“Thanks.” She cleared her throat and focused on the prints. “Here are the shots I took over the casino construction site.” She pushed the others out of the way and brought two pictures forward. In one, the truck was small, but recognizable. Then she looked at the shot taken from five hundred feet, with the girders of the high rise directly beneath them.
“Let’s see that.” Adam held the magnifying glass steady. “Well, that’s all I need. Even if we’d missed the truck somehow, this picture takes care of everything. Look here.”
He grew careless and their arms brushed. They both drew back as if burned. She calmed her racing pulse.
“See that double S etched at the end of that beam?” he said. “That’s my mark. It’s my steel, Loren.”
She wondered if someone looking into her heart would find a similar mark there.
Adam examined the print again. “There’s the proof. That bastard took my steel and sold it to whoever’s building this casino.”
She suspected he’d channeled some of his anger and frustration over their relationship into the steel theft. In any case, from the timbre of Adam’s voice, Barnaby Haskett would soon feel the sting of Scorpio Steel.
“What next?” she asked.
He began stacking the prints. “Let’s take all this back to Sedona. Negatives, film, everything. There’s a wall safe in my room at the resort. I’ll keep it there tonight and bring it back to Phoenix tomorrow. I couldn’t get any action on these now, anyway.”
Loren reached for the pile of prints. “Let me. Professional pride makes me want these stacked in order.”
He relinquished the prints, glancing at them with satisfaction. “You really did a fantastic job,” he said quietly.
“She’s the best,” commented Bill from the other side of the counter.
Loren looked up. She’d almost forgotten the technician was there. “So are you, Bill,” she said with a smile. “I appreciate your agreeing to stay and do these tonight.”
Bill nodded, which dislodged his glasses. He pushed them more firmly onto the bridge of his nose. “Sounds like it was important.”
“It was,” Adam said, reaching for his wallet. “Let me settle up.”
While Adam paid, Loren finished arranging the pictures in order and placed them, along with the special ten-inch negatives, in a large envelope with a clasp. She and Adam thanked Bill again as they left.
“Here you are,” Loren said, handing the envelope to Adam as they walked out the door into the warm July night. “After all we went through to get these, I hope you take good care of them.”
“I intend to.”
Silence settled between them as they began the return trip. They’d driven several miles before Adam broke it. “That lab technician has a crush on you.” It sounded like an accusation.
“I’m aware of that.”
“I just wondered if you knew is all.”
“I knew.”
“And? Have you gone out with him?”
She turned to him, her patience exhausted. “Adam, I do believe you’re getting into matters that are none of your business.”
He swore softly to himself in the darkness. “No, they aren’t,” he said at last. “Old habits die hard, I guess.”
She didn’t respond.
After a short while, he spoke again. “Listen, I’ll bet you’re hungry. Should we grab something to eat?”
“I’m not really hungry, Adam. Let’s just get back.”
* * *
ADAM BATTLED conflicting emotions as they rode in silence, leaving the myriad lights of Phoenix behind and climbing steadily up the sides of the darkened foothills toward Sedona. Once he glanced over at Loren. In the dim light from the dash, he could see her eyes were closed, her head back against the headrest. He didn’t think she was asleep. Her body looked too rigid for that. So she was hiding from him and wishing their time together was over, no doubt.
And wasn’t that what he wanted, too? But the closer they got to Sedona, the more he wondered if he did want that. Maybe it would be easier to drop her off at her house and drive off, but his heart rebelled at the idea. Like a condemned man, he searched for a way to buy time. It wasn’t a logical need and would probably cause him more pain, but logic wasn’t his long suit right now.
“Look, I hate our breaking things off between us so abruptly,” he said into the void that had developed between them. “Why don’t we both get cleaned up a bit, and I’ll take you out for dinner?” In the silence, he heard her swallow hard. “I know what we’ve said before, about needing to get away from each other, but the fact is...that’s not true for me. I’d like...a little more time.”
Her reply sounded strained. “Why?”
“I don’t know. I realize it doesn’t make sense, but then, nothing has recently. We’ve had a rough couple of days. Couldn’t we just have a nice dinner and say goodbye like friends?”
“We can’t be friends. We’ve established that, remember?”
“Loren”
“You’re prolonging the agony, Adam. Let me go. Let the idea of us go, too. Please.”
He couldn’t argue with that heartfelt plea, but panic grew in him as he envisioned a lifetime without Loren in it. But that’s what she wanted, he reminded himself. Total silence between them. No! his heart cried. “I don’t even know where you live,” he said, his voice remarkably steady.
“Same place. With Dad.”
“I wondered.” He followed the familiar route to her house. Taking her home and leaving her there felt wrong, but he couldn’t very well force her to spend the rest of the evening with him. “I’m a little surprised Walt kept the place,” he said, wanting to keep her talking just to hear her voice.
“Because of me and Josh, I’m sure. I moved in when Mom got sick, to help out. Dad was good for Josh, so I just stayed on after...after she died.”
“That must have been tough.”
“It was.”
Dammit to hell. He wanted the right to take her hand, to tell her how sorry he was that her mother had died so young. But he didn’t dare.
