Burke, the Kingpin (The Shamrock Trinity)

by Fayrene Preston

  “Davis has Cara,” Burke said dully.

  “Did he say what he wants?” Cougar asked.

  “He wants me.”

  “He didn’t mention a ransom?”

  Burke shook his head.

  “What about some sort of deadline? Instructions of any sort?”

  “Nothing.” The numbness that had descended on Burke as soon as Davis had said he had Cara was beginning to recede, and in its place a cold rage was forming. He stood up and looked around. “Dammit!” With one sweep of his hand, papers went flying across the room. “He’s got Cara!”

  York and Rafe strode to his side immediately, flanking him.

  “She’s going to be all right,” Rafe said. “Nothing is going to happen to her.”

  York placed his hand on Burke’s shoulder. “He’ll call again, and when he does, he’ll give something away. We’ll get him.”

  “York’s right,” Cougar said, placing a black box on the desk beside Burke’s phone. “He’s playing a game with you, and he’ll definitely call again. When he does, we’ll be ready.” He opened the box and began hooking it to the phone. “This is the little gadget that’s going to be his downfall.”

  “What is it?” Rafe asked.

  “It’s my latest toy. When Davis calls back, this will give us the number from which he’s calling. Then it’s a simple matter to get the address where that telephone is located. No need to say that it’s not available at your local electronics store. Very few people have them.”

  “How did you get hold of one?” York asked.

  “You can get anything you want if you have enough money and know the right people. I put my order in for one as soon as Davis stopped sending his charming notes. I guessed he might try to contact Burke by phone, but I’m afraid it never occurred to me that he’d go after Cara.” He completed the hook up and turned to Burke. “I’m sorry, Burke.”

  “It’s not your fault. It’s mine. I never should have let her go out alone.” He rubbed the back of his neck. “I don’t know what I’ll do if anything happens to her. She’s come to be my life.” He swung around to his brothers. “What can I do? I feel so damn helpless!”

  Rafe and York looked at Cougar.

  “For the moment there’s nothing we can do,” he answered. “We wait, I’m afraid. In the meantime I’m going to check in with my men and find out if they’ve seen anything downstairs.”

  Burke sat back down. With his elbows on the desk and his hands folded, he stared at the phone, willing it to ring.

  Don’t be scared, Cara. I love you. I couldn’t bear it if I thought you were frightened or hurting. Please don’t be scared. Just hang on. Have faith in me. I’ll save you. He repeated the same sentences over and over in his head, as though if he said them often enough, Cara would hear him.

  * * *

  Cara gradually awakened to the realization that she couldn’t move. Her head hurt, and her throat felt dry. She attempted to swallow, but something was in her mouth. She tried to bring a hand to her face and found her hands bound to her sides. Then she remembered.

  The man who had come for her at the toy store had been Davis. With a maniacal laugh he had told her who he was right before he thrust the chloroform-soaked rag over her face. He had told her that and something else that she couldn’t seem to remember.

  What a fool she had been to go with him, she thought, silently berating herself. Yet he had said something had happened to Burke, and she had seen the identification card. Her brain seemed to be operating sluggishly, but she forced herself to think. He must have taken it off one of Cougar’s guards, and if he had disabled one of the guards, how many more could he have gotten to? Even now Burke could be in serious danger. The thought made her struggle desperately, but she had no coordination, and besides, her hands were held securely against her body by some sort of cloth rope.

  Where was she? She could feel her muscles cramping at the unnatural positions they were being asked to hold. She was crammed half-standing in a very tight, dark space. She tried to straighten, but hit her head and heard a metal thud. She made an attempt to shift her weight, and her side hit a wall and created a sort of metallic clank. It was almost like she was in a tall metal cabinet of some sort. But it was so narrow! Could she possibly be in some sort of locker? And where?

  And then she heard it—a faint ticking sound, directly above her. Something came back to her. The last word she had heard Davis say before blackness had claimed her. Bomb. Through the rag that he had stuffed in her mouth, she began to scream.

