Twilight (27 page)

“No. O’Flannery’s going to be ticked enough when he realizes I’m gone. He’ll blow a gasket if you pull a vanishing act, too. He’ll come charging into the city, instead of staying out here and examining those books.”

“But you don’t think he’s going to find anything in the books, do you?”

“I honestly don’t know.”

“Rick, if you know something, you have to tell me.”

He touched a finger to her lips to quiet her. “That’s just it,
querida.
I don’t know anything. I am only guessing. I will call you as soon as I have something concrete. I swear it. Just cover for me now, okay?”

When it became obvious that he wasn’t going to relent and tell her a thing, Dana shrugged indifferently, vowing to herself that she would join him the very instant it was safe to leave Kate and the detective. “Fine. Go.”

“What will you tell O’Flannery?”

“Let me worry about that. Get out of here, before he realizes that something is up.”

“With Kate beside him, I don’t think the investigation is all that’s on his mind. He will remain distracted for a moment or two longer.” He leaned down and brushed a slow, lingering kiss across her lips.

“I will call you,” he whispered eventually. “I promise.”

As he turned and hurried swiftly out of sight, Dana sighed. Didn’t he understand that that was another thing Ken’s death had accomplished? Ken had left her with very similar words on the night he’d been shot. She no longer had any more faith in promises than she did in prayers. The streets of the barrio almost guaranteed that even the most honorably spoken vows couldn’t be kept.

29

S
omething had been nagging at him from the minute he’d stumbled on Tony Vincenzi’s body, but not until they’d been playing mind games with Detective O’Flannery had it come to Rick what it was. If he was right...

Madre de Dios,
he hoped he wasn’t. He also hoped like hell that Dana would be able to keep the detective off his tail. She could do it, if she felt so inclined, but he’d seen the doubts in her eyes, the fear that he was about to betray her to save either himself or Yo, Amigo.

Right now he needed luck and time. He needed to buy a few hours to see if he couldn’t straighten this mess out on his own...if he was right that there was a mess and that his old friend—Tico, his triumphant success story—was smack in the middle of it.

His first stop was Yo, Amigo headquarters. With any luck, the information he was after would be in the files, files that Maria kept so organized that he should be able to put his finger on it in a heartbeat. Even after the office had been ransacked, she had managed to put everything pretty much back in order by working day and night, with help from Rosa, Marco and the others, who would have walked through fire for her.

He went straight to the alphabetized stacks of files, searching until he found the
G
s. He went through the pile twice before determining that the file for Tico Garcia was missing. Though he knew he would have no better luck there, he also searched the
T
s, in case it had been misfiled by someone uncertain of correct filing procedures.

In the end, there was only one conclusion. It was gone. And with it, the only solid piece of evidence linking Tico’s restaurant and Tony Vincenzi, if Rick’s guesswork was correct.

He sank down into the chair at Maria’s desk with a heavy sigh. The fact that the file was missing was as much confirmation as he needed that he was on the right track. Oh, he didn’t have all of the pieces of the puzzle just yet, but he didn’t like what he did have: one chunk with his old friend’s angry face on it and another he was all but certain would have Tony Vincenzi’s signature on a loan guarantee.

Only a handful of people knew who had been in on that deal. The investors had insisted on anonymity. They had shunned publicity.

Ken had been one of those who knew. In fact, he had been the one who had organized the backers in the first place. Had he subsequently stumbled on something questionable about the operation? Was that what had put his life at risk? Had the killer also suspected that Ken might have duplicates of the loan papers in his Yo, Amigo files at the church?

There was only one place to get answers, and it was the last place on earth Rick wanted to go, the last person he wanted to confront. Feeling bone-weary and heartsick, he walked the few blocks to the restaurant.

At this hour of the night, business was booming. The salsa music was lively, the aromas mouthwatering. Tico’s mother greeted him with an exuberant hug.

“Think you can squeeze me in,
Mamacita?
”

“For you, there is always room. I save the best table for special friends.” She bustled down the narrow aisle toward a small table for two, where she usually sat herself when business was slow.

“Sit. I bring you chips right away and a margarita, perhaps? You look as if you need to have your spirits brightened. Tequila is very good for that.”

“No margarita,
por favor.
Is Tico around?”

“Not just now.” She studied his face and frowned. “Is something wrong?”

Rick wasn’t ready to answer her questions. “When will he be back?”