The closer they got to her house the greater his distress. Just dinner. Was it so much to ask? Apparently. He couldn’t bring himself to suggest it again.
Finally, he pulled into the gravel driveway. The house looked the same—a rambling log structure with a big porch in the back, facing the creek. The front door light was on in welcome, as it always had been when they’d been dating. Back in those days they’d always ended the evening with a few more passionate kisses as they postponed the inevitable parting. Tonight he wasn’t even allowed to touch her.
He stopped the car and turned in his seat, but she was already halfway out the door. “Loren!”
“It’s better this way,” she said over her shoulder. “Goodbye, Adam.” She swung the door shut.
He flinched, opened his mouth to call goodbye and couldn’t say the word. He stared at her as she marched over the gravel, her loud crunching footsteps drowning out the soft babble of the creek nearby. He gripped the steering wheel to keep himself anchored inside the car. Then, his lips set in a hard line, he spun out of the driveway.
* * *
LOREN SQUARED her shoulders and wiped at her eyes before she entered the house. She didn’t want her father asking any questions. Fortunately, he wasn’t in the living room watching television, so she had a little more time to compose herself. He hadn’t even bothered to turn on any lights in there, and the photograph over the fireplace was in shadow.
A light shone from the dining room, however. Maybe he was doing some Icarus paperwork at the table. Determined that he not be able to detect anything wrong, she pasted a smile on her face.
He wasn’t doing paperwork.
A blond, beefy man sat across the table from him. The man looked bored. But her father... Loren knew she’d never forget the look on his face as long as she lived. The light from the wagon-wheel chandelier overhead revealed a faint sheen of sweat on his balding scalp. His eyes seemed s
unken into his face, and the lines on either side of his mouth slashed his cheeks like wounds.
She put a hand to her chest, where her heart had begun to pound. Oh, God. “Is it Josh?” she whispered, the blood ringing in her ears.
“He’s okay,” her father said, but there was no inflection in his voice, no reassurance.
Her heart raced faster and she locked her gaze with his, probing the haunted depths. She forced her frozen lips to ask the necessary questions. “Was there an accident?” Not Daphne. Please not Daphne, either. “Was anybody else...hurt?”
“No,” her father said. “Loren, this is Barnaby Haskett.”
* * *
DAPHNE DANCED vigorously to the pounding beat, her gaze riveted on the stage of the outdoor arena, where the band played surrounded by towering ponderosa pines. Screaming out lyrics along with the crowd, she fed on the energy pulsing in the packed arena.
She coaxed Josh to dance, and once he let go, he wasn’t bad at it. She began to reconsider trying to seduce him. For no matter how fast she danced or how loud she screamed, she couldn’t erase the picture of the way her father looked at Loren Stanfield. So they’d gone off to Phoenix together with some excuse about processing film. Ha! Her father had chosen Loren over her.
Less than halfway through the concert, she nudged Josh. “Let’s go.”
“Go? I thought you liked this.”
“I have a better idea.” She started out of the arena, confident Josh would follow. He had a strong sense of duty. His responsible nature would work against her plan, but she should be able to overcome that obstacle.
Once they’d located the Suburban and climbed in, Josh turned to her. “Ready to go home, then?”
She grinned at him. “Absolutely not. I’m ready to party.”
“But we were just doing that.”
“Kid stuff,” she said with a wave of her hand. “Let’s do something really wild.”
“Like what?”
She could tell he was nervous by the way he jingled the keys. “We could drive to Vegas,” she said, making the suggestion sound like a treat to end all treats.
“Aw, Daphne, come on.”
“I’m serious. Look at this.” She dug in her tiny shoulder bag, found her fake ID and switched on the overhead light so he could read it. “I’ve never been questioned on this baby. Do you have one?”
His answer was hesitant. “Yeah.”
“Great! Just think—we could gamble, have some drinks, maybe even see a late-night show. Josh, it would be such a kick!”
“There’s not time. It’d take us four hours to get there, at least, and another five or so to get home. Even if we went there, turned around and came right back, we wouldn’t be home until morning.”
“So what?”
“Gramps and Mom would have a fit, for one thing. And your dad would probably go through the roof.”
“Are you kidding? My father is so gaga over your mother, they don’t even know we’re alive. We could be gone for two days and they’d never know it.”
Josh shifted uneasily in his seat. “Yeah, but what about Gramps? He’s not gaga over anybody.”
“We’ll call him from Vegas and tell him not to worry. He didn’t get mad about your coming in at four in the morning, did he?”
“No,” Josh said with a laugh. “Surprised the hell out of me, too. I walked into the kitchen for breakfast expecting to be chewed out, and he just said, ‘Good morning,’ nice as you please, as if nothing had happened.”
“That’s because you stood up to him. He’ll treat you like an adult from now on. But your mother is another story. She would have stopped you from coming to this concert with me if she could have managed it. She’s still trying to run your life. And I wouldn’t say she should be giving advice after the way she and my dad are acting.”
Josh shifted his weight again. “She’s an adult. She has the right to do what she wants, I guess.”
“You said last night she wouldn’t let you go into the military, like you want to. When are you going to take charge of your own life, Josh?”
