Quinn (27 page)

“Would you like me to give you a little privacy?”

“Why? I’m not ashamed of our relationship. It is what it is. We’re working our way through it.” She spoke into the phone as Luke picked up. “Hi, how are you doing? Are you reading?”

“No, I was having Kelly teach me about how she does her patterns.” He paused. “I don’t understand it. I don’t think I’m dumb, but she sees things that I don’t see.”

“You’re not alone. Kelly is extraordinary. Her professors say that she’s another Einstein. She can start at the beginning of a theory or puzzle and forecast exactly where it’s going to go.”

“I know all that.” Luke’s voice was slow, thoughtful. “But she says that if I go back and tell her all about the years that I was away from you, she’ll draft a pattern that will help me see things clearly.” He added haltingly, “And if I understand it, then I’ll be able to forget it.”

Catherine had known that Kelly was going to try to help Luke in that way. It was the next best thing to psychological therapy, and Catherine would be eternally grateful if it worked. “Maybe not forget it, but it may help you to let it go. Sometimes, bad things help you to grow, and you wouldn’t want to give up the growth. That would mean you’d gone through it for nothing. I don’t think Kelly would want you to do that. She’s gone through some rough times herself.”

“She told me her father was murdered. She saw it.”

“And she’s trying to learn from it. So maybe she’s the right person to talk to you about all of this.” She paused. “Unless you want to talk to me. You know I’m here for you, Luke.”

“I know.”

But he still couldn’t talk to her, she thought in pain. No matter how much she loved him, she was part of the problem. She cleared her throat and changed the subject. “How are your studies going?”

“Okay. I finished
Midsummer Night’s Dream
. But I didn’t care much for it. I’ve started
Julius Caesar,
and I understand that better.”

“Yes, I can see you appreciating
Julius Caesar.
” Ambition and murder and revenge. Luke would comprehend all of those nuances of character from his own experience. “
Midsummer Night’s Dream
would have a little too much whimsy for you.”

“Maybe I’ll go back to it later and read it again if you want me to.”

“I don’t want you to read it to please me. It doesn’t matter.”

“I … want to … please you.”

“That’s good, I want to please you, too. But let’s work on kindness and understanding instead of trying to shape each other’s tastes.”

“Okay.” Another pause. “Are you … well?”

“I’m fine. I should be able to get home soon.”

“I’d like … I know Kelly wants to see you.” He added, “Do you want to talk to her, should I go get her?”

“No, don’t bother her. Tell her I can’t wait to see her and give her my best. I’ll let you go now. I just wanted to check in and make sure you were all happy. I love you. Good-bye, Luke.”

“Good-bye.” He hesitated. “I want you to be happy, too, Catherine.” He hung up.

Someday, he would say he loved her. Someday it would happen.

“You said you were working your way through it,” Gallo said quietly. “It appears that sometimes it’s straight uphill.”

“You think that I mind that?” She swallowed hard to rid herself of the tightness of her throat. “We’re doing fine. Do you know what he went through? Every day that Luke was held by that son of a bitch, Rakovac, he was told that I was to blame. Every time he was whipped or thrown into a solitary cell, it was all my fault. It’s a miracle that he managed to realize that I wasn’t to blame. But there have to be residual effects from all that brainwashing. He can’t trust me even if he wants to.”

“What a bastard,” Gallo said grimly. “He’s dead, I assume?”

“Yes,” she said. “Slow and painful.”

“Good, then I won’t have to offer to do it for you.” He was studying her face. “You had to deal with finding him alone? Your husband?”

“He was murdered the night my son was kidnapped.”

“So you had to handle it by yourself. You might have had to do that anyway. He was in his sixties, right?”

“Yes, but I don’t know why people keep bringing that up,” she said impatiently. “Terry was a good man and great father. That’s all that matters.”

“If that was all that mattered to you.”

“Venable turned me over to him after I was recruited, and Terry taught me everything he knew about being an agent. We were good together.”

“As partners or as husband and wife?”

