The Agent

by Herkness, Nancy

  The head groom had pointed out a couple of their hunter-jumpers to him, so he headed for those stalls. Several horses put their glossy heads over their stall doors, following him with dark, liquid eyes.

  “Sorry, fellows, no horse treats tonight,” Tully said. “This is strictly business.”

  He found the horse he’d had in mind, a big bay gelding named Samson. Tully didn’t ride light, so he needed a good-sized mount. Stroking Samson’s nose, he hooked a lead line on him and led him out into the corridor. Tacking him up at high speed, he tested the security of the girth. Guessing his neighbors would also be hunter-jumpers, he snapped the extra lead lines on their halters and brought them with him. Unhitching Samson, he slid open the big barn door just enough to get his equine entourage outside.

  He swung onto Samson’s back, holding his mount’s reins in his right hand and the other horses’ lead lines in his left. Horses were herd animals, so they should follow Samson without too much coaxing on Tully’s part.

  He hoped.

  He turned the big Thoroughbred’s head toward the gravel road that led between the pastures to Van Houten’s house and urged him to a brisk trot.

  “Leland, are you seeing a horse’s head and some fields in the cam?” Leland had his side of the mic muted for Tully’s protection, so the vest vibrated on Tully’s shoulder in two short bursts, the signal for yes. “Good. Make sure it’s recording once I get onto the estate.” Another double vibration of agreement.

  For the few minutes it took to get close to the estate’s perimeter, Tully allowed himself to revel in the feeling of his body and the horse’s being in perfect sync, moving through the moonlight as one swift, powerful creature. He vowed to get out riding more often.

  Tully veered off the road along the pasture’s fence line, the two other horses obediently trotting along behind him. When he reached the vulnerable spot in Van Houten’s hedge, he dismounted and unhooked the lead lines from the two extra horses.

  “Okay, fellows, I need you to provide a little distraction for me.” Holding firmly to Samson’s reins, he smacked one of the horses on the butt. “Now get out of here.” He flapped his arms and the horse shied away, taking off at a canter. Tully smacked the other one, who followed his buddy.

  He leaped back on Samson and took him up to the hedge to show him it was there. Then he trotted back several yards and dug his heels into the horse’s flanks. “Let’s go, buddy.”

  The Thoroughbred sailed over the hedge with about a foot to spare. “You are a champ,” Tully said, bending to lie almost along Samson’s neck and patting his shoulder. Exhilaration surged through him as he guided Samson through the manicured scattering of trees and shrubs at a ground-eating canter.

  It took only a couple of minutes before he heard shouting. The loose horses must have been spotted, which meant he probably had been too. Hopefully, no one would shoot at one of Van Houten’s expensive Thoroughbreds.

  He urged Samson into a gallop as the trees grew sparser and the mansion came into view. A voice rose from his left. “Hey, stop now! Stop or I’ll shoot!” The guard must be able to see a rider on the horse.

  Tully hugged Samson’s neck more tightly and kept going, heading for an overgrown clump of rhododendrons near the side of the house.

  “Stop!” Anger edged the voice, and then two gunshots sounded.

  Samson shied sideways but Tully was prepared for a reaction, so he managed to stay on with an iron grip of his legs. He turned the frightened horse’s head back in the right direction when another shot rang out that he swore he could hear whistle past him. He cursed under his breath. He’d feel like hell if Samson got hurt.

  But a different voice yelled, “Don’t shoot the horse, you idiot! It’s worth a fortune and the boss will take it out of your pay.”

  Tully had started to smile when a hulking shape on the back lawn caught his eye.

  A spasm of fear walloped him when he realized it was a helicopter. If Van Houten got in the air with Regina and Natalie, it would be almost impossible to stop him.

  Tully wrenched Samson to a stop behind the bushes. While he stripped off the saddle and bridle to keep the horse from getting tangled in the tack, he spoke softly into the vest mic. “Leland, there’s a helicopter sitting on the back lawn. That moves up our timetable. Get the police chief on the phone and tell him to use local air traffic control to stop that chopper from getting off the ground.” A double vibration came in response.

