Pearl Cove

by Elizabeth Lowell

  Cool. Efficient. Merciless.

  Archer smiled grimly and looked at his watch. He didn’t know how much time he had left at Pearl Cove. He knew it wouldn’t be enough to get into Len’s computer, unless he got pig-lucky. “I can be all of those things. It hasn’t helped me get into that damned disk. The things that should have been important to him . . . weren’t.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “His wife,” Archer said succinctly. “You should have been important to him.” And so should his unborn child.

  But Archer didn’t say that aloud. For her it had happened seven years ago; she had healed. For him, it was a fresh wound.

  Hannah shrugged off the suggestion that she should have mattered to Len, but her eyes were haunted. “Some things just don’t work out. Only one thing was important to Len. Pearls.”

  Archer’s eyes narrowed. He turned back to the computer. He fed in variations on the theme of pearls, Pearl Cove, black pearls, experimental pearls . . .

  “Wait!” Hannah said, grabbing his shoulder and leaning toward the screen in sudden excitement. “Try the words Black Trinity. Nothing mattered more to him than making that necklace perfect.”

  The keys clicked quickly as Archer fed in the words. Quickly the screen changed, listing various files and applications.

  “Bingo.”

  Hannah sensed the triumph vibrating just beneath his control. She turned toward him. He was focused on the screen as he opened the file that had been used most recently. The screen blinked and filled with . . .

  Gibberish.

  “Shit.” Archer raked his hand through his hair. “More code.”

  He looked outside. In a few hours evening would descend like a purple and orange freight train. Then it would be dark enough to check out Len’s home away from home, his steel shell against the world.

  For a moment Archer wondered if oysters felt secure inside their shells, or simply trapped.

  “Now what?” Hannah asked.

  “Now I tie up my cell phone for a few hours.”

  Mystified, she watched while he plugged his cell phone into the computer, punched in a number, hit some keys, and stood up.

  “That’s it?” she asked.

  “Yeah.”

  “Now what?”

  “We wait.”

  Seven

  Hours later, Archer unplugged his computer from his cell phone, tossed it on the counter next to Hannah’s phone, and went to the stove for more coffee. Flynn had called in an hour earlier, claiming he was crook—sick. Archer didn’t believe it. Nor did he care enough to do anything about it. He and Hannah weren’t going to be in Australia long enough for Flynn’s report to matter.

  Just as Archer started pouring the thick brown coffee into a mug, his phone rang.

  “I’ll get it,” Hannah said, slipping past him. When she saw that it was his cellular, not hers, that was ringing, she hesitated. With a shrug, she answered it. “G’day.”

  “Archer Donovan.” The woman’s voice was clipped. She wasn’t asking, she was telling.

  “Who’s calling?”

  “It’s his uncle returning his call.”

  “Sounds more like his aunt.”

  “Is Donovan there or not?”

  “Yes.” Hannah turned to Archer. “It’s your uncle,” she said clearly, handing him the phone.

  The change in his eyes made her realize just how warm they had been. She looked at the phone in his big hand and stepped back away from it. From him. Neither the phone nor the man was her business, no matter how curious she was about both.

  She headed for the bathroom, saying over her shoulder, “I need a shower.”

  Archer glanced in the readout window on the cell phone. There was no number for the incoming call. It was in the clear, unscrambled, available to anyone who wanted to overhear.

  “This is Donovan,” he said. His voice said a lot more. Impersonal, leashed, merciless. “How the hell are you, Uncle?”

  Though Archer didn’t watch Hannah, he was aware that she had withdrawn. Just to make sure the distance was far enough, he walked out onto the verandah. Against the blazing sunset, the new screens gave the land and sea a metallic, surreal glow.

  “You waited a long time to call,” the woman told him.

  Silently he absorbed the fact that the U.S. government already knew something about Pearl Cove and cared enough that they had been hoping he would have to ask for help.

  Not good.

  “If I’d known you were waiting, I would have called sooner.”

  “Save it for someone who believes you, slick.”

