by Cassie Miles
Dash shuddered. He’d never undergone that yoke. Though he couldn’t recall his human existence before he became an angel, he knew from personnel files that he had not wed. And he had the feeling that he was missing something important.
He’d never sired a brood of children. Go forth and multiply. Wasn’t that supposed to be an instruction for living? Somewhere in the rules and regs there was an indication that every being, mortal and angel and even devil, would have a mate. Part of the big picture, Dash thought. The union of male and female. Why hadn’t it happened to him?
When he thought about Liz, with her long legs and sweet azure eyes, he got fuzzy inside. Though the memory of her did not blur the clear lines of good and evil that delineated his purpose, he felt his drive being slowed. His motivation to solve crimes softened because he was too busy thinking about her. This tenderness had to stop. He was an avenger, a warrior.
He thinned his earthly form to invisibility and soared to the fourteenth floor where OrbenCorp had their offices. Liz wasn’t there yet. Nor was Hector, Jack or Gary. He sensed no danger in the corporate headquarters.
Swift as a beam of laser light, he flew to Liz’s apartment and glided inside without taking solid form. She stood before the bathroom mirror and brushed her hair. Tawny highlights shimmered in her long brown hair as she stroked thoughtfully. Her blue eyes were soft and contemplative. Unguarded, she looked so lovely and sweet.
But he knew her better than that. He could be sure Liz Carradine wasn’t thinking about fields of daisies and needlepoint projects. More likely, visions of detective work and mayhem danced in her brain.
He watched as she pulled her hair into a ponytail at the nape of her slender neck. Carefully, she fixed pearl studs into her pierced ears. She was humming tuneless snatches of song.
Too easily, he visualized what it would be like to wake up each morning and find Liz there beside him, warm and friendly in his bed. They would share a hot cup of java. They’d talk about their dreams. When she laughed, her amusement would lighten his heart. When she wept, he would comfort her.
No! He couldn’t think this, couldn’t even dream it. It was torture to imagine anything so unattainable.
But it didn’t feel wrong. Love was a blessed emotion. Marriage was a sacrament. How could they be forbidden?
Confusion roiled within his chest. If he fell in love with Elizabeth, would he cease to be an angel?
In the blink of an eye, he soared away from her apartment. He needed contemplation. He needed to relax, unwind, to marshal the strength and wisdom of angels.
His powerful wings spread to their full span, he surged upward through the ether blue, higher than the rooftops of Denver, farther than the topmost floors of skyscrapers. He flew above the snowcapped peaks of the Rockies, seeking the radiant soul of the sun. As he ascended, higher and higher, separating from the earth, he sought peace. The singing of stars. The pure sensation of being one with the universe.
Beyond the horizon of earth, he departed from the atmosphere and ozone. In space, he found solace for his small worries. Surely, his little problems didn’t amount to a hill of beans. Bogie had said that, and Bogart had been right. Not even a hill of beans. Dash rested, allowed his questions to float away. Far from earth he floated, weightless as a wish, ethereal as a prayer.
As a mortal, he would never fly. His life would be mundane and earthbound. He didn’t want that. Never. Yet he felt a pull more compelling than gravity.
As quickly as he had flown, he returned to earth and materialized in the fourteenth-floor offices of OrbenCorp. The reception area was dark. Doors were locked. The offices had the air of total desertion that comes on Friday afternoon before the weekend. He went to Liz’s office. She wasn’t there. Nobody was there!
He glanced at the clock on the receptionist’s desk. It was after five o’clock. Five thirty-seven.
The sharp edge of panic knifed through him. He had spent hours in contemplation. Not minutes. He had left Liz alone and unprotected, headed toward a meeting with Hector Messenger, a primary suspect in the case.
Where was she? Was she safe?
A terrible sense of dread knifed through his being. He’d lived through the major disasters of the twentieth century. Not only the small horror of unsolved crime, but he’d been in the Holocaust. In Chile during the massacres. He’d faced Idi Amin. He’d been in Vietnam. Of all that he’d seen, of all that he’d experienced, he’d never been as shaken as now, when he stood in Liz’s office and stared at her vacant desk.