“Both. I wasn’t some romantic kid who didn’t know what was important. We had a good, solid marriage and had a beautiful child together. I couldn’t ask for anything more.” She defiantly met his gaze. “So it wasn’t anything like what you had with Eve. She said it was crazy and pure sex and nothing else. But in the end, it wasn’t about what you were together, it was about the child you had.”

“And was that what it was about with you and your husband? Your child, Luke?”

She was silent a moment. “I don’t know. We were together for such a short time. Terry wanted a child right away, and that was okay with me. But then, after Luke was born, my son was everything. I guess children change everything.”

“Yes.”

“You agree with me, but you never knew Bonnie,” she said. “I can’t believe all that ghost business, you know. You had me going for a little while, but I’m too hardheaded to really think that could happen.”

“Hardheaded.” He repeated the words reflectively. “What would happen if you’d lost your Luke, and he’d suddenly ‘returned’ to you? What if he was so real to you that all your doubts were crashing down around you? Would you reject him? Or would you let down the barriers and invite him back into your world?”

She shied away from even thinking about Luke taken from her in that most final way. Yet she’d had to face that possibility for the entire nine years of Luke’s captivity. It was clever of Gallo to bring the comparison with Luke into her rejection of the concept of the spirit Bonnie. “I don’t know what I’d do.” No, that wasn’t honest. “I can’t imagine a situation like that, but if it existed, I’d never shut Luke away from me even if it meant being locked up in the booby hatch.”

“The defense rests.”

“But the situation doesn’t exist, and what you and Eve are experiencing could be a hallucinogenic product of the emotional trauma that you’ve both suffered. Understandable, but with no basis in reality.”

“That sounds very slick,” Gallo said. “And not at all in keeping with what I’ve learned about you.”

“No, I’m not slick.” She wearily shook her head. “The opposite. I’m just trying to fit the pieces of the puzzle together, and I’m coming up short.”

“Don’t worry about it.” He pulled Jacobs’s Rolodex out of his jacket pocket. “We’ll try to put this puzzle together instead.”

She came toward him and watched as he flipped the pages of the Rolodex. “Anything?”

“Nate Queen’s address and phone. Several officers’ names who probably worked at Army Intelligence.” He flipped to the T. “No travel agency. I was hoping to save some time, but no luck. Evidently, he makes his own travel arrangements.” He flipped to C. He gave a low whistle. “An entire list of casinos.” His finger ran down the list. “Las Vegas, San Juan, Lima, Rio, New Orleans, Mobile, Rome, St. Louis, Monte Carlo…” He flipped the page. “And another entire page. Jacobs evidently traveled the world to satisfy his addiction.”

“Too many choices. No indication where he might have gone? No preferences?”

Gallo shook his head, still flipping pages. He reached a list of letters with telephone numbers beside them. “M. S. J. N. It seems that he didn’t want to be careless with these particular names.” He handed her the Rolodex. “Why don’t you give these numbers to Venable and see what he can come up with.”

She nodded and started dialing her phone. “No H for Humphrey.”

“Surprise. Surprise.” There was a knock on the door, and he stood up and moved to answer it. “That should be our food.” He checked the security view before opening the door. “I can use that coffee…”

Two hours later, Venable called back, and Catherine scribbled down the information.

She hung up and turned to Gallo. “He couldn’t trace the S, but they were able to pull up info on the others. Juan Martinez, hit man for the San Juan Mafia, Edward Nixon, no gang association but suspect in three murders in the U.S. and two in London, Randy Jason, former Army Ranger now suspected of two killings for hire in Jacksonville, Florida.”

“Martinez is Hispanic?”

She nodded. “And the name Humphrey doesn’t sound in the least Hispanic. It would catch attention and be remembered if Martinez didn’t look the part. So the gray Mercedes is probably Jason or Nixon.”

“Unless Jacobs found another errand boy.” Gallo went to the window again. “Still no Mercedes. Maybe he’s not ready to move yet.” He turned to face her. “Why don’t you try to get some sleep. I’ll stand watch.”

