Innocent as Sin

by Elizabeth Lowell

  “Sure is. And now you’re a part of it. Come on. Grace is waiting for us in Phoenix. She has more papers for you to sign.”

  “What?”

  “Employment contract.”

  Rand shook his head sharply. “If my word isn’t good enough—”

  “Your protection as well as ours,” Faroe cut in. “If you’re employed, you can claim confidentiality if the feds question you.”

  “Try it again, in English.”

  “I knew you’d ask, so I had her write it down.” Faroe reached into a hip pocket and drew out a file card the size of his palm. “She said, and I quote, ‘American law gives us some cover on the basis of trade secrecy, but only if Rand signs an employee confidentiality contract. Otherwise he would have no plausible basis for refusing to answer FBI questions.’”

  Rand blinked. “Was that English?”

  “Good as it gets. The original thing was two pages long.”

  Rand looked at the St. Kilda Consulting contract and read quickly. His only comment was, “‘Employed for a time to be mutually agreed upon.’”

  “That’s my Grace.” Faroe handed the other man a pen.

  For a moment Rand hesitated, remembering Reed’s bloody death and the smiling life of Kayla Shaw. He hadn’t been able to save Reed. Maybe he could help her.

  More likely not.

  Rand took the pen anyway.

  “Welcome back,” Faroe said.

  “Tell me that in a few days.”

  Faroe took the signed contract and nodded to a woman who had been waiting across the room. Freddie walked toward them briskly, scissors and comb in hand.

  Grinning, Faroe did a fast fade.

  14

  Phoenix

  Friday

  7:10 P.M. MST

  Impatiently Bertone tapped his fingers against his polished desk. Joao Fouquette might demand that everyone jump through hoops for him, but he took forever to answer his private satellite phone. Knowing the Brazilian’s lifestyle, he was probably enjoying a long, leisurely meal with his mistress and was reluctant to focus on business.

  Finally Fouquette answered, his voice rough, almost breathless. “Speak.”

  “The account has been set up at our Aruban bank.”

  “It took long enough.”

  “It went more quickly than you had any right to expect, and you know it,” Bertone said.

  In the background Bertone heard a woman’s voice say, “Joao, my soul, you promised me no business. It is my name day.”

  “I’ve sent all the information to your coded e-mail,” Bertone said over the sound of Fouquette soothing his mistress.

  “Expect the transfers within forty-eight hours,” Fouquette said almost absently.

  “But of course,” Bertone said. “I’ve alerted the men to begin gathering the cargo at the Ukrainian warehouse. When the full payment is transferred, the cargo will be flown immediately to Camgeria.”

  “Joao,” said a pouting voice. “I am cold without you.”

  Fouquette broke the satellite connection.

  Bertone set the unit aside, picked up a scrambled cell phone, and punched speed dial. Gabriel answered immediately.

  “All is well?” Bertone asked.

  “Ver’ quiet. She visit a taqueria and now drives back to her little ranch. Such a hot woman need a man.”

  “Business first.”

  Gabriel sighed. “Sí. It is a long time I wait.”

  “Death is a lot longer. Keep it in your pants until I give you the signal.”

  “And if she goes sideways on you?”

  “Bring her to me immediately.”

  “Alive?”

  “If possible. If not, stupidity is a capital crime.”

  15

  Phoenix

  Saturday

  2:30 P.M. MST

  Kayla sat at her desk and wanted to scream. The American Southwest Bank building was pretty much deserted. The only sound she’d heard in hours was the elevator opening and closing while guards or cleaners made their rounds. Everyone was off to enjoy the weekend.

  Except her.

  Damn it, Foley, where are you?

  She hadn’t seen her boss for twenty-four hours. As far as she could tell, Foley had left work shortly after he’d talked to her.

  Cash the check. I’ll put the rest of it in motion.

  She had.

  Had he?

  Anxiety crawled over her like needles, first hot and then cold.

  As she’d already done countless times already, she clicked on her e-mail icon. The answer hadn’t changed.

  Nothing new from her boss.

  Almost desperately she opened the last e-mail from Foley, the one from yesterday.

  Relax, Kayla. I’m working on it.

  “Okay, great,” she said under her breath. “But how hard can it be to consult with the corporate counsel and compliance department? Even if you have to bring in the rest of the high-powered executives, it shouldn’t take a whole day. Everyone is in town. I checked. So where the hell is my boss?”

  She took several long, slow, deep breaths, willing her nerves to settle. Foley might be slick as snot, but he wasn’t a fool. Neither were his bosses. They would understand that she was innocent.

  Wouldn’t they?

  She closed her eyes and gripped her desk until her fingers ached. She was the lowest creature on this particular food chain. If anyone was eaten, it would be her.

  God, how could this have happened?

  Silently she rehearsed the facts she’d have to retell over and over again before this mess was cleared up. And while she did, she prayed she wouldn’t have to give her frail explanations to some cold-eyed federal agent.

  Part of her wanted to grab her backpack and passport and get on a plane.

  Part of her wanted to scream.

  Most of her wanted to kill Bertone and dance at his funeral.