In solid form, he trembled in the darkened office. What was happening to him? He realized with terrifying certainty that he could not go on without her.
LIZ SLAMMED her car door. This afternoon had been nothing but one screwup after another. First, Dash had taken off with a promise to meet her at the office. Then he never returned. Typical irresponsible male behavior.
Then her meeting with Hector had to be postponed because Hector had to come to the processing plant where the raw coffee beans were warehoused before shipping. Muttering, she walked toward the vast, bland, square building with the OrbenCorp logo on the side. There was only one car in the parking lot, and she hoped it belonged to Hector. Otherwise, the entire afternoon would be a write-off.
Both Jack and Gary had been out of the office, and she’d spent the time from two o’clock to four-thirty sitting behind her desk, stewing in her own juices. Then she’d decided to come out here, to find Hector and confront him. But the traffic from town had been absolutely impossible.
Checking her wristwatch, she saw that the time was five forty-two. She was frustrated and angry. And hungry. She hadn’t eaten since this morning. Why wasn’t anybody where they were supposed to be? How on earth could she solve Agatha’s murder if the suspects kept running off?
Liz marched up the concrete stairs to the office door beside the closed bays of the loading dock. If it was locked, she would just go home, have dinner and take a long soak in the bathtub while she considered the clues. Ever since she’d flipped through that photo album, Liz had the sense that there was something buried in the past that would yield a solution.
The doorknob twisted easily in her hand. The heavy metal door opened on soundless hinges. Good! Maybe Hector was here. Maybe she’d have a chance to talk with him.
She poked her head inside. The windowless office area was dark. Not promising. But a car was parked outside, and the door had been open. Somebody must be here.
Liz turned on the light switches beside the door. Unlike the posh corporate headquarters downtown, the processing plant with its warehouse area was barren and plain. The only decorations on matte beige walls were pictures the employees had tacked up. Family photos. Calendars. Liz called out, “Hello? Anybody here?”
Her voice made an eerie echo.
“Hector? Are you here?”
The only response was a faint hum from the airconditioning system. It occurred to her that if Hector was here, they would be utterly alone. If he was the murderer, she needed to exert extreme caution.
In the back of her mind, she wished Dash was with her. She’d feel a lot braver if she had him protecting her rear.
Before taking another step, Liz opened the clasp on her purse and stuck her hand inside. Her fingers closed around the handle of her gun. She didn’t dare take off the safety catch because she might accidentally shoot herself in the foot, but she held the gun ready. She curled her finger around the trigger.
Cautiously, she crept past the desks to the long, unadorned corridor that led to the warehousing and processing areas. That door was also open.
When she stepped into the warehouse area, she was met with the heavy aroma of fresh-roasted coffee from the processing area next door. The scent filled the air from the three-story-high ceilings to the smooth concrete floor beneath her feet. Though fluorescent lights were lit, the warehouse seemed dark and foreboding, piled high with the lumpish forms of raw coffee beans in burlap sacks.
She shivered. There was a prickl
ing at the back of her neck, a sense that someone was watching her. Clearing her throat, she called out, “Hector? Are you here? Is anybody back here?”
There was a creaking from the wood pallets that were stacked beside the door. Rats? Liz shuddered, but she knew the warehouse was pest-free. Though plain and functional, this processing plant was perfectly sanitized.
From somewhere deep in the bowels of the warehouse, she heard a door slam. A frightened gasp escaped her lips. Her finger tightened on the trigger of her handgun. “Hector?”
“What?” came a response. “Who’s there?”
“It’s me. Liz.”
She heard the sound of footsteps clunking on the concrete floor. Her heart slammed against her rib cage. She could feel herself begin to sweat as the footsteps came closer and closer.