He glanced at her in the darkened cab, and his jaw tightened. “Come to think of it, I always did want to see Vegas,” he said, and started the engine.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
LOREN CLUTCHED the back of a dining room chair to steady herself as she looked at Barnaby Haskett, steel thief. His eyes were a pale blue and set close together. His complexion was florid, and tiny broken blood vessels across his nose suggested he overindulged in alcohol. This was the man who’d taken advantage of Adam’s preoccupation with his divorce to embezzle half a million dollars’ worth of steel.
She gripped the chair tighter and controlled the urge to march over and slap his face. “What do you want?”
“The negatives and prints from today,” he said in a gravelly voice.
“I don’t have them.”
“Then I suggest you get them.”
She glanced at her father to gauge whether the menace in Haskett’s voice was something she should heed. He nodded almost imperceptibly. Why would her father want her to go along with this thug? “That would be difficult,” she said as much to Walt as to Haskett. “I don’t know where they are.” Not precisely, that is.
At last her father spoke, his voice tight with strain. “I’m afraid you’ll have to find out, Loren,” he said. “You see, they have Josh” His voice broke and he looked away to collect himself.
Loren whirled and started for Haskett. “What does he mean, you have Josh?” she cried, reaching for his face, ready to gouge his eyes, tear out his heart, if necessary.
He caught her wrists and stood, holding her effortlessly. “We have him under surveillance,” he said. “He’s fine.”
“What are you saying?” Her voice rose as hysteria crept in. “That he won’t be fine if I don’t get you those pictures?”
“Turn her loose,” Walt said, rising. “Let go of my daughter.”
“Tell her not to attack me.”
“Leave him be, Loren,” Walt said, sounding defeated. “He’s just the messenger boy, anyway.”
“I’m not!” Haskett said, shoving Loren away from him. “I’m in charge of this operation.”
Loren faced him, trembling. “Where is he? Where’s my son?”
“Last I heard he was at the rock concert, like he was supposed to be. You get me those pictures, and he’ll come home, and everything will be just fine.”
Nausea rose within her. “Who are these...people who are watching my son?”
For the first time, Haskett looked unsure of himself. “You don’t need to know.”
“The hell I don’t!”
“Loren,” her father said, “I don’t think he even knows. He’s got himself mixed up with people who play for keeps. If we don’t turn the pictures over to this goon...” He didn’t finish. He didn’t have to.
Loren groped for a chair, pulled it out and sat in it before her knees gave way. She stared at the grain in the old maple table that had been in her family forever. Josh had done his homework sitting at this table. Oh, Josh. She gripped her stomach and fought the urge to be sick. She couldn’t afford to fall apart. She had to think.
She glanced up at Haskett. “What about Daphne Riordan? She’s with Josh.”
Haskett looked a little confused, but he recovered himself and cleared his throat importantly. “She’s being watched, too.”
Loren’s stomach twisted. “Then Adam needs to know about this.”
“No, he doesn’t need to know about this,” Haskett said, a thread of panic running through his words. “He’s not to be involved. You are to get the pictures without telling him anything, do you understand? Because if you tell him...” Haskett allowed the unfinished sentence to settle around her like a noose.
So it was up to her to protect both their children. “How much time do I have?”
“About three hours, I figure. By then the concert will be over and your son will start home. If I have the pictures by
then, I’ll make a phone call and he’ll be allowed to return safely.”
Loren had seen her share of gangster movies. “But my father and I know who you are, even if we don’t know the other people. We can identify you.”
“In twenty-four hours I’ll be out of the country. Nobody will be able to find me. You’ll have no one left to identify.”
Loren wondered where that left Anita. But she couldn’t worry about that. “If I somehow get the pictures and negatives and turn them over to you, what am I supposed to tell Adam?”
“That’s up to you. You could say there was a terrible accident and they were destroyed. Of course you would apologize profusely for making such an unfortunate mistake.”
She grasped at straws. “He could have others taken.”
“No, he couldn’t, fortunately. The operation’s closed down. Once the photographs are gone, there will be nothing to show it ever happened. The word will get out that Scorpio Steel doesn’t deliver as promised. Poor guy will probably lose a few contracts, may even go under.”
“But his mark is on that steel! The authorities could”
“Have you ever noticed how fast buildings go up in Vegas?” Barnaby interrupted. “By the time you convince somebody to investigate, if you could even do that, the casino will be nearly completed. Nobody will punch holes in the walls of a new high rise and risk being sued just to prove your theory.”
He was right. Without her pictures, Adam had no case. “Adam will never believe I accidentally destroyed those negatives and prints,” she said. “He knows me better than that.”
“Who cares if he believes you or not? What’s he going to do, press charges for negligence?”
Loren could almost hear the door of the trap click shut. Of course Adam wouldn’t do anything like that. He’d drop the case and lose half a million dollars, perhaps even his whole company. But Loren stood to lose something far more valuable than that. And so did Adam. He’d have to take his chances on the business.
“I don’t even know if I can reach him. We hadn’t planned to meet again...before he left for Phoenix,” she amended, unwilling to let their personal decisions be part of this nightmare.
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