  Automatically she checked her phone for voice mails, hoping that one from Foley would be there, telling her everything had been handled.

  Nothing.

  She checked her e-mails again.

  Nothing.

  Grimly she stared at the screen.

  This is all a bad dream, right? It isn’t real.

  It can’t be.

  She typed her way into the bank’s master database. With shaking fingers she called up the Bank of Aruba correspondent account she had established at Foley’s instruction. The screen flashed into focus, then blinked, as if updating itself.

  Forty-five million, five hundred thousand dollars.

  Air left her lungs in a rush. “That can’t be. The check was only for twenty-two million.”

  With a growing sense of sickness, she scanned down to the banker’s code authorizing the second deposit.

  It was hers.

  No! I didn’t make a second deposit.

  She refreshed the screen once, twice, three times. Nothing changed except the speed of her heartbeat.

  Not a bad dream after all.

  Just a bad reality.

  Someone was using her bank code to make unauthorized deposits into the Aruban correspondent account that she had created.

  Damn it, Foley. You said you would help.

  She hit her e-mail button one last time.

  Nothing new.

  And there was nothing she could do about it right now except trust Foley to get off his ass while she went to the Fast Draw paint-off and smiled so that her picture could be taken with her equally smiling blackmailers.

  16

  Castillo del Cielo

  Saturday

  5:30 P.M. MST

  The tape securing the recorder to the small of Rand’s back itched like fire ants. The nearly invisible wire that served as a microphone tweaked his chest hair when he moved a certain way.

  “Stop scratching. It blows out the microphone.”

  Faroe’s voice came from the earphones of the fake iPod that Rand wore. When the Bertones had turned down an offer from The World in One H
our to film the contest as a human interest piece, Faroe had wired Rand for sound and given him a special camera. It had been prepared by St. Kilda technicians and was capable of shooting through the compound lens, as any other camera would.

  But this particular camera came equipped with another internal hard drive and lens. The second lens took its images through a pinhole disguised as a USB cable port on the side of the camera and sent the results to a memory stick. The second camera’s field of view was at precisely ninety degrees to the normal lens.

  All Rand had to do to take photos from the second lens was to depress a disguised second shutter release and remember to keep his finger away from the USB port.

  “Damn wire is plucking me bald,” Rand said under his breath.

  “Wait until I pull off the tape—you’ll scream like a girl. You see Bertone yet?”

  “No, but his wife is all over the place like a rash.”

  “Don’t scratch her either.”

  Rand laughed silently. Faroe’s acid comments were the only thing amusing about the Fast Draw. As far as Rand was concerned, the contest was an absurd pursuit for adults who lived in a world overflowing with violence. The fact that the party was paid for by the man who had armed most of the African continent just added to the absurdity.

  But at least Rand was used to painting in the field. He was a plein air artist in the original sense of the word. Not every invited artist at the party was. After the invention of good color film, many painters chose to work from photos rather than from field studies. The fact that someone painted excellent landscapes didn’t mean that he or she routinely worked outside of a studio with its good lighting, controlled weather, and endless supplies.

  The thirty artists were all painting some aspect of the Bertone estate, all within the same two-hour period. They were surrounded by more than three hundred members of Arizona’s movers and shakers. The women wore “resort” clothes, the kind that cost thousands of dollars and were accessorized by sandals, purses, sunglasses, and jewelry from every country that catered to the world of European fashion. French champagne and Phoenix gossip fueled the party.

  Rand scanned the crowds of expensively dressed socialites and wondered how many of them knew the truth of Balzac’s epigram: Behind every great fortune is a crime.

  He sketched in a few lines for the pool, the pool house, and the concrete deck that provided the best view of the Phoenix landscape. For a few more moments he assessed the slanting, golden light. Then he decided it was time to quit sketching and start painting. He set aside the pencil and chose tubes of oil from his small worktable, squeezing and mixing colors quickly on his palette.

  “See Bertone yet?”

  “Shut up, I’m working,” Rand muttered.

  “So am I.”

  He painted quickly. And he hoped his disgust didn’t show behind his ruthlessly trimmed beard and newly collar-length hair. The sage green shirt Grace had presented him with was exactly the color of his eyes—or so she said. The old jeans and boots he wore were splattered with oils.

  Soon the new shirt would be, too.

  “Ah, he’s painting at last,” said a woman, her voice carrying clearly above the party’s chatter.

  Rand ignored the woman, who was wearing black silk jeans and blouse and massive Native American jewelry.

  “I told you so,” another woman said. “Elena assured me that he’s a fine young painter.”

  “R. McCree. Never heard of him.”

  “You don’t do the Pacific Northwest art scene.”

  “Why would I?” the first woman asked. “And why is he painting all alone over here? The others are all over there, with that spectacular view of the valley. Castle of Heaven might be a trite name, but it sure fits the view.”

  Rand hoped the women would leave and plague the other artists. Then he shut out the chatter and concentrated on the piece of the estate he’d chosen to paint. Both the spy and the artist in him was pleased with his choice—a vantage point overlooking Castillo del Cielo’s grounds.

  “One of those women is really rude,” Faroe said.

  “You should know,” Rand muttered.