Her expression faltered, then turned to worry. “I do not know. He has gone after Joey.”

Something in Rick’s stomach went ice-cold at that. “Gone after him where?
Mamacita,
this is important. Please, where are they?”

She hesitated, clearly torn between the two sons she adored and the man who had given her oldest a chance at a better life.

“You want to help them?” she asked, a soft, pleading note in her voice.

“If I can.”

She sighed. “Florida. Joey went to Florida. Tico went after him. He was a wild man when he heard his brother had gone there. What is happening? I don’t understand this.”

Neither did he, not entirely. He closed his eyes against the sick sensation that washed over him. Eventually he forced himself to stand. As he stood, he squeezed Mrs. Garcia’s trembling hand. “Don’t worry,
Mamacita.
I will do what I can for them.”

“This is very bad, isn’t it?”

Thinking of Dana’s sons, who were now very much in the path of a man on the run, Rick could only nod. “Yes, I think it may be very, very bad.”

He debated taking action alone, keeping silent until he had all the facts. He weighed Dana’s frantic worry against her right to know, and saw what he had to do. He owed her the truth. Honesty, in fact, might be the only chance at salvaging whatever there was between them. If he kept silent and anything happened, she would blame him forever.

“Can I use your phone?” he asked.

“Of course. It is in the kitchen.”

He called the church office, a number he knew by heart from calling so often to talk things over with his old and trusted friend.

O’Flannery answered. It wouldn’t have been Rick’s first choice, but maybe it was for the best. A lot of things needed to be set in motion in a hurry, and who better to do it than a cop?

He explained his theory and the admittedly sketchy proof he had. “All I do know for sure is that Dana’s kids are down there and somebody needs to be alerted to protect them, in case I’m right and Joey’s desperate enough to try to grab one as a hostage.”

“Isn’t that a big leap?” O’Flannery asked.

He sounded so skeptical that Rick was sorry he’d involved him. “Not if he doesn’t get what he wants from Carolina Vincenzi,” he explained impatiently. “He’s going to be after some other way to get money to get out of the country, and kidnapping would sound like a sure bet if you’re a scared kid who’s not thinking too clearly.”

“I suppose I’ll have to trust your instincts on this one. I’ll get on it right away,” O’Flannery said tightly.

“Let me talk to Dana.”

“No.”

“Dammit, let me talk to her.”

“There’s no point in upsetting her with wild speculation,” the detective countered. “At this point, we don’t have squat.”

“They’re her kids. She has a right to know what’s going on.”

“What you think is going on,” O’Flannery countered.

“Put her on the phone, or I’ll just have to drive all the way out there to tell her in person and waste more time, when both of us could be catching a flight to Florida.”

“Dammit, Sanchez!”

Rick remained silent until finally O’Flannery sighed heavily. “Fine. Here she is.”

“Rick? What’s wrong?”

He filled her in as hurriedly as possible. “O’Flannery’s going to get police protection for the boys. In the meantime, I’m calling to book seats on the next available flight out. You call your father to warn him and then meet me at the airport. Okay? Have you got all that?”

To his relief, there was no hysterical outburst, just a terse “Fine. I’ll be there as fast as I can.”

He had never been more admiring of her strength. “Dana, try not to worry. This is just a precaution. I may have gotten it all wrong.”

“No,” she said, sounding exhausted and terrified. “I think you’ve gotten it right. It’s the only thing that makes sense.”

“Querida?”

“Yes,” she said in a flat tone.

“I hope to God I’m wrong.”

She never said a word. All he heard was the quiet click of the phone disconnecting. He wondered then if she would someday thank him for solving the case, or if she would only hate him forever for inadvertently setting the whole series of tragic events into motion in the first place.

* * *

From the moment Rick told her what he suspected, Dana had felt as if her world began moving in slow motion. Realistically, she knew that phone calls were made hurriedly, that the drive to O’Hare took a fraction of its usual time, with O’Flannery’s siren blaring the whole way, but it all seemed to take an eternity—too long, by far, when she imagined her boys in harm’s way.

Maybe, though, it wouldn’t come to that. Maybe Joey would get what he needed from Carolina and be long gone when they got there. Maybe Tico would greet them and fill in all of the missing pieces of the puzzle, ending weeks of terrible uncertainty and speculation.

