The Wrong Hostage

by Elizabeth Lowell

  Silence stretched while Faroe studied Grace. He didn’t doubt that she was telling the truth.

  And his gut said she wasn’t telling all of it.

  “Sixteen years ago, maybe it would have worked,” he said. “But I’m a different man and you’re a different woman. That’s why you need somebody else. We have too much baggage, the kind that really gets in the way.”

  Grace watched him. Her eyes were huge, glittering with tears she wouldn’t allow to fall.

  “I’ll call Steele myself,” Faroe said, his voice rough with all that he couldn’t say, shouldn’t think, and didn’t want to remember. “There are two men who are as good as I am at this bloody game. One of them could be here by dawn. You and St. Kilda can start over, without the baggage and without the burn.”

  Grace’s eyes dropped to the leather shoulder bag she’d carried aboard. My God, am I going to have to tell him?

  “I’ve learned my lesson,” she said quietly. “I won’t move again without checking over my shoulder.”

  Faroe let out a rush of breath. “Okay. Good. I’ll call Steele.”

  “No.”

  “What?”

  “No. You said in the shadow world, you have to trust your best guess. It’s you or nothing for Lane. It won’t be all that easy for anyone to track down your past. If you’re good at anything, it’s disappearing.”

  “A really good operative with the right connections could peel my identity in a few days. A week, max.”

  She looked at her watch. “Lane has twenty-six hours.”

  “Shit.”

  “I don’t blame you for being angry,” Grace said. “I don’t know why you quit St. Kilda, but I do know you must have had a good reason. And here I am dragging you back where you don’t want to go.”

  A good reason.

  Faroe tried not to remember the feel of a friend-turned-enemy choking to death in his hands, his eyes pleading friendship and his knife still sliding off Faroe’s body armor.

  It had been a near thing for Faroe. It had been a final thing for Bernardo.

  Grace looked at Faroe and wondered what he was thinking that had turned his face into a death’s-head. Then he smiled, a smile so cold it made gooseflesh rise on her arms.

  “Did Steele tell you?” Faroe asked.

  “He said something about you being forced to kill a good man gone bad.”

  Abruptly Faroe stood up and reached for a three-foot length of rope that hung from a hook above the chart table. The ceiling of the stateroom was just high enough that he could extend his arms above his head, one hand on either end of the rope. Slowly he rotated his arms behind his head and down his back. The tight muscles of his shoulders screamed in protest, then stretched slowly, releasing the tension that had built in them.

  Grace watched with a fascination she didn’t bother to conceal. The Joe Faroe she’d known a long time ago had been whipcord thin and coiled like a spring, always ready for action. This new Joe Faroe was more muscular and yet more flexible.

  He’d learned how to handle the destructive tension within himself.

  For the first time, she allowed herself to hope. Just a little. Just enough so that her throat wasn’t locked tight against all the screams she’d swallowed.

  He tossed the rope back on the table and looked at her with a quiet expression that said he’d made up his mind.

  “You sure it’s me or no one?” he asked.

  “Yes.”

  “Two on a tightrope is dangerous, especially when one is an amateur.”

  Grace glanced again at the purse that held all the pictures of Lane she owned. She was both relieved and oddly sad that she hadn’t had to use them.

  “What do you want me to do?” she asked.

  “Whatever I say, whenever I say it.”

  She told herself the words only had one meaning. She nodded tightly.

  Faroe smiled. “Give me your cell phone.”

  Without a word she went to her purse, pulled out her cell phone, and handed it to him.

  If this was some kind of twisted test, she damn well was going to pass it.

  OCEANSIDE

  SUNDAY, 10:29 A.M.

  14

  FAROE PUNCHED IN THREE digits and hit “send.” Then he handed Grace the phone.

  She listened to the ring. “Who am I calling?”

  “There are only two three-digit numbers in the phone system. I didn’t call information.”

  “You called 911? What am I supposed to say?”

  The phone rang a second time.