  Painting in a controlled fury of creation, he ignored Faroe and the sweat that dried on his skin almost as soon as it appeared. Phoenix already had one foot into the searing summer that defined its landscape and the lives of its citizens. The pouring afternoon light picked out every line and curve of the land like “star lighting” in an old black-and-white movie.

  That kind of light was the artist’s best friend.

  And worst enemy.

  Because the desert light itself was so different from the cool, diffuse light of the Pacific Northwest, Rand had decided against doing a pure landscape. It would take time to master the subtleties of desert light. He didn’t have time.

  So he was counting on the vanity of Elena Bertone, who was one of the three judges. According to St. Kilda’s dossier on her, she’d overseen the details of Castillo del Cielo’s design with an intensity that had driven the architect to drink. Literally. Castillo del Cielo was Elena’s, and she loved it like a child.

  So he would paint her baby.

  A smart choice, but not an easy one for him. He’d never before painted a subject he didn’t enjoy. Like the party, to him the estate was…wrong. It had been hammered onto a site blasted from rock and cactus. The gem blue of the pools and the diamond glitter of huge water features fought with the sun-ravaged hills and spare shapes of cactus on the unbuildable ridgelines around the estate. The house itself was in the Tuscan style, calling upon a past that simply didn’t exist on this side of the Atlantic.

  Wrong.

  And very expensive.

  “Why didn’t Bertone just take out a billboard advertising his gross worth?” Faroe asked. “And I mean gross.”

  “Quit reading my mind.” The words didn’t go beyond Rand’s collar, which was far enough.

  “I was eavesdropping on that irritating woman. Wonder if her man of the moment gags her before he screws her.”

  “Go away.”

  “Find Bertone.”

  “Quit chewing on me because Hamm couldn’t get a photo of Bertone,” Rand said. “I’ve taken enough color photos of the estate for twelve coffee-table books.”

  “Bertone never goes to the parts of his estate that are monitored by closed-circuit security TVs. He’s one crafty bastard. That’s why we’re paying you an outrageous amount to play with oils and trick cameras.”

  “I’d have done it for free,” Rand said, painting fiercely, trying not to remember the twin who had died in his arms, taking too much of Rand with him.

  “Your job isn’t to avenge Reed. Remember that.”

  Rand didn’t answer.

  17

  Castillo del Cielo

  Saturday

  5:35 P.M. MST

  Kayla Shaw stood off to one side of the pool, searching the crowd for Steve Foley. Surely he would at least put in an appearance at the premier event of the bank’s premier private clients. Surely he’d tell her to relax, it was taken care of, she was safe.

  Surely she was being paranoid.

  The grim lines around her mouth were out of place in the beautiful, slanting light. The sun was still hot, but coolness seeped up from the ground itself, a reminder that winter wasn’t completely gone. Or maybe it was just her nerves, the paranoid part of her screaming Get out! Run! Hide!

  Kayla pulled her black linen jacket closer around her. The rich teal of her silk blouse glowed in the light, as did the black pearl earring studs that were her parents’ last birthday present to her. Her body all but vibrated with tension as she scanned the thirty artists slapping paint on canvas as if their lives depended on it.

  Foley was nowhere to be found.

  What am I going to do?

  The question rang in her mind like a frantic heartbeat.

  Don’t think about it. All you can do right now is play nice so that the Bertones don’t get suspicious.

  But
if—

  Don’t think about it. Not now.

  But—

  Not now!

  “Are you enjoying yourself?” asked Bertone’s voice right at her elbow.

  Kayla jumped sideways, startled that he’d been able to slide in so close without her knowing it.

  He grasped her arm and pulled her back from the edge of the pool.

  “Nervous, are we?” he asked.

  “I always jump when somebody sneaks up on me,” Kayla said. “What about you?”

  “Sneak?” He laughed and didn’t release her arm. “Ma petite, I weigh in excess of two hundred pounds and am over forty. I could not sneak if my life depended on it. Are you sure you aren’t nervous?”

  “Should I be?” she answered, pulling away from his grasp.

  “I suppose it’s rather like bridal jitters. But then, you hinted this wasn’t your first time on the, ah, ‘primrose path.’”

  Kayla set her teeth and didn’t say anything.

  Bertone caught her chin with his strong hand. Slowly, almost gently, he forced her to look him in the eye.

  Anger.

  She was furious.

  “Are you truly that much an innocent?” Bertone asked. “Have I really misread you that badly? You do understand how things are done in the real world, don’t you?”

  “Yes.” She stepped back, freeing herself. “As profitably as possible.”

  His eyebrows rose. “Ah, so you feel underpaid.”

  She shrugged tightly.

  “You interest me,” he said.

  She stiffened as Bertone’s glance ran up and down her body like hands. She had deliberately dressed plainly in a linen trouser suit and a silk top cut just low enough to show the rose tattoo on her collarbone. But the way he was looking at her made her feel like she’d been stripped to her skimpy underwear and doused with cold water.

  “Did the second wire transfer post to the new account?” Bertone’s voice was once again neutral.

  Kayla wanted to sigh with relief. “Yes.”