The Perfect Stranger (14 page)

John splayed his hand against the desk bolted into the back of the van, could almost see Saura gazing at Lambert through those amazing melted chocolate eyes of hers. Her hair would be flowing around her face and against her shoulders.

That was her game, he realized. Press through silence, not brute force.

“You?” Lambert finally said. “No. It’s just this place. The gardens. I—I’ve hardly come out here since I learned of my son’s death.”

John rose from his seat.

“Andrew loved it out here,” Lambert went on. “When he was a boy. He would play pirate and bury treasures everywhere.” Another beat of silence. “Once the diamond necklace I gave his mother when he was born went missing, and we were quite sure one of the staff had stolen it.”

Saura laughed softly. “He didn’t—”

“He did. I found it buried at the base of the gazebo.”

The walls of the small van closed in on John. He’d wanted Saura to get Lambert talking, but not like this. Not intimately about the son who’d died in Afghanistan. John didn’t see the world in stark contrasts of black and white the way Gabe did, but when it came to law enforcement, he’d learned at a brutally early age that it was the shades of gray that got you killed.

The second a cop started seeing a perp as anything other than a criminal—as a son or father or husband, a respected businessman or pillar of the community—the balance of power shifted. All it took was one hazy second and the price could be fatal—the son of a bitch who’d killed his father had been a renowned surgeon, the son of respectable parents, husband of a city councilwoman, father of four children, a deacon in his church.

And John knew, deep in his gut he knew that as his father had entered the pricey house in a pricey neighborhood, he’d let those factors lull him into the complacency that had killed him.

“When your kids are little, you’d do anything for them,” Lambert said, and his voice, so sad and haunted, tightened through John. “Then they grow up and you can’t do anything at all.”

“Nathan,” Saura whispered, and goddamn it, John heard the softening in her voice. This time he didn’t stop to think or catalog any reasons. He yanked at the door and stepped into the night, started toward the house.

“Saura.” He kept his voice low, didn’t want to startle her. “He’s playing you.”

“I know,” she stunned the hell out of him by saying. “I know how hard it is to lose someone you love.”

John kept walking. He couldn’t march up to the door and ring the bell, he knew that. But he could get closer. He could be ready.

“It’s like something inside of you dies, too,” she whispered. “But worse because you’re still alive. You get up every morning and look into the mirror, see your face staring back at you, but feel nothing. You walk through the day, you do all the right things, but—”

“Nothing is the same,” Lambert finished for her.

“No,” she agreed. “Not for a long time.”

John walked faster.

“And you don’t want it to be,” she was saying. “You can’t bear for it to be. Everyone tells you time heals all wounds, but there’s a part of you that doesn’t want to heal, doesn’t want to live. Because living means feeling and you know that if you feel, you could lose all over again, and this time the bleeding might never stop.”

The insight stopped John cold.

“Every survival instinct you have sends you into lock-down—because it goes against human nature to expose yourself like that. To risk.”

But she had, damn it. She was. And yet instead of applauding the courage it took to step toward the future, he’d done nothing but goad her.

“But the darkness doesn’t stay forever,” she whispered. “It can go away. When you least expect it, something changes, and suddenly you find yourself wanting to live again—”

John didn’t know why, but damn it, he ran.

“Is that what happened with you, Dawn?” Lambert’s voice was disgustingly gentle. Almost tender. And John knew that the son of a bitch was touching her. Maybe her hand. Maybe her face. “Have you reached that point? Do you want to live again?”

John rounded the corner, saw the elegant old house.

“Yes,” she whispered, and the word slammed into John, almost made him trip on the tree-root-gnarled sidewalk. “I do. I never expected it, never dreamed it, but I do.
I want to live.
”

Take your hands off her!
he wanted to shout, but knew the words would change nothing. In his mind’s eye he could see them in the gauzy moonlight, Lambert holding Saura, probably stroking her back or running a hand along her hair. Next he would—

The two quick gunshots stopped John’s world.

J
ohn sprinted. “Saura!” he shouted, no longer giving a damn who did or did not hear him. “Saura! Answer me, damn it!”