“We’ll take turns. Three hours. Leave the connecting door open.” She sat down on the bed. “My internal clock is pretty good. Will you need me to wake you?”

“I believe I can manage.” His lips turned up at the corners as he turned out the light and headed toward the door. “I can always use my phone alarm. But if I fall down on the job, by all means shake me.”

“And then you’d probably grab me and break my neck.” She pulled the sheet over her and closed her eyes. “I’ll be careful…”

CHAPTER

15

GALLO CROSSED TO THE CONNECTING
door and looked at Catherine curled up under the covers like a cat.

She was sleeping hard, having gone to sleep within five minutes of the time that she had pulled the sheet over her two hours ago. Her breathing was light and steady, and her sleep was deep and sound. Yet he’d bet that if she sensed anything that was unexpected, she’d be awake in a heartbeat.

As he would be, Gallo thought. Her CIA training and his years in the Rangers had given them both a military mind-set that would probably remain with them the rest of their lives. Now it was strange thinking of Catherine as a soldier. Her competence was superlative, beyond question; but he could no longer think of her as the hunter who had stalked him through the forest.

He was too aware of her as a woman.

Shit, aware? Understatement.

He had trouble looking at her and not remembering her naked, wet, and shimmering in the sunlight. When she had come out of the water, there had been drops of water on her breasts and nipples, and he had wanted to bend down and lick them, make them taut and ready. Then move between her legs and put his hands—

Hell, he was getting hard just thinking about that moment.

And this moment, too.

She was lying there helpless, asleep, and there was a catlike grace about her. But like a cat, he could imagine her moving beneath him, fierce, sensual, springing forward and taking what she wanted.

As she had wanted to do at the lake. Dammit, she had wanted him as much as he had wanted her.

Stop. Block it as he had done since they had started in search of Jacobs. So what if he wanted her more than any woman he’d wanted in years? Screwing her wouldn’t be good for either one of them.

Wouldn’t be good? What was he thinking? It would be fantastic.

Maybe in the short term, but she didn’t deserve any more complications. God knows, he was too scarred to have a decent relationship with any woman. He had come close to almost destroying Eve years ago.

And Bonnie?

But Catherine had said he hadn’t destroyed Bonnie.

He closed his eyes as the pain washed over him. God, he hoped Catherine was right, that he hadn’t accepted what she had said because he wanted it to be so. But for that reason alone, he should be thinking of Catherine with gratitude and not as a sexual object.

Not likely. He was too damn selfish, and he wanted her too much.

But he could perhaps put off moving to satisfy that selfishness for a little while.

Keep busy. Find Jacobs.

His lids flipped open, and he turned away from the door and moved toward the window in his room.

Let that Mercedes be there.

He pulled back the drape. No Mercedes in the lot, dammit. Where the hell was the—

But he caught a glimpse of silver out of the corner of his eye.

Around the side of the hotel, in the far parking lot. He took his binoculars out of his suitcase. Be sure.

A shadowy figure at the wheel. Light shirt, dark hair, brawny shoulders. No reason for anyone to be sitting in the parking lot at one in the morning.

Jason or Nixon?

It didn’t matter.

He let the drapes fall back, turned, and glided silently toward the door to the hall.

Prey.

*   *   *

CATHERINE WOKE
with a start.

Darkness. Silence. Something was wrong.

No Gallo.

She swung her feet to the floor and jumped out of bed.

She ran into his bedroom. She hadn’t expected him to be there. But his suitcase was open and on the bed. Binoculars on the table by the window.

She grabbed them and thrust the drapes aside.

“Damn you, Gallo.” She lifted the glasses and scanned the parking lot. Nothing.

No, to the far side …

She threw the binoculars down, ran back to her room, and slipped on her shoes.

Then she was running out of the room. No time for the elevator. She took the steps two at a time as she ran down to the lobby and out onto the parking lot.

She stopped short.

