by Nora Roberts
That cut his minor tirade off in midstream. “What?”
She squared her shoulders. “I’ll sleep with you. I’ll do whatever you want, if you help me.”
He stared at her, at the way the moonlight showered over her hair, at the way her eyes continued to glisten. And wanted her mindlessly.
But not in a barter.
“Oh, that’s nice.” Bitterness spewed through his voice. “That’s great. I don’t even have to tie you to the damn railroad tracks.” He stepped toward her, grabbed her by the arms and shook. “What the hell do you take me for?”
“I don’t know.”
“I don’t use women,” he said between his teeth. “And when I take one to bed, it’s a two-way street. So thanks for the offer, but I’m not interested in the supreme sacrifice.”
He let her go, started back to the car. Fury had him turning back. “Do you think your friend would appreciate the gesture if he found out you’d slept with me to help him?”
She took a deep, steadying breath. The depth of his sense of insult had gone farther toward gaining her trust than any promise or oath could have. “No. It wouldn’t stop me, but no.”
She stepped toward him, stopping only when they were within an armspan. “My friend’s name is Bailey James. She’s a gemologist.”
He recognized the name from the doctored paperwork. But the pronoun was the most vital piece of information to him. “She?”
“Yes, she. We went to college together, we roomed together. One of the reasons I located in D.C. was because of Bailey, and Grace. She was our other roommate. They’re the closest friends I have, ever have had. I’m afraid for them, and I need your help.”
“Bailey’s the one who sent you the stone?”
“Yes, and she wouldn’t have done it without good reason. I think she may have sent the third one to Grace. It would be Bailey’s kind of logic. She does a lot of consulting work for the Smithsonian.”
Suddenly tired, M.J. rubbed her gritty eyes. “I haven’t seen her since Wednesday evening. We were supposed to get together tonight at the pub. I put a note under her door to check the time with her. I work a lot of nights, she works days, so even though we live right across the hall from each other, we pass a lot of notes under the door. And lately, since she got the job working on the Three Stars for the Smithsonian, she’s been putting in a lot of overtime. I didn’t think anything of it when I didn’t see her for a couple days.”
“And Friday you got the package.”
“Yes. I called her at work right away, but I only got the service. They’d closed until Tuesday. I’d forgotten she’d told me they were closing down for the long weekend, but that she’d probably work through it. I went by, but the place was locked up. I called Grace, got her machine. By that time, I was annoyed with both of them. I figured I just was going to have to assume Bailey had her reasons and would let me know. So I went to work. I just went on to work.”
“There’s no use beating yourself up about that. You didn’t have much choice.”
“I have a key to her place. I could have used it. We’ve got this privacy arrangement, which is why we pass notes. I didn’t use the key out of habit.” She shuddered out a breath. “But she didn’t answer the phone now, when I called from outside that bar, and it was two o’clock in the morning. Bailey’s arrow-straight, she’s not out at 2:00 a.m., but she didn’t answer the phone. And I’m afraid… What they did to that man… I’m afraid for her.”
He put his hands on her shoulders, and this time they were gentle. “There’s only one thing to do.” Because he thought she might need it, he pressed a kiss to her brow. “We’ll check it out.”
She let out her breath on a shuddering sigh. “Thanks.”
“But this time you have to trust me.”
“This time I will.”
He opened the door, waited for her to get in. “The other friend you were talking about, the he?”
She pushed her hair back, looked up. “There is no he.”
So he leaned down, captured her mouth with his in one long, searing kiss. “There’s going to be.”
He took a chance, went back to Union Station first. They’d be looking for his car, true enough, but he was banking on the moldy gray of the Olds, with its scarred vinyl top, blending in.
And he intended to be quick.
Bus and train stations were all very much the same in the middle of the night, he thought. The people curled in chairs or stretched out in blankets weren’t all waiting for transportation. Some of them just had nowhere else to go.
“Keep moving,” he told M.J. “And keep sharp. I don’t want to get cornered in here.”
She wondered, as she matched her pace to his, why such places smelled of despair in the early hours. There was none of the excitement, the bustle, the anticipation of goings and comings, so evident during the daylight hours. Those who traveled at night, or looked for a dry corner to sleep, were usually running low on hope.
“You said we were going to check on Bailey.”