Nothing. Just the crackle of silence, in the wake of gunfire.

The St. Charles Avenue mansion looked as graceful as always, with the sprawling trees in the front yard, the inviting wraparound porches, and the warm glow of lights from the windows. No movement. No noise. Not even a hint of violence.

Dark possibilities ripped through him, bringing with them a truth that punished. He’d been careless. He should never have let her be alone with the man, no matter how many precautions they took. It could have all been a trap, everything, the phone calls throughout the evening, Lambert’s suggestion that they skip the play and return to his house. The walk through the gardens…

Bypassing the front, John took the eight-foot fence at a dead run, reached the top and vaulted over, landed on the other side with a hard thud. Then he ran some more.

Dim lights played across the Romanesque cabana. “Saura!” There was no movement, no one running from the house. No security personnel or bodyguards. The earpiece, John realized. He’d heard the gunshots as Saura heard them, but at shortly after eleven, the rest of the world continued to watch late-night TV or sleep.

Through the shrubbery he saw the dome of the gazebo, but the path he’d taken wound in the opposite direction. He plowed through the hedge and slapped at the hanging moss, but never slowed. Not even when he saw them lying at the base of the gazebo.

Sleeping. They looked like they were goddamn sleeping.

…something goes wrong and Lambert catches on to you, silences you, then it will all be over. You won’t have to feel anymore. You won’t have to hurt.

“Saura.” Her name was barely more than a whisper. He lunged toward them and dropped to his knees, violated everything he knew about crime scene preservation and rolled Lambert’s body from hers.

John knew death. He knew the feel and sound of it, the scent. And without even checking the man’s pulse, he knew Lambert was gone.

“Saura, honey,” he whispered, crawling toward her. She lay too still, dark hair strewn across her face, arms extended as if she’d tried to break her fall, Lambert’s white dinner jacket engulfing her body and smeared with blood.

“I’m here.” Swallowing against the horror, John stroked the hair from her face. He was a cop, damn it. A veteran. Crime scenes were nothing new to him. Death and violence, he’d lived them from the time he was a boy.

But this, kneeling over an unmoving Saura, wanting so badly to scoop her body into his arms and run, just freaking run, was new. This was different. And it made something deep inside him want to shake.

Somehow he found training. And somehow he pushed aside the paralysis of a rookie. And he did not let himself shake. He kept one hand to her face as he ran the other along her body, checking for the source of the blood.

Lambert’s, he realized the second he spread the jacket from her body. The blast of relief almost felled him. He didn’t let it, knew he could not allow himself to feel. That was the credo that kept him alive, kept him sharp. He could not abandon it now.

“Saura,” he tried again, and this time her eyelids fluttered. He took her hand and squeezed, leaned over and brushed a kiss along her mouth. “You’re okay,” he promised. “I’m here.”

A soft sound whispered from her throat.
“Étranger.”

The endearment wove through him, piercing everywhere it touched. It was just a word, damn it. But the feel of her mouth moving against his brought an affirmation he’d never imagined possible.

“John.”

He lifted a hand to brush the dirt and dried grass from her face. “Just take it easy, honey. No one’s going to—”

Slowly her eyes opened. “You’re here.”

He wasn’t sure she’d ever looked more beautiful. “I am.”

Her chest rose and fell with increasingly deep breaths. “I don’t under—W-what happened…?” He knew the second memory returned. “Oh, God,” she rasped. “Is he—”

“Gone,” John answered before she could say the word.

Horror hollowed out her gaze. “But that doesn’t make any sense, not unless…” This time she let the words trail off, and this time John did not supply the unsaid. They both knew.

Unless the gunman had been aiming for Saura, and hit Lambert instead.

“We’ve got to get you out of here,” he said, going from his knees to a squat. “Can you move? Are you hurt? I can carry you—”

“I—I…” The transformation stunned him. One second she lay on the ground like a broken doll. But then everything about her sharpened and she rolled to her knees and pushed to her feet, and
Femme de la Nuit
returned. “I’m okay.”

