by Lee Taylor
“I’ve gotta drive. I’ll call you in an hour.”
That next hour turned out to be the longest in Vega’s life. Tyree’s parents deteriorated into emotional wrecks at the sight of their errant daughter, scolding while hugging her with tears clouding their eyes. Vega fended off as many hugs as she could manage. Escaping their enthusiastic embraces became a losing battle after Tyree blurted out how Vega had overpowered three men with nasty guns.
The local Dearborn police weren’t much more reserved in their reaction to her appearance with Tyree. Detroit PD had called ahead. They picked up the men she’d left at Bryon’s drug shack—all except for the infamous Finn Kayne. Vega thought she smelled a dirty cop when she heard Finn had escaped. Of course, Finn could have pulled some kind of Houdini act and freed himself. But Vega doubted that. She’d done a thorough job securing him to that refrigerator. He wasn’t going anywhere anytime soon.
Officer Ford showed up while she was in with the Dearborn chief of police, discussing Tyree’s cooperation and willingness to testify against Byron. When she got a chance to question him about the arrests, Ford looked rather sheepish about Finn’s escape. There was definitely a dirty cop somewhere among the ranks. Her father must have been turning in his grave.
“Ford, you’ve gotta let me go. I’ll give you a statement tomorrow.” She quickly explained Fiona’s situation in Atlanta—sketchy as it was. After a few more minutes of begging, Ford reluctantly let her leave the Dearborn police station without a full interview.
“Jack.” Vega called the moment she got home. “Talk to me. How is Fiona really?”
“Let me put her on,” Jack said. The phone went silent for several minutes.
“Hi sis,” Fiona slurred. She sounded drugged.
Vega swallowed the urge to shout at her sister. “What happened? How did Grayson get you?” she asked instead.
“He saved me.” Fiona’s tone took flight. “I’d been attacked and I think he saved me ‘cause I’m not dead.”
Vega made Fiona put Jack back on. Her sister needed to sleep off whatever medication she’d been given before she’d make a whit of sense.
“Jack, I’m coming to Atlanta.”
“No, you’re not.” He was adamant.
“Okay,” she said, knowing damn well she’d be on the next flight out.
The beauty queen might have had one thing right. Sometimes pride was worth fighting for. Vega was the best in the business, no matter what anyone said. It was her duty to find Grayson and keep him from harming anyone else.
Chapter Fourteen
“How does letting the pretty one go get us ahead?” Matt whined. He was under the kitchen table again. Puffing on a cigarette while hiding from the cops he imaged were circling the block in search of him. “We don’t got her or her sister. We can’t even share one woman now. It ain’t making no sense, Gray.”
Grayson ignored Matt. He’d been doing nothing but griping about the loss of his pretty one ever since they left Fiona tied up in that men’s bathroom near the Atlanta Cyclorama.
“You forgot to wait for the money, Gray.” Matt whistled through his teeth. “Shit, you’re a stupid kidnapper. You should’ve killed the girl if you didn’t want the money. Hell, you kill her even if you get the money. She knows who we are. We’re dead meat.”
Grayson bent under the table and handed Matt a greasy brown paper bag with a hamburger and fries inside. “Don’t worry, Matt. I’ll take care of you.”
Matt popped his cigarette out of his mouth long enough to tear into the hamburger. “She’s going to come after us, the sister, not my pretty one,” he said with a mouth full of food.
“She is,” Grayson agreed. His heart raced at the thought of Vega hot on his trail again. He didn’t touch his own hamburger. His mind was running too fast to even consider eating. A cat and mouse game with that sexy bounty hunter promised to be a remarkable challenge. Especially considering the mouse planned to set all the traps.
* * * *
The air had turned even colder in Detroit. Butch watched as a small man quivered on his knees in front of him. The scum’s breath swirled around his foaming mouth in white clouds. Butch gave him another punch in the belly for good measure. He’d brought the scum behind a deserted warehouse near the waterfront to teach him a lesson. No one worth shit would dare bother Butch here.
