A Drive-By Wedding

by Ramin, Terese

  He shut the door and turned. Allyn stood behind him, hair once more braided, the glow of her skin heightened by the tangerine camisole and the matching strings of tiny beads that circled her throat and right wrist. A denim shirt for her and white T-shirt for him dangled from her left hand. Jeth stepped to her, cupped her face in his hands and kissed her.

  “Have I had the good sense to mention how beautiful I think you are?”

  Allyn smiled, nervous but trying not to show it. “I think you said that at least once or twice last night, yeah.”

  “Good. I meant it then, I mean it now.”

  “I know.”

  They looked at each other a moment, then gazes slid away, seeking someplace easier to rest. Sometimes just looking was the most painful thing in the world.

  “Here,” Allyn said at last, “I brought your shirt. Let me help you—”

  “It’s all right,” Jeth returned quietly. “I can do it.”

  He took the piece of clothing from her, pulled it first over his wounded arm then, wincing, dragged it over his head and stuck his other arm through its sleeve. She reached to smooth the fabric down his torso, slipped her arms around him and hugged him tight.

  “Whatever happens,” she whispered.

  Heart in his throat, he wrapped his good arm around her shoulders and pulled her into his chest. Bent his head to drop a kiss in her hair.

  “Whatever happens,” he agreed, and released her to open the door to his brothers once more.

  The office where they met their contacts in Seligman was small and cramped, could have benefited from a coat of paint.

  Allyn looked the place over, trying hard not to let fear get the better of her when Jeth was taken to a separate room for his debriefing. Her interrogation was cursory and curiously void of what she’d have deemed pertinent questions about Sasha, herself or anything else—almost as though the special agents and the Tucson assistant prosecutor weren’t really looking for answers, but time.

  Next door Jeth’s questioning proceeded in similar fashion, although he was asked for his weapon so the lab could match it against shell casings found in the alley and bullets recovered from the body—a question that became moot when they discovered he wasn’t carrying. When they asked where his gun was, he told them, truthfully, that his department issue was in his apartment in Tucson.

  On the face of it, there was little to hold Jeth on, but both the fed and the state prosecutor’s representative were adamant about moving Jeth to the larger facilities in Kingman where the agent in charge of the operation Jeth had been called in on awaited him. In exchange for his cooperation in this matter, they would release his wife. Jeth agreed to the trip with alacrity.

  Knowing he’d finagled something to get her away from him just in case, Allyn was loath to leave Jeth behind—especially when they gave her a minute with him and she read the corded tension in the set of his muscles, the remoteness that hooded those beautiful eyes and strained his features. He shook his head slightly when she would have said something about it to him, and she realized then that he was afraid of being listened in on. So with great reluctance she kept her conversation light, talking about the mistake that had been made, her belief in him and things of that ilk. Then she kissed him lightly goodbye as though she were certain she’d see him later and turned to go. Jeth caught her ring hand and pulled her back, awkwardly maneuvered his left hand so he could lace his ring finger with hers and kissed her knuckle.

  Then he hugged her and, with his lips close to her ear, warned her as softly as possible not to let anyone to follow her to Sasha.

  She stiffened in his arms, suddenly terrified of the implications behind his warning. They planned to hold on to him, let her go, hoping she’d head straight for the baby they’d barely mentioned, then kill him. When reflex would have made her give them away, Jeth pressed her face into his shirt and kissed her hair, pretending to soothe away tears. With an effort Allyn brought reflex under control and, all brave newlywed stuck in a nuisance of a nightmare that must surely be about to go away, she straightened and dabbed at her eyes with the edge of a forefinger. Then she stood on tiptoes and brushed a kiss on her pretend husband’s cheek and preceded the waiting Guy out the door and into the parking lot to his pickup. Climbed in and looked at the man who wasn’t really her brother-in-law.

  “He told you to get me out of here, didn’t he?” she asked bluntly.

  To his credit, Guy started but didn’t choke at the question. He did study her for a minute weighing his answer, however. Allyn nodded. His silence told her everything she didn’t need to hear. Her mouth drew a savage line.