There was no time to savor the sight of her in the moonlight, so goddamn beautifully alive that he could barely breathe. “Then let’s go.”

She didn’t take the hand he offered her. “Go where? The police will be here any minute—” She paused, and he could tell that she listened. To the silence. “Why aren’t there sirens?”

The tightness started low. “I haven’t called it in yet.”

Her eyes clouded. “But—”

“Not now, Saura,” he rasped, taking the hand she’d not given him. “Lambert is dead, and you were the only one with him when he went down. I’ve got to get you out of here before someone realizes their mistake.” He used his body to shield hers as he scanned the swarm of trees. “Now do I have to carry you,” he asked, looking back at her, “or can you run?”

Maybe it was the edge to his voice, or maybe the reality of his words, but Saura pivoted and started toward the house. The sight should have sent relief pulsing through him: Saura, up and running on her own. But he could find no relief, not until he had her as far from Lambert’s world as possible. Hand in hand, he guided her through the gardens to the cabana, up the steps and toward the side fence. “The van is around the corner—”

She yanked her hand from his. “The van? We can’t just leave—”

“The hell we can’t.” He all but growled, hating the way she was looking at him, half in confusion, half in accusation. “Don’t tell me
Femme de la Nuit
never slipped into the shadows before the authorities showed up.”

Dark hair fell into her face, accentuating the suspicion in her eyes. “But I’m a freelancer. You’re a cop.”

His chest tightened. The reminder stung. “Saura, please—I’ll explain later. Right now I just need you to trust me.”

“I do,” she said, but did not move, just stared at him with Lambert’s bloodstained jacket hanging from her shoulders. “But I was his date, I was with him when it happened. You were around the corner. We can’t leave without—”

“
Dawn
was his date.” He stepped toward her and took her hand, hated how cold it was. “Not Saura
Robichaud.
” He let a beat of silence build between them, let the implications sink deep. If by some miracle Saura’s alias remained intact, the second the police arrived, that would change. And the second her real name surfaced, the real trouble would begin.

“And I,” he added, hating the bitter taste at the back of his mouth, “am supposed to be on vacation.”

Her chin came up. “W-what?”

The truth burned. “Lambert is not mine, Saura. I’m not supposed to be here, either.”

Against the night, a siren sounded. “I don’t understand,” she whispered, for the first time sounding confused and lost and…wounded in a way
he
didn’t understand.

“There is no investigation, damn it!” Lambert was too connected, too powerful. He’d pulled too many strings. “Alec’s death was ruled an accident.”

She backed away from him. “Oh, my God—”

That was a freaking understatement. “We have to go,” he said. “Now! If they find you here—”

He didn’t need to say who they were, or what they would do. The truth of it registered in her gaze. She ripped from him and ran toward the house.

“Saura!” He lunged after her, caught up with her at the sliding door. “Didn’t you hear me?”

She twisted toward him. “You asked me to trust you,” she said. “Now I’m asking the same of you.” She paused, nearly slayed him with the fire in her eyes. “Wait here.”

Then she ran into the house.

He wanted to run after her. Ninety-nine-point-nine times out of a hundred he would have run after her. But she’d asked him to trust her, and in the darkness of a dead man’s patio, he realized that he did.

Later, he told himself. Later he would let himself think about all the protocols he was breaking, both those of the force, and those of the man.

She returned less than two minutes later with her flimsy wrap wadded up and tucked under her arm, Lambert’s dinner jacket still dwarfing her shoulders.

The sight made his heart slam too damn hard. Without a word he reached for her hand, and without a word, she took his. Together, they disappeared into the night.

“You’re pale. Maybe you should lie down and rest.”

Saura shook off her cousin’s concern. “I’m fine, just a little dizzy.” She’d washed the blood off the second she and John had arrived at Gabe’s house, but the spinning wouldn’t stop.

“Maybe a shower then—”

“No.” Then, because she knew Gabe was only trying to help, she aimed for a smile. It had been after midnight when they arrived, but the television had been on, and he’d answered the door on the first knock. “Thank you. I just…need to think.”

