by Zoe Chant
"Now, Tara, you know I'm not going to indulge your delusions. You should come home so we can get all this cleared up, for your father's sake if nothing else. This whole thing is taking a toll on his health, you know."
Was that a threat against her father? She didn't believe Dick would move openly to hurt him, at least not yet, not without a good reason. But maybe she was giving him a reason. Maybe her plan was only going to get her father hurt or killed.
Axl's hand squeezed hers again. She steadied her nerves.
"Dick, I know you hired people to kill me. I know because I've been talking to them."
Dick laughed, but she thought there was a nervous note in it. "That's ridiculous."
"Really? Do the names Fred and Frank Weezer mean anything to you?"
"Who have you been talking to?" His voice was sharper now.
"I told you, I talked to the Weezers. Actually, to be clear, I paid them a large sum of money to leave me alone. More than you paid them to hurt me."
"Where on Earth did you get that kind of money?" he snapped.
"You think I left without taking anything with me? My father is rich, Dick. Unfortunately I gave most of it to the Weezers, which got them off my back, but now I'd like to make a deal."
"Are you ... blackmailing me?" He sounded incredulous, as well he might. The prey had turned into the hunter now.
"Of course not. If you come and talk to me, I won't have the Weezers talk to Dad, or to the police. I think that would be a really interesting conversation, don't you?" Gripping Axl's hand, she reiterated, "I want to talk to you in person."
"Fine. We can meet near my office—"
"No," she said. "I'm not coming within a thousand miles of New York. You're going to fly out where I am. Just you. No hitmen. If I get even a hint I'm not safe, I'm out of here and you'll never find me 'til the story of Dick Bannon, embezzler and murderer, hits the papers."
"You can't tell me what to do." His voice was low and furious. Still, she noticed how careful he was being not to say anything incriminating, just in case she was recording the call. This might be harder than she'd thought.
"I'm not giving you orders, Dick. I'm merely offering a mutually beneficial business arrangement. I think we can settle this like grownups if we meet face to face. And then I'll disappear and you'll never have to worry about me again."
To her surprise he agreed, a little too easily. She gave him the details of the nearest major airport to Pinerock County. "I'll text you with the meeting place when you arrive. It's going to be a bit of a drive, I'm afraid. But I don't want to give you any ideas about setting up a surprise for me."
"Oh no," Dick said. He sounded cheerful again, but it was tightly controlled. "No surprises. We'll settle this like grownups, just like you said. And hopefully soon you'll see reason."
She hung up without saying goodbye, and sagged into Axl.
"I hate this," he muttered, smoothing down her hair. "It's much too fucking dangerous. He's going to try something, you know."
"I know. I'm counting on it. We just have to make sure he doesn't have a chance to set up any ambushes."
And now here she was at Marge's Diner. She'd texted Dick with instructions to a different town in Pinerock County, then texted him again with the real instructions, and now she sat with her heart trying to claw its way out of her chest.
Axl is here. He won't let anything happen to me.
And Cody was stationed down the road, in a parked truck where he could see the diner, while Remy was hanging out near the crossroads. They were prepared to alert Axl and Tara if any suspicious strangers rolled into town, so the whole thing could be called off. She wasn't sure where Alec was, if he was helping Axl or if he'd simply washed his hands of the whole affair.
She watched the clock. Had time itself slowed down? A minute crawled past, then another.
They'd picked 3 p.m. for the meet, because it would allow Dick ample time to get there, as well as being the dead time of the afternoon when few customers would be in the place. Right now, the only other person besides Tara was a bearded trucker who had greeted Sammie by name and was currently eating a Marge's Special All-Day Breakfast in the corner.
Her phone vibrated. It was a brand new one Axl had bought for her this morning, since she hadn't been keeping a phone with her on the road from fear it could be traced. Now her new phone had a new text on it, from Remy. Rental car just turned at the crossroads. Guy in it matches your description of Dick. He's alone.