“I should beat you to death,” Butch said. The man’s expression paled to a shade whiter than the snow all around him. “But, today is a freebie. Tell your friends. Next time you don’t pay your debts on time, you’ll not live to tell anyone about it.”
Butch’s phone chirped.
Vega. He’d been expecting her call. He smiled at the thought of hooking up with her tonight. There was a new move he’d learned from a new whore he’d discovered that he just knew would make Vega putty in his hands.
“Get out of here.” Butch pummeled the small man’s face a few more times before letting him up.
Blood had splattered on Butch’s boots. Damn. He’d have to clean them before meeting up with Vega.
“It’s me, baby,” Butch purred into the phone.
“I ain’t your baby,” the sharp voice on the other end said.
Finn.
Butch growled. Finn was calling a little too regularly. Playing the part of hired gun wasn’t a role suited to Butch’s ego. He was his own man, with his own mind and goals. Getting his hands on gobs of money topped that golden list of goals, which was why he put up with the likes of Finn.
“That damned bounty hunter knocked me upside my head this afternoon,” Finn nearly shouted. Finn never shouted, never thawed that frightening cold exterior. This must have been big. “Two of my men are sitting on their hands at the police department and another is in the hospital thanks to her. I had to call in a few favors to not be there myself.”
Butch knew better than to ask any questions. “Don’t worry. We’ll be in Atlanta within the next few days. She won’t ever step foot in Detroit again.”
“Funny, man.” Finn’s artic tone chilled Butch’s blood. “Your bitch was seen boarding the 7:45 flight to Atlanta tonight. I’d told you I didn’t want her involved with this. Kill her already and get this under control or I’ll find someone who can.”
That double-crossing lying whore. She didn’t even have the courtesy to call him before she left. He thought they had something special—that she’d wanted to become his wife.
“Dammit. She’ll be sorry she toyed with me.”
* * * *
Vega found Jack and Fiona having breakfast in the hotel restaurant. Fiona’s head bounced as she talked excitedly, pausing only to take small bites of her bagel smeared with far too much cream cheese. Jack smiled and nodded, playing the part of adoring uncle. No one would ever guess he’d charged to Atlanta yesterday with a briefcase filled with cash to save Fiona’s lovely neck. A waitress dressed in a neatly pressed black and white uniform refilled both Fiona’s and Jack’s mugs. Vega hoped that it was decaf the waitress was feeding Fiona.
“He was the most awful man,” Fiona was saying, oblivious of Vega’s approach.
Jack must have sensed her. He snapped his head in her direction. His eyes darkened.
Fiona didn’t notice her loss of an audience. She plowed on with her story. “He told me I needed to take lessons from Vega. Called me green. Can you imagine the nerve?”
“Been calling you green for years,” Vega said. She propped her hands on her hips and waited for an explosion of protests.
None came.
Go figure.
Fiona tilted her head and smiled a sickly grimace. “Jack told you to stay in Detroit. Aren’t you becoming difficult in your old age?”
Vega kept the inspired words that flooded her head to herself. She matched her sister’s smile in size and sweetness. “You look good, Fiona. I’m glad.”
There were two empty chairs at the table. Vega made use of the one closest to Jack.
“What are you doing here, Vega?” Jack asked, his voice crusty fro
m all that caution he’d piled all around him.
“Well,” she plucked a slice of melon from his plate and bit into it, “I’ve been thinking.”
“Thinking?” Jack couldn’t have sounded more wary.
“Yeah. And I decided you’re a fool to keep me from finding Grayson. I know how to find him.”
“I found him, too,” Fiona protested.
“You stumbled in his way,” Vega said flatly. “He’s a danger. The longer he remains on the streets the more we jeopardize someone else’s life. Who knows when he’ll kill next or why he spared Fiona. Perhaps he has a thing for noisy brunettes.”
Fiona sputtered and huffed before launching into a mini-tirade. Jack didn’t flinch. He let Vega take the brunt of Fiona’s anger for several minutes.
No one could do an impression of a deaf mute better than Jack. Vega tried, but failed miserably when Fiona began making bold and dangerous promises. “You will not walk out of here right now and go back to where Grayson kidnapped you.” Popped out of Vega’s mouth without any warning.