  Tully turned Samson toward the front of the house and smacked the horse on the rear. By this time, Samson’s inborn taste for speed had taken over his equine brain, so he shot off like a rocket. Catching him would keep the guards busy for a while.

  The helicopter meant Tully had no time for stealth or subtlety. He raced to the mansion, shimmied up a few feet of sturdy copper drain spout to reach a dark first-floor window, and used the hilt of his knife to smash the leaded glass. He was surprised when no alarms went off as he unlatched the window, swung it open, and hauled himself into what turned out to be a library, with fully loaded bookcases rising up two floors. Given all the activity at the house, Van Houten must have decided not to risk setting off an alarm and drawing the police.

  Another shudder of fear ran through him at the further evidence that Regina’s husband was in a rush. He needed to find Natalie before Van Houten decided he didn’t need her anymore.

  Chapter 19

  Natalie awakened to pain and confusion as Dobs Van Houten’s blurred face hovered over her.

  “Let’s just make sure you stay awake.” He backhanded her across the face so the pain exploded again. She tasted salt and metal as blood flowed from her cheek where he’d slammed it against her teeth.

  She cried out and brought her hands up to shield her face, baffled to find them stuck together so she looked more like she was praying than defending herself.

  Dobs’s face disappeared. “Get her on her feet,” his voice said as she stared up at an unfamiliar ceiling with ornate plaster ornamentation.

  A scary-looking man in a dark suit loomed over her and grabbed her shoulders to jerk her into a sitting position. “Stand up,” he commanded.

  She tried but her knees felt like rubber and she couldn’t separate her hands for balance. She staggered and sat back down hard on the sofa she’d been lying on. “I can’t,” she whimpered, fighting the fog wrapped around her brain.

  Where was she? And how did she get here?

  “You! Help Vince get her moving,” Dobs said. “My wife wants to make sure this bitch is all right. Untie her hands too. Don’t want to upset Mrs. Van Houten. She’s carrying my child.” Pride oozed from his words.

  Regina was here? This had to be Dobs’s house . . . mansion. Why would Regina come here?

  The scary man named Vince yanked at her wrists so they came apart, and she realized that they’d been tied together with the nylon rope Vince tossed on the floor. He took her elbow and jerked her to her feet, setting off a wave of nausea that she swallowed hard to quell.

  “Take her other arm. I don’t want her falling down. Mrs. Van Houten might not like that,” he growled at his assistant.

  With a large, frightening man on each side of her, Natalie staggered forward through a large formal living room toward a set of double doors, one of which stood open.

  She pushed the tendrils of fog out of her brain, trying to think coherently while her cheek throbbed from Dobs’s slap. She’d been at her house. Now she was here, feeling woozy. Probably drugged but that didn’t matter. What was important was that Regina was here. Synapses fired in her brain, and hope fluttered to life.

  Leland must know Regina was here, so Tully would know Regina was here. She just had to keep Dobs from doing whatever he was planning to do until help arrived. Because she knew in her bones that Tully would come.

  Stall.

  “I feel sick,” she said, letting her weight sag against her captors. “I think I’m going to throw up.”

  Vince cursed. “The boss won’t l
ike her puking on his fancy carpet. Let’s get her to the bathroom.”

  They lifted her so that her feet barely touched the ground and hustled her out the door and partway down a hall, where they thrust her into a powder room.

  “Spew fast,” Vince said, backing out but leaving the door open. “The boss don’t like to wait.”

  Natalie lowered herself to her knees in front of the toilet and made herself gag. That was enough to kick the nausea into gear and she retched with dry heaves a couple of times before something came up.

  “Where the fuck is she?” Dobs’s angry shout jabbed at her eardrums.

  “Puking up her guts,” Vince said.

  “Get her out as soon as she’s done,” Dobs grumbled.

  Her stomach spasmed a few more times, emptying its contents and burning her throat and the cut inside her mouth with bile. She added as many fake dry heaves as she thought she could get away with before she flushed the toilet and dragged herself upright by holding on to the marble sink.