  * * *

  Time dragged. It had been fifteen minutes since Davis’s call. Burke had taken off his jacket and tie, opened the buttons at his collar, and rolled up his shirt sleeves. His brothers had done the same. He glanced across the room at them, thankful that they were here with him. Their presence gave him comfort. They were talking quietly to one another. Their faces were grim, but if they were anything less than optimistic, he knew they would never let him know. They had spent much of the last fifteen minutes reassuring him.

  Burke closed his eyes and began once again repeating his prayer to Cara. I love you... Please don’t be scared. Just hang on. Have faith in me. I’ll save you.

  Burke heard Cougar slam the receiver down on the phone, and he opened his eyes.

  “One of my men has just been discovered unconscious, gagged, and tied up. The security of this building has been breached.”

  “That means Davis could be in the building somewhere.” Rafe said.

  “And so could Cara,” York added.

  “Cougar, how many men do you have on duty?” Before Cougar could answer, the phone rang, and Burke lunged for it.

  “I hope this is him. Hello, Davis?”

  “You were expecting me. How nice.”

  In his peripheral vision, he saw Cougar, York, and Rafe cross to him. “Where have you got Cara?”

  “She’s gonna die soon now.” Davis’s laughter was earsplitting. “I hope the thought has given you half as much grief as I’ve had to bear. But you’re not gonna have to suffer too much longer, because you’ll be dead too. And guess what? I’m gonna watch the whole thing.”

  A number popped up on the screen of Cougar’s black box. Cougar looked at it, then ran to another phone and placed a call.

  Burke covered the mouthpiece of the phone. “She’s got to be here somewhere in this building. He says she and I are both going to die and he’s going to watch.”

  “A bomb!” York whispered.

  “Have you planted a bomb in this building, you bastard?” Burke yelled. “Is that what you’ve done?”

  The line went dead amid shrieks of laughter. Burke pushed back his chair. “Cougar, we’ll need the bomb squad. Call the police, then get you and your men out of the building, along with anyone else you find. I don’t want to be responsible for needless deaths. Fortunately this is Saturday afternoon. There shouldn’t be that many people here.”

  “I’m staying,” Cougar said. “Davis is watching from across the street. I’ll start searching immediately. The problem is, it’s going to take a hell of a long time to search twenty floors. Maybe too long. Did Davis give you any indication where he put Cara?”

  “No, but I’m going to get him now,” Burke said grimly, already halfway out the door. “He’ll either tell me or—” He stopped and threw a twisted smile over his shoulder at Cougar. “Try to find Cara before I kill him.”

  “Cougar’s information is that the phone he used is in one of the ground-floor offices in the building across the street.” Rafe said, “and I’m going with you.”

  “So am I.” York said. “You’ll need help searching those offices.”

  Burke didn’t waste his breath arguing with them. He knew it wouldn’t be any use.

  * * *

  Burke’s hand quietly grasped the doorknob of the office door and turned. This was the third office he had searched. The other two had been empty. When they entered the building, he, York, and Rafe had split up. York and Ra
fe obviously hadn’t had any better luck, or he would have heard something by now.

  He pushed the door open and went in, being careful to tread softly. The room he had entered was a small reception area. His eyes quickly scanned the room as he moved through it. One more door. Cautiously he twisted the knob, then pushed the door slowly open. Disappointment shot through him as he realized this office was going to come up empty too.

  He sensed the movement before he saw or felt anything, and that split second’s warning saved him as he jerked his head to the side and spun at the same time. The butt of a gun whizzed by his temple. He grabbed Davis’s arm and twisted, and Davis gave out a wild scream as the gun dropped from his grasp.

  Burke continued to twist the man’s arm high up behind his back, then shoved him hard against the wall. “Where is she, Davis? Tell me now and save yourself a lot of pain.”

  “No way, man,” Davis said, panting. “Maybe you won’t be in that building when it goes, but it won’t be a total loss. This way I’ll be able to see your face when we hear the explosion. I can’t wait.”

