by Nora Roberts
“You’re the one who’s running, Lord.”
On the left. He didn’t know how he was going to do it yet, but he knew they’d have to get to the opposite shore.
“Yeah, maybe I’m slowing down.” Checking off different angles, Doug kept talking. The birds that had fled skyward screaming at the sound of the shot were calm again. A few had resumed their lazy chatter. He saw that Whitney had opened her eyes again, but she wasn’t moving. “Maybe it’s time we talked deal. You and me, Remo. With what I got, you could fill a swimming pool with that French cologne. Ever think about branching out on your own, Remo? You got brains. Aren’t you getting tired of taking orders and doing somebody else’s dirty work?”
“You want to talk, Lord. Paddle over. We’ll have a nice little business meeting.”
“Paddle over and you’ll put a bullet in my brain, Remo. Come on, let’s not insult each other’s intelligence.” Maybe, just maybe, he could angle one of the poles in the water and guide the boat. If he could wait until dusk, they might have a chance.
“You’re the one who wants to deal, Lord. What do you have in mind?”
“I got the papers, Remo.” Gently he tugged open his pack. He also had a box of bullets. “And I got me a classy lady. They’re both worth a hell of a lot more money than you’ve ever seen.” He shot Whitney a look. She was staring at him, pale and dry-eyed. “Dimitri tell you I got me a heiress, Remo? MacAllister. You know, MacAllister’s ice cream? Best goddamn fudge ripple in the States. You know how many million they made off fudge ripple alone, Remo? You know how much her old man’d pay to get her back in one piece?”
He slid the box of bullets into his pocket while Whitney watched. “Play along with me, sugar,” he told her as he checked to see that his gun was fully loaded. “We both might get out breathing. I’m going to give him a list of your attributes. When I do, I want you to start swearing at me, rock the boat, kick up a scene. While you’re doing it, grab that pole. Okay?”
Expressionless, she nodded.
“There ain’t much meat on her but she really warms up the sheets, Remo. And she ain’t too particular about who she warms them up with. Know what I mean? I got no problem sharing the wealth.”
“You rotten sonofabitch.” With a screech that would’ve done a fishwife proud, Whitney reared up. He hadn’t meant for her to put herself in range and grabbed for her. Wound up, she swung at his hand and knocked it away. “You’ve absolutely no style,” she shouted, standing straight. “Absolutely no class. I’d as soon sleep with a slug as let you into my bed.”
In the lowering light she was magnificent, passionate, hair streaming behind her, eyes dark. He didn’t have any doubt that Remo’s attention was fixed on her.
“Grab the pole and don’t get so damn personal,” he muttered.
“You think you can talk to me that way, you worm?” Snatching up the pole, Whitney raised it over her head.
“Good, good now …” He trailed off when he saw the expression on her face. He’d seen vengeance in a woman’s eyes before. Automatically he lifted a hand. “Hey, wait a minute,” he began as the pole smashed down. He rolled aside in time to see Weis come tumbling into their boat from a small, dark raft. They’d have capsized then if Whitney hadn’t lost her balance and fallen half over the opposite end, righting their boat again. “Jesus, get down.” But the warning ended on a whoosh of air as he started to struggle with Weis.
Whitney’s blow had caught the big man on the shoulder, knocking his gun aside, but annoying him more than harming him. And he remembered the sensation of having his nose shatter. Whitney lifted the pole again and would have brought it down but Doug rolled on top of him. The boat swayed, taking in water. She saw Jacques’s body floating on the surface of the canal before she froze her heart to fight for her life.
“For God’s sake give me a clear shot,” she shouted, then tumbled backward when the boat rocked violently.
On shore, Remo pushed Barns aside. “Lord’s mine, you little bastard. Remember it.” Taking out his gun, he focused and waited.
It looked like a game, Whitney thought as she shook her head to clear it. Two overgrown boys wrestling in a boat. Any moment one might cry uncle, then they’d brush themselves off and go on to other amusements.
