he was manacled to a man in a three-piece suit. If McCullers cared about what others thought—which he didn’t—he would feel embarrassed. Instead all he felt was a growing annoyance with Massey and a
rising anticipation of connecting with the woman once again. This time she wouldn’t get off the hook so easily. She was going to die at his hands even if he had to take out an entire city block to do it.

“They will be there,” Massey said. “They didn’t spend that much time on the road only to stop briefly at some house.”

What was it about Massey? McCullers wondered. At first, he had assumed the man was just a suit, a guy who lived his life between home and the office. Yet there was something different about him. He had secrets, deep secrets. Under that Brooks Brothers was a man who knew more than he was telling, had seen more than he was willing to share. McCullers was a good judge of character. He had to be. His life often depended upon it. Still, he couldn’t get a read on the man who sat next to him in the rented Mercury. Although he would never admit it, McCullers found the man unsettling. Massey was too smart, too calm, too self-assured. Men like him could cut your throat before breakfast and forget that you ever existed by lunch.

“We may need this equipment,” Massey said. “We don’t know what we’re going to face, and I want us to be prepared.”

McCullers thought of the equipment in the backseat. All of it fit into two regular looking briefcases, and he had no idea what they contained. Massey played his cards close to his chest, never offering more information than necessary. McCullers didn’t care. He knew everything he needed to know: the nature of his mission and the paycheck he would receive. Everything else was superfluous.

The briefcases had been waiting for them when they set down in Santa Barbara. Massey had explained that Moyer had arranged for the equipment. How Moyer had been able to have the cases available so quickly, McCullers couldn’t even guess, but if anyone could arrange it, Moyer could. A man had been waiting too—a stiff-looking older man with silver hair. The helicopter had barely settled on the pad when the man approached, handed the rental keys to Massey, and took charge of
the helicopter. They had spent less than five minutes at the Santa Barbara Municipal Airport.

“How much longer?” McCullers asked as he gazed out at the ocean. Massey was driving the car south at the precise speed limit. It was driving McCullers crazy.

“Ten minutes,” he answered.

“Can’t you drive faster? At this rate she’ll die of old age. Where’s the fun in that?”

“I don’t want to draw attention.”

“Cars are racing past us, Grandma. That makes us stand out. At least keep up with the flow of traffic.”

“Speeding gives a police officer just cause to stop us. That would slow us down all the more. Is that what you want?”

“I just want to get there.”

“We’re almost there. Just sit back and enjoy the view.”

“You enjoy it,” McCullers snapped. “I’ve got a job to do.”

“
We
have a job to do,” Massey corrected.

“I told you, I work alone.”

“Not on this, you don’t. You’re stuck with me until our mission is accomplished. Then you can run off and do whatever it is you do.”

Massey turned off the freeway, directed the car through an intersection, and continued down the frontage road that ran along the coastline. The two-lane street they were on was lightly traveled. A minivan drove slowly in front of them. McCullers could see the driver pointing to the ocean and jabbering. “Tourists,” he said angrily. “Pull around that guy.”

“Just sit back and take it easy.”

Swearing, McCullers reached over and leaned on the horn. A loud, obnoxious tone bellowed from the front of the car.

With a motion so quick that it surprised McCullers, Massey knocked his hand away. “Are you nuts?”

The driver of the van looked in his rearview mirror and threw up an
obscene gesture. McCullers swore again and returned the sign. The van came to a sudden stop, its tires squealing on the pavement. A second later, the driver was out of the vehicle and approaching the car.

“Great,” Massey said, but McCullers didn’t respond. He had something else on his mind. Popping loose his seat belt, he swung open the door and exited the car.

“You gotta problem, buddy?” the driver said. He was a tall, athletic man in his late twenties. He stood several inches taller than McCullers, and his fists were clenched. McCullers knew he was a hot-tempered fighter, a road-rage warrior. A woman’s voice yelled, “Steve, Steve. Stop it. Don’t fight.”

“Yeah, I got a problem,” McCullers said loudly. “You’re my problem.”

“Aw, poor baby,” the man taunted. “What are you going to do—” The man’s words were cut short.

McCullers had continued to approach as the man spoke, then, like a rattlesnake striking, McCullers landed a hard right to the man’s mouth. Blood splattered as the man brought his hands up in a belated effort to ward off the blow. McCullers hit the man again, ignoring his victim’s upraised hands. He felt the bone in the back of the man’s hand break as McCullers’s knuckles found their mark. The man screamed, but McCullers wasn’t done. He was having fun. This time he struck a vicious kick to the stomach that dropped the man to his knees.

“Stop it! Stop it!”

McCullers turned to see a thin woman running toward him, her face marred by the terror of seeing her husband pummeled.

“Stop. Please stop. You’re killing him.”

“That’s the idea, lady,” McCullers sneered. She charged him in a heroic effort to protect her husband, who lay in agony on the steaming hot asphalt. Raising her hands in tight fists, she tried to deliver a punch of her own. It was a wasted effort; McCullers easily blocked the
punch and grabbed her arms, picked her up, and pushed her out of the way.

“Mommy!” a little girl screamed.

“Get back in the car,” she cried, tears streaming down her cheeks.

McCullers took a step forward. All of his pent-up frustration and anger surfaced in a rush—the time spent in the hospital, the time confined to a car or helicopter with the annoying, self-righteous Massey. This was fun.

Instead of advancing, McCullers found himself in a sudden, unexpected retreat not of his own making. Someone had grabbed him by the collar, and he flew backward. Before he could turn to defend himself, he felt a sharp pain in his back. It took a second before he realized he had been thrown onto the front of the rental car.