  Burke let go of Davis’s arm and jerked him around. His dark green eyes had turned almost black with savage fury. “You’ll tell me now or you’ll die now! And you won’t get to see or hear anything for the rest of your life.”

  “Then you had better hurry,” Davis taunted. “The bomb may go off within the next few seconds. I’ve lost track of time and can’t seem to remember when the bomb is set to explode. How about you? Do you know? It may go off at any moment, before you have a chance to kill me. And then the place where you knew such pleasure will become her tomb.”

  Davis’s unnaturally shrill laughter was cut off by Burke’s hands around his throat. The thought of Cara in danger, the thought of her in fear, the thought that he might never see her again, had driven him past the point of reason. His thumbs pressed into Davis’s windpipe, and his hands began to squeeze tighter and tighter.

  Burke felt hands on his shoulders. He heard Rafe and York talking to him, but he didn’t know what they were saying. The next thing he knew, he was across the room and York’s arms were around him, restraining him. Davis was lying on the floor, and Rafe was kneeling beside him.

  Burke shook his head, willing his mind to begin functioning again. “Is he dead?”

  Rafe’s fingers were lying lightly over the pulse point on Davis’s neck. “No. He’s just unconscious. Did he tell you anything?”

  “No.” Burke rubbed his hands across his eyes. “Wait a minute! Yes! Dammit, yes.” He broke free of York’s hold and headed out the door on a dead run. “The gym,” he called over his shoulder. “She’s in the Delaney Tower gym.”

  * * *

  Firmly blocking the sound of the ominous ticking from her mind, Cara concentrated on Burke. He would find her, she told herself. She knew he would. He had to. Their love was not going to end now.

  She had learned so much since she had known Burke. She had learned that to know love, you had to possess the courage to reach out, to take hold, and to not let go. She had to tell Burke all this and so much more. The thought that he might never know of her love for him was unbearable.

  She formed a picture of him in her mind. He would find her. He would find her.

  “Cara! Cara!”

  She could hear Burke calling her and the sound of locker doors being slammed back against one another. She tried to let him know where she was, but the gag and the swollen, raw condition of her throat hampered her.

  Oh, no! A new thought had just occurred to her. What if the bomb went off now? It would take Burke too. She tried to scream in order to warn him, to give him enough time to get out, but the pitiful noises she was making couldn’t be heard over the metal crash of the locker doors.

  “Cara!” The locker door swung open and Burke reached for her. His only thought was that he was never going to let her go.

  He had seen her tear-stained face and the terror that showed in her eyes before he had grabbed her, and it made him wish that he had killed Davis while he had had the chance.

  “A bomb.” She tried to get the words out so that he could hear her. “A bomb.”

  He was walking rapidly toward the door. Men in uniforms were swarming in. She saw Rafe, then York. They were running ahead of them, opening doors, clearing the way. She closed her eyes and lay her head against Burke’s shoulder. Everything was going to be all right.

  It wasn’t until they were down on the street and a safe distance away from the building that Burke set her feet gently on the ground.

  He stripped away the gag from her mouth. “Are you all right?”

  She nodded.

  “Forgive me, darling. Forgive me for putting you in such danger.”

  “There’s nothing to forgive.” The words were rasped out. “I’m just so glad you weren’t hurt.”

  He untied the belt from a terry-cloth robe that Davis had used around her arms.

  “Get a doctor over here!” Burke yelled toward a group of people standing around an ambulance.

  “No,” she whispered. “I’m fine.”

  “Maybe you should see a doctor, Cara,” Rafe said gently. “You’ve been through a terrible ordeal.”

  She shook her head, but no one was listening to her. A paramedic came over and began checking her out.

  A few minutes later York came running up. “The police chief just told me that they’ve successfully dismantled the bomb. We got out of there in the nick of time. It would have exploded within a few minutes.”

  Held securely against Burke’s chest, Cara shuddered. “I want to go home.”