It looked like Dick was playing it straight so far, at least.
What if he isn't willing to play along with my script at all? So far, she had been envisioning all the worst-case scenarios of Dick going full-fledged Snidely Whiplash: showing up with a car full of thugs, hiring a sniper to shoot her through the window, planting a bomb in the diner. Now she found herself imagining a disaster of a completely different sort. What if Dick pulled out the same "nice guy" routine that he'd used to convince her father that she was a hysterical female who was trying to pin a heinous crime on poor old him? What if she went to all this trouble, and all she managed to record was Dick being polite and conciliatory and asking her to come home?
In that case, she'd just have to goad him into admitting the truth. No matter what it took.
Text from Cody: Rental car turning into parking lot.
Tara swallowed and reached into her pocket, turning on the recorder. Her hands were wet. She wiped them on her jeans.
Outside, a car door slammed. A figure approached the door. The bell jingled.
Showtime.
It was very weird to see Dick Bannon step into Marge's Diner. He looked exactly like she remembered him, thinning hair and slight potbelly and all. He was dressed in a brand new, stylishly cut suit. I see you spared no expense to meet your potential murder victim, she thought.
Her stomach was flipping over and over, butterflies doing somersaults inside. Good thing she hadn't tried to eat the burger after all.
Dick's cool gaze scanned the diner quickly, and screeched to a halt on Tara. She met his gaze with what she hoped was more calm than she felt.
He strode briskly in her direction, and stopped at the table. "Tara, thank God you're all right," he said, his voice warm and filled with relief. It was completely at odds with his eyes, which were cold as ice. Reptile's eyes. How had she never noticed that before?
"Cut the bullshit," she said. "Sit down. I'm here to talk business."
Dick eyed her. He seemed surprised, as well he might, she thought. She never would have talked to him like that in the old days, especially not in front of her father, and she was rarely around Dick without her father being present.
But things were different now. She was different now.
Dick pulled out a chair and sat. "Long time, Tara."
"Yes," she said. "It's been a long time." Months, which might as well have been years, severing her from her old life like a guillotine.
Sammie Jo bustled out of the back, tying the strings of a fresh apron around her plump body and grabbing up a coffeepot and menu from the stand by the counter. "Coffee, sir?" she asked Dick, brisk and professional as if she didn't know either one of them, but her eyes flickered sideways to Tara.
Tara had worried about giving herself away, but she'd never thought of Sammie. She kept her eyes forward. Sammie got the hint and broke eye contact.
Dick, fortunately, was not looking at Sammie. He wasn't the kind of person who noticed waitstaff. He turned his cup upright for Sammie to fill, and accepted the menu with a polite nod, but he didn't open it. As Sammie left, with a last glance over her shoulder, Dick ran a fingertip over the menu's plastic edge.
"You've given your father a lot of heartbreak, Tara Malloy."
"You and I both know who broke his heart, and it wasn't me." She had to fight not to touch her hand to her pocket, to feel the reassuring tiny weight of the recorder there.
Axl, I hope you're getting all this.
"And there you go with your delusions a
gain. We can help you, Tara, if you'll just come home." He reached across the table and made an attempt to pat her hand. She jerked out of his reach; she'd sooner stick her hand into a pile of manure.
"Give it up, Dick. I talked to the Weezers, remember? I know you hired them, and I know what you hired them to do. Want me to refresh your memory?"
"Good help is so hard to find these days," Dick said icily, and the tight ball in her stomach unclenched a little. He wasn't going to deny it after all. Now she just had to get him to admit everything, without tipping him off she was doing it.
"Well, that's the problem with hired thugs, Dick. They're in it for the money, so if someone pays them more, you just lost your thugs, and gained some rather damaging witnesses against you."
"As if you're an expert," he sneered.
Don't get him angry too soon. Her natural inclination was to sneer back, answering rage for rage, but she tamped herself down. Instead she pretended she was in a board meeting with a difficult client. While studying for her MBA, she'd taken classes that taught, among other things, assertive and open body language for use in a business setting, and she'd tried to take it to heart. There were many ways to lead people's emotional responses by using subtle body language to establish a rapport and draw them out.