  “Tell them you’re reporting a hot prowl,” Faroe said. “Somebody tried to break into your boat at Slip F-39. He’s up on the dock now.”

  A third ring.

  “And sound scared,” Faroe added.

  “Nine one one, what is your emergency?”

  “I’m at the Oceanside marina,” Grace said hurriedly. “A man just tried to break in and I’m here alone. Please help me!”

  “A prowler? What’s your address?”

  “Slip F-39 at the marina. He’s gone back up the gangway. He’s in the parking lot right now, in a phone booth and he’s—he’s watching me!”

  “Describe him, please.”

  “Dark hair, a blue shirt, or maybe a jacket. He has a pair of binoculars. I think he’s been looking at boats to see if anyone’s aboard.”

  “Okay, ma’am, we’ll send somebody right away.”

  Grace covered the voice pickup and said to Faroe, “They’re sending a car.”

  “How long?”

  Grace lifted her thumb and spoke into the receiver. “How long until it arrives? I’m alone and—scared.”

  The dispatcher hesitated, checking her status board. “Three minutes. You can stay on the line if you want.”

  Grace mouthed, Three minutes.

  Faroe nodded, took the phone, and ended the call.

  “It really lights a fire under them when the phone goes dead in the middle of a prowler call,” he said.

  “Clever, but what about me? Doesn’t that dispatcher have my number on caller ID right now?”

  “Nope,” Faroe said. “Cell phones don’t trace.” Well, not usually. “Besides, you haven’t done anything wrong. There’s a dude out in the parking lot who shouldn’t be there and you’re nervous.”

  “You sure you aren’t a defense lawyer?”

  “I’m a good liar, does that count?”

  He grabbed his own leather shoulder bag and checked the interior. All Grace saw before he closed it under her nose was a satellite cell phone like the one on Steele’s desk.

  “Is there a gun in there?” she said.

  “You worried about crossing the border when we go to check out the school?”

  “That and the roadblocks.”

  “Where?” Faroe asked.

  “There was one on the toll road to Ensenada and one at the entrance to the school.”

  “Were they looking for guns?”

  “They didn’t say, but they could have searched the car, and me, if they wanted to.”

  “No worries,” Faroe said with a thin smile. “I’m a convicted felon. It would be against the law for me to possess a firearm here or in Mexico. So I don’t carry.”

  “A border cowboy without his gun? Why do I feel that the law is the least of your problems?” Grace muttered.

  “Because you know me pretty well.”

  He led her out the hatchway onto the deck of the TAZ. After he locked up the stateroom behind them, he unclipped the safety line and stepped down onto the dock, shouldering the bag. When she was slow to follow, he turned and offered her his hand for balance.

  Grace took his hand and stepped down lightly. She was startled when he used her momentum to draw her into an embrace. He looked into her eyes, smiling, ignoring her shocked stiffness.

  Whatever I say, whenever I say it.

  “There are only two reasons a woman like you would be with a man like me,” Faroe said against Grace’s lips. “We want the dude up there
to think it’s the second reason. Hot sheets, not hired help. Okay?”

  “Joe—”

  “Yeah, I know,” he cut in, “you don’t want me and you’re not used to fooling people. Learn fast, Your Honor. Follow my lead or get your beautiful ass out of the game right now. Which will it be?”

  There was an edge to Faroe’s voice that told her he meant every word. She resisted for another second, then let her body soften and move toward his.

  “Good,” he said. “Now put your arms around my neck and let me give you what should look to our pal like a passionate kiss.”

  “What?”

  “Take it easy,” he said against her lips. “It doesn’t have to be the real thing, just good enough to pass inspection through binoculars.”

  “A stage kiss, right? All show and no go?”

  He smiled. “Yeah, but sell it to the cheap seats. We need this guy to believe I’m the new cock on your walk.”

  Faroe started the kiss deliberately and discreetly off-center.

  Grace mentally calculated the angles between them and the phone booth and let herself sag gently toward him.

