Azure Secrets

by Patricia Rice

  “Feed them poison,” Monty declared in a snit that he didn’t have time to beat the pulp out of the quivering cowards—and that he’d doubted Fee for even a second. He didn’t know what had got into her, but he’d find out.

  Turning on his heel, he marched back to the street where Lee’s limo driver was attempting to terrorize Hillvale’s police force. Walker didn’t look too terrorized, but he had his hands full with a mad woman.

  “Meet Mrs. Gonzalez,” Walker said over her curses. “Eduardo is probably around here somewhere, if she hasn’t hacked him into sushi.”

  “I’m ripping the heart out of that lying, conniving hijo de puta,” church-going Mrs. Gonzalez shouted.

  “Good idea,” Monty told her, not knowing if the SOB to whom she referred was her husband or Lee or Haas or all of the above. “Just let us find out what’s going on first.”

  Mrs. Gonzalez pointed at the limo attempting to pass the gridlock of Haas’s Escalade and Walker’s SUV. “Ask Lee.”

  Then she pointed at the county attorney, still on the ground, except with his pants down around his hips so Nurse Brenda could jab him with a needle. Exposing Haas’s hairy buttocks probably hadn’t been necessary. Knowing Brenda, Monty assumed she was making a statement.

  “And that lying rat,” Mrs. G spat out. “Men! They should all have their bollocks cut off.” And she was off on another hysterical rant.

  That sounded painful. Monty didn’t bother asking what the fight was about. Fee had gone after the kid, if he knew people at all. Therefore, he had to go after Fee. Except he didn’t know where Fee had gone.

  Which was when he realized that if he raced headlong after Fee without knowing where she was, he’d lose the opportunity to nail killers and kidnappers and conceivably settle this without anyone getting shot.

  Fee had essentially told them all to go to hell when she’d run out the back door and abandoned them. That was not his shy, unpretentious Fiona pushing aside gunmen with the arrogance of a born diva. He had to trust that she knew what she was doing—and that she wasn’t expecting him to follow.

  Which really irritated the hell out of him. Every fiber of his body needed to leap into the fray and beat people to a pulp. But the head he preferred using as a battering ram said tackling the running back wasn’t the answer to this situation. With a put-upon sigh, Monty wove through the blockade of vehicles, opened the limo’s back door, and hauled out a startled businessman in a tailored suit.

  He didn’t know the guy from Adam, but Mrs. G had pointed him out as Lee, presumably the smuggler and Stacy’s step-grandfather. Fleeing the scene of an accident made him guilty in Monty’s book.

  “Inside,” he ordered. “Finish your dinner like a man and not a snake. What happens in Hillvale, stays in Hillvale.”

  That didn’t sound as snappy as he’d hoped. Monty shoved the slighter man toward the restaurant, then leaned in to speak to the limo’s other occupant. No one had mentioned any women involved in smuggling, and he couldn’t punch out an old lady. His best tactic was to remove her from the scene. “If you tell your driver to back up and turn around, I’ll let the lodge know you’re coming. Drinks and meal on the house. If this drags out too long, we’ll put you up. Our spa is rated one of the wonders of the world.”

  He was pretty certain the woman in the back seat smiled. He slammed the door and barked at Amber lingering worriedly in the doorway of her shop. “Call the lodge for me, will you? Tell Roper what’s happening and that I have guests arriving he should treat well.” Guests the manager probably knew, given their board connections. He really didn’t want to fire Roper. Yet.

  That task accomplished, Monty marched over to where Haas had recovered enough to pull up his pants.

  Brenda was packing up her kit. “He’ll live, although I have the impression he doesn’t deserve to. Get some food in him.”

  Needing to expend his pent-up frustration, Monty caught the county attorney’s tailored collar and hauled him up. “You and Lee are going to talk, now.”

  He shouted over his shoulder at Walker, who was still trying to calm down the virago. “She knows things. Hogtie her and bring her inside.”

  Now, all he needed was Eduardo Gonzalez and he’d have a full deck.

  First, he had to send an army wherever the hell Fee had gone. That would take more than muscle.