For one fleeting instant, she thought of the cost to Rick. He had been forced to admit that his shining example of Yo, Amigo’s success was at the heart of some kind of scandal that had led to the murder of three people so far. No sooner had the stirring of sympathy come than she angrily dismissed it. It was, after all, because of him that Ken was dead, just as she had believed in the beginning.

And she had slept with him. Worse, she had begun falling in love with him. She sighed. Why not admit the truth now, at least to herself? She had fallen in love with him, against all odds, against all reason.

When this was over, though, she would walk away from him. It was the only choice she had, she concluded with devastating finality.

He was waiting for them outside the terminal at O’Hare. After a quick glance at her, he stepped away with O’Flannery so the detective could brief him on all of the arrangements that had been made with law enforcement officials in Florida.

Dana felt Kate’s hands on her shoulders and dragged her gaze back from the two men to meet her friend’s deeply troubled expression.

“Don’t blame him,” Kate said, reading her as clearly as if she’d spoken her thoughts aloud. “He didn’t kill Ken.”

“He didn’t pull the trigger, but he might as well have. Ken is dead because of the world Rick dragged him into.”

“No,” Kate said sharply. “Ken is dead because he cared so much for helping others that he took risks. He weighed them and he took them anyway. The risks didn’t matter to him.”

Dana stared at her incredulously. “You want me to blame Ken for getting himself killed?”

“Haven’t you been doing that from the beginning? Rick is just a convenient target, sweetie. The person you’re really furious with is your husband.”

She couldn’t be mad at Ken, Dana thought, as tears stung her eyes. Ken was dead, gone forever. It would be wrong to be so terribly angry with him.

And yet wasn’t there a nugget of truth in what Kate said? From the instant she’d been told about the shooting, hadn’t she really wanted to shout and curse at the man who’d left her alone with three young sons, who’d put strangers’ needs above his own family’s?

She pushed aside the anger. What did it matter now? She couldn’t think about any of this now, not while events were still being played out hundreds of miles away. Not while her babies were in danger.

Again, Kate squeezed her shoulders. “Promise me you won’t slam any doors,” she said urgently. “Promise me.”

“It doesn’t matter now. I have to concentrate on Bobby, Kevin and Jonathan.”

Kate sighed. “Yes, of course you do. They’re going to be fine. I’ll be praying for them every second until I hear from you.”

Before Dana could reply, Rick was beside them, his expression serious, his eyes wary. “We have to go or we’ll miss the flight.”

Dana nodded, then gave Kate a quick, final hug. She gazed up at O’Flannery. “Thank you for everything you’ve tried to do.”

“It hasn’t been enough, but everything’s in motion. Your boys will be safe and sound when you get to Florida.”

“Dana?” Rick said.

“Yes, I’m coming.” She turned and walked into the terminal without another backward glance.

“I have the tickets. We can go straight to the gate.”

He led the way and she followed, bitterly aware that he hadn’t touched her, hadn’t really even looked directly at her since her arrival at the airport. It was as if he already knew, as she did, what the future held for them: nothing.

30

F
ear overcame despondency very quickly as the flight touched down in Tampa. A connector flight to Fort Myers was available almost at once, but after they were on board, the plane sat parked at the ramp for what seemed an eternity.

“What’s happening?” Dana asked. “Why aren’t we leaving?” She reached for the call button to summon the stewardess.

“Weather,” Rick said, putting his hand over hers to prevent it. “There’s a bad storm passing over. I’m sure we’ll take off as soon as it’s safe.”

Until he mentioned it, she had been oblivious to the raging rain and wind and the occasional violent bursts of thunder. “Dammit, we can’t wait,” she said unreasonably. “What if—”

Rick quieted the question with a touch of a finger to her lips. “Shh,
querida.
Use that brilliant head of yours. We won’t get there at all if we take off, only to crash. You know that. We have to rely on the pilot’s judgment.”

Of course she understood that, but it didn’t matter. Not knowing what was happening to her children was killing her. Her own safety didn’t matter at all.

She suspected Rick was just as worried about his friends, although, at the moment, she didn’t give a rat’s ass if Tico and his brother went down in a burst of gunfire. Still, she knew how hard it must have been for Rick to admit that Tico was implicated in the crime. Yet he hadn’t hesitated. He had told her at once. She supposed he deserved some credit for that.

“What made you think Tico might be involved in all of this?” she asked eventually, hoping that conversation would keep her mind off the inevitable delay.

