“Think whatever you want, Russ,” she said, unable to restrain her temper any longer, “but I knew nothing about the drugs. Quinn, I’ll wait for you in the car.” She rose slowly, her soul heavy with her new burden of guilt and despair.
“I’ll come with you,” he said, pulling out her chair.
“Maybe you didn’t know, missy, but you shoulda.” Santerre’s voice punched her in the heart. “He done it for you. Instead of my boy, it should’ve been you died on that boat.”
Three days later, the combined law enforcement forces had come no closer to finding the bomber or Raoul and his men. Although he and Claire were interviewing people who knew both Jonathan and Alan, Michael’s gut instinct told him they were just treading water. Somehow their murders were tied to Paul Santerre. He just didn’t yet know how.
In the evening, he sat in Claire’s living room, once again poring over his copies of the police files. The CID hadn’t tumbled onto Paul’s drug trafficking, especially since their investigation began so long after the fact. Russ sure as hell hadn’t told them about the drugs, only his suspicions about his daughter-in-law.
He heard the bang of a file drawer from Claire’s office. She was searching old files and account books for proof one way or the other about Paul and drugs.
Seeing how Russ’s revelation had slammed into her ripped pain through Michael’s heart. The burden she carried, already weightier than Atlas’s, expanded with each new fact they uncovered. She blamed herself even though he would bet Paul’s avarice and ambition had nothing to do with her. The need to lift her millstone dragged at him, but he wasn’t even close to the truth.
Something about the way Santerre’s body had ended up bothered him. The medical examiner reported body trauma and seawater in the lungs—death by drowning. Nothing suspicious there. But the tingling on his nape told Michael to dig deeper.
Rarely did someone who’d drowned have the luxury of remaining with his skiff. A week after his disappearance from the Rêve de coeur, what the fish and the rocks left of Paul Santerre had been found wedged beneath his overturned skiff.
As if someone had wanted the body found.
A bang and a crash from the next room shot him from his seat, but before he reached the doorway, Claire stepped into the living room.
“Quinn,” she said, holding out a flat maroon ledger, “I found this taped behind a drawer. It might be records of Paul’s smuggling.” Rather than triumph gladdening her countenance, sorrow turned down the corners of her mouth and slumped her shoulders. “I hoped not to find anything. Or to find a record of the boat sale or some proof he earned the money legitimately. But hidden like that…”
They sat side by side on the sofa. Michael longed to slide his arm around her shoulders in solace, but her stiffness mandated a professional distance between them.
He watched as Claire flipped the ledger’s yellowed pages to a date more than five years past. Down the pages, a blue-inked scrawl detailed amounts of cocaine and marijuana, dates of receipt and delivery, names and places.
It was all there.
Five years ago, if the DEA had had this damning evidence, they might have arrested Paul Santerre before fate had meted out a harsher and more permanent sentence. Instead of a widow suspected of murder, Claire would be a prisoner’s wife.
And Michael Quinn would never have known her. That notion tightened a steel clamp in his chest. He wasn’t proud of being glad for someone’s death, but there it was.
“I suppose I should have guessed,” Claire began, “should have realized—”
“No!” Michael barked. Before a rational consideration for their cooled relationship could stop him, he tossed the ledger to the floor and grasped her shoulders, turning her to face him. “Dammit, Claire, don’t you dare blame yourself. Not for this. Paul’s pact with the damn devil was his alone. He kept the ledger hidden, made it all look on the up and up.”
Dark eyes wide with surprise at his outburst, she allowed him to draw her closer until she leaned on him, soft and yielding in sorrow as she once had been in passion. At her lack of resistance, a tendril of warmth eased the tightening in his chest. Tenderly, silently he held her. His heart stumbled, then resumed its regular beat, as if her nearness were essential to its rhythm.
“What should we do with this?” she asked.
“Do with it? This ledger could lead to the capture of the stalker or the drug gang. We turn it over to the cops.” Then maybe the DEA would allow him to disclose everything to Claire.
