Orange Blossoms & Mayhem (Fantascapes) (20 page)

“
I guess it just goes to show money can’t buy everything,” I sighed. My mood wasn’t buoyant, and neither was his. I wondered what was up.

Grady scrunched his eyes closed, thrust the paper at me. “This came in today’s mail,” he said.

Frowning, I took the elegant bit of paper, which turned out to be check. From Interpol Headquarters in Lyon, France. For a sum well above the amount I had spent on Rhys Tarrant.

How very transparent I must have been for Grady to realize what this check meant to me. He’d guessed, or at least suspected, that I’d hoped Rhys would pay the debt in person. He’d said . . . he’d
promised
. . .

“
Laine, you said yourself that someone’s out to get Tarrant. There’s no way Interpol’s going to let him out of their sight until the mystery of Who and Why is solved.” Grady retrieved the check, giving my hand an awkward squeeze as he did so.

“
Sure. Thanks, Grady.” I stood there like a lump, contemplating my foolishness. Not until my dream burst did I realize how much I’d wanted it.

Wanted him.

I should have known, of course. What else could have shut down my intimate dreams of Flint Ramsay?

Clearly, there were fantasies not even Fantascapes could arrange.

There’s a long skinny barrier island just north of Golden Beach, appropriately named Needle Key. Its highest central hump, perhaps twenty feet above sea level, is occupied by two stunning mansions of Newport size and distinction, which were once the only houses on the island, except for a commercial enclave of motels and restaurants clustered around its southern bridge. In the fifties and sixties a few brave souls, ignoring the fact that only a low sand dune stood between them and the not-always-peaceful Gulf of Mexico, began building modest one-story homes along the narrow gulf-front road. Homes that in the last twenty years had been gobbled up for their land value and replaced with monster mansions, some even larger and more impressive than the two originals.

In spite of the severe hurricane threat, the two original island castles still stood, surrounded by four times the land any of the new homes could boast. One of them was Crest House, with whose owner Fantascapes had a smooth working relationship. He only lived on Needle Key January through March. The rest of the time his mansion—the ultimate in Moorish-influenced Mediterranean Revival, from intricately tiled gulf-front terrace to inlaid furniture, marble bathrooms, towering trees, and elaborate landscaping—was available for elegant weddings and receptions.

Today, I was working on the security details for our next wedding there, including how many of Dad’s private security army, known as Jordan’s Gerries, we would need. More than usual, I estimated, as the bride was an up-and-coming female attorney with political ambitions and the groom was a survivor of 9/11 who decided to get out of Dodge after walking down eighty flights in World Trade Center One. Neither was going to feel comfortable with just one squad of Gerries. In case you’re wondering, Gerries is a term coined by Grady when he was still in high school. Dad’s security teams are composed primarily of retired police officers and retired military, including Marines, Seals, and Rangers. Major tough guys, but Grady had seen them as positively ancient, calling them Uncle Jordan’s Geriatrics. The name stuck. I suppose we should have opted for Halliday’s Heros, but at Fantascapes we tend to downplay the heroics. Jordan’s Gerries, it was. There were two teams, and I decided to use them both for the Palmer wedding.

Jessie peeked her head through the door of my office. “Laine, there’s someone here to see you.” My face must have been an open book, because she added hastily, “Uh, sorry, he wouldn’t give his name, but I don’t think it’s your Interpol guy.”

I gritted my teeth, refusing to crane my head to see around Jessie’s bulk in the doorway.
Damn and blast!
Did everyone know I was suffering?

“
Thanks, Jessie, send him in.” I started to stand to greet my guest and froze, my hand half-extended in the ludicrous position of an old crone reaching for her cane. “Arlan,” I hissed, allowing his hand to engulf mine before sinking back into my chair. “What brings you to our part of the world? You packing another
bolas
?”

He gave me the suave grin of a man of the world speaking kindly to the little hick from the sticks. “Darling . . . what’s a
bolas
?”

