by Marie Jermy
The Liberty Penthouse Suite.
And now he noticed the bustle of activity beyond the open bedroom door. The place was crawling with cops and white-suited CSIs.
“The cut was superficial and not particularly deep, but with that knot in your skull, the EMTs who examined you recommended you go to hospital,” Anderson explained. “But I just knew the minute you regained consciousness you’d check yourself out and come straight back here. When they left, I thought I’d close that cut up myself with that laser pen of yours, but I couldn’t find it. However,” he continued, taking a Beretta from his belt and tossing it onto the bed beside Scott, “I did find this. Care to explain what it was doing in the lining of your case?”
Scott ignored the question for the time being, more intent on patting, stroking, and scratching Archie’s ears as he jumped back into his lap again. “Leia?”
“No sign. Yet.”
Scott merely nodded. “Archie, you okay?”
One woof.
Yes.
“I had to call the vet in because he wouldn’t leave your side. He’d been drugged with a strong sedative but shouldn’t suffer any long-term damage. In fact, he was just coming to when I arrived and found you.”
Scott checked his watch. It was now almost dawn. He distinctly remembered it had been half-past-ten when he and Leia had made love out on the balcony. Then he’d been knocked on the head and well into the next century. “What time did you call me?”
“Midnight. I got here about half an hour later. Back to my original question.”
So he’d been out of it for almost eight hours in total. Damn! All that time wasted. “You can’t exactly hide a gun in a shaving kit.”
Anderson’s gaze turned up toward the dangling spotlights. “No, I don’t suppose you can.” He turned back to Scott and regarded him with a steady eye. “I know what’s been going on here at this hotel. Professor Rogers. You. McNulty’s been very forthcoming with his confession. Not that it was all his own doing. He never wanted any part of it but was forced to by none other than Charles Williamson. Apparently, they were frat friends at Yale. But anyway, Williamson threatened McNulty, saying it was either do what he wanted or receive a bullet to the brain. The man was terrified. Still is.”
Again, Scott merely nodded, Anderson only confirming what he already guessed had happened.
“Although McNulty’s been charged, I’m going to recommend he be entered into Witness Protection and placed into a safe house until his trial.”
“Let him go.”
Anderson’s dark brows drew together to form a frown of surprise. “What?”
“I’m not pressing charges against him,” Scott clarified. “But by all means put him in Witness Protection. Good luck with it, though. You’re dealing with a dead felon here.”
“No need to remind me. Do you want to know the reason why Williamson did it?”
“I think I can guess. Laura.”
“Exactly. McNulty said, and I quote, ‘Charles wanted revenge on the man who fucked his wife in life and in death.’ Not that he understood the last part. But I do.”
Scott refrained from passing comment and instead asked, “And Lavengro? I will be pressing charges against that pond slime.”
“Exercising his right to silence. Not that it matters. We’ve got his laptop and the CDs of every guest he recorded. I’ve seen yours. You and Leia put on quite a show.”
“Glad you were entertained.”
One dark brow rose. “You’ve fallen in love with her.” It was a statement, not a question.
“Hard and fast. I don’t even know when—” Scott broke off, and a beaming smile emerged. “Oh, yes, I do. It was the best caramel macchiato I’ve ever wasted.”
The brow rose higher. “You were the ignorant schmuck who threw coffee over Leia?”
“And what exactly are you going to do about it?” Scott challenged.
Anderson refused to take the bait and again glanced up at the spotlights before allowing his gaze to drift around the room and the other cameras that had since been removed. “Care to explain why Professor Rogers came to you and not the police?”
Scott swung his legs off the bed onto the floor and gingerly stood up. His spinning head took a turn for the worst before slowing into a manageable pivot. The throbbing pain was bearable. Just. He glanced down at Archie, who now sat to attention at his side, looking up at him, a sad expression on his doggy face. That wiped his beaming smile clean off. “Because he’s a shape-shifter.”
