by Anne Woodard
Maggie felt her heart skip a beat. They hadn’t come across information about a cabin before.
“I don’t know where it is, though,” the woman admitted. “He only mentioned it once. Well, actually, I overheard him mention in on the phone. He might have gone there, and if it helps you find Tina…”
Rick’s earnest thanks eased the doubt in her eyes. Maggie could feel her rather wistful stare follow Rick all the way out of the office. With the promise of another lead to Jerelski in hand, she managed not to let it annoy her.
“Funny,” Maggie said once they were out of earshot. “I didn’t know you were such a lady’s man.”
That came out with a little more bite than she’d intended, but he didn’t seem to notice.
“I’m not,” Rick said.
All trace of the good-natured, smiling charm he’d used on the secretary had vanished. In its place was an unfamiliar, forbidding grimness that hardened the already strong lines of his face. Clearly, Jerelski’s sudden absence worried him as much as it did her.
“It’s what we in academia call a basic survival skill,” he continued. “You either learn how to get on the good side of the admin folk, or you spend the rest of your career scrambling to catch up.”
“Ah! It must work. I didn’t know about any cabin for Jerelski. That might be handy.”
Something in his eyes went bleak and hollow.
“Only if we can find it.”
“Now we know it exists, we’ll find it. You can count on it.”
But would they find it in time? Or would they just be wasting their time when they should be looking for Tina in some other direction?
“Have you been there?” he asked. “To Jerelski’s house, I mean?”
She shook her head, grateful to be back on safe ground. It annoyed her that she could be so easily distracted. It annoyed her even more that the secretary’s obvious interest in him should have gotten under her skin like that. This was a job, she reminded herself. Rick Dornier was part of it, that’s all.
And she would do well to remember it.
“I’ve driven past it,” she said. “But that’s all. Coffee shop employees don’t generally get invited to dinner by senior university professors. We’ve watched the place a couple of times, when we thought there might be something going down, but we never saw anyone or anything suspicious. We didn’t really expect to,” she admitted. “Jerelski’s too smart to conduct any illegal business out of his home.”
“How about his business?”
“All he’s got here is one of those warehouse spaces in a business complex at the edge of town. The stuff comes into West Coast ports on container ships, then the containers get off-loaded onto trucks and brought here, where Jerelski’s people break them down into smaller orders for shipping all over the country.”
He gave a soft curse. “That must be convenient.”
“For Jerelski,” Maggie agreed dryly. “Customs have made a point of inspecting some of those containers when they hit port, but…” She shrugged. “So far, nothing. It’s all been legitimate art imports, so far as they can tell. Which isn’t that unusual. There’s millions of tons of stuff in millions of containers that come through those ports every year. We could triple the number of customs inspectors and drug-sniffing dogs and it still wouldn’t be enough to catch everything coming into this country illegally.”
They were almost to the truck—visitor parking on campus was always a half mile from any place you really wanted to be—when Rick stopped suddenly. So suddenly a student on a bicycle behind them almost ran them over.
The bicyclist muttered something unfriendly as he swung around them, but Rick’s only reaction was to grab Maggie’s arm and pull her off the path, out of the way.
“What?” Maggie demanded, irritably tugging her arm free. Every time he touched her, something inside her jumped. This morning in the kitchen had been bad enough, but to be affected by him this easily, when she was supposed to be concentrating on her job, not him.
“You’ve been looking for drugs,” he said, his face suddenly alight with eagerness. “But have you been looking for anything else?”
“Anything else?” Maggie gaped. “Like what?”
“Art,” he said. “Stolen art. Did you ever look for that?”
“Customs does. All the time. But—”
He glanced around quickly, then pulled her farther away from the path and anyone who might overhear them.
“I just remembered,” he said. “The last time Tina was home, she was talking about how big the trafficking in stolen art has become. Billions of dollars a year, she said.”
Maggie nodded. “That’s right. But it’s mostly European art. Old Masters type stuff. And pre-Columbian art from Central and South America, I guess. But we don’t generally run into that stuff in the DEA.” She shrugged. “The kind of people who traffic in drugs tend to spend their money on fancy cars and expensive jewelry, not paintings they can’t hang on their walls.”
“Tina said the trade in stolen art from Asia was growing. Fast.”
“I don’t know about fast,” Maggie said, “but you’re right, it is growing. We just haven’t seen any of that around here. Though if we did…”
“Jerelski would be the perfect candidate,” Rick finished for her.
“Yeah, he would,” she agreed thoughtfully.
“If Tina was going to stumble over anything crooked, it’s more likely to be stolen art than illegal drugs.”
She frowned, considering the ramifications of what he’d just suggested. It made sense. But where to start looking? And how?
“Let’s get your truck,” she said. “I need to make a few calls while we’re headed to Jerelski’s.”
Jerelski wasn’t at home.
They hadn’t expected to find him there, but figured they had to check, anyway.
He wasn’t at his place of business, either.
Maggie stared at the door with the words Imports, Ltd. painted on it. There wasn’t anything else. No business hours, no description of what Imports, Ltd. did. Nothing.