Gallo and a dark-haired man were wrestling on the ground beside the driver’s side of the Mercedes.

As she watched, Gallo flipped him over and climbed astride him. His arm encircled the man’s neck. Gallo’s face was flushed, his lips pulled back and revealing his teeth. Savage, animalistic anger and something close to bloodlust twisted his features. She remembered he had killed Paul Black with that very hold.

“Gallo,” she said through her teeth. “Don’t you kill him until we find out what we need to know.”

He looked up at her, and, for a moment, she thought he would ignore her. Then he drew a deep breath, and his arm loosened from around the man’s neck. “I’m not going to kill him … yet.” He jerked a knife from the man’s grasp. “He nicked me and made me a little upset.”

She could see the blood on Gallo’s forearm. Nick seemed a good description for the wound. “He didn’t hurt you.” She came forward and stood over Gallo and the man. “And if he did, you deserved it, you bastard. You left me without a word.” Her gaze shifted to the man who was glaring up at her. “Who is he? Nixon or Jason?”

“Why don’t we ask him?” Gallo pressed the edge of knife against the man’s throat. “Answers. I want answers. Name?”

“Humphrey.”

The knife brought blood. “Name?”

“Nixon.”

“Very good. Now, where is Thomas Jacobs?”

“I don’t know.” He gasped with the pain as the knife bit again. “I tell you, I don’t know. He hired me to watch his place and report back to him. He was expecting you to go after him when he heard about Queen’s death.”

“Report back? And that’s all?”

“For the time being. There might have been additional work later. He was going to consider it.” His lips curled. “I don’t think the son of a bitch could afford me. I wouldn’t have even taken the job if I hadn’t been having a slow month.”

“A ‘slow month,’” Catherine repeated. “What constitutes a ‘slow month’ in the assassination game, Nixon?”

“Where is Jacobs?” Gallo asked again. “One minute.”

“He was stalling me. He said he’d decide in two days,” Nixon went on quickly, his gaze on the knife. “That probably meant he had to find a way to score before he could pay me. He did it once before when he had me take care of one of the bosses at a casino in Atlantic City. The bastard always thought he could beat the tables. Sometimes he did. Sometimes he didn’t. But he was always sure he was going to make the big score.”

“That’s not enough,” Gallo said. “More. Jacobs is going to have to disappear for a while, and it’s going to take cash. He’d need money to pay you and to find a place to lie low from the police. Where would he go to get the money?”

“How do I know? He didn’t—” He cursed as the blood started to run down his neck as Gallo’s knife bit deep. “Maybe New Orleans. He told me once he lost his shirt in Atlantic City and the pit bosses were all crooks. He said that next time, he was going back to New Orleans, where he always won big.”

“When did he say that?”

“Six months ago.”

“Not when he set you up to do this job?”

“No, he didn’t mention anything.”

Gallo looked at Catherine. “What do you think?”

“I don’t know. I think he’s telling the truth.”

“I’m not sure.” His grasp tightened on the knife.

Nixon gasped. “Let me go. I’ll find out for sure and set him up for you. What good is it going to do you to slit my throat?”

“Good point,” Catherine said. “Let him make a call and see if Jacobs trusts him enough to tell him what we need to know.”

“Pity.” Gallo took the knife away and got to his feet. “I was beginning to enjoy myself.”

Nixon hurriedly sat up. “You’ll let me go if I get you what you want?”

“I didn’t say that,” Gallo said.

“We don’t need him. He’s not going to call Jacobs back and tip our hand.” She stared Nixon in the eye. “Because he knows we’d be after him and never give up. It wouldn’t be good business, would it, Nixon?”

“No.” He moistened his lips. “I don’t care about Jacobs. Why should I?”

“You shouldn’t care. As I said, it’s not good business.” She backed away from him. “Get in your car and turn the speaker on your phone so that Gallo can hear loud and clear.” She turned to Gallo. “I’ll take a turn around the parking lot and make sure that we haven’t disturbed any of the hotel employees or guests while you keep Nixon company.”