“Will they release the information to the press? It will destroy Russ.”
Incredulous, he eased back to scrutinize her expression. Intent, utterly somber and earnest. To assuage the father’s grief, she would suppress evidence against the son, evidence that might clear her in the public eye. “You seriously care about that old man after the way he’s treated you?”
“He loved his son, the only family he had.”
“Is that why you didn’t deny his charge that it was your appetite for luxury that drove Paul?”
“I suppose. Convincing him that Paul’s ambition was strictly his own would only chip away more of his already shattered good-son image. I couldn’t do it.” On a deep sigh, she shrugged, that Gallic shrug he found so sexy. “Russ wouldn’t believe me, anyway.”
“In answer to your question about the press,” he said, “I doubt the police will release the information right away. Once the bad guys have been taken out of circulation, the whole story will come out. This disclosure will bring the DEA into the case, as well.” If only he could tell her they already were.
Before her sensual mouth could lure him to taste her again, Michael dropped his hands from her shoulders. He lifted the ledger from the carpet and leaned against the sofa.
Her arms cold at the loss of his touch, Claire remained perched on the edge of the seat. She cast a shuttered glance at Michael reclining beside her.
His denim-clad, muscular legs crossed at the ankles, he lounged with animal grace against the cushions. The black mock-turtleneck pullover encasing his torso emphasized his powerful build and warrior aura. To maintain her restraint, Claire rearranged the table decoration on the low table before her, five fat white candles on a teak marquetry tray.
Caged briefly in his embrace a few moments ago, she had greedily inhaled his scent—soap and after-shave and something distinctly Michael. Blindfolded in a crowded room, she could locate him by scent. She longed to cuddle against him, but distance was imperative, she told herself, necessary and safer, if painful. The problem of understanding the mysterious deaths was becoming more and more complex and compelling. As devastated as she was at the truth about Paul, she knew the dirty business of the drugs conformed to the rest of his character. Paul’s connection with the drug gang might have led to his death.
The ledger could be the key…
“Do you think this ledger is what the drug gang wants from me? The reason they keep coming to Weymouth?” She turned to Michael.
“That would be a neat solution,” he said, slanting her a sexy half grin that almost had her reaching for him, “but I doubt it. Someone’s been in your house twice, but whoever it was didn’t seem to be searching for anything. Druggang flunkies wouldn’t toss a house without ransacking drawers or cupboards and overturning furniture. It’s certain they don’t know about the ledger.”
For the first time, Claire wondered frankly if the three deaths might be totally unconnected. It didn’t absolve her if they were, but with the ledger, they had the chance to solve one of the puzzles.
She chewed her bottom lip while she worked out her idea. “Suppose…suppose they would go for the ledger if they knew about it. What if we used it…to set a trap?”
Thinking about Claire’s dangerous proposal, Michael wrenched the steering wheel harder than necessary to turn onto the Weymouth exit off the interstate. Although piles of plow-driven snow framed the roadway, the pavement was dry. A deep breath settled him for the quiet streets of the suburb. So dee
p in thought, he barely heard the distant wails of emergency vehicles somewhere ahead of him.
After trying to dissuade Claire from her trap scheme last night, he’d spent the morning doing the same damn thing with Pratt and Cruz. Independently, both agencies came up with the same idea as Claire’s. The CID and the DEA thought setting a trap for Raoul and his men was a hell of a good idea.
The trouble was that both schemes, Claire’s and the official one, involved her as bait.
Too damn dangerous. He still didn’t fully trust the cops—or himself—to protect her. As it was, he hated leaving her this morning. Who knew where Raoul and his henchmen might show up next? The anonymous calls had dwindled to only about twice a week, but that kind of crazy could switch to a more overt attack anytime. Claire had promised to stay home, if even that was safe, working on her overdue translation.
After driving down Weymouth’s main street, Michael turned into the well-groomed avenue leading into Claire’s neighborhood. Most of the sirens faded, but behind him from the direction of the small community hospital came yet another. A car accident or a Christmas tree fire, he speculated.