  Monty frog-marched Haas into the restaurant, where Lee was attempting to look unperturbed by the sight of his bodyguards tied up with dishtowels on the floor. Dinah stood over them with her frying pan as Harvey kept his foot on the one struggling while Thomas finished knotting.

  “Find Fiona,” he shouted at the lot of them. “I don’t know what the hell the lot of you were doing, but if that baby is anywhere within a hundred miles, she’s gone after her.”

  He thought he felt a general air of relief, but Monty was too busy arranging his dinner party to yell at them for doubting Fee and not going after her immediately.

  “And what do you intend to do?” Cass asked, looking at his prisoner with disdain. “Beat up people?”

  “Isn’t that what I always do?” He shoved Haas into an empty chair and gestured at Dinah. “Feed him. If Fee left any poisonous goodies around, start there.”

  When Walker hauled in the ranting virago, Monty pointed at another empty chair. “Tie her to it, if necessary. Anyone seen Eduardo?”

  “Not yet,” Mariah said with what could almost be enjoyment dancing in her dark eyes. “Keegan is on his way to the Weldon place. There’s a van parked down there. We’re hoping Stacy is in the van.”

  “But you don’t know for certain.” Monty cursed and glared at the assembled Lucys and their victims. He needed to bash heads, except bashing wouldn’t help Fee or Stacy.

  “You cannot hold us here,” Lee said. “This is kidnapping. We will have you charged.”

  “Oh, that’s rich.” Assured that Haas and Mrs. G were settling down with the prospect of food and drinks, Monty turned on the tailored suit sitting alone. “I’m blaming the lot of you for kidnapping a baby, murdering her mother, and killing a killer. I could take you all up the mountain and shoot you and no one here would convict me.”

  Lee looked as if he were prepared to object—until tendrils from one of Sam’s hanging plants curled around his collar.

  Monty had forgotten to check on his cheerful, oblivious niece. Samantha simply grew pretty plants as far as he was concerned. Crawling greenery, however, was no accident. Lee looked startled and backed his chair away. The plant followed.

  Sam leaned against the restaurant wall, idly swinging her witchy stick. The crystal in the handle glowed, and she was watching it with the interest of the scientist she was.

  Mariah watched the plant enviously. At catching Monty’s look, she gave him a defiant glare and climbed on a chair to remove one of her ectoplasmic ghostcatchers from the ceiling. Keegan wasn’t here to stop her.

  Oh hell, if you couldn’t beat them. . . Monty pulled out a chair at Lee’s table, blocking him with his bulk. “Mariah, why don’t you bring Mr. Haas over to join us? If Mrs. Gonzalez can be calmed down, let’s have a bottle of Kurt’s best wine.”

  “I won’t sit with a criminal,” Haas protested.

  Mrs. G began screeching incomprehensible curses.

  Monty smashed his fist on the table, rattling utensils and sending a water glass off the edge. “We can settle this here, or you can all go up the mountain and shoot each other. Be my guest. But I’m hungry, and I’m sitting down to a damned good meal.”

  While fighting the urge to protect Fiona from herself. . . He had to learn to trust her.

  The tall silver van parked in the newly-cleared driveway of the Weldon cabin looked empty. Piles of sand and construction equipment littered the yard. The sun was setting behind the trees, throwing the clearing into shadow. Fee couldn’t see anything like cameras or radio equipment on the van and didn’t know if anyone could see her, but she crouched low behind the bushes and the bulldozers until she reached the
van’s rear.

  She didn’t know why Lee’s limo wasn’t roaring down the road right now, but she meant to fix it so this van wouldn’t be leaving with him. She could smell Stacy all over it.

  She’d never owned a car, but she’d heard enough gripes about slashed tires and nails to know that thick rubber could be penetrated. Sacrificing her beautiful kitchen blade, she dug the point into the tread, then slashed at the sidewall. She was pretty certain she heard hissing. The van was huge and heavy. Just in case they had a spare, she gashed the other back tire as well.

  Now what? Lee still had his limo. Blocking it from entering the drive wouldn’t stop him from taking Stacy away, if she was here. Fee didn’t know what she thought she could do if there were armed goons inside the van or cabin.

  Bravado could only go so far, but maybe. . . