by Rebecca York
She joined him on the sidewalk, but before she could approach the building, he put his hand on her arm to stop her.
“Do you ever bring visitors to see your father?” he asked.
“No.”
“Then who am I? And if you’re asked, why am I here with you?”
She didn’t miss a beat. “To introduce my fiancé to my father.” She looked over at him. ‘That is, if wolves marry.”
“God yes. But for now, I think it might work out better if nobody sees me.”
“Why?”
“I’m not sure. But I can’t ignore the hunch.”
“There’s a door at the end of the hall where Dad’s room is located. I’ll go in and open it.”
“Thanks.” He saw Francesca square her shoulders as she headed for the main entrance.
Zane took a narrow walkway along the side of the building and found the door he thought she meant. It had a large glass panel, and it was locked. After a few moments, he saw Francesca coming down the hall, heading for him.
She let him in, and they silently headed for room 301. As he passed, he saw bedrooms along the hall. All had hospital beds, some occupied by patients sleeping or watching television. But many were empty, and he supposed that most of the residents were in other parts of the facility engaging in various activities.
Francesca stopped at her father’s room. When Zane looked in, he saw a frail man lying in bed. His hair was thin, his skin splotched, and the hand that lay on the covers was bony. He didn’t stir, except that the hand twitched. Francesca crossed to him.
“Dad?”
At first he didn’t respond.
“Dad?” she tried again.
His eyes blinked open, and he stared at his daughter, looking confused. “Rosa?”
“No, Dad. It’s Francesca.”
She pressed the button that raised the backrest before adjusting the pillow behind his head and leaning to kiss his forehead.
He kept his gaze on her, ignoring Zane. His voice was quavery as he said, “Francesca?”
“Yes.”
He shook his head. “I thought you were my Rosa. This damn disease, it makes me see things that aren’t there.”
“I know. I’m sorry.”
He switched topics abruptly. “Where have you been? I kept waiting for you.”
“I needed to take a trip.”
“Why didn’t you tell me you were going away?”
She dragged in a breath and let it out. “I had to see how it turned out. I went to Florida to see your brother, Angelo.”
As soon as she said the name, the old man gasped, alarm spreading across his features. “Angelo! I warned you. He’s bad news.”
She swallowed hard. “Yes. Something bad happened.”
“It always does with him.”
“Then why did you keep saying you wanted to see him?”
“Did I?”
She struggled to keep from shouting that she’d almost gotten killed because he’d wanted to see his brother. In an even voice, she said, “Yes you did. A lot. I thought it was important to you.”
Her father’s eyes pleaded for understanding. “I did want to see him—like he was when we were young. Then when we grew up, before he turned . . . bad. Selfish. Dangerous. He’s the one who got me in trouble with the law. And I got in deeper and deeper, until I knew I had to escape.”
She glanced helplessly at Zane, then turned back to her father as she covered the old man’s hand with her own. “I guess he got himself into bad trouble. There’s no easy way to say it. I’m afraid I have to tell you—he’s dead.”
“Oh my God. It was the mob, wasn’t it?”
Francesca glanced at Zane again, then back at her father.
“I was at his house. We were talking and . . . rough-sounding men broke in. They killed him. And they went after me. I would have gotten killed if Zane hadn’t saved me.”
He had been standing a few feet away. When she ushered him forward, he approached the bed. Was she going to tell her father their relationship? Apparently she’d decided that was too much for now.
“Dad, Angelo’s dead now. And the men who killed him went after me. You have to explain why. What was still wrong between you twenty years later?”
“I swore I’d never talk about it.”
“But I’m still in danger. You have to give me more information.”
His lips pressed into a grim line.
“Dad, I’m wanted by the police.”
“Please, don’t tell me that.”
“But it’s why you have to explain what happened between you and your brother. We need to figure out what’s going on.”
Francesca had been focused on them. Suddenly she was aware of someone standing in the doorway. It was a short, slender man dressed in an expensive knit shirt and khaki pants. He had a medical mask over the lower half of his face, like he was afraid of getting an infection. His eyes were sharp and intense.
As Francesca watched, he pulled the mask down revealing thin lips curved into a grim smile. “She doesn’t have to,” he said to the man in the bed. “I will,”
Francesca’s eyes bugged out when she saw his face and the gun he held in his hand.
“Uncle Angelo,” she wheezed as she stared at the dead man. “But I heard those men kill you.”
Chapter Nineteen
Angelo gestured with the gun, which Zane noted had a silencer.
“Move back toward the bed,” he said, addressing both Zane and Francesca.
They moved. Zane could feel Francesca shaking beside him, and he put an arm around her waist.
“Steady.”
To help her keep her balance, he clasped her against his side, thankful that the phone in his pocket was recording.
Fumbling behind himself, Angelo closed the door and tried to lock it, but there was no way for a patient to lock himself in. “You heard what I arranged for you to hear.” He turned toward the man on the bed. “So you’re Glen Turner now, you scumbag. All these years, I’ve been looking for you, and then sweet little Francesca calls and says you’re dying. She says she wants us to kiss and make up. So I invite her down to my house in Naples.”
