Guarded Moments
Page 21
“I want to see her open the safe.”
Tasha inhaled deeply. She willed the trembling in her hands to stop. Brown was on their side. He would help them. That was why he had no record with Interpol. He was an undercover cop.
She wished she could communicate with David and inform him that they were almost home free. But she needed to concentrate on the safe. When she placed her sensitive fingertips on the cool metal, she felt the secrets of the lock. Though she knew the combination from the numbers that Henning had given her, she approached Jezebel with respect.
The dial twisted stubbornly in her fingers and she turned clockwise, then counter, then clockwise again. When she touched the last number, nineteen, there was no click. It didn’t feel right.
She grasped the handle. It wouldn’t turn. Something was wrong! Henning had not given her the correct combination. Or perhaps she hadn’t remembered the right numbers.
Spinning the dial, she tried the combination again.
“I knew she couldn’t do it,” Green said. “Get the thermal lance. We’ll have to cut through.”
“Wait,” Tasha said. “Give me one more try.”
She closed her eyes. Lightly she turned to the first number Henning had given her. She felt the tiniest resistance. That number was correct. The second, third and fourth were also exact. The problem was the last digit.
Easing past the nineteen, every fiber of her being focused on her sense of touch. Twenty. Twenty-one. Twenty-two. At twenty-nine, she felt the click. In her mind, she could see the lock opening.
She gripped the brass handle and turned. Stiffly, it turned in her hand. The safe was open.
Tension flowed from her, and she reached inside, grasping a black velvet case. She lifted the lid, and her eyes beheld the red fire of rubies. She couldn’t resist touching the necklace, holding the priceless treasure that had been stained by the blood of beautiful women.
A familiar voice cut through the silence in the vault. “How very skillful you are, Miss Lancer.” A British accent and a Scotsman’s burr. “What a remarkable talent!”
Inspector Henning stepped through the opening. He held a sawed-off shotgun in his hands. “Don’t reach for your gun, Mr. Green. You’ll be dead in an instant. Besides, I believe you’ll be most interested in what I have to say.”
“I’ll never deal with—”
“Shut up, Green.” He nodded to the others. “Hello, Cerise. You have done well. It’s most gratifying to finally meet you in my true identity.”
“What are you saying?” Cerise demanded.
“Come here, luv. Reach inside my outer suit coat pocket.”
Cerise did as she was ordered, extracting a passport.
“Now read the name,” Inspector Henning ordered.
“Charles Jacob Black.” She gasped. “My God, you’re Mr. Black.”
“Indeed, I am. And you three are privileged to be in attendance at my swan song. This will be my last job as the leader of Spectrum. It’s time for me to retire now. But I want the rubies to finance my old age.”
“What about my share?” Green snarled.
“I daresay there’s plenty to go around with what you have in those satchels. And it will only be a two-way split. Because one of you is a traitor.”
He leveled the shotgun at Brown. “You’ve worked four jobs for me. Twice I’ve had to directly manipulate the evidence so you wouldn’t be caught. I thought you were just sloppy, but it’s something more. You want to be caught. You’re a.cop.”
Henning unloaded both barrels of the shotgun. In the enclosed vault, the blast was deafening. Brown flew back against the wall. His blood spattered on Tasha.
“A terrible shame,” said Henning. “He was a genius with computers and electronics.”
“He got what he deserved,” Cerise said coldly. “Will we split the rest?”
“You’re not listening, dear. The rubies are mine. You and Green take what you have in the satchel. It’s a good haul. Now, get out.”
“I want my share of the rubies,” Green said.
“Be glad I’m allowing you any portion at all. I shan’t alert the police for another two hours. That should be sufficient time to make good your escape.”
“But I want—”
“My finger grows tired on this trigger. Don’t test me.”
Henning stepped aside so they could leave. Then he turned his attention to Tasha. “You really are astonishing, Miss Lancer. I had thought you wouldn’t be able to open the safe. That way, Green would have killed you and saved me the trouble.”