  “Damn him.” She bit her bottom lip until the place where the stitches had been ached, and stared through the windshield at the office where Jeth remained. “Damn him.” She faced Guy. “He doesn’t think he’s going to make it to Kingman, does he?”

  “There’s no reason to think that.”

  “Then why do I think it? Why am I sure he thinks it? And don’t mess with me, damn you, Guy. You haven’t got the face for telling good lies.”

  Guy studied her. “And you do?”

  Allyn eyed him back. The muscle that created the dimple in her left cheek twitched. “I’ve got a chunk of the Blarney Stone at home to prove it.”

  For a moment he watched her. Then he gave her hard and furious. “Are you telling me—”

  “I’m not tellin’ you anything,” Allyn snapped, “except that your brother doesn’t think he’s going to make it to Kingman.”

  Guy’s turn to hang his wrists over the steering wheel and stare through the windshield. “We discussed the possibility. We’re doin’ what we can to prevent it.”

  “While you do what with me?”

  “Get you to the nearest airport and put you on the first flight out.”

  Allyn swore. Then said emphatically, “You know I’m not going, don’t you? I won’t leave him, and I can’t leave Sasha.”

  Guy nodded. “Russ and I figured as much. That’s why we didn’t listen too hard when he told us to do it. I am getting you out of here, however.”

  “Where?”

  “Same place we moved Sasha to last night.”

  “We can’t go there, they’ll follow us. They’ll take him. Jeth thinks that’s why they let me go.”

  Guy swore. “I thought it was too easy.” A moment of silent study, then he looked at Allyn. “Trust me?”

  “Will it help him and protect Sasha?”

  “If it works.”

  Allyn viewed him with calculation. “We have a plan?”

  Guy grinned tightly. “If you’re game, we have a plan.”

  Over Russ’s and the local sheriff’s protests Jeth was handcuffed and locked into the back of a squad car for transport.

  There was no reason for it, especially since he wasn’t formally charged with anything, but that didn’t prevent the fed from doing as much damage to Jeth’s shoulder as possible when he yanked Jeth’s wrists behind him, then snapped the cuffs into the safety locks in the back seat of the cruiser so he couldn’t move.

  When Russ had attempted to climb into the front seat to travel with his brother at the sheriff’s invitation, the special agent waved him aside and said “back off, federal jurisdiction,” and climbed in instead.

  Jaw ticking, Russ waited until they were out of sight, then mounted his own vehicle to follow the cruiser at a distance.

  Red dust and desert, saguaro and barrel cacti, sun and heat rising to a hundred and five and more. Battered windmills, poised to catch any wind, stood guard over land empty of anything except the hardiest desert scrub. A hundred miles from nowhere, it was the perfect place.

  Doing his best to remain alert despite the throbbing pain in his still knitting chest, Jeth watched his surroundings trying to figure where, if anything was going to happen, it would most likely occur. The deputy sheriff talked aimlessly; too easily irritated, the federal agent told him to pipe down. Which meant, Jeth guessed, that if something was going to ha
ppen it would be soon.

  Twisting as much as cuffs and shoulder would allow, he scoured the countryside for signs of life.

  “Stop here,” the fed said suddenly.

  “What?” the deputy asked, puzzled. “This isn’t—”

  The agent pulled his weapon and leveled it at the deputy. “Stop.”

  The deputy did so.

  The agent motioned with his gun. “Now get out.”

  Given little choice, the deputy complied. The agent slid into the driver’s seat.

  “What the hell am I supposed to do now?” the deputy asked. “It’s too far to walk back without water and—”

  “You’re right,” the fed agreed, and shot the deputy twice in the face and once in the chest, closed the door and pulled away. “Now,” he told Jeth, “you and I can go someplace and talk private.”

  Three related things happened simultaneously after that.

  In Arizona, Russ, who had been following the cruiser at a distance, came upon the deputy’s body, still warm, at the side of the road. And two time zones away, in Michigan, Becky Meyers Catton doubled over with a gasp of surprise and pain and knew without question that Allyn was hurt and in serious trouble, while a city away her stepfather pulled the report he’d been waiting to get on Jeth Levoie out of the fax machine in his university office.