She tried to stand again, but nearly tipped over the side. She could see the gun still in Doug’s hand, but the other man outweighed him by at least fifty pounds. Balancing herself on her knees, she gripped the pole again. “Dammit, Doug, how can I smash him if you’re laying on top of him? Move!”
“Sure.” Panting, Doug managed to pry Weis’s hand from around his throat. “Just give me a minute.” Then his head jerked back as Weis caught him on the jaw. Doug tasted blood.
“You broke my fucking nose,” Weis said as he dragged Doug to his feet.
“Was that you?”
They stood, legs braced as Weis began slowly to turn Doug’s gun hand so that the barrel pointed at his face.
“Yeah. And I’m going to blow yours off.”
“Look, don’t take it so personally.” Planting his feet, Doug was certain he felt something rip inside his left shoulder. It was something to think about later when the barrel of a gun wasn’t staring him in the face.
Sweat ran from him as he fought to keep Weis’s finger from slipping over the trigger. He saw the smile and cursed that it was the last thing he’d ever see. Abruptly, Weis’s eyes widened and air whooshed out of his mouth as Whitney shoved the pole smartly into his stomach.
Gripping Doug for balance, Weis shifted. In the next instant his body jerked. He’d become Doug’s shield at the instant Remo had fired from shore. With a look of surprise, he fell like a stone against the side of the canoe. The next thing Whitney knew, she was swallowing water.
On the first panic, she surfaced, choking and thrashing.
“Grab the packs,” Doug shouted, shoving them at her as he treaded beside the overturned canoe. Two bullets struck the water inches from his head. “Holy shit.” He saw the jaws of the first crock open and close over Weis’s torso. And he heard the sickening sound of ripping flesh and breaking bone. Making one frantic grab, he locked his fingers over the strap of one pack. The other floated just out of range. “Go!” he shouted again. “Just go. Get to shore.”
She too saw what remained of Weis and struck out blindly. A dull red mist floated over the brown river water. What she didn’t see until it was nearly on top of them was the second crock.
“Doug!”
He turned in time to see jaws open. He fired five shots point blank before they closed again and sunk in a pool of red.
There were more. Doug fumbled for the box of bullets, knowing he’d never get them all. In a desperate move, he propelled himself between Whitney and an oncoming crock, lifting the gun butt first. He waited for the impact, the pain. He was braced, lips pulled back in a snarl. The top of the crock’s head exploded when he was less than an arm’s length away. Before Doug could react, three more crocks went under, tails swishing. Blood swirled around him.
The shots hadn’t come from Remo. Even as Doug turned toward shore he knew it. They’d come from farther south. Either they had a fairy godmother or someone else was on their trail. He caught a movement and a glimpse of a white panama. When he saw Whitney just behind him, he didn’t stop to think about it.
“Go, dammit.” He grabbed her arm and pulled her toward the bank. Whitney didn’t look back but simply forced her legs to kick her through the water to shore.
Doug half dragged her over the wet reeds on the edge of the canal and into the bush. Panting, aching, he propped himself on the trunk of a tree.
“I’ve still got the papers, you sonofabitch!” he shouted across the canal. “I’ve still got them. Why don’t you take a little swim across the canal and try to take them from me?” For a moment, he closed his eyes and just worked on getting his breath back. He could hear Whitney heaving up canal water beside him. “You tell Dimitri I’ve got them and you tell him I owe
him one.” He wiped the blood from his mouth, then spat. “You got that, Remo? You tell him I owe him. And by God, I’m not finished yet.” Wincing, he rubbed the shoulder he’d wrenched during the struggle with Weis. His clothes were plastered to him, wet, bloody, and stinking with mud. A few yards away in the canal, crocodiles were in a frenzy of feeding. The gun was still in his hand, empty. Deliberately, Doug took out the box of bullets and reloaded.
“Okay, Whitney, let’s …”
She was curled into a ball beside him, her head on her knees. Though she made absolutely no sound, he knew she was weeping. At a loss, he ran a hand through his dripping hair. “Hey, Whitney, don’t.”