  “You done?” Vince started back into the bathroom.

  “Please let me rinse my mouth,” Natalie begged, wiping her lips with the back of her hand.

  Dobs’s goon wrinkled his nose at the smell. “Do it quick.”

  She turned on the cold water and cupped her hands under it, bringing handfuls to her mouth to swish and spit out. Then she splashed the chilly water on her face, hoping it would sharpen her mind even more. Yanking the elegant hand towel embroidered with a swirling VH from the towel ring, she blotted her face gently, although she still hissed with pain when she touched her swollen cheek. She dropped the monogrammed linen on the floor and stepped on it.

  Vince grabbed her arm and spun her around. “Move.”

  Her knees felt stronger now that her stomach was empty, but she decided it would be a good idea to continue to wobble on her feet. That brought the other guard over. Was that good or bad?

  As they passed through a large entrance hall—although not as grand as Tully’s—she noticed a set of matching suitcases piled by a doorway. Dobs was leaving. Taking Regina somewhere she couldn’t escape from?

  A tremor of nerves ran through her as she slowly connected the dots. He must have used Natalie as leverage to get his wife to come here. Once he had Regina, would he need Natalie anymore? Would he just let her go, or would he want to eliminate witnesses? She glanced at the man walking beside her. He was a witness, but Dobs paid him. Did that mean Vince would keep quiet if Dobs committed murder?

  Could Regina have snuck out of Dawn and Leland’s apartment without them knowing? No, she couldn’t—wouldn’t—have done that. Help was on the way. Natalie had to believe that.

  She genuinely stumbled over the edge of a patterned runner in the long hallway they were walking her down. Vince’s grip tightened painfully and she whimpered.

  They marched her through another doorway into a room with a huge wooden desk and chairs upholstered in black leather. Regina was huddled in one oversize chair, looking pale and frightened, while Dobs paced in front of the desk. At the sight of Natalie, Regina jumped up. “Are you okay?” she asked, coming forward with concern darkening her eyes.

  “Other than being drugged and kidnapped by your psycho husband, I’m fine,” Natalie said. She was trying to provoke Dobs. If she could make him mad, make him pay attention to her, it would slow down his exit. She hoped.

  She ignored Regina, who came to a startled halt.

  “You sent me all those stupid emails and notes, didn’t you?” she prodded as Dobs rounded on her, his face flushed with anger. “Did you honestly think those ridiculous quotations about beauty would scare me?”

  The flush darkened and mottled. “They did scare you. You hired a guard and that asshole consultant.”

  “No, my friends sent the guard and the consultant. I thought it was an overreaction.” Natalie started to shake off her two unwanted guards but decided that her knees still weren’t reliable enough. “And you really overdid the melodrama by throwing blood on my door.” She rolled her eyes. “Where did you get that idea? Some adolescent Halloween prank? I laughed when I saw it.”

  “What is she talking about, Dobs?” Regina asked, an expression of horror on her face. “What blood?”

  Natalie hadn’t told her about the stalking. Regina had had enough to worry about.

  Dobs walked over to put his arm around his wife and lead her back to the chair, gently pushing her down into it. “It was just a little warning. Because she had interfered in our marriage.”

  “That’s right,” Natalie said. “I saw the bruises on her arms and told her she didn’t have to stay with an abusive psychopath like you. I told her I would help her get away from you.”

  Just when she thought she’d really riled him, the anger seemed to drain away. His eyes became blank and unreadable and his fists relaxed. “I love my wife. I would never hurt her,” he said. “You tried to come between us by telling her lies. I needed to punish you.”

  Regina looked terrified now and Natalie willed her not to say anything. She didn’t want Dobs to focus his insanity on his wife.

  “Well, it didn’t stop me, did it?” Natalie said. “Because I took in your lying little accomplice, just like I took in your wife. You were counting on me doing that, so you must have known you hadn’t scared me, you moron.”

  Dobs stroked his hand over Regina’s dyed hair. “My dear, I need to talk with Natalie alone. Go with Vince and Arlo to the helicopter. I’ll be right there.”