  Bad move.

  Her breasts brushed against his chest. The rest of her body followed without waiting for her command. The kiss went from awkward to explosive as she tasted him and everything changed, past and present mingled like lovers, curling around one another in timeless embrace. She moved closer to him, closer, and felt his erection pressing hard against her.

  Slowly, breathing deep, Faroe forced himself back to reality, where time went only one way and someone was watching them through binoculars.

  “That’s why me taking this job isn’t the smartest idea either one of us ever had,” he said.

  Reluctantly he let go of her.

  “I’m sorry,” she said. “I don’t know what happened.”

  He gave her a sideways glance. “I do.”

  “I—it won’t happen again.”

  “Don’t bet on it.” He put his arm casually around her shoulders and started up the dock. “That kind of need is hard to fight.”

  They were still walking on the dock when the first patrol car came gliding into the marina parking lot like a killer whale with flashing red eyes. The Latino with the binoculars must have had a guilty conscience. He broke cover and walked quickly toward a black Suburban parked nearby.

  The patrol car veered toward the Suburban.

  By the time Grace and Faroe reached the top of the gangway, a uniformed officer had the man spread like a blue moth on the hood of the patrol car. A backup unit wheeled into position.

  “Remember, we’re just a couple of consenting adults walking up to the parking lot after a quickie on the boat,” Faroe said softly, tugging gently at her short hair. “Act natural. Look a little at the cops and at the man hugging the hood of the car and trying to explain himself. While you’re at it, check out the license plates on the Suburban.”

  Grace turned and looked at all the action. The license plates were from Frontera Baja California but they had an unusual color pattern.

  She tipped back her head and said softly to Faroe, “I saw the same colors on the cars at the second roadblock Saturday, the one in front of the school.”

  “They’re Mexican government tags,” he said, nibbling along her cheekbone. “They’ll probably come back to the Baja state judicial police. But with any luck those Oceanside cops will run the VIN numbers on the truck. Five will get you ten it was stolen up here.”

  “Oh, God,” Grace whispered. “Policemen driving stolen vehicles and running surveillance for drug traffickers.”

  “Welcome to my world, tastefully decorated in all the lovely shades of gray. The entrance to that world is down at the south end of Interstate 5. I’ll drive.”

  “I’m a big girl. I can drive myself.”

  “Can you ditch that dude’s partner?” Faroe asked.

  “Partner? Where? And stop nibbling. You’re distracting me.”

  “I’ll know about the partner as soon as I leave the parking lot.”

  Unhappily Grace surrendered her ignition key. She was used to being in control. She needed it. Ted had accepted that about her and given her the independence she wanted. At first she believed he’d done it as a salute to her competence. Later she’d realized that once he figured out that she wasn’t going to follow his orders, he didn’t care enough about her to worry.

  From Joe’s take-care-of-the-little-woman machismo to Ted’s let-the-bitch-do-what-she-wants indifference. Grace let out a frustrated breath. Isn’t there an in-between on the Y gene?

  Faroe tucked her into the passenger seat of her Mercedes and climbed in behind the wheel. He started the engine, listened to the healthy hum, and tapped the accelerator enough to lift the revs above 5,000. There was a lot left before the needle hit the red line.

  “Sweet,” he said, smiling. “When did you acquire a taste for macho horsepower? Or did Ted pick this out?”

  “Ted?” Grace laughed. “He’s the kind of guy who’d drive halfway to San Francisco before he realized he was locked down in second gear. I picked out this handsome beast all by myself.”

  “Ted missed a lot about you.”

  Grace shrugged. “Maybe I was missing something about him, too.”

  Faroe doubted it, but all he said was, “Where is Ted’s office?”

  “He has two. One in La Jolla, on Pacific Coast Highway, and the other in Malibu. But right now he’s not at either office and they don’t know when he will be.”

  The tone of her voice told Faroe that she was parroting various receptionists.