And she saw Hector. His thick-shouldered silhouette appeared from behind a stack of wooden pallets. Though his face was in shadow, she knew that he was staring at her. His black eyes would be cold, hard and angry.
“Took your time, Liz.”
“What?” She tried to banish the fear from her voice. But she might be staring into the face of a murderer. She knew the rumors about Hector’s past. He’d been a mercenary. He’d been in Vietnam. Surely, he had killed before. He’d been a soldier then. But now? Had he murdered Agatha?
“I called Sarah’s around noon,” he said. “Told her I would meet with you here.”
“I never got that message.”
“You went to the office?”
“Yes.”
He took a step toward her. “Did you talk to Jack or Gary?”
“No. They weren’t there.”
He came nearer. Only a few feet from her. His fists were clenched. The warehouse light reflected off his gold necklaces. A muscle in his jaw twitched.
Liz kept her hand in her purse, holding the gun.
“I wish you’d talked to me,” Hector said, “before you told that damn bean counter, Gary Gregory, that I haven’t been doing my job.”
“I never said that.”
“Come off it, Liz.” He made a swift, slashing motion with his hand. “You told him I’ve been paying too much for the beans. You’ve been comparing figures.”
“It’s true, Hector. You’re paying eight to ten percent more.”
“You know nothing about this business,” he snarled. “Nothing.”
“Agatha told me to check your buy prices. To compare them against the buys of our competitors and the other coffee brokers.”
“Agatha?” He wrenched his features into a pained grimace. “Never speak to me of Agatha.”
Hector reached into his trouser pocket. When his hand emerged, he held a shaft. A button popped. A knife blade snapped out. The dim light shone against sharp steel.
Liz stifled the terrified scream that rose in the back of her throat. Would she have to shoot him? My God, could she do it? Her fingers tensed and trembled. Could she kill this man she’d known for eight years?
He turned away from her, plunged the knife blade into a burlap sack and withdrew a handful of raw coffee beans.
He thrust them toward her. “These are the finest beans in all Colombia. Of course, I pay more. I buy only the best. Agatha would have known that. Agatha would not have questioned my judgment.”
He flung the beans to the concrete floor. “And I don’t know where you got your figures. Sure, I pay more. Sometimes four percent more. But eight percent? Ten percent? No! It’s not that high.”
“It’s on the computer,” she said.
“Then the computer is wrong.” His harsh gaze stabbed through her. “You are wrong. You all are. Even Jack. He wants me to buy cheap, not quality. And Gary is the same. Damn them! I miss Agatha. She knew how this business was supposed to run. She understood.”
“I’m sorry, Hector.”
“You—” He raised his finger, swift as the strike of a rattler. He pointed in her face. “You disappoint me, Liz.”
He turned on his heel and paced away from her, disappearing behind the stacks of pallets and bags of coffee beans. She heard the door to the office area open and slam closed. He was gone.
Liz exhaled the breath she hadn’t been aware of holding. Her finger twitched convulsively on the trigger. She tried to take a step, but her legs were paralyzed. “Oh, my God.”
Now she knew what people meant when they referred to being scared stiff.
The door from the offices swung open. And she jumped. Had Hector come back? Was he going to kill her?
“No,” Liz whispered. She wasn’t ready to die.
She dropped her purse to the concrete floor, but she still held the gun in her hand. She raised her arm straight in front of her. She sighted down the barrel. “Who’s there?”
“Take it easy, partner.”
“Dash!” She flew toward him. Her arms circled his neck and she held on tight.
“Are you all right, precious?”
“Don’t talk.”
Instinctively, she sought his warmth, his reassurance.
When his arms gently embraced her, his nearness comforted her in a way she’d never thought possible. As he held her, Liz felt whole and complete, safer than she’d ever been in her life. Relief swept through her like a cleansing wind, blowing away the fear and easing the tension in her muscles until she felt limp and boneless. Liz doubted that she could even stand up without his support.
Gently, he patted her shoulders and smoothed her hair. “You’re okay, Elizabeth. You’re going to be okay.”