She had no idea how responsive Dick would be, though, or what might set him off and put her life in danger. It was like trying to charm a cobra.
However, she did her best, leaning forward and opening up her body language. As soon as Dick had walked in, she'd automatically huddled in on herself, shoulders hunching without even noticing it. Now she made herself aware of her body's posture, straightening her shoulders and setting her arms on the table to either side of her untouched plate. I am confident and assertive, this position said. I am not hiding anything.
"You're here to talk business, aren't you?" she said. "Let's not get sidetracked."
"What you call business, I call blackmail. I'm sure your father will be devastated to hear that his daughter has moved on from embezzlement to extortion."
She forced herself not to react except by raising her eyebrows. "You're going to tell my father that I tried to blackmail you over hiring hitmen to kill me? Don't you think that's going to raise a few awkward questions?"
She could see she'd scored a hit. He was bluffing, trying to use her father as a bludgeon against her. He had no intention of reporting this conversation to anyone, because the fact that he'd dropped everything to fly out and meet her—without telling her father—was as good as an admission of guilt.
"Here's the deal, Dick. We both know I'm innocent. You stole all that money from my family's company and set me up for it, and then tried to take me out to stop me from talking about it. Are you denying any of that?"
He didn't say anything. However, lack of denial was not quite the same as an admission of guilt.
"So the question is, what's it worth to you to keep me quiet?"
Now he snorted. "And you expect me to believe a one-time payment is going to shut you up? Better to shut you up permanently."
Her stomach climbed into her throat. But she couldn't believe he would attack her in a public place, in front of witnesses, even if no one was close enough to hear—the bearded trucker, Sammie wiping down tables while unobtrusively trying to watch.
And Axl was getting every word of this.
She hoped.
"Like you tried to shut me up back in New York?" Okay, now she was getting mad, thinking about it. "What did you put in my tea that night, anyway? I thought it tasted funny."
"Sleeping pills." He smiled a cold, crooked smile. "I guess you didn't drink it."
"No, which is why I was still awake when Fred Weezer tried to smother me in my bed. How'd he get into the house without getting caught on the security cameras?" Actually she had a pretty good guess about this, but she wanted to make Dick say it for the recording. And he didn't disappoint.
"I helped your father set up that security system. I know where all the blind spots are."
"Was it really just to stop me from going to trial? You must have been very confident that I could bring you down if I got on the witness stand, if you were willing to take such a huge risk."
"Not confident at all, but I wasn't about to risk it. There was always the chance your father was going to believe you over me."
"So tell me, Dick, since we're being honest with each other now." She leaned forward, inviting his confidence, and was pleased to see him unconsciously leaning forward too. "When did you come up with the plan to frame me? It couldn't have been at the beginning. From what I saw of your fancy footwork on the account books, you'd been siphoning off money from M&M for a long time."
His smile was thin. "Not from the beginning, no. You were the one who forced my hand, dear. I never would have had to do anything if you hadn't shown up and started poking your nose into things. Your father is such a trusting idiot that I could've kept taking my cut right under his nose for as long as I wanted. When I got tired of fleecing the fool, I'd take early retirement and skip off to buy myself a private island."
"It must have really cheesed you off when I got involved, huh?"
"Oh, you have no idea," Dick said with ice in his voice. "Which is why I'm looking forward to this so much."
One of his hands moved, subtly, in his lap. Tara tilted her head to see around the little café table, and her stomach went cold. There was a small gun in his lap, pointed at her midsection.
"You think just because I flew out here, I wouldn't come armed? There are guns for sale here too, you know, and there's nothing like a thick roll of bills to grease the wheels of commerce."
"I didn't think shooting people was your style," she said, her heart racing triple-time. Come on, Axl, make your move! "You're more the kind who stabs people in the back."