  “Slick, huh?” He smiled thinly. The agent who had reluctantly helped Kyle chase ancient Chinese jade had called both Donovan men “slick.” April Joy had been in and out of Donovan lives several times since then. She was a very beautiful, very intelligent, and very ruthless agent. At one time he would have been attracted to her. He was a lot older now. “I thought your specialty was jade.”

  “That’s why I’m not happy. As far as I’m concerned, pearls are the end product of constipated oysters.”

  Archer smiled thinly. “My requests are simple. Do you want them in the clear?”

  “Knowing you, I doubt it.”

  Static poured into his ear before a status light blinked on his phone and words came out instead of electronic garbage. Obviously the two computers had found a code they both could translate.

  “. . . understand?” she asked.

  “Loud and clear. Ready?”

  “I was born ready.”

  He didn’t doubt it. “Two passports. Married couple. Mine should have blue eyes instead of gray. Hers should be brown. Black wig, long enough to put in more than one hairstyle. The woman is five feet ten inches, one hundred and twenty-five pounds, brown hair and brown eyes, thirty-four, dressed like designer sin. Expensive.” With a faint curving of his lips, he wondered if Hannah would object to having five years, one inch, and some odd pounds piled on her life, plus a courtesan’s clothes. “One pair of brown contacts. One pair of dark blue. Tickets from Broome to Darwin under one alias. Tickets from Darwin to Hong Kong under the second alias.”

  “Got it. You’ll be Mr. and Mrs. Murray on the flight from Broome to Darwin. Darwin to Hong Kong you’ll be Mr. and Mrs. South. Where to after Hong Kong?”

  “I’ll take care of it from there.”

  There was a humming silence on the other end of the call that told Archer he wasn’t making April happy.

  “How soon?” she asked, her voice clipped.

  “Yesterday.”

  She snorted. “Next week.”

  “Tonight.”

  “Tomorrow, Mr. South, and you should be thanking me on your knees with your face buried in my deepest cleavage.”

  Archer smiled despite the urgency gnawing on him. “South. Right. I have a rental car. White Toyota, left rear taillight will be broken.”

  “Careless of you.”

  “I’m a careless kind of guy.”

  April laughed at that, a sound of genuine amusement.

  “The car will be parked in the airport lot at Broome,” Archer continued, “as close to the entrance of the lot as possible.”

  “Do better. I’m not sending some joker cruising the airport parking lot for hours, looking for a broken taillight.”

  “You ever been to Broome?”

  “No.”

  “You can cruise the whole town in five minutes, max.”

  “East Bumblefart,” she muttered. “Anything else?”

  Archer gave her a few more items, waited, and asked, “What do you want from me?”

  “The betting is that you know all about Len McGarry’s background.”

  “Until seven years ago, yes.”

  “Okay, slick. Listen up. Uncle never heard of Len McGarry.”

  Archer grunted. That wasn’t good news. “Especially in the past seven years?”

  “You catch on. Make damn certain no one else does.”

  “Yeah, folk
s get really testy when friends spy on friends.”

  She muttered something in Chinese, which made Archer wish that his sister-in-law Lianne was along to translate.

  “Slick,” April said, “you sit down at a table where China, Japan, and Australia are playing pearl poker, and you can count your friends on your cock. McGarry was a loser, but he was a useful loser. Sometimes. Most of the time he was just a hemorrhoid. He took money from everyone at the table and some who weren’t. He was a player without a handler.”

  Nothing new there, Archer thought. Len had never liked taking anyone’s orders, no matter how compelling the reason.

  “What does Uncle say?” Archer asked.

  “We know French Tahiti’s pearl farms are getting raped by international pirates—mostly Chinese businessmen in league with the triads. We’re not crying. The French told the world to go to hell when they nuked that atoll. Now we’re returning the favor.”

  “Just so I don’t accidentally eat Uncle’s lunch,” he said, “all you’re interested in is keeping Len’s past quiet?”

  April hesitated.