“Soon as I’m done with this.” He headed straight for the storage lockers, did a quick scan. “Sometimes you just get lucky,” he murmured, and, matching numbers, slid the key into a lock.
M.J. leaned over his shoulders. “What’s in there?”
“Stop breathing down my neck and I’ll see. Backup copies of your paperwork,” he said, and handed them to her. “Souvenir for you.”
“Gee, thanks. I’m really going to want a memento of our little vacation jaunt.” But she stuffed them in her bag after a cursory glance. Her interest perked up when Jack drew out a small notebook covered in fake black leather. “That looks more promising.”
“Where’s his running money?” Jack wondered, deeply disappointed not to find any cash when he swiped his hand around the locker a last time. “He’d have kept some ready in here if he had to catch a train fast.”
“Maybe he’d already taken it out.”
He opened his mouth to disagree, then shut it again. “Yeah, you’ve got a point. Could be he wanted to have it on him if he wanted to make a fast exit.” Brows knit, he flipped through the book. “Names, numbers.”
“Addresses? Phone numbers?” she asked, craning her neck to try to see.
“No. Amounts, dates. Payoffs,” he decided. “Looks to me like Ralph was running a little blackmail racket on the side.”
“Salt of the earth, your friend Ralph.”
“Former friend,” Jack said automatically, before he remembered it was literally true. “Very former,” he murmured. “If this got out, he’d have lost more than his business. He’d have been doing time in a cell.”
“Do you think someone decided to blackmail the blackmailer?”
“Follows. And not everybody puts the arm on for money.” He shook his head. According to the figures, Ralph had made more than a decent income with his sideline. “Sometimes they go for blood.”
“What good does this do us?” M.J. demanded.
“Not a hell of a lot.” He tucked the book into his back pocket, scanned the terminal again. “But someone Ralph was squeezing squeezed back. Or, more likely, someone who knew about Ralph’s little moonlighting project saved the information until it became useful.”
“Then killed him,” M.J. added as her stomach tightened. “Whoever did isn’t just connected with that little book, or Ralph. They’re connected to Bailey through the stones. I have to find her.”
“Next stop,” he said, and took her hand in his.
Chapter 6
M.J. understood the risk, and prepared herself to make no arguments whatever about Jack’s instructions. She’d ask no questions. This was his area of expertise, after all, and she needed a pro.
That vow lasted less than thirty minutes.
“Why are you just driving around?” she demanded. “You should have turned left back at the corner. Did you forget how to get there?”
“No, I didn’t forget how to get there. I don’t forget how to get anywhere.”
>
She rolled her eyes in his direction. “Well, if you’ve got a map in your head, you’ve just taken a wrong turn.”
“No, I didn’t.”
Men, she thought on a huff of breath. “I’m telling you—I live here. The apartment’s three blocks that way.”
He’d told himself he’d be patient with her. She was under a lot of stress, they’d both put in a long, rough day.
His good intentions fled to the place M.J.’s vow had gone.
“I know where you live,” he snapped. “I had your place staked out for two hours while you were out shopping.”
“I wasn’t shopping. I was buying, and that’s entirely different. And you still haven’t answered my very simple question.”
“Do you ever shut up?”
“Are you ever anything but rude?”
He braked at a light, drummed his fingers on the wheel. “You want to know why I’m driving around, I’ll tell you why I’m driving around. Because there are two guys with guns in a van looking for us, specifically in this car, and if they happen to be in the area, I’d just as soon see them before they see us. And the reason for that is, I’d prefer not being shot tonight. Is that clear enough?”
She folded her arms over her chest. “Why didn’t you just say so in the first place?”
His answer was a mutter as he turned again. He drove sedately for a half block, then pulled over to the curb, shut off the engine.
“Why are you stopping here? We’re still blocks away. Look, Jack, if your testosterone’s low and you’re lost, I won’t hold it against you. I can—”
“I’m not lost.” He put both hands in his hair, and was tempted to pull. “I never get lost. I know what I’m doing.” He reached over, popped open the glove box.
“Well, then, why—”
“We’re going on foot,” he told her, and grabbed a pencil-beam flashlight and a .38. He made sure she saw the gun and took his time checking the clip. She barely blinked at it.
“That doesn’t make any sense. If we have to—”
“We’re doing this my way.”
