Yours in Black Lace (17 page)

“I’m open to negotiation, Jack. What are you offering?”

“How about your continued good health?”

Stevie recoiled, her eyebrows wrinkling in confusion. This was not the same guy she’d walked out the door with. She must have him running scared. “The price of my silence just went up by half. I consider the video a rare collector’s item. So now I want to collect seventy-five thousand for it.”

He opened his mouth to reply, then snapped it shut. She turned her head to see a couple appear on the stairs below, apparently having been for a stroll through the moonlit hotel gardens. Weston nodded politely, his features once again set in a harmless facade.

As the couple walked by, he stroked his hand over her chest, clumsily fondling her breasts. Anger and humiliation burned her cheeks. Stevie ground the spike heel of her shoe onto his instep. He yelped in pain and loosened his grip.

“Let go of me, asshole.”

“Name-calling? Grow up. I want that tape and I want it now.” He turned on her, the average-looking, mild-mannered politician gone, and in his place was an adversary who’d just shown his true nature.

Where the hell was her backup team? This wasn’t going the way she’d planned. “You’re repeating yourself, Jack, and I’m getting bored with the conversation. I’m going back to the ball.”

“Sorry you’re bored, Stevie. Let me tell you something new.” He gripped her upper arm to stop her, hard enough to bruise. “You’d better give me what I want. It would be a shame to destroy that pretty face.”

Her temper careened right into
seriously pissed off
and she struck out at him, landing a blow to his shoulder. When he let go of her arm, she got in his face. “You think you can threaten me? Don’t make me laugh. You’re nothing but Braga’s errand boy.”

Weston smacked her, hard, across the mouth.

Tears of pain stung her eyes and she gasped. Too stunned to cry out, her mind went numb for a moment, hurling her into the past when another seemingly genteel man had brutalized her without warning. She tasted blood where her bottom teeth cut the inside of her lip.

She looked over at the ballroom doors, concentrating, trying to pick up any sound other than a discouraging silence. The earpiece and transmitter must still be malfunctioning, which meant no one was coming to her rescue.

“Don’t underestimate my desperation, Stevie.”

She suffered the same jittery anxiety she always felt when her ex-husband was on the verge of exploding. Swallowing hard, she tried to appeal to whatever morality Weston might have left. “You’re making a huge mistake, Jack. Do yourself a favor and help me put Braga behind bars. It’s the only way—”

His short bark of laughter sounded hollow. “It’s too late for that. All I can do now is try to buy myself some time.”

Her heart pounded unevenly in her chest. “Jack, listen to me. You know better than anyone how valuable your testimony against Braga would be. As soon as I turn that video over to the Feds, you’ll lose any bargaining power you had.”

Weston shook his head, a chilling finality clouding his eyes. “I’ve already sold my soul. And now it’s time to pay the devil his due. You’re coming with me.”

Raised voices, pealing with laughter, approached from off to the side. People were coming out onto the veranda. This was her chance. Stevie opened her mouth to scream, only to have the sound die stillborn when Weston grabbed her neck, choking her.

“You don’t want to do that.”

He cut off her air, a reminder of who was in control. Pulling her close, into the embrace of the enemy, he brushed his lips across her ear. “Try to look romantic, Stevie.”

It was a sick replay of the scene she’d made inside. She glanced over his shoulder, frantic to make contact with the people milling about in the cool night air. But it was too dark in this corner and their lovers’ pose looked too authentic.

Fairy lights danced before her eyes as her lungs burned from lack of oxygen. Weston reached behind him under his tuxedo jacket. When he brought his arm back around, he made sure she saw the gun he was holding. He finally eased the pressure on her wind-pipe. Stevie gulped in drafts of air while he murmured quiet threats.

“In a minute, I’m going to let you go. Then you and I are going to walk through the garden to another entrance of the hotel.” He squeezed her throat again until she nodded her understanding. Then he slipped the gun into his jacket pocket. “Good girl. You do as you’re told and you won’t get hurt.”

Her stomach clenched against a wave of nausea. Her ex-husband Tom had often phrased his words to sound like that, giving her false hope that if she just followed his instructions and catered to his whims, he wouldn’t punish her.

The boisterous group returned to the White Orchid Ball, leaving them once again alone on the veranda. Weston gave her a little shove toward the stairs, then moved right behind her, his arm securely around her back. She was so scared. Emelio—

No, she couldn’t think about him now. She was on her own, with only her wits and training to rely on.