  “Home?” Burke asked, a cold dread settling in the pit of his stomach. After all she had been through, he supposed it was only natural that she would want to go back to Paris. But dammit! He couldn’t lose her now!

  “Burke,” she whispered, “take me home to Killara.”

  Ten

  From the top of the keep Burke and Cara had an awe-inspiring view of the sunset. Splendid colors splashed across the sky, vying with each other in their intensity—magenta, crimson, gold, vermillion. The sky seemed to sense the joy of the hour and bathed the land with the shimmering hues of fire.

  Burke felt the peace and the joy, but he kept a watchful eye on Cara. “Are you sure you feel well enough to be up here?”

  “I’m fine,” she assured him, and smiled. They had flown back to Killara hours ago. Burke had clucked around her like a mother hen, practically hand-spooning hot tea with honey and lemon into her until Cara’s throat felt much better. And when she said she couldn’t take one more sip of tea, he had scooped her into his arms and carried her to bed. There he had held her close against him until she had dropped off to sleep.

  “I feel recharged after my nap. Did you sleep too?”

  He shook his head. “I watched you.”

  Lightly touching his cheek, she smiled. “No wonder I felt so secure.” A caressing breeze tossed a silver-blond curl across her face. She pushed it away. “Thank you for bringing me up here. I didn’t want to miss this sunset.”

  “Why this one in particular?”

  “Because it’s going to be very special. I can tell.”

  He pulled her against him so that her back rested against his chest. “I still remember that sunset a month ago when I first saw you riding Shalimar across the range.” His mouth was over the opening of her ear, and when he spoke, his breath tickled warmly. “I thought you were a fantasy. I was right.”

  “I’m no fantasy.”

  “You’re wrong. You’re my fantasy, and I almost lost you.”

  Her lips curved tenderly. “When I was in that locker, waiting for you to come and rescue me...”

  He turned her around to face him, and the expression on his face was grim. “I don’t want you to think about it, Cara. It’s over, and Davis will never have the opportunity to harm you again.”

  “I know, and I don’t mind talking about it. I’m not afraid anymore, of anything.” She touched his face, reass
uring him. “It’s important to me that I tell you what I was thinking during that time.”

  He looked at her doubtfully, but he was so glad to have her here with him, safe and smiling, that he would have granted her anything. “If you’re sure, then.”

  “I’m sure. It’s about you.”

  “Me?”

  “When I was in that locker, the thought of you and all you’ve taught me sustained me. You’ve made me a better person, Burke. Being with you over this past month, I’ve gradually learned that love is worth all the risks. But I’m convinced that loving you has no risks.”

  His pulse began to beat faster. “What are you saying, Cara?”

  She looked at him with unwavering gray eyes. “I’m saying that I love you.”

  He could hardly believe what he was hearing. “Is it really true?”

  “I woke up this morning, saw you sleeping beside me, and all of a sudden I knew that I loved you. I’m only sorry it took me so long to figure it but...”

  His voice shook as he murmured, “Dear Lord in leaven, I love you so much.” Slowly he pulled her to him and then his mouth lowered to hers with a kiss that held a deep and abiding tenderness and a promise of all that was to come.

  “I love you too,” she whispered when the kiss was over.

  “I’ve wanted your love so desperately. I always believed you would grow to love me.” Burke threw back his head and laughed with pure exultation. “You realize that I wouldn’t have allowed anything else to happen, don’t you?”

  She grinned. “Oh, sure, now that it’s all over, you can gloat, right? You’re a formidable man, Burke Delaney, and I’ll love you for the rest of my life.”

  “You’ll never be able to tell me that often enough. Wait a minute! I just thought of something! We’re going to be able to share our happiness with Rafe and York.”

  “How?”

  “I was notified shortly before we came up here that York’s helicopter landed on Killara out in the foothills, then took off again. The word is, he’s not alone.”

  “What’s he doing out there?”

  “I don’t know, but I’m sure we’ll find out soon. And that’s not all. Rafe radioed that his copter will be landing shortly. He’s also bringing a guest.”