She’d rung the bell. Twice. If anyone was at the back of the building, they weren’t interested in answering.
Rick was peering in the dusty front window, his hands cupped around his eyes to block the sun. The wind ruffled his hair, which was in need of trimming, and the stance dragged his jacket up in the back, giving her a great view of a nicely curved masculine rump and long, masculine legs in well-worn jeans.
She had a sudden sharp mental image of him in her kitchen that morning, his skin still damp from the shower, with his hair uncombed and those worn-out sweats riding enticingly low on his hips.
Deep inside her, muscles tightened involuntarily. Then he shifted a little, angling for a better view, and her breath caught as they tightened again, more demanding this time.
Maggie wrenched her gaze back to the front door. It wasn’t any more informative than it’d been two minutes ago, but at least it didn’t drag her thoughts down dangerously unprofessional paths.
“Nothing much there,” Rick reported, straightening. “A cheap desk, three chairs, a two-drawer filing cabinet, a fax and a phone. There are some papers in an in-box on the desk. Look like invoices from here, but I can’t really tell.”
“That’s it?” To her, her voice sounded a little high and tight, but he didn’t seem to notice.
Instead, he nodded. “If Jerelski’s into customer service, it’s long distance. There’s a door through to the back, but it’s closed.”
They’d circled the building when they drove in. The back was nothing but a long stretch of painted concrete block wall broken at regular intervals with windowless industrial-size garage doors and the windowless regular doors beside them. One door at the far end was open, revealing a couple of vans with Bradley Carpet Cleaning, We Do It Right! painted on the sides.
The only way they’d been able to tell which pair of doors belonged to Imports, Ltd. was by counting. If there was anything of interest in
the warehouse area, they would have to try a little more breaking and entering to find it. Maggie had no trouble imagining what Bursey or her boss would say if they did.
“You folks looking for something?”
Maggie spun around to find a gray-haired man eyeing them with suspicion. Mentally, she gave herself a good, swift kick for not being more alert.
“Oh, hi!” she said brightly. “We were looking for Professor Jerelski. Have you seen him?”
The man’s expression hardened. “Not lately. What do you want with him?”
The way he said “him” made the pronoun sound like a vulgarity.
“My sister’s one of his student assistants,” Rick said. He extended his hand. “I’m Rick Dornier. My sister’s name is Tina. She’s been missing for a couple of weeks and we’re trying to find out where she’s gone. We were hoping that Dr. Jerelski might have seen her.”
The man hesitated, then seemed to decide Rick’s direct approach was acceptable, for he thawed visibly.
“Sam Ferguson,” he said, shaking Rick’s proffered hand. “I run the cabinet shop two doors down.” He turned toward Maggie. “And you are…?”
“Maggie Mann.” Maggie extended her hand. “I work at the Cuppa Joe’s downtown.”
That worked even better. The man actually smiled as he shook her hand. “Good place. My wife and I like to drop in for a cup every now and then.”
“I’m helping Rick track down his sister. You don’t know her by any chance? Tina Dornier? Dark haired, slender, a little shorter than me?”
Sam frowned thoughtfully. “Maybe. I’ve seen a young woman like that here a time or two, but I’ve never talked to her.” His frown deepened. “I’d suggest you talk to Shana, who ran the place, but Jerelski fired her last week.”
She and Rick exchanged looks. “Fired her? Why?”
“Don’t know. She came in crying to tell my wife about it. Really shook her, coming out of the blue like that. Jerelski sails in, hands her six weeks’ pay in cash and tells her to clear out, just like that. No apology and no explanation. Didn’t make sense, either, because she said they were expecting a shipment of that ugly junk he sells, and she always took care of that sort of stuff. Shana was sharp. A real good worker. I’d have offered her a job myself if I could have afforded it, so why would he fire her just when he was expecting more stuff to arrive?”
Maggie tried to keep the rising excitement out of her voice as she asked, “Do you have a number where we could contact her?”
He shook his head. “She went back to Chicago to see her family. I told her I’d help her find another job when she got back, but that won’t be for a couple of weeks.”
“Oh.” Rick looked as disappointed as she felt.
“Well, if she comes back early, or you can think of anything that might help us, would you mind calling us?” Rick handed him another one of his business cards with her cell phone number written on it.
Sam glanced at the card, then frowned again. “Dr. Dornier? You a real doctor, or just another college professor?”
“Just another professor, I’m afraid.” A smile tugged at the corner of Rick’s mouth. “Wildlife biologist, Montana. I study grizzly bears.”
It was amazing how even a small smile like that could light up his face, Maggie thought.
Not that it mattered, she reminded herself sternly. Once Tina Dornier was found and they’d grabbed Jerelski and his people, her job was done. Her boss would drag her back to Washington and the next job, and that would be that. Rick would probably forget her five minutes after she was gone.
If they found Tina safe, that is. If anything happened to his sister, he would probably never forgive her.
Not that that mattered, either. Stupid to think, even for a moment, that it did. She had her job, work that was important. Work that made a difference. That was what counted. She owed it to Greg to stay focused.