“Would to…if I wanted to.”
Vega clamped her mouth shut. She had no desire to sink to petty squabbling.
Fiona blazed on, her mouth moving faster than the human eye could detect. Finally, she ran herself down. “I’m not a noisy brunette, either,” she muttered.
“These sister to sister moments touch my heart,” Jack came to life and said. “I hope you feel better now, Fiona.”
She gave a sheepish nod and lowered her head to begin a close examination of the half-eaten bagel sitting on her plate.
“Good.” Jack’s coffee must have kicked in. His expression tightened with concentration. “How’s the shoulder, Vega?”
“It’s fine…healing.”
“If I punched you there, would you go down?” he asked. His pupils sharpened to pinpoints. If she lied, he’d know.
“I’d stumble, sure. Doubt the pain would knock me down all the way, though. Getting hit would make me mad as hell. So don’t dare try it, Jack.”
He chuckled. “Okay.” His head snapped toward Fiona. “Don’t say a word.”
“I wasn’t…” Jack’s piercing glance shut her up real quick.
“Fiona’s kidnapping was a set up, you know that?”
She knew.
“He released her before we were even supposed to bring the cash, and he’d said if you show up he’d kill Fiona. That ploy has Brer Rabbit written all over it. ‘Don’t throw me into the briar patch’ and all that.”
“It’s a trap,” Vega agreed. “If he didn’t want me in Atlanta, he wouldn’t have laid so many tasty breadcrumbs.”
“Wrong fairytale,” Jack said. “I know you can find Grayson without any problem. What worries me is what he has waiting for you when you do find him.”
Vega wasn’t worried about any of that. She had no intention of playing this pickup by Grayson’s rules. If there was a trap, she planned to avoid it all together.
“You can’t take this assignment away from me Jack,” Fiona jumped up from her chair apparently unable to keep silent a moment longer.
At that, Jack smiled. Not at Fiona, though, but at Vega. “I’m not taking anything from you, Fiona. You and Vega are now a team. Buddies sealed together at the hip.”
“Jack, Fiona doesn’t have the experience.” Vega struggled to keep her voice calm.
“I know. I’m hoping her being here with you will keep you from doing anything stupid.” Jack wiped his mouth with the cloth napkin he’d hidden on his lap and pushed back from the table. “I have an afternoon flight to Detroit. If there’s anything you need before I go, you can find me up in the room. I have several phone calls to make.”
* * * *
Vega had a few phone calls to make of her own. On the way back to her room, she stopped by the front desk and arranged to have her bags moved to the room adjoining Fiona’s. She then made a quick call to Snitch to check on her progress with finding more information on Finn. Snitch asked for a few more days. Once back in her room, Vega plugged in her laptop computer and scanned the files on Grayson Walker. There was one name she couldn’t quite remember but continued to nag her mind.
Matt Lockler.
Fiona had said—somewhere during that tirade of hers—that Grayson now had an accomplice with him. Tommy Fisher was in South Carolina. The bits of Greg Harper the coroner could scrape out of the carpeting had been buried.
But Matt Lockler, the fourth man with Grayson’s ISA team in South America, had jumped bail three years ago. The file on Lockler was filled with mental evaluations. He tried to hack up a lady in a department store with a knife one afternoon. The police had arrested him. Lockler’s psychologist had convinced a judge to grant bail based on the fact that his client suffered from, among other things, acute claustrophobia. Lockler had been fitted with a monitoring device that he’d pried off his leg without detection.
The criminally insane were often much crafter than the common fugitive. Vega made it a point to never underestimate their survival instincts. She printed out the file photo and went in search of Fiona.
She found her sister resting in a sunny spot on a lounge chair next to the hotel’s glassed-in pool.
“This Grayson’s accomplice?” She held the photo of Matt Lockler in front of Fiona’s nose.
Her sister snatched the picture and sat up. “How’d you do that? I didn’t even give you a description.”
“I work.” Vega took the picture back and left Fiona with her mouth still gaping.