Anderson snapped his attention back to Scott, however, before he could comment, Travis poked an ashen-face around the door. “What’s happened, Mike? You look like you’ve just seen a ghost.”
“I think I have.” Travis stepped farther into the room. “I’ve just been in the security room, trawling though this evening’s camera footage of the hotel’s public areas.” He paused to rub a hand over his chin. “Er, the cameras in the parking garage show, um…Well, they show Miss Howard being dumped into the trunk of an Aston Martin, personalized plates of—”
“Was she struggling?” Scott interjected. “Screaming or shouting?”
“No. Limp as a rag doll.”
Black fury engulfed Scott, and he balled his fists. He cut a glittering glance at Anderson, who even with his balls of steel stepped back. Gut instinct told him who, but his voice a mere growl, he asked anyway. “Who took her?”
Travis hesitated. “Er, Charles Williamson. And I swear not only was he hovering, but I could see right through him. There’s no such things, but I don’t know what other explanation there is. It was Williamson’s ghost that I saw.”
“Yeah, and I believe Santa Claus exists, too.” Scott gave a derisive snort to cover up the fact that Williamson’s ghost was exactly what the officer had seen.
Anderson knew it, too, and jumped in with a plausible explanation. “Williamson obviously faked his suicide. Mike, grab some help from Olsen and Slater and check all the traffic cameras in the area. I want to know precisely where Williamson’s taken Miss Howard.”
“Ross, I mean, sir.” Travis bobbed his head and left the room.
“Considering what I experienced at the hands of a ghost,” Anderson said to Scott, “this is gonna sound like a real half-assed question, but can they actually drive?”
“They can do anything they put their dead mind to.”
So as well as being a pompous prick, a murderer, and a dead man, Williamson had added kidnapping to his résumé. Why was Scott not surprised? The fury inside blackened further as he uncurled his fists and snatched the Beretta from the bed, keenly aware of Anderson watching him as he checked it over.
He knew exactly what Anderson was thinking. Nobody, however, was going to stop him from doing something he should have done when Williamson fired the fatal shot that ended Laura’s life. And nobody was going to help him with bringing his Leia home safe and sound. Well, unless that somebody had four legs and a tail.
A few silent and heavy seconds ticked by, then, “Scott, if you want to talk, then I’ll listen.”
Surprised, Scott turned around. Obviously, he’d been mistaken with Anderson’s train of thought. He would have laughed if he’d found it funny. “Look, Ross, you don’t like me any more than I like you, so let’s cut with the sympathy crap.”
“I’m just suggesting you talk to someone.”
“I’m pissed, not fucking suicidal!”
“My mistake,” Anderson sneered, actually squaring up to Scott. But then he blew out a breath and relaxed his stance. “Actually, I do like you. Not in that way you understand. Scott, you saved my life, and that’s something I’ll never forget. I regard you as a good friend and one who I admire and respect.”
Even more surprised than he had been seconds earlier, Scott blinked before cracking his shark-like grin. “Not in that way either, but I like you, too. And I was actually gonna come to you with this. I knew that shape-shifter or not, you wouldn’t stand for this crap. Even knew that you’d keep Professor Rog
ers out of it altogether, and it would be just me as the victim.”
Anderson returned the grin. “Right, now that we’ve cleared that up, does Leia know about the Federation? You moron!” he berated when Scott said nothing. “If you love her like you say you do, then you should tell her. Everything. No secrets.”
“Well, when I find her, I will.”
“Do you know where Williamson has taken her?”
“No,” Scott lied. He knew exactly where. All he had to do was find his boots and get away from Anderson. He looked down at Archie, who seemed to know that a plan of action was called for and started pawing at his leg and whining. “I’m going to take Archie for a walk. Clear my head, as well.”
“You’ve got twenty minutes. Then you’re coming back to the precinct with me.”
For one long moment, Scott regarded Anderson. Did he have an inkling of what he had planned? Or where he was going? He saw nothing. Locating his boots out on the balcony, he then left the suite, Archie stuck to his side like glue. Archie wanted to help. Fine by him. He had no intention of leaving the dog behind anyway.