“Oh, big surprise. I’m simply asking—”
“I’m tired of answering, really tired of answering.” But he sighed out a breath. “We’re going to cut down this street, then between those two yards, around the building on the next block, then through to the back of the apartment. We’re going on foot because we’ll be tougher to spot if they’ve got your building staked out.”
She thought it over, considered the angles, then nodded. “Well, that makes sense.”
“Thanks, thanks a lot.” He grabbed her purse and, while she stuttered out a shocked protest, emptied her wallet of cash.
“Just what the hell do you think you’re doing? That’s my money.” She snatched back her empty wallet as he stuffed bills in his pocket, then goggled as he plucked out the diamond and pushed it in after the bills. “Give me that. Are you out of your mind?”
She made a grab for him. Jack simply shoved her back against the seat, held her in place and, risking another bloody lip, crushed his mouth to hers. She wriggled, muttered what he assumed were oaths, popped her fist against his ribs. Then she decided to cooperate.
And her cooperation, hot, avid, was a great deal more difficult to resist than her protests. He lost himself in her for a moment, experienced the shock of being helpless to do otherwise.
It was like the first time. Consuming. The thought circled in his mind that he’d been waiting all his life to find his mouth pressed to hers.
Just that simple. Just that terrifying.
The fist she’d struck him with relaxed, and her open fingers slid around, up his back, hooked possessively over his shoulder. Mine, she thought.
Just that easy. Just that staggering.
When he shifted back, they stared at each other in the dim light, two strong-minded people who’d just had their worlds tilt under them. Her hand was still gripped on his shoulder, and his on hers.
“Why’d you do that?” she managed.
“It was mostly to shut you up.” His hand skimmed up her shoulder, into her hair. “It changed.”
Very slowly, she nodded. “Yes, it did.”
He had a strong urge to drag her into the back seat and play teenager. The idea nearly made him smile. “I can’t think about this now.”
“No, me either.”
The hand in her hair moved and, in a surprisingly sweet gesture took hers, laced fingers with hers. “We’re going to do more than think about it later.”
“Yeah.” Her lips curved a little. “I guess we are.”
“Let’s go. No, don’t take the purse.” When she opened her mouth to argue, he simply tugged it away from her, tossed it into the back. “M.J., that thing weighs a ton. We may have to move fast. I’m taking the cash, and the stone, because they might make the car, or we may not get back to it.”
“All right.” She got out, waited for him on the sidewalk. Glanced briefly at the gun he secured in a shoulder holster. “I know this is risky. I have to do it, Jack.”
He took her hand again. “Then let’s do it.”
They followed the route he’d mapped out, slipped between yards, a dog barking halfheartedly at them. The moon was out, a bright beacon that both guided their path and spotlighted them.
He had a moment to intensely wish he’d had her change out of the white T-shirt. It glowed in the dark like a lit-up flag. But she moved well, with quiet, long strides. He already knew she could run if necessary. He had to be satisfied with that.
“You have to do what I tell you,” he began, keeping his voice low as he surveyed the back of her building. “I know that goes against the grain for you, but you’ll have to swallow it. If I tell you to move, you move. If I tell you to run, you run. No questions, no arguments.”
“I’m not stupid. I just like to know the reasons.”
“This time you just do what you’re told, and we’ll discuss my reasoning later.”
She struggled to fall into step. “Her car’s here,” she told him quietly. “The little white compact.”
“Okay, so maybe she’s home.” Or, he thought, she hasn’t been able to drive. But he didn’t think that was what M.J. needed to hear. “We’ll go in the side, through the fire door, work our way around to the stairs. No noise, M.J., no conversation.”
“Okay.”
Her eyes were already on Bailey’s windows as they hurried toward the side door. The windows were dark, the curtains drawn. Bailey left her curtains open, was all she could think. Bailey liked to look out the windows and rarely shut out her view.
They slipped inside like shadows and, with Jack a half step in the lead, walked quietly to the steps. The security light beamed, lighting the hall and stairs. Jack glanced out the front door, keeping well to the side. If anyone was watching, he mused, they’d be spotted easily going into the light.
It was a chance they’d have to take.
As they moved up the stairs, he listened for any sound, any movement. It was so late it was early. The building slept. There wasn’t even the murmur of a late-night TV behind any of the doors they passed on the second floor.
When they reached the third, M.J. made her first sound, just a quickly indrawn breath, instantly muffled. There was police tape over her door.