  “On the way to the border, I’ll do a drive-by on the La Jolla office,” Faroe said.

  “What do you expect to find?”

  “Nothing special.” I hope. “How do I get there?”

  Grace bit back what she wanted to say and gave directions instead.

  LA JOLLA

  SUNDAY, 11:05 A.M.

  15

  LIKE EVERYTHING ELSE IN Grace’s life, La Jolla had changed in sixteen years. Once it had been little more than a snotty California beach resort. Now it was a high-end retail and financial center that rivaled Tijuana’s Zona Río.

  Faroe drove slowly down a side street that dead-ended in the parking lot of Edge City Investments. There was a guard shack at the entrance to the parking lot. Faroe turned the corner and pulled over to the curb, inspecting the five-story stainless steel and glass building.

  Silently he read the building directory that had been hand-carved on the marble retaining wall at street level. Besides Edge City, the building housed an import company, an international marketing firm, branches of two Wall Street brokerage houses, and the offices of four financial advisers, three of whom had Spanish surnames.

  “There’s a lot of black money washing anonymously back and forth across the border,” Faroe said.

  “You’re stereotyping. Just because there are some Spanish names on the building doesn’t mean there’s something illegal going on.”

  “Actually, I’m speculating. That’s where the big money is, right? Speculation?”

  She didn’t look convinced.

  “Get used to it,” he said. “I’ve seen the ass end of too many aardvarks to be politically correct. Not all male Middle Easterners blow up airplanes, but it’s beyond stupid to search everyone’s Caucasian grandmother in the name of political correctness.”

  “The law says—”

  “The law is made by politicians,” Faroe cut in. “Hell, I know that all Russians aren’t part of the mafiya or tucked into the trough of a corrupt government, but the chances of Ivan Freaking Innocent coming into big money honestly in Mother Russia is about as great as Juan Freaking Innocent getting big money in Father Mexico without getting real dirty in the process.”

  She wanted to disagree. It was a reflex she shoved back into the past. She might not like what Faroe was telling her, but if she was arguing civics when the likes of Hector appeared with his heavily armed thugs, she’d
be a deadly liability to her son.

  “There are lots of places like La Jolla around the world,” Faroe said. “Aruba, Medellín, Beirut, Moscow. Fast money, black money, drug money, arms money, terrorist money—it’s all pretty much the same. It rolls around this world of ours like a big old sticky ball, picking up outwardly honest bankers and brokers and financial advisers.”

  “You make it sound like there’s no legal money out there.”

  “Depends on how you define legal. Sort of like provenance in art. Put the goods through three previous owners and you’re home free. You’d be amazed at how often art is used as a way to get value—money—across borders and into safe, numbered accounts.”

  “There is a world of law,” Grace said fiercely. “I know. I’ve lived in it.”

  “The clean tip of a muddy iceberg.”

  She shook her head.

  He looked back toward the steel and glass monument to financial success and let the silence echo.

  “Ted didn’t start out to end up in the shadow world,” Faroe said finally. “It happened one small decision at a time. One light shade of gray. A favor for a friend, then new friends and new favors. These are the people you eat with, drink with, raise your kids with. Close to you.”

  Grace didn’t like where Faroe was going, and she didn’t know how to stop him. His calm words were wrecking balls tearing down the world she’d lived in, forcing her to see things she didn’t want to see, had fought and worked all her life not to have in her view.

  “Some of those friends are a dirty shade of gray, and their friends are even dirtier,” Faroe said. “The longer you hang with them, the dirtier you get, until one day you wake up and find yourself in bed with the likes of Hector Rivas Osuna. Then you’re free-falling in the shadow world with no real idea of how it happened and not a clue about what the landing will be like.”

  She set her teeth and remembered her courtroom, where the law was a vital, living force, as real as the air she breathed. She turned to tell Faroe about her world, and saw that he was looking past her at something on the street outside. The intensity in him was as tangible as the presence of law in her courtroom. She started to turn around to see what was so interesting but he stopped her.