She didn’t move, she didn’t speak. Doug looked down at the gun in his hand. Violently, he shoved it back in his belt. “Come on, honey. We’ve got to move.” He started to put his arms around her, but she jerked back. Though tears ran freely down her face, her eyes burned when she looked at him.
“Don’t touch me. You’ve got to move, Lord. That’s what you’re made for. Moving, running. Why don’t you just take that all-important envelope and get lost. Here.” Reaching in her pocket, she struggled to pull her wallet out of her clinging slacks. She threw it at him. “Take this too. It’s all you care about, all you think about. Money.” She didn’t bother to wipe at the tears, but watched him through them. “There’s not much cash in there, only a few hundred, but there’s plenty of plastic. Take it all.”
It was what he’d wanted all along, wasn’t it? The money, the treasure, and no partner. He was closer than ever, and alone, he’d get there faster and have the whole pot to himself. It was what he’d wanted all along.
Doug dropped the wallet back in her lap and took her hand. “Let’s move.”
“I’m not going with you. You go after your pot of gold alone, Douglas.” Nausea heaved in her stomach, rising in her throat. She swallowed it down. “See if you can live with it now.”
“I’m not leaving you here alone.”
“Why not?” she tossed back. “You left Jacques back there.” She looked over toward the river and the shaking started. “You left him. Leave me. What’s the difference?”
He grabbed her shoulders hard enough to make her wince. “He was dead. There was nothing we could do.”
“We killed him.”
That thought had already rammed into him. Perhaps because of it he gripped her harder. “No. I got enough baggage to carry around without that. Dimitri killed him the same way he’d swat a fly off the wall. Because it doesn’t mean any more to him than that. He killed him without even knowing his name, because killing doesn’t make him sweat, it doesn’t make him sick. It doesn’t even make him wonder when it’s going to be his turn.”
“Do you?”
He went very still a moment, while water dripped from his hair. “Yeah, dammit. I do.”
“He was so young.” Her breath hitched as she grabbed his shirt. “All he wanted was to go to New York. He’ll never get there.” More tears spilled over, but this time she began to sob with them. “He’ll never get anywhere. And all because of that envelope. How many people have died for it now?” She felt the shell, Jacques’s ody—for safety, for luck, for tradition. Whitney wept until she ached from it, but the pain didn’t cleanse. “He died because of those papers, and he didn’t even know they existed.”
“We’re going to follow this thing through,” Doug told her as he pulled her closer. “And we’re going to win.”
“Why the hell does it matter so much?”
“You want reasons?” He drew her back so that his face was inches from hers. His eyes were hard, his breath fast. “There’re plenty of them. Because people’ve died for it. Because Dimitri wants it. We’re going to win, Whitney, because we’re not going to let Dimitri beat us. Because that kid’s dead, and he’s not going to have died for nothing. It’s not just the money now. Shit, it’s never just the money, don’t you see? It’s the winning. It’s always the winning, and making Dimitri sweat because we did.”
She let Doug draw her into his arms, cradle her there. “The winning.”
“Once you don’t care about winning, you’re already dead.”
That she understood because the need was in her as well. “There’ll be no fadamihana for Jacques,” she murmured. “No festival for him.”
“We’ll give him one.” He stroked her hair, remembering the way Jacques had looked when he’d held the fish. “A real New York party.”
She nodded, turning her face into his throat a moment. “Dimitri isn’t going to get away with this, Doug. Not with this. We’re going to beat him.”
“Yeah, we’re going to beat him.” Drawing her away, he rose. They’d lost his pack in the canal so they’d lost the tent and cooking utensils. Hefting hers, Doug secured it to his back. They were wet, tired, and still grieving. He held out his hand. “Get your ass in gear, sugar.”
Wearily, she stood and tucked the wallet back in her pocket. She sniffed, inelegantly. “Up yours, Lord.”
They walked north in the lowering evening light.
C H A P T E R
12
They had eluded Remo, but they knew he was hot on their heels, and so they did not stop. They walked as the sun set and the forest took on lights only artists and poets fully understand. In twilight when the air turned pearly gray with mist as the dew fell, they walked still. The sky darkened, went black before the moon rose, a majestic ball, white as bone. Stars glittered like jewels of another age.