"Do you really think you're in a position to make threats, sweetheart?"
"She might not be," said a voice from the door leading into the diner's kitchen. "But I sure as hell am."
Axl!
Tara looked up quickly. Axl was hulking behind the counter, looking furious. And there was someone shocking beside him—the very last person she would have expected to see in Pinerock County.
"Dad?" she gasped.
Her father stepped forward. Although he was not a large man, fury made him seem to tower. "Every word Tara told me about you was true. You've been stealing from me. You framed my daughter for your crimes. You tried to kill her!"
"Dick Bannon," Axl began, his voice a snarl. "You're under arrest for attempted murder and embezzlement—"
"You think so?" Dick demanded. He pushed aside the lightweight café table, sending it skidding across the linoleum and revealing the gun. His eyes were wild; sweat beaded his forehead. "I've got a hostage here. Tara and I are just going to walk out together. Isn't that right, Tara?"
Tara sat frozen. Would he shoot me in front of all these people? In front of Dad and a cop? But she was very much afraid he would. He was about to lose everything, and he was enough of a rat bastard to take her down with him.
"Don't move a muscle, Bannon!" Axl bellowed. When Tara risked a glance at him, he had his service weapon out, pointing at Dick. Everyone else in the diner—the other patron, Sammie Jo, her father—were statue-still in shock. "If you make another move toward her, you're a dead man!"
Tara didn't wait to see what Dick would do next. While his attention was on Axl, she lashed out with a foot and clipped the leg of his chair. It didn't fall over, but it did tilt him off balance.
Axl didn't shoot him. Instead he lunged, shifting as he went, leaving a trail of shed clothing. His gun clattered to the floor. He was impossibly fast and impossibly huge, and before Dick could recover, the bear was on him. Grizzly paws the size of platters, each tipped with claws as large as kitchen knives, pressed him flat to the floor.
The diner's door burst open, and two more grizzlies charged in: Cody and Remy. Pressed to the floor like a field mouse surrounded by cats, D
ick stared in round-eyed horror at the ring of huge bears clustered around him.
One of the bears—it was midway between the other two in color, so Tara was pretty sure it was Cody—planted a big foot on top of Dick's gun hand. Gun and all vanished under the massive grizzly paw.
Axl shifted back, crouching naked on top of Dick with his knee pressed into in Dick's stomach. "Now you're under arrest. Someone get my handcuffs?"
Tara sagged back in her chair. The next thing she knew, she was engulfed in Axl's strong arms, swept out of her chair and crushed against his chest. She clung back, not caring that he was naked in front of a room full of people. The reaction was starting to set in, and she shook in every limb.
"You were amazing," he whispered into her hair.
"I should have listened when you said it was dangerous." She couldn't believe she'd just had a gun pointed at her. It didn't seem real.
"Yeah, but thanks to you, we've got all we need to put this jerk away for a long time." He looked contemptuously down at Dick.
Footsteps crossed the room. Tara looked up, expecting her father, but instead it was another person she hadn't expected to see—Alec, carrying Axl's handcuffs that he'd retrieved from the floor. As the only one of the clan who hadn't shifted, he was still fully dressed in his work pants and a Carhartt jacket.
"I didn't know you were here," Tara said, amazed.
"He's the one who got your dad," Axl told her. Giving his brother a narrow-eyed look, he added, "Didn't mention anything to me, either. Called him, went and picked him up from the airport, all without a word to any of us."
"Really?" Tara said in surprise. She slid out of Axl's arms, and held out a hand to Alec. "Thank you."
Alec hesitated, then shook it. His big hand engulfed her small one.
Her father approached the little gathering with evident nervousness. He was dwarfed by the enormous bear shifters. "He called me yesterday and told me what was happening. If I wanted to be here for your meeting with Dick, he said I should buy the next ticket out of JFK." His face fell. "Honey, I'm so sorry. I can't believe I took his word over yours. Can you forgive me?"