“You don’t want to kill me.” Tasha rose from the floor. Playing for time, she fastened the Sheikh’s Rubies around her throat, knowing the stones would dazzle him. “You’ve always been fond of me, Henning. Admit it.”
“You know I can’t leave witnesses. Are you trying to enchant me?”
“Like Aziza and the sheikh,” she purred.
“What a liar you are!”
“I’m the most honest of women. I’m willing to admit that I find wealthy men more attractive than bums. You’re rich, Henning. And powerful.”
Cruelly, Henning turned the gun on David who had wakened enough to force himself into a standing posture. “And what if I kill him first? Would you be so willing to come with me?”
“David?” Despite her racing heart, she kept her voice calm. “He means nothing to me. I was only using him to get at the rubies.”
She sidled up behind David. Her movements were graceful as a dance. “Poor David. He cares for me a lot. Maybe he even loves me.”
Peeking around him, she pretended to look up into his face. At the same time, she manipulated the latch on the handcuffs. She fumbled once. “If I really loved him, would I be hiding behind him? Would I let you shoot him first?”
David covered her actions with his own speech. “She’s a liar and a thief, Henning.”
“Precisely,” he murmured. “That is what I find so intriguing about her.”
Tasha unfastened the cuffs.
Gracefully, she slipped out from behind David and approached the inspector. “You’re a powerful man, Henning. Wealthy as the sheikh. Let me be your best wife. Like Aziza. I promise to make you happy. And if I displease you, you may chop off my head.”
“Quite tempting, luv. But I haven’t come this far to be tricked by a woman.”
Rudely, he pushed her away from him and she fell to the floor.
In the instant Henning took one hand off the shotgun, David reached into his trouser pocket.
Henning sensed the movement. He wheeled around.
But David was quicker. He fired three shots into Henning’s face.
As soon as the inspector hit the floor, David shouted to her. “Get his gun.”
Tasha moved fast.
From the other side of the wall, she saw Green coming through the small, chiseled entryway. His movements were cramped. He had to duck his head. She fired with the shotgun, and the recoil kicked her back against the wall.
She felt the world fading to darkness. The last thing she saw was David’s face.
NINE DAYS LATER, Tasha wakened in her bed. For the past week and a half, since she and David had dismembered the Spectrum gang, her life had been an idyll.
After she’d fallen in the vault, she sustained a slight concussion, enough that she was in the hospital for two days while David dealt with the police and the guards from Pola and Tweed. Every word he said checked out, including the discovery of a multimillion-dollar Swiss bank account that Henning had left to his club in London.
Once she and David were in the clear, Janet Pola had paid for the workmen who repaired the refrigerated unit in Bloom’s, and special order sales had been excellent. It seemed that there was nothing like a dose of notoriety to perk up business. Half of the people who ordered from Bloom’s wanted to hear the story from her own lips.
Each time Tasha repeated the events, they faded, finally becoming more myth than reality. It was only at night that she occasionally drea
med of Brown, Green and Henning, all dead. They haunted her from the grave. When they crept up upon her, she turned to David in her sleep. His presence comforted her and protected her from the nightmares.
This morning, he sat at the edge of her bed with a mug of coffee. “You’re awake,” he said.
Lazily, she gazed into his gentle gray eyes. He was already showered and shaved and groomed to perfection in a white shirt and navy blue striped tie.
“Are you really this handsome?” she wondered. “Or is it me?”
“It’s you,” he said.
Though she wished their time together would never end, Tasha was well aware that today was the final day on his contract. They hadn’t spoken about his leaving. Each time David mentioned the time slipping by, she shook her head and refused to listen.
Tasha knew that she loved him. She didn’t want to face losing him.
“There’s something we need to talk about,” he said.
“Hush, David.”
“Tasha, we can’t avoid it any longer.”