She pretended to stumble into a ceramic urn filled with geraniums at the bottom of the stairs. When Weston tried to steady her, she jammed her right elbow into his side. He must have suspected she would try something, however. In the next instant she felt the hard point of the gun against her breast.

“The next time you try something, if you make one wrong move, just one, I’ll leave you to die among the flowers.”

Weston pushed her forward, following closely behind as they entered the garden. Under cover of darkness, Stevie slid one hand into her evening bag and scrambled through the contents. She moved the voice-activated pen to the top and left the bag’s clasp open slightly.

The pen would capture whatever happened next on its digital recorder. She only hoped it didn’t record her last words.

“Team Leader. I want radio silence.”

The hotel manager’s office was so still he could hear his heart thudding in his chest. There was a scrabbling sound followed by a loud gasp. Then he heard Stevie, making every effort to come across as brave and in control.

“I wish I could say it was a pleasure, Mr. Braga. You might have picked a meeting room with fresh paint and some furniture.”

Braga chuckled humorlessly. “I apologize for the poor accommodations, however you won’t be here for long.”

“Well, in that case, I’ll just be going now.”

He made a tutting noise and sighed. “That won’t be possible, I’m afraid.”

“I don’t know anything.” Stevie’s response had an edge of panic that echoed in the room where she was being held. “Just because I saw you and Weston together—”

“Is reason enough, my dear.”

Someone cleared his throat, then Emelio recognized Jack Weston’s voice. “She has a videotape of our meeting in Palm Beach last year.”

In the ominous silence that followed, he thought he heard something familiar in the background. Emelio leaned over and whispered to Alex. “What is that faint clanging?”

His partner frowned, concentrating. “Metal on metal, something being opened manually, whirring…”

“Freight elevator?”

Before he could be certain, Braga spoke again.
“There is a videotape. How is such a thing possible? You had assured me—”

Jack stammered.
“I didn’t know, I swear. There was no way to know they had hidden surveillance.”

“Where is the tape, Ms. Madison?”
Braga asked.

“It’s safely hidden. You’ll get it once I’ve been paid.”
Stevie was still trying to maintain the blackmail pretense.

“Mr. Weston, perhaps you can convince her to be more specific?”

“My pleasure.”

“Keep your hands off me, Jack…”

There was a scuffle and he heard Stevie cry out. Emelio closed his eyes, sickened by the sound of grunts and blows, flesh smacking flesh. He felt so damn helpless! If only he knew where she was.

“Enough!”
Whatever Braga did got immediate results because the fighting stopped.
“Get up, Mr. Weston.”

Emelio opened his eyes and smirked. “That’s my girl,” he whispered.

“Very impressive, Ms. Madison. Maybe I should offer you a job in my organization.”

Jack protested.
“Damn it, it’s not my fault—”

The reply was a blend of sympathy and steel.
“Nothing is ever your fault, Mr. Weston. I trust that you were more cautious this time?”

“What do you mean? Even if someone saw us leave the party, I made sure they’d think it was for sex.”

Braga raised his voice.
“Have you frisked her, you imbecile? Did you make certain she isn’t wearing a wire?”

Jack answered defensively.
“Where would she hide
one in that dress? I felt her. There’s nothing in her cleavage or around her back.”

Impotent rage, hot and murderous, had Emelio clenching his fists. Weston had dared to touch her. He’d put his hands on her and… Then he thought only of Stevie, how much she hated being vulnerable. He couldn’t imagine how she’d suffered from that kind of degrading assault. When he growled in frustration, Alex spoke softly behind him. “We’ll get him, hombre. Stay focused.”

“What about her evening bag, Mr. Weston?”

“Oh. I, uh… Give me that!”
Jack demanded. Emelio heard keys jangling, several thuds, the metallic clink of loose change—everything in Stevie’s purse hitting the floor.
“See, there’s nothing here.”

“Luckily for you.”

Jack’s voice rose in volume.
“Wait. What are you—”

“Your incompetence has rendered you an unacceptable liability, Mr. Weston.”

“Wait a minute!”

Two distinct coughlike noises, the sound of a gun with a silencer being fired, were followed by Stevie’s keening wail. For a second Emilio was too stunned to react. Then cold fear stabbed him through the gut. “Oh, shit, Alex. We’ve got to find her. We’ve got to find her.”

“Where is that videotape?”
Braga’s voice lashed out.
“Tell me! Or the next one is for you.”

“It’s in my apartment! It’s on the shelf in my apartment.”