Dash felt her heart hammering against him. The beat was rapid, fluttering. Her fear trembled through him, too. If anything happened to her, he didn’t think he could stand it. He cared more for her safety than for his own. Her well-being meant more than all the celestial rules and regulations Angelo could throw at him.
“Hector was here,” she whispered. “He left just before you got here. Did you see him?”
“No.” Dash had flown. This was the fourth place he’d searched before he saw Liz’s little red car in the parking lot. “Did he threaten you?”
“I don’t think so. I mean, I don’t think he meant to threaten me personally, but he was angry, and he had a switchblade knife.”
An angry man brandishing a knife sounded potentially harmful to her health, but Dash didn’t comment. Nor did he say a word about the gun in her hand. He was too grateful to find her in one piece.
“You’re okay, Liz.” He held her by the shoulders and reluctantly moved her away from his body. Her face was pale. But he didn’t trust himself to hold her any longer. A prolonged embrace between them could lead to trouble. “You’re okay.”
“I know.” She stood apart from him, swaying slightly. When she lifted her hand to brush her hair from her face, she realized that she still held the gun. Surprised, she stared down the barrel, turned the gun over her in hand.
When she gazed at him, the color had begun to return to her cheeks. “Do you believe this? I had the gun out. I was ready to use it.”
Though her wide blue eyes still held the vestiges of fear, her mouth twitched into a smile. “Me! Mousy little me. Liz Carradine, the doormat, the secretary. Don’t you get it, Dash? I was ready to shoot Hector.”
“Yeah?”
“Just like a real private eye.” She threw back her head. Her shoulders straightened. “Damn it, I knew I’d be good at this stuff.”
Dash groaned. He wanted to read her the riot act. He wanted to tell her that the fear she’d experienced was nothing compared to real danger, to the sensation of death. But he didn’t have the heart to give her a hard time.
Also, judging by the exultant look on her face, he didn’t think his warnings would do any good. “Come on, precious. I’ll take you home.”
They walked through the offices, turning out lights as they went and snapping the automatic locks on the door.
Liz glanced around the asphalt parking lot, which was deserted except for her car. “How did you get here?”
“Does it
matter?”
“I’m just curious. I mean, you keep turning up all over town, and you don’t have a car. Either you’re running up a gigantic bill in taxicabs or you’re flying like Superman.”
“You guessed it, sweetheart.” He grinned. She didn’t know how right she was. “Want me to drive?”
“No.” She climbed behind the wheel and started her car.
“Why was Hector angry?”
“I needed to compare some figures with him. It looked like he was paying too much for raw beans. But he said he was paying more for better quality.”
“Do you believe him?”
“I don’t know.” She swung her car out of the parking lot and aimed toward the highway. “But Hector was right about one thing. I didn’t handle this situation well at all. I should have talked to him first instead of telling Gary.”
“Why?”
“I guess Gary and Jack got mad at Hector. They aren’t too concerned about quality. Especially not Gary. All he cares about is the bottom line.”
Dash noticed, as she merged onto the highway, that Liz was driving faster and with more élan. She had a new sense of confidence that worried him. At the same time, he admired her spirit.
“As soon as I get back to my apartment,” she said, “I’m going to write all this down and try to make some sense of it. Right now, I just have a lot of vague impressions.”
“About what?”
“When we were looking through those photo albums, it occurred to me that the solution might be somewhere in the past. And now, with the stuff going on in the officeall this fussing about Hector and the beans—there’s got to be a connection there.” She frowned. “Or maybe not.”
Dash leaned back in the passenger seat. “Tell me all about it. I’d like to know the history of these people.”
“I’ll start with Agatha.”
Throughout the drive to Liz’s apartment, she spoke of memories. Some good. Some not so good. The picture of Agatha Orben that emerged was one that coincided with Dash’s impression. Agatha had been a good woman, dedicated to helping others. But she’d also been a smart businessperson. At times, impatient. At times, demanding.