Chaos reigned in the hotel’s lobby with a mixture of guests, staff, police, and reporters. A good thing, Scott decided, because it meant he and Archie could slip away unnoticed. And because speed was of the essence, when the officer’s back was turned, they made off with his squad car.
Chapter 9
Charles Williamson paced, or rather hovered, the corridors of his former mansion on Staten Island. His suicide plan had been brought forward, and he was furious. Furious with Alan McNulty. Furious with Scott Rafferty.
McNulty was a pinstriped dead man. All he had to do was blackmail Rafferty as instructed. But, oh no, the moment “Mr. Scott Walker aka Rafferty and lady companion” checked in, his so-called backbone had disappeared, and he’d dissolved into the yellow sac of sweat that he was.
And as for Rafferty...well, not only had he betrayed him by bedding his wife, Laura, behind his back, but he’d enlisted the help of a blind woman to screw him in front of the cameras. How low could a man sink? Didn’t he have no decency? No shame?
Williamson sank through the floor into the living room. On the sofa, dressed in an oversized T-shirt, the woman he’d snatched from the hotel suite was still unconscious. He would have felt sorry for her if she didn’t have Rafferty’s stench all over her. It reminded him of all the times Laura had returned home smelling the same. How he’d hated her and forgiven her for it.
There would be no forgiveness for Rafferty. Death, he knew, however, was too quick, too easy. He cast the woman one final glance and then floated through the wall, his dead mind forming a new plan of revenge. One that would give Rafferty a lifetime of suffering and pain.
* * * *
One by one, Leia’s four senses kicked into life, and she opened her eyes. As was normal, she only saw blackness, but her ears picked up the squeak of wood, a window shutter blowing in the wind maybe. Her nose picked up the smell of mothballs. And in her mouth, the bitter taste of fear. She lay on something firm but soft—a sofa?—and there was scratchy cloth under her fingers.
She swallowed past the dry lump in her throat and sat up, swinging her legs in front of her to rest her bare feet on the hardwood floor. Since she had no idea where she was, she remained seated. She tugged the hem of Scott’s T-shirt over her knees to ward off the chill. Wherever she was hadn’t been used for a very long time.
Various explanations of what had happened whizzed through her mind, but only one stood out—the “Federation” was somehow involved. Leia had already concluded that the Federation was some sort of organization and that Scott worked for them. But firstly, what kind of organization? And secondly, and more importantly, what had Scott done to warrant her kidnap?
She pondered on question one first. That dream of hers was a massive clue to its answer, and she deduced the Federation was an organization that dealt with the undead. Sam Carrick was a vampire. As was Henry Pakefield. Scott himself had been attacked by a werewolf. Then there were those ghosts she’d sensed at the office. And, of course, her kidnapper. It had definitely been a man, but he sure hadn’t been alive.
Now for question two. Hmm, a difficult one, Leia decided. Unless, of course, Scott had made an enemy of her ghostly kidnapper. Had Scott arrested him in the past for crimes allegedly committed, and he’d vowed vengeance? Or had Scott been involved in the events leading up to his death, even been the one to pull the trigger as such? A ghost out for revenge was stretching the imagination. But at that point, particularly with what had happened and what she believed in, anything was possible.
Goose bumps crawled over her skin as an icy and evil presence sailed past her right side. It was her kidnapper. Who was he? Or rather, who had he been? Silence reigned, and not wanting to speak first, Leia followed the ghost with her blank and unresponsive eyes as he continued to drift back and forth in front of her.
The minutes ticked by, and then a gruff voice said, “Blind, yet you seem to know exactly where I am. Very astute, my dear.”
No way was she going to accept what could be considered as a compliment made by a patronizing ghost. Instead, she asked, “How did you die?”
“Who says I’m dead?”
“You really expect me to grace that question with an answer?”
There was a bark of evil laughter. “Suicide. I slashed my wrists last night. Are you afraid of me?”