“I know what today is,” she said. “I know what’s going to happen. I just don’t want to—”
The telephone on her bedside table rang, and she pounced on it, grateful for the interruption. “Hello?”
“Hi, sis.”
Tasha pushed herself up on the bed. “Stacey? Is that you?”
“I’m the one who should be asking all the questions. I can’t believe you single-handedly rounded up the most dangerous thieves in the world.”
“Not single-handed.”
“But it was Spectrum! I can’t believe it. What happened to you? You were always the quiet one.”
“Even a mouse can roar,” Tasha said. “Where are you?”
“Rio,” she said lightly. “I’ve been on a cruise with the most adorable man. That’s why it took me so long to call.”
“Do you remember when we did the magic act on a cruise ship to pay for our passage to Europe?”
“God, that was a long time ago. Seems like another lifetime.”
“Yes,” Tasha agreed. “It was.”
“But tell me about you. I’d heard that Spectrum was planning a move on the Sheikh’s Rubies.”
“And, I’ll bet, you also heard that they were working with you—the infamous Stacey Lancer.”
“I’m sorry,” she said without the tiniest hint of contrition. “Maybe I should have come out there to help you. But I just met this guy. Besides, I sent a bodyguard.”
“You hired the bodyguard?” Somehow, Tasha wasn’t totally surprised.
“How did he work out?”
“Better than you would believe, Stacey.”
“So? Tell me the whole thing.”
Tasha sipped her coffee and recited her story while her sister was uncharacteristically silent. “And that’s it. Henning was Mr. Black.”
“I really and truly am sorry,” Stacey said. “You’ve been through hell. Do you forgive me?”
Indulgently, Tasha replied, “How could I not? You’re my twin. We were hatched from the same egg. But, Stacey, I worry about you.”
“Don’t. I’m having a wonderful life.”
“When are you going to be in touch again?”
“It might be soon. I think this gentleman is going to propose marriage. And he’s rich enough to support me in the manner to which I am accustomed.”
“You’re getting married?”
“It’s not so hard to believe, is it? Your biological alarm clock must be going off, too.”
Tasha looked up at David. It was strange that she and her twin sister had fallen in love at the same moment. Though worlds apart in terms of life-style, they really weren’t all that different. “Let me know, Stacey, if you make a decision. I want to dance at your wedding.”
“Bye, sis. Take care.”
Tasha hung up the telephone. Her happiness for Stacey was bittersweet, tinged with her own sorrow that David was leaving. She took his hand and lifted it to her lips for a light kiss. “All right, David. I guess I can’t put this off any longer. We should talk.”
“You know that I love you, Tasha.”
“Yes, I know.” But love wouldn’t stop him from leaving. She also knew that.
He dug into his trouser’s pocket, wincing as he touched the bandage dressing on his thigh.
“Here,” he said, placing a small, black velvet box into her hands.
Tasha gasped.
The three-carat, marquise-cut diamond from Pola and Tweed sparkled in a platinum setting. The gemstone caught and held the morning light, taking on a life of its own “David, this is beautiful. But it’s much too expensive.”
“I can afford it. Don’t get practical on me.”
“All right. I won’t.” Tasha slipped the ring on her fourth finger, left hand. A perfect fit.
“Tasha, will you marry me?”
“And be your wife? And live with you forever and ever?” She stroked his cheek. The shimmer of her engagement ring paled in comparison to the brilliant love that shone from his eyes.
“Yes, David.”
When they kissed, she experienced the most perfect moment of fulfillment. Finally, she’d gotten her just reward.
eISBN 978-14592-7590-4
GUARDED MOMENTS
Copyright © 1996 by Kay Bergstrom
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All characters in this book have no existence outside the Imagination of the author and have no relation whatsoever to anyone bearing the same name or names. They are not even distantly inspired by any individual known or unknown to the author, and all incidents are pure Invention.
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Table of Contents
Cover Page
Table of Contents
Excerpt
Dear Reader
Dedication
CAST OF CHARACTERS
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Copyright