I looked him straight in his limpid eyes while I did an inventory of the gray hairs cropping up in his mass of dark curls. “A diabolical South American invention,” I told him, “that damn near splattered me instead of an Inca wall.”

“
Tch, tch, dear girl. A figment of your imagination. You must have been suffering from
soroche
.”

So it
was
Arlan. One of his petty little retaliations for the ease with which I’d fixed the airplane problem at Nazca. “I repeat, what brings you to Fantascapes’ neck of the woods?”

“
A bit of spelunking and exploration,” he replied casually, though his hazel eyes were alive with glee.

Oh, shit!
“You didn’t!” I breathed. “It’s impossible.”

“
Did.” Arlan’s teeth flashed in a grin that made my fingers clench into fists. I wanted to kick his butt all the way to the beach. The miserable rotten sneak had come into
my
territory and accomplished something I’d been trying to arrange for years. And he didn’t even have a first-born child to donate for the privilege.

There’s a warm mineral spring ten miles southeast of Golden Beach. People come from all over the world to bathe in its medicinal waters. Far down in its depths is a cave with artifacts dating back ten thousand years, one of the finest archeological sites in North America. But the spring is privately owned, and after an archeologist suffered a severe case of the bends back in the early eighties, all cave exploration ceased. I’d been beating my head against a wall for years, attempting to get permission to allow qualified divers to go only as far as the cave mouth, and now . . . Arlan Trevellyan—
damn him!
—had gotten permission to go
inside
the cave. The dirty rotten miserable
rat
. He was here to crow about a genuine five-star triumph.

“
I guess you made the owner mad,” he said with a shrug that was so smug my shock turned to fighting mad. “Harassment,” Mr. Jankowski called it. “I’m afraid he’s really enjoying sticking the knife.” Arlan bared his teeth in something that passed for a sympathetic smile. “Sorry, dear, but some men really don’t like pushy women.”

The horrible thing was, Arlan was probably right. Girls like me are an acquired taste. Obviously, even Rhys, whose British butt I’d saved, had had second thoughts.

“
Are you in town for long?” I asked.

“
Just long enough to cement the deal.” Arlan’s smile took on a tinge of leer. “Could I tempt you to show me the sights, the best place for a nice quiet dinner . . .” He raised an eyebrow, while allowing his voice to trail into suggestive silence.

He had to be kidding.

Then again, I recalled that ancient advice about keeping your enemies close. I’d be a fool not to take this opportunity to pry into the details of how Arlan Trevellyan had gotten around Arkady Jankowski. “Fine, let’s go,” I said, and enjoyed watching his eyes widen in surprise. Too bad. He’d asked for my company. He was going to get it. I would stick with him until I waved goodbye at the airport, giving him no more opportunities to horn into Fantascapes’ territory. Later, it was my turn to smile at the look on Arlan’s face when he discovered Flint was joining us for supper.

Four weeks since Peru. I’d seen Arlan off to Toronto. I still didn’t like him, but we’d parted with a slightly better understanding of how we could avoid stepping on each other’s toes. Whether or not we chose to do so was still in question.

The inner two Fabergé eggs were finished. Viktor and I made a field trip to Sarasota, where he declared them “perfect.” The Ringling students re-doubled their efforts to make the wedding deadline, now only two weeks away.

Still no word from Rhys. In those last frantic minutes before the
policia
boarded the VistaDome in Cuzco, he’d given me his cell phone number, and since we both had global service, I could call him any time. I’d even considered it once or twice—or maybe thrice. Until the check came. Now he could rot for all I cared. He’d dangled the carrot of Interpol under my nose. He’d dangled
himself
under my nose—I had a flash of Rhys stark naked in our room at the Pueblo—and then he’d disappeared. Well, he had my cell number too. Each of us was instantly available to the other, all we had to do was punch in the numbers.