Moonlight turned the forest into a fairy tale. Shadows lowered and shifted. Flowers closed their petals and slept as animals that knew only night stirred. There was a flutter of wings, a thrash of leaves, and something screamed in the bush. They walked.
When Whitney wanted to drop into a ball of mindless exhaustion, she thought of Jacques. Gritting her teeth, she went on.
“Tell me about Dimitri.”
Doug paused only long enough to pull the compass out of his pocket to check their direction. He saw her fingering the shell as she had off and on during the hike but he’d run dry of comforting words. “I already did.”
“Not enough. Tell me more.”
He recognized the tone of voice. She wanted revenge. And revenge, Doug knew, was a dangerous ambition. It could blind you to priorities—like staying healthy. “Just take my word for it, you don’t want a personal acquaintance.”
“But you’re wrong.” Though breathless, her voice was soft and firm. She wiped sweat from her forehead with the back of her hand. “Tell me about our Mr. Dimitri.”
He’d lost track of the miles they’d covered, even the hours. He was only sure of two things. They had put distance between themselves and Remo, and they needed to rest. “We’ll camp here. We should be deep enough in the haystack.”
“Haystack.” She sank down gratefully on the soft, springy ground. If it’d been possible, her legs would’ve wept with relief.
“We’re the needle, this is the haystack. Got anything in here we can use?”
Whitney pulled makeup out of her pack, lacy underwear, clothes already rent, filthy, or ruined, and what was left of the bag of fruit she’d bought in Antananarivo. “A couple of mangoes and a very ripe banana.”
“Think of it as a portable Waldorf salad,” Doug advised as he plucked up one of the mangoes.
“All right.” Whitney followed suit and stretched out her legs. “Dimitri, Douglas. Tell me.”
He’d hoped to set her mind on some other scene. He should’ve known better. “Jabba the Hutt in an Italian suit,” he said as he bit into the fruit. “Dimitri could make Nero look like a choirboy. He likes poetry and porno flicks.”
“Eclectic taste.”
“Yeah. He collects antiques—specializes in torture instruments. You know, thumbscrews.”
Whitney felt the little pulse in her right thumb throb. “Fascinating.”
“Sure, Dimitri’s a real fascination. He has an affection for soft, pretty things. Both of his wives were stunners.” He
gave her a long, level look. “He’d like your style.”
She tried not to shudder. “So, he’s married.”
“Married twice,” Doug explained. “And tragically widowed twice, if you catch the drift.”
She did, and bit into the fruit thoughtfully. “What makes him so … successful,” she decided for lack of a better term.
“Brains and a streak of ice-cold mean. I’ve heard he can quote Chaucer while he’s sticking pins between your toes.”
She lost her appetite for the fruit. “Is that his style? Poetry and torture?”
“He doesn’t simply kill, he executes, and he executes with ceremony. He keeps a first-class studio where he tapes his victims before, during, and after.”
“Oh God.” She studied Doug’s face, wanting to believe he was weaving a tale. “You’re not making that up.”
“I ain’t got that much imagination. His mother was a schoolteacher, I hear, with a few wires crossed.” Juice dribbled down his chin and he wiped at it absently. “Story goes that when he couldn’t recite some poem, Byron or somebody, I think, she hacked off his pinky.”
“She—” Whitney choked, then forced herself to swallow. “His mother cut off his finger because he couldn’t recite?”
“That’s the story on the streets. Seems she was religious and got her poetry and theology a little mixed. Figured if the kid couldn’t quote Byron, he was being sacrilegious.”
For the moment she forgot the horror and death Dimitri had been responsible for. She thought of a young boy. “That’s horrible. She should’ve been taken away.”
He wanted her to shy away from revenge, but he didn’t want to replace it with pity. One was as dangerous as the other. “Dimitri saw to that, too. When he left home to start his own—business, he went out in a blaze. He torched the whole damn apartment building where his mother lived.”
“He killed his own mother?”