She shivered. "Not a pretty thought."
He climbed back up the ladder and she handed him the electrical tape.
"And you're sure this will work?" she asked, holding on to the sides of the ladder while he leaned over to splice two wires together. "This doesn’t look like any surveillance system I've ever seen."
"He started to laugh. "Forget Mission: Impossible and MacGyver," he said. And PAX, for that matter. "This is how it's done in the real world."
"Where will you hide the camera?"
"He pointed toward a Toulouse-Lautrec print on the window wall. "The frame is hollow. Rosie said we can carve a small hole in the woodgrain and hide it there."
"Won't that be obvious? I mean, a hole large enough to hold a camera . . . "
He held his thumb and index finger less than a quarter-inch apart. "See this?" She nodded. "That's all the space we need."
"For a movie camera?"
"For a movie camera."
"And you can film the whole room?"
"We can film the whole apartment, Joanna. We'll be adding additional cameras in each room. They'll all be hooked up into this master system." He explained how he would be monitoring the transmissions live from her apartment. She nodded but said nothing. "If you want out, Joanna, it's fine. This system can manage without you."
"The hell it can," she snapped back. "If Stanley comes back from his trip and realizes no one's living here, he won't do a damned thing. I'm just as important to this as you are, O'Neal, so you can take your male superiority and –"
"Whoa!" he said, laughing. "I said, the system can manage without you. The rest of the plan can't."
"Don't try to make amends. You put your foot in your mouth and I'm going to make sure it stays there for a while."
The fiercely determined look in her eyes stilled his laughter. "This could be dangerous, Joanna. I want to make sure you realize that."
She met his eyes head-on. "I realize it."
"We already know Stanley plays rough. You might get hurt."
"We've gone over that possibility before."
"You'll be in here by yourself each night. Anything can happen."
"I'm not afraid," she said. "I just want to help Rosie."
"It might be dangerous."
She grinned and snapped her fingers. "Danger is my middle name."
Joanna Stratton, he thought, where have you been all my life?
Chapter Sixteen
For the past three days, Ryder and Joanna had been setting the stage to lure Stanley Holt into Rosie's apartment and their trap. Thanks to a life mask, Joanna's makeup job had been perfected; her costume was ready; Ryder had wired and bugged every square inch of the place.
Tomorrow would be opening night.
Tonight, however, they had other things on their mind.
The lights were low in Ryder's bedroom. The quilt lay in a heap near the foot of the bed; two half-filled glasses of wine rested on the end table near the phone.
The air was heavy with the sweet smell of sex, and the only sound in the room was the sound of Ryder O'Neal and Joanna Stratton as they played a game of can-you-top-this.
"The Piazza de Mozzi," Joanna said, her voice muffled by his shoulder.
"Florence," Ryder said, stroking her hair. "Three times." He paused a moment. "Kongens Nytory."
"That's easy. Copenhagen. The statue of Christian V is there."
"Memorizing the Michelin Guide doesn't count," he said. "Firsthand experience only."
She poked him in the belly with her forefinger. "My mother's second husband had a home there. I spent two summers with them."
He tilted her face toward him. "No one place to call home?"
Something about the look in his eyes made her breath catch in her throat. "Oh, you know my story," she said, struggling to keep her tone light and breezy. The fact that she had shared so much of her life with him – in such a short period of time – still amazed her. "Always on the move. Cynthia's apartment was the closest I ever got to having a home. I guess I come from gypsy stock."
"Not me," he said, drawing her closer to his side. "My family is rooted in Nebraska soil."
Joanna's interest was immediately piqued. This was the first time Ryder had ever hinted at having a family. She was beginning to think he sprang from the same mysterious source as his pal, and Holland's, Alistair Chambers.
"If they're so firmly rooted," she said, "how did you end up a rolling stone?"
"I take after my father. He liked to get around."
In the gathering darkness, she couldn't see his face, but the tone of his voice told her he had said more than he'd planned. She remembered the night the story of Eddie's death had leaped, unbidden, to her lips. She remembered the way it had felt to finally rid herself of the truth.
"I'm a good listener," she said.
"Not much to listen to," he said, his mouth pressed against her hair. "My old man wasn't cut out for nine to five or a house filled with kids and wet sneakers. He took the next train out when I turned nine."
What had happened to his story of being to the manor born? "Hard to imagine a mansion filled with wet sneakers," she said. "What did the help think?"
He raised up on one elbow and she caught a glimpse of his face in the shadowy light. "No mansion, Joanna. Just a frame house on the corner of a rundown, middle-class street in Omaha, Nebraska."
His story about being one of the privileged classes had never quite jibed with the street-tough look in his eyes. "You had me fooled, Ryder."
"I know," he said softly. "I almost had myself fooled."
#
The words were out before he could censor them, and yet once he said them he was glad. He was getting tired of games and they were running out of time.
She gestured toward the opulent apartment around them. "This is a far cry from Omaha. How did you make the leap?"
How the hell was he going to balance his need to open up to her with his responsibility to PAX? "I met Alistair when I was nineteen," he said. "He opened up a whole new world to me."
"Computers?"