Needed John to get back. They’d barely been at Gabe’s five minutes before John had taken off. Once she would have resented being tucked away like some damsel in distress, but as he’d pressed a hard kiss to her forehead and promised her she was safe, the realization that he was scared for her, that he didn’t want her to be alone, had touched her.

Watching her, Gabe ran a hand along the whiskers darkening his jaw. Several days’ worth, she guessed, glancing toward the nearly empty bottle of Scotch on the pass-through to the kitchen. And the bottle of prescription pills beside it.

There’d been a time, not that long ago, when Assistant District Attorney Gabriel Fontenot shaved every day.

Frowning, she moved toward the counter and glanced at the small amber bottle, recognized the pain medication. Then she noticed the piece of white paper with what looked to be pieces of newsprint taped against it.

The whisper of unease was immediate, but before she could read the words he was by her side and picking up the page, wadding it into a ball. “Gabe—” She turned toward him, but the look in his eyes stopped her.

Secrets. They shone in his eyes with an intensity that frightened her, as much for the fact he was keeping them, as for the fact that she could tell. Once, her cousin had been renowned for his poker face. His hand could be a flush or a dud; no one would know by the expression on his face or movement of his body. He was that good, a fact which had served him well in the courtroom.

But now, God, now Saura looked at the cousin she’d loved her whole life, but saw only a stranger, a man in faded jeans and a long-sleeved black T-shirt, whiskers at his jaw and secrets in his eyes. “Gabe, honey, what’s going on?”

He shoved the crumpled paper into his front pocket and walked into the kitchen. “Nothing you need to worry about,” he said. “Just a case I’ve been working on.”

She followed him. “But I thought you were still on leave—”

“I am.” He opened the refrigerator and pulled out two bottles of water. “This is personal.”

Something about the way he said
personal
jarred her. “Oh, my God—
Camille?
”

He spun toward her. “No. Not Camille.”

Her heart kicked hard. She wasn’t sure why. “Then—”

“Easy there, Nancy Drew,” he said, and just like that the old Gabe was back, the charming lawyer who could disarm with nothing more than a smile. He handed her one of the bottles, and for a crazy minute Saura couldn’t help but think,
he knows. Who I am. What I do.
“Don’t forget you’re the one who came to my door with blood on your hands.”

Lambert’s blood. Lambert who’d made no secret of his desire to destroy her family. Lambert whom Alec had gone after. Lambert whom she’d targeted, who’d held her hand and talked of a parent’s love for a child.

Lambert who now lay dead.

Throat tight, she set down the bottle and lifted her eyes to Gabe’s. “There’s something you need to see.” Something that didn’t make sense.

Agitated, she crossed to the kitchen table, where she’d set down her wrap. Unfolding it, she revealed the two files she’d grabbed before leaving, and the small wooden frame.

“What—” Gabe started to ask, but the question died the second he saw the photograph.

John flashed his badge to the patrol officer and strode into Lambert’s St. Charles Avenue mansion. Black-and-whites with their lights flashing filled the tree-ined street. An ambulance sat in the driveway, its back doors thrown open. Three news vans were parked across the street.

The reporters were the only ones scurrying. Everyone else moved slowly, methodically. Because everyone else knew running and shouting would change nothing. Nathan Lambert was dead.

If the bullet that took down Lambert had veered a few inches wider…

John strode toward the back of the house. Now was not the time to think of Saura, of the sight of her sprawled beneath Lambert. Now was not the time to think of the way she’d looked at him when she realized he wasn’t supposed to be anywhere near Lambert—or the way she’d looked when he’d left her at Gabe’s. Thinking of her made everything blur. Thinking of her scraped. Now he had to stay focused. Later—

He didn’t know what the hell would happen later.

On the cabana, he looked at the crime scene through the eyes of a cop, saw nothing immediately out of place, only two detectives standing with a grief-stricken Marcel Lambert.

“D’Ambrosia—”

He turned to see a third detective striding toward him. “Glen.” A twenty-year veteran, Glen Caves was one of the few men John trusted with his back. “I just heard the report on my scanner.” Not entirely a lie. He had flipped his scanner on, and there had been a report.