He gave her a smug look. “I couldn’t have planned it better if I had written the movie script.”
“Those men who invaded your house were really working for you?” Zane qualified.
Angelo’s expression turned nasty. “Yeah. And everything would have gone off without a hitch if you hadn’t stuck your ugly mug in where it didn’t belong.”
“Why did you want me think you were dead?” Francesca blurted. “And why did you burn down your own house?”
“The place was a rental. No skin off my nose. And I wanted to be sure you’d cut and run.”
“I could have gotten burned up.”
“Naw. The guys started with a bunch of smoke—to make you think the house was burning. It got out of hand, but that was okay. You were always supposed to get away and run back here to your dipshit Daddy and tell him what had happened. I was gonna use that pendant to make sure that went as planned. I coulda had my men follow you to the airport and see where you were going, then had someone pick up your trail when you got home, but your boyfriend here screwed that up. So I thought about what to do and sent the guys to his house, but you got away.” He glared at Zane. “I still had her fingerprints from the orange-juice glass. That was my backup—‘cause I knew they’d be on record.”
Zane gave him a questioning look. “Couldn’t you just use the ID you found in her purse?”
Angelo glared at him. “I didn’t know if it was legit. I mean, she and her dad have been hiding out for years. It could have been an elaborate hoax.”
“You’re the only one who’s that tricky,” the man in the bed muttered.
Zane was still after answers. “And you sent those men to kill us,” he interjected.
Angelo laughed. “Well, to kill you. But not her. I still needed her to go running back to Daddy.” He kept his focus on
Zane. “And you wouldn’t give it up, would you? Why didn’t you cut and run instead of trying to squeeze my guys?”
Zane didn’t answer.
Francesca looked sick. “But why go to all that trouble to fake a murder scene? What’s all this about?”
The intruder’s gaze flicked toward his brother. “Back in the old days, your dad and I had a nice little hustle going until he got cold feet after the cops nabbed him.” He spoke directly to the man on the bed. “I woulda gotten you out of it.”
“Oh sure,” Francesca’s father answered.
Angelo ignored him and went on. ‘”You traded information for your hide, you rat. You got a lot of the guys sent to the slammer. Men who were loyal soldiers. I was lucky to get away, but not with my money. Where is it? What have you done with the cash you stole from me?”
Turner tried to push himself up, then collapsed back onto the bed.
“The money,” his brother snarled.
“This is about money?” Francesca gasped.
Both brothers ignored her. A mixture of fear and defiance fought for dominance on the sick man’s face. “I don’t have it.”
“What—you gave it to her?” He gestured toward Francesca.
“No!” the man who had become Glen Turner shouted. “It was dirty money. I didn’t want anything to do with it. I gave it back to the people we stole it from.”
Angelo’s face reddened, and he let loose with a string of curses. “You stupid son of a bitch. All this plotting and planning for nothing. One of my best guys is dead. Another’s in the hospital, and two are chewed up by a dog. I was gonna make you pay for screwing me out of my money—and have your daughter watch. Now you’ll all pay.”
Zane fought not to look toward the door. Christ, where were Jonah and Knox? This would be a good time for them to arrive.
He knew he was listening to the ranting of a psychopath. And once again he was thinking he had no other choice about how to keep the guy from killing everyone in the room. Moving slowly, he inched away from Francesca. Under his breath, he had begun to say the chant of transformation.
“Taranis, Epona, Cerridwen,” he murmured, then repeated the same phrase and went on to another set of ancient words.
Francesca heard and gave him a startled glance, but she must have understood what he was doing because he’d told her she wouldn’t hear that chant again unless she was going to see a wolf.
“Ga. Feart. Cleas. Duais. Aithriocht. Go gcumhdai is dtreorai na deithe thu.”
He felt his jaw elongate, his teeth sharpen, his body contort as muscles and limbs transformed themselves into a different shape. He hadn’t been able to get rid of his clothes, but his pants slipped off and his shirt flapped around him as he leaped forward.
Angelo was paralyzed in front of him, as he watched something that had to be impossible taking place before his eyes.
Then he screamed, found he could move, and raised the gun.
But the man who had been standing beside the bed was gone, and the bullet smashed into the wall across the room at the same time the door burst open. Angelo whirled and fired again, but another wolf came in low, taking him down, clamping fangs onto his neck and dragging him into the hall.
There were running feet in the corridor now and people screaming. The two wolves dashed for the back of the building where Zane had come in. They pushed the doors open with their momentum as they disappeared from view.
###
Francesca knew she had to act quickly. Stooping down, she scooped up Zane’s pants and shoved them into one of the drawers where her father’s clothing was stored.
She was just in time. Again there was a scream in the hall, and a nurse rushed into the room.
“Are you all right?” the woman gasped out.
“Yes. What happened?”
“I . . . I don’t know.”
The nurse was partially blocking Francesca’s view. Peering around her, she saw Angelo sprawled on the tile floor of the hall, a pool of blood around his head and neck.