There was, however, the not-so-little matter of Halliday pride. There were certain aspects of feminism I refused to embrace. No way, no how . . .

I jumped as the tinkling notes of my cell phone demanded my attention. Rhys, Interpol, the lovely Florida day disappeared with the first anguished syllables of the frantic call from our rep in Paris.

We’d arranged an extended European vacation for an Argentinian rancher and his wife that included a week at a private chalet in Switzerland, where they would live in pampered luxury while comparing the Andes to the Alps. Everything had gone smoothly until today, when a spring avalanche had buried their chalet under twenty feet of snow.

“
Oh, my God,” I breathed. “I’m on my way.” A half hour later, Bella roared into life. I was on my way to Switzerland and, believe me, I was praying.

But not so steadily I didn’t recall that just over the border in France was the city of Lyon.

I arrived in time to see Jorge and Julieta Gaudio pulled from the chalet, frostbitten but alive, thanks to outstanding work by local rescue teams to whom avalanches were as much a way of life as hurricanes were to Florida. I added my profuse thanks, accompanied the Gaudios to the hospital, and as soon as they were pronounced fit to be moved, whisked them to a private sanatorium where their every whim would be indulged, in addition to receiving expert medical care. I instructed our Paris rep, who had reached the site of the disaster only a few hours ahead of me, to be on stand-by to adjust the Gaudio’s airplane reservations back to Buenos Aires. Whatever was needed—Fantascapes carried high-level insurance for just this sort of thing.

I paid a final visit to our clients who were gracious enough to express their gratitude for what I could only view as Fantascapes putting their lives in danger. No more Swiss chalets during snow melt season! Then I packed my bag and took a taxi into Bern. Now that the crisis was past, I didn’t mind taking some time to compare the Andes to the Alps myself. A few hours on a train would give me time to think, to ask myself if I were crazy. To say,
Laine, turn around. Go home! You’re not wanted here.

I bought a first class ticket, though a vision of Grady’s disapproving face flashed before me. This side trip was definitely not on my schedule.

Spectacular as the scenery was from Bern to Geneva, there was rather too much white stuff for a girl who’d spent the last dozen years in Florida. The villages were picture postcard perfection—quaint, sparkling clean, and backed by amazing rugged mountains. Yet in my mind I saw the green of the Urubamba Valley, of vast agricultural terraces, and the solid stone on stone of Inca walls, the only snow on distant white-capped peaks tall enough to defy their location so close to the equator.

There was a half-hour stop-over in Geneva, and then the next leg of my journey. Just under three hours after I left Bern, the train pulled into Lyon.

Chapter Twelve

While in Switzerland, I’d had several long evenings to continue my research on Interpol via laptop and to investigate Lyon as well. Among other things, I’d come to the conclusion that the Meridien Hotel was the place to stay. Close, but not embarrassingly close, to 200, quai Charles de Gaulle, the home of Interpol. The Meridien was also the top ten floors of a rather spectacular round skyscraper. I’d stayed in some pretty strange places—witness Phuyupatamarca—but I’d never stayed in a round hotel. Since my mind seemed to circle endlessly these days, accomplishing only what it absolutely had to, a circular hotel seemed both ironic and fitting.

But before I registered, I asked the taxi driver to take me past Interpol’s headquarters. He flashed a knowing grin, as if to say,
But of course, mademoiselle, what visitor would not wish to see Interpol?
I joined him in the front seat so I’d have the best view, and off we went.

After only a few blocks of city traffic, we emerged onto the beautifully landscaped bank of the Rhone. The broad river was on our left; to our right, a large park dotted with people of all ages enjoying the brisk spring afternoon. “
C’est là
, mademoiselle.” The driver, beaming, waved his hand toward a sparkling white building that appeared to be more like a fairy-tale castle set down in a sea of green than an international police headquarters. Suddenly, I felt like a small child with her nose pressed to the toy store window.
This
was Interpol?