Rick sighed, his expression filled with sorrow. “The way he’s been acting lately, for one thing. He’s been tense and defensive. He said it had to do with Joey, but a part of me wondered if that was all there was to it. Then today, when we were at the Vincenzi place, I started thinking about the consortium of investors that Ken had put together.”

“You’d never met them?”

“Never. I’d never even heard their names, because they insisted on anonymity. I wondered about that at the time. In my experience, most people wish to take credit for their good deeds. I went back to Yo, Amigo to see if the paperwork was in the files, to see what, if anything, it might reveal. It was gone, which explained that ransacking. To my regret, too many things added up.”

“I’m surprised you didn’t fly down here on your own to check it out, without telling me what you suspected,” she admitted. “Tico is your friend, after all.”

He gave her a rueful grin. “I considered it.”

“And?”

“I figured you would never forgive me if something happened and you believed you could have prevented it, if only you’d known the truth about what was going on. You deserved to hear everything from me.” His gaze locked with hers. “Don’t forget,
querida,
you and I are friends, too. Perhaps even more than friends.”

“It really matters to you what I think of you?” She supposed it shouldn’t have, but it surprised her.

“This is not news,” he said dryly. “It has always mattered,
querida.
You were the wife of a man I respected, a man I thought of almost as a brother. Even before we met, it bothered me that you hated me so.”

“How did you even know I hated you?”

“It wasn’t too difficult,” he said with a sad half smile. “Never once, in all the time your husband and I were working together, did you invite me to your home. Ken grew uncomfortable whenever I suggested we all get together. Since he and I spent a great deal of time together, it didn’t require a tremendous mental leap to realize that you were the one who wanted no part of me.”

“It wasn’t personal,” she said. “It was never personal.”

“You were afraid for him,” Rick said wearily. “I understood that.”

“I was right,” she pointed out.

“Does that make you feel any better?” he asked softly. “Or did it only create a rift between you when he was still alive, one that you will never be able to heal, now that he is gone?”

The truth of that hurt. “Yes,” she acknowledged. “It created a terrible tension and that makes me feel unbearably sad.”

“Me, as well. I regret that I inadvertently came between you.” He glanced out the window. “It looks as if the storm is over. We will be taking off soon and then all of this will end.”

“You don’t have any doubts at all about what we will find, do you? Do you think Tico will fill in the blanks once he is caught?”

“Despite what you think of him, he is an honorable man. He is only trying to save his brother. However that turns out, he will tell you what you need to know.”

And then, Dana thought, the nightmare would finally be over.

The instant the plane touched down in Fort Myers, Dana rushed for the door. Her father was waiting for her inside the terminal, and she could tell at once from his drawn expression that the nightmare wasn’t over, after all.

“Dad, what is it? What’s happened?” she asked as he enfolded her in a tight embrace.

When he released her, he met her gaze evenly. “Now, baby, I don’t want you to panic. The police assure me that they have the situation well in hand.”

She could feel her already frazzled nerves snapping. “Dammit, what situation? Please tell me.”

Her father exchanged a look with a man standing quietly nearby. He walked over to join them.

“Mrs. Miller, I’m Detective Rogers. If you’ll come with me.”

Dana balked. “Not until I know what’s going on, all of it.”

“Just tell her,” Rick said. “She needs to know everything. She’s a very strong woman. She won’t fall apart on you.”

Her father nodded. “That’s right, Detective. My daughter is a professional investigator. She’s been working on this case for weeks now. She might be able to help.”

“It’s your son,” the detective said, his voice gentle, his gaze obviously watchful for any sign that she was about to fall apart. “He’s being held hostage, we believe by a man named José Garcia.”

“Where?” she asked, fighting to keep her voice from shaking. She had anticipated this possibility, but the reality of it was devastating. Her whole body suddenly felt ice-cold with dread.

“At the Vincenzis’,” her father said, his expression filled with guilt. “It’s our fault. We didn’t know. Bobby asked to go to play with one of the boys from school. We didn’t realize which boy it was until it was too late.”

Not again, she thought.
Please, God, not again
. She couldn’t bear to lose another person she loved to this kind of insane violence.

And for the first time since Ken’s death, she began to pray. It was pure instinct. She didn’t know if there was a God, or if He would hear her this time, but at the moment, prayer and faith were all she had.