“Stay in your room,” the nurse said. “We’re on lockdown until that animal is caught.”
Caught? She prayed the wolves had gotten away.
As the woman closed the door, Francesca hurried back to her father. He was lying in the bed shaking, mumbling to himself.
“Dad, are you all right?”
“I don’t know. I must have had another one of those damned hallucinations.”
“Yes, right,” she soothed.
He gave her a dazed look. “Was Angelo here? Did I make him up?”
Deciding honesty was best, she answered, “He was here.”
Turner shook his head. “My own brother. He came to kill me. I knew he had turned rotten. I can’t believe he would go that far.”
“It’s over now,” Francesca soothed, but her father kept talking.
“He said I took his money. But it wasn’t his money. He stole it.”
“Yes. I’m sorry.” She swallowed hard. “This is my fault.”
“No!”
“Yes. He never would have found you, but I got in touch with him and went down to Florida because you kept saying that you wanted to see him.”
The old man’s face contorted. “I did, and I didn’t. I wanted to make things right with him. But I now I know that would have been impossible. All he wanted was to get that money back—and to punish me for taking it away.”
She pressed her hand over his. “But it’s all over now. He can’t hurt you. He’s dead.”
“How?”
She gulped. “It was like a freak accident. A large animal was in the nursing home. It got him.”
“But how?”
“There must have been a vicious dog on the loose,” she answered lamely, wondering if Dad was going to point out there were two dogs. But maybe he had blended them into one.
Her father seemed to buy into her explanation—probably because he wanted to. But would the police believe the story?
“Where did your young man go? Or did I make him up, too?”
“He went to get the police,” Francesca answered, knowing they were going to show up soon. “But it’s best if you don’t tell them he was here.”
He studied her tense expression. “All right.”
In the distance she could hear sirens blaring.
Suddenly exhausted, she sat down in the chair beside the bed. Where was Zane? She wanted him to come back, but she understood why she had to carry this off alone. Forcing herself not to grip the wooden arms, she folded her hands in her lap.
She could hear voices in the hall. Finally when a uniformed officer opened the door and strode into the room, she felt tension crackling through her body. Would this guy realize she was the woman who was wanted for murder in Naples, Florida?
Playing the part of a terrified bystander, she asked, “Is it safe to come out now?”
“The building is clear.”
“Thank God.”
The cop had a notebook in his hand. His name tag said, “Murphy.”
“You’re.” He looked at his notepad. “Mr. Turner’s daughter, Francesca?”
“Yes. I was visiting him.”
“Did you see anything?” he asked.
“Well, a nurse came in, and I saw . . . a man on the floor. Is he all right?”
“Do you know him?”
This was it—the jackpot question. While she was still deciding how to answer, two more men entered the room. Her heart leaped when she saw one of them was Zane. The other was an older man she didn’t know. He spoke to the cop.
“I’m Frank Decorah, head of the Decorah Security Agency, and this is one of my agents, Zane Marshall. He was on assignment in Florida when he got involved in a murder investigation.”
An interesting way to put it, Francesca thought. Zane was fully dressed, and she had to figure the guys in the flower truck had brought clothing for him.
Decorah gestured toward Francesca. “The dead man is her uncle. Before he died, he admitted coming her
e to murder her father and her, too. We have that confession on tape as well as his admission that he sent thugs to murder Ms. Turner and my associate.” He didn’t add that his operative and Ms. Turner were murder suspects down south.
The cop stared at him. “A confession on tape?”
“Yes. We need to go over to your station house where Ms. Turner and Mr. Marshall can give a statement and turn over the tapes.”
“But what happened to the dead man? How did he get mauled by a large animal—or two large animals inside this nursing facility?”
“No idea,” Frank Decorah said. “You can stay here to continue that investigation, or you can escort us to the station house.”
“I don’t appreciate a member of the public dictating police actions,” Murphy snapped.
“Of course,” the Decorah chief said. “Which is why you may want to contact your lieutenant. I have further pertinent information relevant to the investigation.”
“What?” the cop demanded.
“I’d rather keep it private, which is why we should go to the station.”
While Frank was talking to the officer, Zane moved to stand beside Francesca’s chair. When he reached for her hand, she turned her palm up and gripped his fingers.
“Are you okay?” he murmured.
“Mostly. What about you?”
“I’m fine.”
Murphy was speaking to someone on the phone now.
Keeping her voice low, Francesca asked Zane, “You had your phone recorder on when you came in here?”
“Yes.”
“But your phone is still in your pants pocket.”
“I was transmitting it to Knox and Jonah.”
“Oh. Good thinking.”
“And I see you got rid of my pants.”
“In one of the drawers.”
Murphy interrupted their conversation. “We’re all going down to the station.” He made it sound like he was the one issuing a decree.
He looked at Zane and Francesca. “You’re riding in a police cruiser.”
“Of course,” Zane said.
They were ushered into the back, with a different officer driving, but at least they weren’t handcuffed. Frank Decorah trailed in his rental.