Emelio’s heart fractured as her ragged whispers carried across the radio waves.
“Oh my God. You killed him. Oh my God.”

Weston’s body lay sprawled on one of the canvas painter’s tarps covering the floor. In a moment of shock-induced insanity, Stevie wondered if a coat of white latex would be able to hide the mess on the wall. She turned away, wrapping her arms around her waist.

She’d earned decent scores in her Tactical Firearms course. But nothing could have prepared her for this. It was one thing to test-fire a gun, to put nine bullets into a paper target. It was something else to see a man’s head blown into a hundred fragments.

None of her training had taught her how to erase the image of a dead man from her mind. Stevie gave a soft, bitter laugh. Emelio was right. She could take all of the secret-agent classes she wanted, but reality was the harshest of teachers.

Braga walked toward her, tapping the gun against his left thigh. A pleasant half smile added to the attractiveness of his face, the salt-and-pepper hair giving him a distinguished appearance. He seemed perfectly content where he stood, posture militarily correct, studying her through eyes so dark as to appear black.

“You find the situation amusing, Ms. Madison?”

She shifted from one foot to the other on high heels and shaky legs, a chill prancing along her skin. She shouldn’t have called attention to herself. “Sometimes you have to look for the humor in life, Mr. Braga.”

“Then you will die laughing. How nice for you.”

Stevie stared at him, her heart cold and still despite the amiable tone of his voice. He could just as easily have been discussing the weather. No matter what expression his face took on, no matter how smoothly he delivered his words, his eyes still had a reptilian quality.

Braga was handsome, charming, vicious. Just like Tom.

Past terrors and the present danger combined to gnaw away at what little hope she had left. The Smith-Carlyle had four hundred guest rooms, three ballrooms and nine meeting rooms in addition to the offices. With her damn transmitter malfunctioning, she had no way to let the Double O Team know where she was.

“Nothing else to say, my dear? I thought not.” Braga angled his head, narrowing his eyes as though measuring her worth. “Sanchez should have to watch your life spill onto cold, hard concrete. But perhaps I will save myself the effort of dragging you to another location. Which would you prefer?”

Neither option was particularly appealing. She stayed quiet, and utterly still, the primitive part of her brain wanting to believe she’d be safe as long as she didn’t so much as blink.

“Answer me.”

Moving faster than she could react, Braga’s fingers tangled in her hair as he raised the gun to eye level. Her heart seized and she held her breath. Stevie stared down the long, black muzzle, afraid of seeing the bullet in its chamber where it waited to end her life.

He yanked her hair, pulling several strands out by the root. “I am waiting for your answer, Ms. Madison. Shall I kill you now, or should I wait?”

“Wait.” The words were a hoarse plea forced past the dryness of her throat.

“Say please.”

“Wh-What?” She dared to look away from the gun to the stark expression on his face.

His words were soft, yet rich with menace, a reprimand to a disobedient child. “You forgot your manners. You have to say please.”

Braga had the voice of an evangelist, or a psychopath, slick and seductive and oh so full of insinuation and threat. She didn’t hear him anymore, but instead whispers of the past echoed in her memory. Old voices—her ex-husband, her ex-family—voices she’d locked away in the back of her mind seeped under the door she’d tried so hard to slam on them.

If you’d just be a good girl, a good wife, a good victim…

Her whisper was the smallest of sounds, like a ghost floating over a grave. “Please.”

“Please wait, Señor Braga,” he prompted, caressing her right temple with the brushed steel of the barrel.

She gasped and squeezed her eyes shut. “Please. Wait.”

“As you wish, my dear.” Braga abruptly released her hair and stepped back, his voice once again pleasant.

Her eyes popped open in disbelief. She watched him lower the gun and stroll casually across the room, away from her, as if her presence was already forgotten.

“Felipe.
Venga aqui.
”

The door to the meeting room opened and a young Hispanic man responded to Braga’s call.
“Sí, jefe?”

“Go and bring the car around.”

Her legs gave way and she slumped to her knees on the industrial-grade carpet. Stevie dropped her chin to her chest and tears spilled onto the hands clenched together in her lap. She should move. She should jump up and run for the door, yanking it open to scream for help.

But, alone and consumed by desolate anguish, she didn’t. It wasn’t just the fear that paralyzed her. It was the humiliation. It was the shame. She experienced the kind of dread only an abused woman can know. Braga had made her beg for her life and she didn’t doubt for a second that he’d make her beg again.