“Grizzly bears, huh?” Sam said, dragging her attention back to the present. He calmly pocketed the card. “Well, if you’ve got a bear gun, you could do me a favor and shoot Jerelski. He’d deserve it, treating a nice young girl like Shana that way.”
Chapter 9
M aggie was looking grim by the time they got back in the truck. Rick wasn’t feeling any happier.
He stuck the key in the ignition, but instead of starting the truck, he crossed his arms on top of the steering wheel and stared out at nothing. His shoulders and arms ached with pent-up tension. It felt as if the weight of the world were pressing down on them.
The weight of the world would have been easier to bear than the weight of all the doubts he had.
“I don’t like the way things are shaping up,” he said. He had to force the words out through a throat gone dry and tight.
“I don’t, either,” Maggie said. “Things are connecting way too neatly.”
That brought him around. “Too neatly? What in hell’s neat about this mess?”
She ticked the points off on her fingers. “First, Tina is seen with a man nobody knows at a place nobody expects her to be, and then she disappears. Within a week, Jerelski is expecting a shipment of something, fires the woman who’d normally receive it and then doesn’t show up at the college when everyone there expects him to. His house is shuttered, his business closed and he is no place to be found. There’s a possibility that he owns a mountain cabin, but the department secretary doesn’t know where and neither the DEA nor the police have ever come across any trace of it. Which is suspicious in itself.”
“Suspicious? Why?”
“Because the police and my people have been looking. If there were any property registered in his name in the state besides the house he lives in, we’d know it. But we haven’t come across a hint of it. But even if it exists, we may have a hard time finding it.”
“The secretary could be wrong.”
“Sure. But I don’t think she is.” A muscle in Maggie’s jaw jumped. “Listing property under assumed names or dummy companies is a common way for drug dealers to hide their operations and their profits.”
“And people,” said Rick, trying to ignore the fear that had been churning in the pit of his stomach ever since Maggie had found his sister’s reference book that morning.
“Yes,” Maggie agreed grimly. “And people.”
“That house this morning—”
“Could be Jerelski’s. It could just as easily belong to someone else entirely.”
“And if it’s not his?”
Her eyes mirrored his own doubts. “If it’s not his, then things are even more complicated than they look. And from where I sit, they looked pretty darned complicated.”
“They also might be a whole lot simpler,” Rick objected. Not because he really believed it, but because he didn’t want to believe that Tina’s disappearance had anything to do with Jerelski or Jerelski’s dirty business. “Tina’s disappearing like this really might be nothing more than a wild fling.”
Maggie didn’t dignify that with a response.
“And that man Tina was seen with… If he were associated with Jerelski, your people would know, right?”
Her eyes darkened. “Not necessarily.”
That wasn’t the answer he’d wanted to hear.
Rick curled his hands around the steering wheel so tightly his nails bit into his palms. This time last week he’d been in Glacier National Park, checking on some of his bears’ favorite feeding grounds to see what food was available to them in these last weeks before they went into hibernation.
Seven days, that was all. Only two since his mother had finally broken down and called to tell him of Tina’s disappearance.
It seemed an eternity.
Tina had been missing for over two weeks.
“If only I’d gotten to know her better.” The words slipped out before he could stop them. Until now, he’d never known how much guilt could attach to the simple words, “if only.”
“I should have made more of an effort,” he added, remorseless in his sel
f-blame. “I should have gotten to know her friends, paid more attention to her, to her life. If I had, maybe she’d have called me when all this trouble started. I would have come, but she didn’t know that. Maybe she wouldn’t have disappeared if she’d felt like she had a brother she could rely on, someone who would help her when she needed it.”
“Maybe.” Maggie let out her breath in an edgy, frustrated sigh. “And maybe not. Even brothers and sisters who grow up together don’t tell each other everything. I know all about that, remember?”
He glanced at her and found he couldn’t look away. Her beautiful green eyes had narrowed, turned darker, more challenging. Her square chin was set rock hard; her too-wide mouth was just as firm.
But all that was a facade. Underneath, she was hurting. She’d tallied up the same mistakes and should-haves that he had, and she’d come up with the same gut-wrenching regrets.
Maggie Manion knew all about guilt and the pain that went with it. The only difference was, she’d been all the way to the end of that particular road, and she’d lived with the knowledge ever since.
He hoped to God he never had to come any closer than he was right now.
Something of his thoughts must have shown in his face because her eyes narrowed even further—with concern this time—and she leaned closer. So close he could smell the lingering floral fragrance of shampoo in her hair.
Again his fingers tightened around the steering wheel, but this time it was to keep him from running them through those tangled curls, or smoothing the worried wrinkles from her brow, then tracing the fine, strong lines of her face.
He wanted to touch her, suddenly. Wanted to hold her close and kiss her.
He desperately wanted to kiss her, and because now was not the time and this was not the place, he deliberately looked away, instead.
“Don’t waste time beating yourself up for what might have been, Rick,” she said. “You can’t change the past.”
“You’re still trying.”
That made her flinch. “Which just proves I know what I’m talking about.”