This time, there was no way she was going to admit she was scared witless. “No.”
“You should be.”
Leia failed miserably at hiding a deep shudder. “Who are you?”
“My name is Charles Williamson. Ever heard of me?”
The name did ring a bell. For a moment, Leia couldn’t think why, but then it came to her. “The former senator? As in the former Senator Charles Williamson who shot his wife, Laura, and is now serving a life sentence for her…” She trailed off. Laura? Scott’s murdered lover was called Laura.
Laura was married. To a selfish and overbearing bastard who didn’t love her or deserve her. So, no, we didn’t make a life together. All we had was eight years of snatched moments, and then he put a bullet in her head because she finally found the courage to ask for a divorce.
Her hand drifted to her mouth in shock.
“Ah, the penny’s dropped. Yes, Laura was my wife, and that bastard Rafferty took her from me.”
“No!” she spat, a surge of anger overtaking her fear. “You took Laura from Scott when you murdered her in cold blood.”
There was a tense silence, then, “No matter. It’s time to even the score.”
“What do you mean?” she asked, her voice quavering, the fear returning as quickly as it disappeared.
“I’m going to give Rafferty a lifetime of misery and pain. And you, my dear, play a central part.”
Okay, that didn’t sound good.
“My original plan was to kill you. But that would be too easy, too quick. So, I’m going to snap your spine in two instead. With you in a wheelchair for the rest of your life and Rafferty knowing he could have prevented it, my unfinished business will be complete. Serves the bastard right for sleeping with my wife, don’t you think?”
No, definitely not good. In fact, it was freaking terrifying. She wrapped her arms around her waist as a violent shudder ran through her. But then a familiar dark, forbidden, and compelling voice slid into her ears, calming her and alleviating her fear.
Archie’s fine. He’s outside waiting for you.
Momentarily closing her eyes, Leia exhaled a silent breath of relief. How typically thoughtful of Scott to inform her of Archie’s well-being instead of his own. Not that she didn’t want to know about Scott. However, she knew from his composed yet determined tone that he was okay. What do you want me to do?
Tell that pompous prick that what he’s done is against Federation law. The punishment is vaporization.
This was it. The secret of the Federation was about to be revealed. She sat up straighter
and adopted a poker face. “What you’ve done, kidnapping me, threatening my life, is against Federation law. Punishment is vaporization.”
“What do you know about the Federation?” Williamson asked, sounding taken aback.
“Everything,” Leia answered, reciting Scott’s words. “I’m not only the secretary for Magnum Investigations, but the Federation, as well. I work alongside Scott, scheduling his meetings with new members he has recruited. Sometimes even taking his place at those meetings.”
“Impossible!”
“Then how do I know that the Federation is a highly-classified global organization that protects ghosts, vampires, werewolves, witches, and so on, and if necessary, eliminates them should they use their powers for immoral gain? But then you should know that, too. You were Director of the North American Division before Scott.”
Leia’s poker face slipped then. So, she’d been right about the Federation. And not only was everything she believed in protected or eliminated—vaporized?—if they broke the law, but Scott was their leader as such. As Henry Pakefield had said: the Main Man.
Silence had descended and she could almost hear the whirring of Williamson’s dead brain cells. The poker face slipped back into place and she continued with reciting what Scott told her. “And how else do I know that that Professor Rogers is a shape-shifter?” She’d known something had been wrong with Rogers’ aura, but never would you have guessed that. “You knew that, too. And you used him just as you used Alan McNulty.”
Several more seconds ticked by, then, “My dear, what an active imagination you have.”
The arrogance in the tone, like Williamson was addressing a small child, pissed her right off. “Scott? Please vaporize this pompous prick.”
“My pleasure.”
Leia had a vague idea what “vaporization” entailed, but what she didn’t expect was a blast of intense white light—so bright she threw her hands up to shield her face—a kaleidoscope of rainbow colors and then… Her hands dropped. She blinked furiously, not believing what she was seeing—actually seeing!