  Russ immediately radioed for help and marshaled the forces he and his brother had arranged to have waiting in the wings in case, and stepped on the accelerator, following the distant billow of dust that had to be from the deputy’s cruiser.

  As soon as she could straighten, Becky called the one person she always called in case of trouble even when she wasn’t sure she wanted to: her best friend and husband, Michael. Then she called Gabriel, who was on his way out of the office at speed after calling in a few favors that he hoped would help get Jeth out of the trouble he was headed into—if his supposed son-in-law wasn’t already in it. Becky’s call confirmed his worst fears. So he called his wife, apprised her of the situation and headed for the airport.

  Allyn picked her head off the dashboard of Guy’s pickup and looked blearily around. Her temples throbbed, and the taste of salt and iron flooded her mouth. Beside her, Guy slumped sideways against his half-open door, face, head and chest bloody.

  Unlocking her seat belt, Allyn edged unsteadily toward him and put her fingers to his neck, looking for a pulse. Weak but steady. A good sign.

  Carefully she checked him over, assessing the damage. He had a gash on his forehead from where he’d hit the steering wheel and a cut inside a nice-looking bruise on his temple where his head had bounced off the window. The blood on his chest was really from his arm, where a broken shovel handle had jammed through the window in the back of the cab and speared him. Ugly, but it didn’t appear he’d sustained any permanent or life-threatening damage.

  She hoped.

  She shut her eyes and rested her forehead in a hand. God, her head hurt. What had happened? She couldn’t seem to remember anything beyond… Puzzled, she canted her head and tried to think. A sound, she’d heard a sound, and then they’d gone banging all over creation and then…nothing. She couldn’t remember. A blowout, maybe, at high speed, in the middle of Arizona nowhere between Kingman and the Canyon and—

  Jeth.

  That part of her memory came back in a rush. They’d been on their way to help him somehow. Guy’s plan… She had to… Everything in her brain went muzzy for an instant. Had to what?

  Rescue him if he needed it, that was what.

  Relieved to remember what she was about, Allyn pulled her hand away from her face. Bloody. Not surprising, she supposed nonsensically. If she felt banged up, she must be banged up.

  Focus, she commanded herself. Guy needs help. Jeth needs help. Get help.

  Her gaze fell on the radio mike under the dashboard. She started to reach for it—and stopped at the sound of her door being opened.

  “Thank goodness,” she began, turning, “my brother-in-law needs help—”

  “Too bad,” the gal from the state prosecutor’s office said. “I’m real sorry to hear that, he’s kinda cute, but you’re the one I’m here for.”

  Then she pointed Jeth’s gun at Allyn and motioned her out of the truck.

  The place where the fed took Jeth was a run-down shack in the middle of nowhere surrounded by a three-hundred-sixty degree view of nothing in particular. A good place, Jeth thought ironically, to see what was coming a long time before it reached you.

  So much for the best-laid plans.

  Grabbing Jeth’s left elbow and jerking so it was all Jeth could do to keep from groaning, the fed hustled him into the hovel and shackled him to the only sturdy thing in the place: a solid metal shelving unit that was screwed to the floor. Then he grabbed a chair for himself and settled in, gun resting carelessly in his lap.

  “Now what?” Jeth asked.

  The other man shrugged. “Now we wait.”

  “For what?”

  “For the person who’s going to get you to tell us what we need to know.”

  “And that would be?”

  The other man flashed a nasty smile. “Wait,” he suggested, and said no more.

  Not a man to waste time, especially when there was none to spare, Jeth took visual stock of his surroundings as best he could. Four rotting walls, a set of bunk beds, a junked cast-iron stove tipped on its side, a counter and cupboards either without doors or with the doors hanging off, a broken table and a couple of listing chairs. An iron skillet hung on the wall nearest the counter. A filthy sink in the counter. All in all, not much to look at.

  “How long we got to wait?” he asked.

  “However long it takes,” his captor said comfortably. “You should look at it like no news is good news. The longer we wait, the longer you live.”