He adjusted his position in the seat to accommodate a familiar hard lump. Once again carrying a pistol in his small-of-the-back holster, he made a silent vow to do everything in his power to keep Claire safe.
Her words had finally taken root in his soul. Someone else’s actions were not his responsibility.
As tragic as it had been, as it still was, his sister Amy’s death was not his fault. Her reckless behavior and the drug-crazed actions of her killers owned the blame. The cruelly senseless death of the kidnapped child, Kathy, sat squarely on the shoulders of her captor. And, as Claire had asserted, Michael should never have been the shooter that day. That mistake was his superior’s.
Grief had blinded him, but Claire’s insight helped him begin to deal with his past. When he could close that door, he’d be ready to open another.
With Claire.
In the midst of her own crises, she had a big enough heart to care about his problems. Warmth and hope infused him at the memory of her trust in him. His arms ached to hold her.
He fought against caring, against the possibility of more grief, but she didn’t allow him his isolation. Claire’s own passion for life, her gentleness and courage drew him to her, a reluctant moth to her healing flame. What he felt for her surpassed lust and tenderness. It bloomed incandescent and intoxicating in his heart.
When this was all over, he’d see where it led.
For now, he wanted her out of danger. The reasons for his superior’s decisions were a mystery. It would be a mistake to involve Claire in trapping the drug gang. And yet another error not to allow him to tell her everything. Keeping her in the dark was akin to stranding her in a skiff on the open bay. He winced at the inadvertent parallel to her second husband’s death.
Damn, but it was frustrating! Even Cruz didn’t know why Michael had to remain in his undercover P.I. identity.
At the corner of Claire’s street, Michael pulled off to allow the ambulance to pass. Seeing the flashing blue police lights and red ambulance ones sent fear and dread coursing through him and clamped a vise on his chest.
What had happened?
Claire!
His professionalism switched on and tamped down his incipient panic. A moment later, he parked his Cherokee one house away from his destination, beyond the police barrier. As he raced toward the house, he noted peripherally a small gathering of neighbors standing by and two uniformed cops talking to a woman across the street. He ducked under the tape and continued.
His frantic sprint slowed when he saw the EMTs roll a gurney from the ambulance. One white-coated attendant unfolded a black body bag.
Then he saw the body.
He stumbled to a halt, unable to fuse the connection between his brain and his legs.
She lay crumpled like a boneless doll in the dirty plowed snow at the curb in front of her house. He recognized the black coat. He recognized the dark brown hair fanned around her head. A shaft of sunlight glinted on its red highlights and on the ragged halo of crimson-stained snow around it.
His heart slammed against his ribs, and his ears roared. He’d left her alone, unprotected, and now she was…he couldn’t even think the word.
He’d failed her.
He’d lost her.
In agony, he stood frozen a dozen feet away in the drive, incapable of moving closer to the lifeless form in the street. “No! Claire, God, no!”
As if he could erase the horrible sight before him, he swiped one hand across his eyes. He would personally kill whoever did it.
“Michael?”
His hand reached for the gun at his back then stilled. No, shooting would be too quick. And not nearly painful enough. He’d beat the crap out of him. Then he’d kill the cowardly bastard with his bare hands.
“Michael, over here.”
The lilting accent penetrated the crimson haze in his brain before the words did. Stumbling forward, he rotated his head toward the voice. Dressed in a long black sweater, she stepped from the porch.
“Claire?”
Shock and anguish ashen on her face, she hurried down the walk to him.
“You’re…I thought….” He touched her arms, her cheek, her hair. Moisture dimmed his vision, and his heart drummed with the dawning realization that she lived.
“Yes, Michael, I’m all right.” Tears spiked her lashes, and her eyes were haunted, but she managed a crooked smile. Without any resistance from her, he drew her into his arms. Her slender body trembled, her heart thumping against his chest.
Someone was dead, but he couldn’t prevent his joyful relief that it wasn’t Claire. Then who— “Martine?”
With a nod, she eased back and turned toward where the technicians were sliding the gurney with its gruesome burden into the ambulance.