“Why should they be disturbed? I was very quiet. He didn’t even scream.” He opened the driver’s door and smiled. “But I agree that I should be the one to babysit him. We’ve grown so close we’re almost like family.”

“Family? Maybe the Borgias.” She moved away from the car and strolled across the parking lot. She doubted if their encounter with Nixon had attracted attention. It had seemed to go on for a long time, but it had actually taken only a few moments. It was the middle of the night, but there was always the chance that someone had glanced out the window. Or that a motel employee had come out for a cigarette. At any rate, she had to check out possible problems before they erupted to become real problems.

They had to move fast to find Jacobs and certainly didn’t need trouble with the police.

She was striding back to the Mercedes ten minutes later. Nixon was just hanging up his cell phone. She glanced at Gallo. “Well?”

“New Orleans. Cadalon Casino,” Gallo said. “He was on his way to the airport. Jacobs promised Nixon that he’d have his blood money by day after tomorrow.” He added, “Actually, Nixon handled it very well. He displayed a wonderful mixture of greed and venom. Jacobs didn’t suspect a thing.”

“You said I could go,” Nixon said. “You know where Jacobs is heading. I did everything you asked.”

“That’s true,” Gallo said. “But it was really Catherine who said we’d let you go. I really don’t approve of—”

“Let him go,” Catherine said. “We don’t have time to deal with him.”

Gallo shrugged. “Whatever you say.” He stepped back and gestured to Nixon. “Run along. Frankly, I’d make time to deal with you, but if we experience any backlash, I may still get my way.”

Nixon muttered a curse, but he was frantically starting the car and screeching out of the parking space.

Gallo was gazing regretfully after him. “You know that he’ll come after us eventually?”

“But it will take time for him to get over the first intimidation,” Catherine said. “You frightened him.” She turned away as Nixon peeled out of the parking lot. “I can see why Queen thought you were so valuable when you worked for him as a special agent. He said that there were moments when you were like an ancient Viking with the bloodlust on you. He called you a berserker. You can be—” She stopped, searching for the right word.

“Frightening?” He fell into step with her as she moved toward the glass door. “Did I frighten you, Catherine?”

“No.” She opened the door. “But I found it interesting to watch you. I couldn’t decide whether you were bluffing or if you really wanted to kill him.”

“I don’t bluff. Nixon is scum. Would I have cut his throat?” He smiled recklessly. “You seem to think I’m better than I think I am. So I believe I’ll let you wonder.”

“You’re good with a knife. Is that your weapon of choice?”

“I find it effective. Most people have experience with being cut and fear it. Guns are more impersonal. What about you?”

“Sometimes a knife is necessary, but I prefer being impersonal.” She added, “Except when I’m dealing with someone I hate.”

“Like Rakovac?”

She nodded. “I would have made him suffer as much as a victim of the Spanish Inquisition if I’d had the time. I wanted to take it slow.”

“If you run across a similar situation, let me know. I’ve learned a lot from personal experience about the methods the Inquisition used in that period. I’ll be glad to share.” He started up the stairs. “I’ll call and make our airline reservations to New Orleans.”

He stopped before entering his room. “Nixon should really have been eliminated. You know it as well as I do. It goes against your professionalism and my good judgment. Why?”

Because she hadn’t wanted to see Gallo do it. Yes, Nixon was scum and would cause them trouble, but she was holding on to her faith in Gallo by a very tentative grip. She had not been shocked by Gallo’s savagery, but it had made her wary.

“Never mind.” His gaze was on her face. “I think I know.” He shrugged. “I couldn’t expect anything else.”

“No, you couldn’t.” She went next door to her own room. “I should be ready to go in ten minutes. But I’m going to call Venable and tell him where we’re going and see if he can pave the way for us.”

“Good idea. Fifteen minutes then.”

But there was a missed call on her phone when she picked up her cell to call Venable.

Eve.

She stiffened, then drew a deep breath.