  Shit. But what Archer said aloud was, “Right?”

  “I’ll get back to you on that.”

  “Don’t wait until a postmortem.”

  “You planning on killing someone?”

  “I’m planning on staying alive. Pass the good word.”

  “I will.” She hesitated, sighed, and stuck her neck out. “Don’t turn your back on anyone. Anyone. Pearls in general, and unique black pearls in particular, have become a very valuable bargaining chip at certain international tables. That could change in a week, a month, or a year. Until it does, there are some fairly lethal folks out there playing pearl poker.”

  “Does Uncle favor any of the players?”

  “So far, we’re just kibitzing.”

  “Let me know if that changes.”

  “I hope it doesn’t, slick. Odds are we wouldn’t be on the same side.”

  Archer wondered if the U.S. favored China, Japan, or Australia in the black pearl free-for-all. But there was no point in asking. April had already said more than he had expected her to. More than she should have.

  “Thanks,” he said simply. “When this is over, I’ll arrange a tour of the Tang jade collection, if you’re interested.”

  “Am I breathing?”

  He laughed.

  “Stay alive, slick. I dream of seeing Wen Tang’s jade.”

  “There it is,” Hannah said, pointing.

  Crouching on his heels, Archer ran his fingertips very lightly over the bent metal that once had been the door to the biggest pearl-sorting shed. Though the sun had long since fallen off the hazy western edge of the horizon, the metal was still hot.

  He set down his backpack, opened it, and took out the small flashlight again. An intense beam of light leaped out, sweeping over the metal like a second noon. Holding the light almost parallel to the warped door, he examined the salt-stained steel.

  “What are you looking for?” Hannah asked.

  “Tool marks.”

  Anxiously she glanced over her shoulder. No one was nearby. No one was walking toward them. The ocean lay in shades of black with molten silver highlights. A fugitive moon winked between pillars of clouds. Fitful fingers of breeze combed water and land alike. The cooling air was silky, heady, laced with salt and the earthy scent of tidal flats bared by the retreating tide.

  Intent on the remains of the shed, Archer was aware of the heat and rushing night and silence, but he didn’t really notice it. He wouldn’t, unless something changed in a threatening way. With small, smooth motions, he shifted the light from the lock and door handle to what was left of the hinges.

  Between one heartbeat and the next, the chemical heat of adrenaline slid silently into his blood, bringing his whole body to a heightened awareness. It was just a small flick of the adrenaline whip, nothing like he had known in the past, but it was very real. The echoes and memories it brought reminded him of everything he had tried to leave behind.

  “What is it?” Hannah asked, caught by Archer’s absolute stillness.

  “Looks like somebody went after the hinges with a hammer and chisel.”

  Swiftly she crouched beside him. The surface of the ruined door was like a road map of chaos—dents, scrapes, lines, gouges, pits, everything that a violent, debris-packed storm could do to metal.

  “How can you tell?” she asked. “The whole door is scratched and banged up.”

  “Storm damage is random, not symmetrical.”

  As Archer spoke, his long index finger traced the faint, repeated parallel gouges that radiated out from—or into—the top hinge. The marks of purposeful damage were repeated on the middle hinge, as well.

  Hannah shivered convulsively and stood up.

  Without standing, Archer looked at her pale, drawn face. “You’re certain that Len was inside the shed when the storm struck?”

  She nodded jerkily.

  “Alone?” he asked.

  Again the jerky nod.

  He watched her for a minute, wondering why the discovery of the marks had upset her. Earlier, when he had told her that someone had knifed Len and then rammed a fragment of oyster shell between his ribs to disguise the wound, she hadn’t shown much response. Maybe she had just been too tired.

  A soft breeze tugged at her hair and flattened the thin white tank top over her breasts and belly. She had changed from shorts to cutoff jeans. Her legs were racehorse-long, beautifully shaped, and bare. He wondered what she would do if he ran his palms up the back of her legs, over buttocks hugged by worn jeans, beneath the tank top to her shoulder blades, then slowly around to the high breasts that were as naked as his tongue beneath the tank top.