“A hit and run. She—” Tears overflowed Claire’s redrimmed eyes. “Mon Dieu, it was terrible! She had just left when I heard her scream and the screech of brakes.”
“Did you see the driver?” His voice was colder than the late December air. It could have been Claire. They meant it to be Claire.
“No. The car was gone by the time I made it outside.” She swayed like a birch in the wind, and he pulled her close again. “Michael, they were after me. I know they thought it was me. Oh, poor Martine!”
“She was wearing your coat. Why?”
Claire swallowed hard, as if fighting nausea or the urge to scream. As he had observed her do before, she forced herself to rally, to focus. “She came to see me. I’ve never seen her like that—nervous, so agitated she couldn’t sit down. She ran out of her house with only a sweater, so I lent her a coat when she left. She wanted to get back before Newcomb knew she had left.”
Craving her touch and fearing the danger all around her, he kept his arm at her waist. “That’s why I thought it was you. The hair and the coat. The killer must have thought so, too. Why was she here?”
“We were right about Jonathan and her. A brief affair the summer after he graduated from high school. When he went to college, he broke it off. She was afraid we knew and begged me not to tell Newcomb.”
“Does Newcomb know about his wife’s death?”
She nodded sadly. “He’s inside now. With one of the policemen. I telephoned him after I called the ambulance.”
“Have you told him the truth?”
“I cannot do that. I said she came to patch things up, but I don’t think he believed me.” She glanced toward the street, where a state police car parked in the spot just vacated by the departing ambulance. “Oh, no, it’s Pratt. Quinn, if I have to tell him about Martine and Jonathan, Newcomb will find out. And the children.”
He heard her words, saw the CID detective approach, but his world narrowed to Claire. To her singular scent, her creamy skin, the vibrant life that was almost snuffed out. Urgent desire raged in his body. He wanted to drag her into the house and possess her
, claim her with his body. Nerve endings scraped raw, he fought to maintain a pragmatic grasp of reality. “Let’s wait and see what develops.”
“Afternoon, Ms. Saint-Ange,” Pratt said. “You keep popping up in the middle of things.”
“Like a hair in the soup,” she rejoined with acerbity.
Michael blinked at the oddity, then assumed it was another mixed-up idiom. He stayed at her side, his arm around her shoulder. Pratt could think whatever the hell he wanted.
The portly detective gave a negative wag of his head. “More like the center of a bull’s-eye. Between you and Quinn here, we’ve had more violence this week in this little town than in the past five years.”
“Does that mean you think we’re onto something with our investigation?” Michael asked.
“Mighty chilly weather for stirring up hornets,” he said, tugging his coat collar around his neck. “This kind of hornet comes armed and dangerous. And he doesn’t care who gets hurt in the crossfire.”
“Claire was inside her house when it happened,” Michael added. “Whoever killed Mrs. Farnsworth must have thought it was Claire. They resemble each other closely.” That must be as clear to the cops as it was to him.
Someone wanted her dead. But why? To silence her? About what?
“Witnesses have confirmed that fact, Quinn. A neighbor spotted a dark blue Explorer fleeing the scene. Could be those Hispanics again. Your client isn’t a primary suspect.”
He heard Claire’s dismayed inhalation. “What do you mean ‘primary suspect,’ Lieutenant Pratt?” she snapped. “Do you actually think I might be responsible indirectly?”
“You can bet she’s responsible. Probably hired some thugs to kill my wife. Like she killed my son.” Newcomb Farnsworth stood a few feet away. His patrician features contorted with pain, he approached ramrod stiff and seething with rage. “The Widow Spider is extremely clever and devious, aren’t you, Claire? But sooner or later you’ll make a mistake.”
Claire recoiled and shrank against Michael’s side at the appalling accusations. She reached a tentative hand out to the grieving man. “Newcomb, they were trying to kill me, not Martine. Blame me, hate me more than you already do for that if you want, but I didn’t kill her.”
Dangerous Attraction Page 14