"Among other things."
"I have a million questions," she said.
He pulled her closer to him in the darkness. "I don't have a hell of a lot of answers, Joanna."
"Sometimes you scare me," she whispered. "Every time I think I understand who you are, I realize I don't know anything at all about you."
"You know everything that matters," he said, moving his lips against her. "You know how I feel."
"I don't ask for promises, Ryder. I don't believe in them."
"You can believe in me," he said, fool that he was. "You can believe I'll never hurt you." For a moment, he was about to forget about PAX and commitments that went far beyond his pitiful need for normalcy.
"I want to believe," she said softly. "This time I want to believe."
More than anything, so did he.
#
Last night had brought them closer; there was no doubt about it. Somehow the darkness and the wine and the accumulated pleasures found in working together had combined to knock down their individual barriers and underscore the seriousness of their growing, yet ultimately doomed, relationship.
Working with him as he set up the equipment there in Rosie's apartment, spending hour after hour talking and laughing while they worked – and while they made love – made Joanna realize just how cautious and cynical she'd allowed herself to become.
How could she have forgotten how splendid togetherness could be? Even the fact that happily-ever-after wasn't in the cards for them wasn't enough to dilute Joanna's joy. For the first time in years, she felt as if what she was doing mattered, that instead of catering to vanity and America's slavish devotion to beauty, she was actually using her talents for a greater purpose.
Combining her skills with Ryder's in order to help Rosie and the other elderly tenants in the Carillon was enough to make her overlook the danger she was in and savor every moment. She wondered how she could e
ver return to the superficial world of Hollywood illusion and Broadway glitter.
The blend of personal happiness and professional satisfaction she'd found these past few weeks was more than she'd ever dreamed.
And so was Ryder O'Neal. The fact that he seemed to enjoy her company as much when she was in full Rosie Callahan makeup as he did when she was herself, naked and willing and wrapped in his arms, was enough to win her cautious heart.
It was hard not to fall in love with a man like that, even if he did have the alarming habit of making telephone calls at odd hours of the night, muttering chemical formulae in his sleep and keeping two out of eight rooms in his apartment dead-bolted shut.
She readjusted the grayish-red wig on her head and arranged the curls on her forehead. Lovesickness, however, didn't keep her from wondering what lay beyond those locked doors.
Maybe private eyes stockpiled guns. Maybe he had filing cabinets crammed with photos of celebrities in compromising positions. Maybe his walls were lined with electronic bugging equipment that cost more than three Mercedes and a Porsche put together. Maybe –
Ryder tapped on the door to his bedroom where she had been changing. "Come on, Stratton. I want you out and visible before Stanley finishes his rounds."
Joanna pushed her crazy notions from her mind and stood up. This was it, then, her first time out as Rosie Callahan's double. Ryder's first impression would tell her everything.
"Come on in," she called. "I'm all ready."
He opened the door. "It's about time. If we don't get –" He stopped dead in his tracks and stared at her. "Son of a bitch."
She glanced at her reflection in the mirror. "Is that good or bad?"
He took her by the arm and led her over to the window where the noonday sun hit her full in the face.
"It's unbelievable," he said, lightly touching her forehead, her cheek. "If I didn't know better, I'd swear you were Rosie."
Joanna was always confident in her work, so the surge of pleasure his compliment afforded her came as a surprise. "Now let's hope Stanley falls for it."
She followed Ryder out into the living room where he handed her one of Rosie's voluminous fur coats.
"Okay," he said, leaning against the black lacquered table near the window, "let's run through it one more time."
"If Stanley is working on the broken stair near the mail room, I'm to pull my shopping cart by him, making sure he gets a good look at me."
"No matter what Stanley says, keep your mouth shut."
"That's not in character. If there's one thing you can be sure of, it's that Rosie Callahan never keeps her mouth shut."
"This isn't the Actors' Studio, Joanna, and you're not Rosie Callahan. Let Pacino worry about the Method. You just worry about getting to the store and back without tipping our hand.
"I'll try to manage that." Her tone was frosty.
"Sorry," he said. "But we only have a few more days to get the goods on him." Once Rosie was back, they would concentrate more on keeping Stanley out, not luring him in.
"He's going to try something today, Ryder. I can feel it. Stanley's a shrewd man. After that mess in the alleyway with his two pals, he's not about to take any unnecessary chances." The thought of catching that bastard in the act made her adrenaline surge, and she poked Ryder in the chest for emphasis. "He's been watching and waiting and, you mark my words, he's ready to strike."
Adding another layer of black mascara to a starlet's eyelashes had never provided excitement like this.
"This is really getting to you, isn't it, Joanna?" His hazel eyes, rich with gold and green highlights, sparkled in the sun.
"I was born to this life, Ryder. I couldn't wait to get back from the studio and get to work." She gave him a hug, then laughed as he sneezed from Rosie's flowery perfume. "Do you think the CIA is looking for a few good women?"
"I wouldn't know. It's been a while since the CIA and I have been on intimate terms."
"Just as well. I can't afford encumbrances. Spies have to travel light." She slipped on Rosie's coat and draped a scarf around her throat. "Sorry, Ryder, but from here on in, my clandestine activities will have to be top secret." She grinned as she headed toward the door. "You understand, don't you?"