  Helicopter? So Dobs was leaving by air. And soon. She needed to find a way to delay him.

  When the two men released Natalie, she staggered slightly before finding her balance. As the goons escorted Regina out of the room, the young woman threw an anguished glance toward Natalie, who steadfastly ignored it. She had to keep Dobs talking.

  Natalie went on the offensive. “How did you get Sarah Lacey to drug me?”

  Dobs closed the door and turned the key in the lock. “I borrowed her daughter for a day.”

  Natalie felt like he’d hit her again. Now she understood why Sarah’s terror had been so genuine. “You kidnapped a child?! You don’t deserve to be a father.”

  “Shut up, you stupid bitch!” He swiveled toward Natalie, his face lit with an ugly anticipation.

  Natalie put a large chair between herself and Dobs as cold fingers of fear walked down her spine.

  Where the hell was Tully?

  Dobs walked over to his desk. “You’re a hairdresser. I believe you are right-handed.” He surveyed the vast desktop with its array of expensive accessories before he picked up a fist-size chunk of greenish-yellow crystals embedded in a white mineral base. “Brazilianite.” He brought the rock up to his eye level and turned it back and forth so the faceted crystals glittered in the light. “Rare gemstone quality. It will do nicely to crush the delicate bones of your hand. And these points will penetrate the skin to draw blood.”

  He put the rock back on the desk before he pivoted toward Natalie. “I enjoy blood. The color is so vivid.”

  Natalie involuntarily tucked her right hand behind her back.

  He came toward her, moving faster than she expected. She dodged behind the desk, but the sudden movement kicked up the drug-induced vertigo again. Dobs’s lips drew back in something between a snarl and a smile. “If you think I’m going to play ring-around-the-rosy with you, you’re wrong.” And then he vaulted onto the desk, looming over her with a triumphant sneer. She shrank back against the bookcase as she tried to decide whether to dash right or left.

  “It doesn’t matter which way you go,” Dobs said. “Pick one so we can get this done.”

  Natalie grabbed the wheeled desk chair, a heavy wood-and-leather piece, using it as a shield as she scooted sideways to the left. When Dobs committed in that direction, she gave the chair a hard shove to keep it going and bolted right, hoping Dobs would jump onto the chair and fall. Unfortunately, he managed to stop his momentum before he hit the edge of the desk, leaping onto the Pe
rsian rug to land only a few feet from where Natalie braced herself behind another chair.

  His agility surprised her but maybe it was fueled by his insanity. She hoped his knees hurt like hell in the morning.

  Feeling like a cornered rat, she tried to dart sideways as he closed in on her sheltering chair, but he managed to grab a handful of her blouse and yanked her back against him, wrapping his free hand around her throat and squeezing.

  She clawed at his wrist, but between the drug and the lack of oxygen, she didn’t have much strength.

  “Van Houten, let her go now!” Tully’s voice cracked like a whip, sending relief and joy rushing through her like a shot of adrenaline.

  She twisted in Dobs’s hold, expecting it to loosen, but instead her captor squeezed harder and spun toward the office door. Although Natalie’s vision was beginning to blur, she saw Tully, dressed in black like some sort of ninja, advancing into the room, his gray eyes blazing with fury. He pointed a huge handgun toward her and Dobs.

  “If you’re trying to give me a legitimate reason to shoot you, Dobs, you’re doing a good job,” Tully said, moving smoothly into the center of the room, the black hole at the end of his gun never wavering. “And believe me, I’m looking for one. Let her go now!”

  Dobs dragged her toward the desk, keeping her body between him and Tully’s big gun. She pictured the chunk of rock resting on the leather top and reached out, her fingers scrabbling over the doodads arranged there until she felt the sharp crystalline points. She grabbed it and slammed the Brazilianite into Dobs’s thigh as hard as she could, hoping the shock of pain would be enough to loosen his hold on her so she could get out of Tully’s way.

  Dobs shrieked but he kept squeezing harder while he called her horrible names. She tried to put an apology in her eyes as she looked at Tully, who stood like an ebony statue.