So, Grayson had teamed up with Matt Lockler? Track down Matt and find Grayson. At least that was what Vega was banking on happening.
“Jack.” She found him in his hotel room packing up his things. “I need you to get me a contract on a certain bounty jumper. Problem is, he’s been on the run for three years.”
Jack frowned at that one. “The bonding company must have already settled with the surety company. They won’t want anything to do with us.”
Vega held her ground. “Tell them I’ll do it for free.”
Jack quirked a brow and gave her a Vega’s-lost-her-mind-again look. She tried to ignore it.
She handed him the photo of Matt Lockler and explained his connection to Grayson. “I’d like to legally take him into custody…just in case Grayson isn’t still with him.”
Jack nodded. “I should be able to work something out.”
* * * *
Atlanta, nearly forty degrees warmer than Detroit in the dead of winter, shared the Motor City’s dependence on the automobile. The amount of traffic on the road at three in the morning surprised Vega. She steered her rental, a brand new gas/electric hybrid Ford SUV she’d paid a premium for, onto the interstate and picked up speed to match the racecar pace of the traffic.
Whoever said the southern lifestyle was slow must have never driven in Atlanta. Vega laughed silently at the thought. She felt too damn smug and didn’t care to do anything about it.
Grayson had returned to Atlanta for a reason. Vega could feel it in her bones. He wanted to prove something. Perhaps he wanted a confrontation with her. Fiona’s kidnapping was a set-up, a ploy to pull Vega closer.
Well, she’d give him what he wanted.
No more games, damn it.
He’d played her but good, acting like he respected her abilities, like she was his equal, or perhaps even a little better than him, a trained Special Ops officer.
Oh, a girl could fall for such compliments, especially one as hungry for them as Vega. He was ever so clever. He didn’t even overdo it with his words. How he conveyed his respect for her with his actions drew her in faster than any compliment.
But she could match his cleverness.
Grayson would never suspect she’d be able to connect him with Matt Lockler or that she’d be able to figure out so quickly where he and Matt had holed up.
Bounty hunters relied on the element of surprise. Late night raids that woke the unsuspecting fugitive from a deep slumber often guaranteed Vega t
he upper hand. Matt and Grayson should be no different. Everybody sleeps.
She left Fiona sleeping soundly in her bed, tossing from side to side. She didn’t hear Vega slip out of the hotel to make the dead of night drive to Vine City, a revitalizing community near the Georgia Dome.
Earlier in the day, she’d spent several hours driving through a variety of similar communities, talking with the people on the street. Making friends by handing out liberal amounts of green. Even those with very little street knowledge knew of Matt Lockler. The visibly insane tended to make strong impressions on a community.
“The bastard slapped me upside my head for nuthin’,” an angry muscle-bound man, with a scowl certified to make a baby scream, told her that afternoon in exchange for a hundred dollar bill. “Crazy son o’ bitch packs enough firepower to bring down an army. I ain’t goin’ tell him nuthin’. I just kept on walkin’ like nuthin’ happened.” Only a madman would consider crossing a mammoth like this guy. “You get that one off the streets and we’ll make you some kind of saint in Vine.”
The muscle wasn’t the only one who gladly ratted out Matt’s crackpot crib—as everyone on the streets called it.
She found the building just a few blocks from Martin Luther King Street, deep in the heart of Vine City where renovation and decay clashed in an all out war. She parked a few houses beyond the apartment building and walked back to it, keeping a keen eye open for surprises. There was no doubt she’d found the right place.
Fiona had given quite a thorough description of where Grayson and Matt had held her captive. In fact, Fiona’s description had helped Vega narrow down which neighborhoods to search. Her keen eye for details had saved them at least two days of investigations.
The apartment building was as dilapidated as Fiona had described. No one inhabiting the singed hull with four walls and most of a roof paid rent. Though, by the glow from the windows the apartment building appeared filled to capacity. On such a chilly night, the residents living without the convenience of electricity would have to build fires to stay warm. Vega zipped up her leather coat and nudged the front entrance door open with her boot. The Beretta in her right hand was loaded and ready. The metal against her skin felt natural, though the weight of the pistol was wrong.