  With a silent curse Archer yanked his mind back to the business at hand. The steel door had buckled along the side, between the hinges. The damage could have come from a crowbar or from the storm itself, after some hinges had given way. He was betting on the crowbar. Once the door was pried partly open from the hinge side, the violent cyclone would do the rest.

  Absently Archer fingered the frayed wires of what had once been the door’s electronic lock.

  “Most electronic systems freeze in the locked position if the power goes out,” he said. “Is that the way the shed was set up?”

  “Yes.”

  “Is there a manual release on the inside?”

  “Yes.”

  “Did Len spend a lot of time alone in the sorting shed?”

  “Yes.”

  “Did everyone know it?”

  “Yes.”

  “Not much help there.”

  She didn’t respond.

  “Hannah.”

  Though Archer’s voice was soft, she flinched. Then she looked at his eyes and flinched again.

  “What’s the problem?” he asked. “You called me, I came, yet more often than not I feel like I’m opening oysters with my bare hands when I ask you questions.”

  Visibly she took a grip on herself. “I was all right before you came. I knew I had only myself, that I couldn’t let down. So I didn’t. But now . . . ”

  Archer knew that she hadn’t been all right. She had been running on nerve and adrenaline, headed for a big crash. Yet all he said was, “Want me to leave?”

  “No.” The reply was instant, certain.

  “Good. I wasn’t going to go even if you asked.”

  Startled, she stared at him. What she saw in the reflected glow of the flashlight both frightened and reassured her.

  “Len was murdered,” Archer said evenly. “I’m in this for the whole distance, with or without your help.”

  “I know,” she whispered. “I knew when you came back from Broome. You looked the way Len used to look. The way you look now. Deadly. But you’re sane and he wasn’t, not always. Not even most of the time.” She rubbed her hands over her arms. “God, I hope I did the right thing by calling you. I don’t want more death. I just want the Black Trinity.”

&nb
sp; “I’m not planning on Old Testament justice. The modern kind will do just fine.”

  Hannah’s long eyelashes swept down as she let out a breath in a relief she couldn’t hide.

  “But one way or the other, there will be justice,” Archer added softly. He stood and snapped off the flashlight. “Show me what’s left of the main shed.”

  Without a word she turned and walked back to the path leading down to the water. Crushed oyster shell crunched softly underfoot. He walked just behind her, trying not to notice the rhythmic, elementally sexy arc of her hips. He knew that she wasn’t swinging her ass for his benefit.

  You look the way Len used to look. Deadly.

  Archer didn’t need to ask how that made Hannah feel about him. She needed him, but she didn’t like it—or him—one bit. He didn’t really blame her. He was associated with the worst hours of her life, when Len had begun the transformation from a vital, virile husband to a bitter, crazy shell of a man.

  Hannah wouldn’t be the first one to shoot the bad-news messenger. Archer understood too well how she felt, nerve and resentment all tangled up, the child beneath the adult crying, I don’t want to go there! He had spent years trying to put his past where it belonged. Behind him. Coming here, seeing Hannah, seeing Len, brought it all back in savage clarity. He didn’t want to go there again.

  But there he was.

  The only thing he could do was wrap this mess up as soon as possible, then get out before all the sad, dark echoes of his past deafened him to the possibilities of the present. That had nearly happened once. He had nearly gone under, lured by the siren call of adrenaline and danger, until nothing was real but a world where treachery was the norm, multiple identities were the rule, and death was the sole judge of who won and who lost.

  Some people thrived on that life. He wasn’t one of them.

  But he had left Len mired in that brutal, covert world. He hadn’t been able to pull his half brother out until it was too late. Len had gone under, and Archer felt a guilt at escaping that was as irrational as it was powerful.

  “How much warning did you have before the storm?” he asked neutrally.

  Hannah’s steps hesitated, as though she was startled to find herself not alone. Or maybe it was the emotions she sensed battling just beneath Archer’s level voice that made her pause.