  “I appreciate that,” Jeth said, then winced and groaned theatrically. “Look, man, my arm’s killing me. You think I could sit before I pass out?”

  “Stand still, you won’t pass out,” the man advised him, then sat back in his chair and closed his eyes.

  Outside the windmill creaked. Beyond that was the sound of a small plane in the distance. It came closer then faded away. After that the silence lasted long enough for Jeth to count the boards in three walls, at which point the muffled roar of an engine approaching in four-wheel drive broke the stillness. The guy in the chair straightened, glanced at Jeth and rose.

  “Time’s up,” he said, and went to the door.

  The four-wheel drive thundered to a stop and shut down. Jeth heard the engine tick for a minute, then doors opened. There came the sound of muted voices and doors slammed. Then came the crunch of approaching feet, the slough of something or someone dragged behind.

  Nothing prepared him for the sight that got pushed through the door after the woman from the prosecutor’s office entered and stepped aside. Swaying on her feet, Allyn viewed him through the blood dripping off her forehead and into her glassy-looking eyes. Recognizing him, she blinked and stumbled forward a step, only to be yanked back by Jeth’s captor. She grinned weakly at him.

  “Hi, honey,” she murmured. “I’m home.”

  Then she crumpled to the floor unconscious.

  In an agony to reach her, Jeth yanked at the metal shelves, trying to pull them out of the floor. Any thought he might have had of taking mercy on his opponents if—when, damn it—he got the upper hand fled.

  “Lyn. Judas, Lynnie.” He eyed the man and woman standing over Allyn. “What have you done to her? Damn it, Jeri, you don’t want her. She’s a civilian. Leave her the hell out of it.”

  “You brought her into it,” the woman said. “You’re the only one who can get her out.”

  “You’re frigging cold, Jeri. I should have figured you for this somewhere.”

  Jeri shook her head. “Sticks and stones, youngster. You want to hurt someone you find out what matters to ’em—like your little sister. We found her, I knew you were the one’d help me get what I wa
nt eventually. You were such easy pickin’s it couldn’t’ve been funnier.”

  Fury blinded Jeth momentarily. So he’d been right. Too late, but right. It had been Jeri who’d taken Marcy, not one of the criminals he’d been investigating. No wonder his sister had gone so easily. Jeth had introduced Jeri to her once when Marcy came to the office for a career day to learn a little about what he did. He looked at his supervisor’s face and knew, knew that she was the one who’d given Marcy to the incompetents who’d buried her with the faulty air tank and unwittingly left her to die. Judas, Judas…

  His jaw clenched; he bit down on the thing he might have named her—or himself—and got control of himself. There was no more fitting name for who Jeri was or what she’d done. And damn, if he lost control, he couldn’t do Allyn any good. He needed time.

  “You got the cards,” he said tightly. “Deal.”

  “I want the baby,” Jeri said simply.

  Dumbfounded, Jeth stared at her. “For yourself?”

  She hooted. “Don’t be an ass. Of course not for myself—can you see me with a kid? Get real. No.” She shook her head. “He goes to the highest bidder. I don’t care if that’s a couple who can pay to adopt him, if it’s the Colombians or his KGB daddy. For whatever reason, the kid’s a gold mine. Where is he?”

  He looked at Allyn’s face, turned toward him where she lay on the floor, wondering which answer would best buy time for her.

  And nearly lost it when her eyes opened, she looked directly at him and winked. Was the blood an act, too? If they got out of this alive, he was going to throttle her, kiss her, then watch his step around her forever because she would damn sure keep him on his toes.

  “I’m waiting,” Jeri warned. She prodded Allyn with a foot. “You can’t tell me, I’m sure your wife can. Where’s the kid?”

  Another glance at Allyn, who waggled her visible brow at him. Yep, he was definitely going to strangle her. “I don’t know.”

  Jeri pointed her gun—no, his gun, Jeth realized with a start, wondering how she’d gotten hold of it—at Allyn. “Fine,” she said, “Don’t tell me. I can make it look like you killed her here as well as anyplace.”