#
Ryder understood. He understood too damned well.
Joanna had no idea how close she'd come to the basic conflict of his existence these past few months. Trying to figure out how to balance a real life with a professional life that was predicated on subversion and secrecy.
In the scheme of things, what he was doing to Rosie Callahan was not about to change the world. Governments wouldn't rise or fall depending on the outcome; global safety wouldn't be ensured for future generations.
All that would happen was one elderly woman would secure the right to a peaceful life in her own apartment.
Not the stuff of which headlines are made.
But the pleasure Ryder felt working side by side with Joanna on something they both believed important, surpassed the adrenaline rush of excitement he got out in the field. For a woman with no experience in this kind of work, Joanna was enthusiastic, fearless and, most important, exceptionally talented.
He'd seen the life mask of Rosie from which she'd patterned her latex-and-foam disguise. He'd watched as she applied the potions and paints and shadows that gave it life and dimension. He'd stared as she turned into Rosie Callahan right before his eyes.
He also knew the type of courage it took for her to place herself in jeopardy as she was doing. Stanley was capable of violence; her experience in the alleyway proved that. He would never forget the sight of Joanna in her Kathryn disguise trading punches with that punk Stanley had hired to rough up Rosie.
What wouldn't it be like to work side by side with a woman like that, a woman who gave as good as she got, who had more courage in her little finger than most men had when they packed an Uzi in their briefcase. To be able to share the ins and outs of a profession understood by no one but those already in it –
"Forget it," he said out loud. He wasn't one for impossible dreams and the dream of a future with Joanna Stratton seemed the most impossible one of all. She needed security and honesty and stability, all the things he couldn't possibly give.
In a few weeks when they each moved on to the next thing in their lives, he'd look back on this and take bittersweet satisfaction from the fact that, at least once in his life, he did the right thing.
Alistair had been right all along. PAX was in his blood and in his bones; his work with them was the right and natural extension of the skills with which he'd been blessed. To turn away from what he could accomplish with the organization was to turn away from the one thing he'd always been proud of: his involvement with protecting the innocent.
Even during his period of wild self-indulgence when he cavalierly dismissed Valerie's love, his work had remained constant, the one truly valuable thing he was capable of.
He knew that now.
But it wasn't enough. He wanted more. He wanted everything else good that life had to offer and he wanted to share all of it with Joanna.
He'd make no impossible promises, he'd raise no false hopes, especially not his own. What he did to Valerie Parker, he would never do to Joanna.
If anyone's heart broke, let it be his.
#
The tension was driving Joanna insane.
"How do you do it?" she said as Ryder fiddled with the contrast on one of the monitors providing a full view of Rosie's apartment. "I can't take much more of this."
Two hours had gone by since she had slipped back into Ryder's apartment via a seldom used delivery entrance, taken off her Rosie disguise and gone up to her mother's place. Not once had Ryder budged from his spot in front of the five monitors set up on her mother's prize rosewood table.
"It's only four o'clock," Ryder said, leaning back in his seat and grabbing for another slice of pizza. "Stanley knows Rosie never gets home before six."
"All the more reaso
n for him to do something now. Why risk getting caught?"
"Still think detective work is glamorous?" He offered her a bite of his pepperoni but she shook her head.
"How can you think of food right now? We should be coming up with an alternative plan."
"We have the best plan available right now," he said in a tone so reasonable she wanted to smack him over the head with the empty pizza carton. "We've set the trap and now all we have to do is wait."
Joanna, however, was sick of waiting. She wanted action. "Maybe we need to change the bait. I could get back into costume and –"
"Forget it," Ryder said. "We're not going to run the risk of another mugging. Let's give this a shot, Joanna. Then we'll start talking of alternatives."
"Maybe you have the patience to sit there staring at a TV screen all night, but I don't. If something doesn't happen soon, I'll just go downstairs to Stanley's apartment and –"
"Shh!" Ryder grabbed her wrist and pulled her near him. "Look."
He directed her attention to the first monitor that covered the foyer of Rosie's apartment. Unbelievably, Joanna heard the sound of a key in the lock and she watched as the door swung open and Stanley Holt stepped inside.
A whoop of excitement rose up from nowhere and she battled to keep it trapped behind her teeth. Stanley was just on the other side of the wall; if she gave things away now, all of their work would be in vain.
"My God," she whispered as Stanley double-locked the door behind him from the inside. "Look how cool he is."
"Practice," Ryder said quietly. "The bastard's had a lot of it."
As Joanna watched in fascination, Stanley strolled casually through the foyer and into the kitchen where he first helped himself to a banana, then polished off the rest of a box of Godiva chocolates Rosie had been storing in her refrigerator.
"That proves Rosie's story about the missing steaks," Ryder said, jotting something down in a small notebook.
Watching Stanley, so calm, so casual, as he violated Rosie's privacy, put Joanna into a rage. She had to jam her fists into her pants pockets to keep from punching a hole in the adjoining wall as she followed his progress through Rosie's apartment.
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