“Your neighbor with the bunny slippers called the cops,” Jack murmured. “Odds are they’re looking for you, too.” He held out a hand. “Key?”
She turned, kept her eyes on Bailey’s door as she dug into her pocket, handed it to him. He gestured her back toward the steps to give her room to run away, unsheathed his gun, then unlocked the door.
Keeping low, he used his light to scan, saw no movement. Holding a hand up to keep M.J. in place, he stepped inside. What he’d seen had already decided him that no one was there, but he wanted to check the bedroom, the kitchen, before M.J. joined him.
He’d taken the first steps when her gasp, unmuffled this time, had him turning. “Stay back,” he orde
red. “Stay quiet.”
“Oh, God. Bailey.” She shot toward the bedroom, leaping over ripped cushions, overturned chairs like a hurdler coming off the mark.
He reached the door a step ahead, shoved her roughly out of the way. “Hold it together, damn it,” He hissed, then opened the door. “She’s not here,” he said a moment later. “Go close the front door, lock it.”
On legs that trembled, she crossed back, taking a winding path through the destruction of the living room. She closed the door, locked it, then leaned back weakly.
“What have they done to her, Jack? Oh, God, what have they done to her?”
“Sit down. Let me look.”
She squeezed her eyes tight, fought for control. Images flitted through her head. Her and Grace sitting in the shade of a boulder while Bailey gleefully hunted rocks. The three of them giggling like fools late at night over jug wine. Bailey, a wave of blond hair falling into her face soberly contemplating a pair of Italian shoes in a store display.
“I’ll help,” she said, and let out a whoosh of breath. “I can help.”
Yeah, he thought, watching the way her spine stiffened, her shoulders squared, she probably could. “Okay, you’ve got to keep it quiet, and keep it quick. We can’t risk the lights, or much time.”
He skimmed the beam over the room. Contents of drawers and closets had been tossed and scattered. A few breakables smashed. The cushions, the mattress, even the back of chairs, had been slashed so that stuffing poured out in an avalanche of destruction.
“You’re not going to be able to tell if anything’s missing in all this mess.” He surveyed the surface damage and calculated that the woman had gone in for tchotchkes in a big way. “But I can tell you, I don’t think your friend was here when this went on.”
M.J. pressed a hand to her heart, as though to hold in hope. “Why?”
“This wasn’t a struggle, M.J. It was a search, a quick, messy and mostly quiet one. I’d say we have a pretty good idea what they were looking for. Whether they found it or not—”
“She’d have it with her,” M.J. said quickly. “Her note was very clear that I should keep the stone with me. She’d have kept it with her.”
“If that’s true, then odds are she still has it. She wasn’t here,” he repeated, scanning the light into the living room. “She didn’t put up a fight here, she wasn’t hurt here. There’s no blood.”
Her knees wobbled again. “No blood.” And she pressed a hand to her mouth to cut off the little sob of relief. “Okay. She’s okay. She went underground, the same way we did.”
“If she’s as smart as you say she is, that’s just what she’d do.”
“She’s smart enough to run if she had to run.” It helped to look at the tumbled room with a more careful eye. “She doesn’t have her car, so she’s on foot or using public transportation.” And M.J.’s heart sank at the thought of it. “She doesn’t know the streets, Jack. She doesn’t know the ropes. Bailey’s brilliant, but she’s naive. She trusts too easily, likes to believe the best in people. She’s sweet,” M.J. added, on a little shudder.
“She must have picked up something from you.” He appreciated the fact that she could smile at that, even a little. “Let’s just take a quick look through this stuff, see if anything pops out. Check her clothes—you could probably tell if she’d packed things.”
“She has a travel kit, fully stocked. She’d never go anywhere without it.” Buffered by that simple, everyday fact, M.J. headed into the bath to check the narrow linen closet.
Even there, items had been pulled out, the shelves stripped, bottles opened and emptied. But she found the kit itself, opened and empty on the floor, recognized several of its contents—the travel toothbrush, the fold-up hair brush, the travel-size shampoos and soaps.
“It’s here.” She stepped into the bedroom, did her best to inventory clothes. “I don’t think she took anything. There’s a suit missing. It’s fairly new, so I remember. A neat little blue silk. She might be wearing it. Hell, shoes and bags, I don’t know. She collects them like stamps.”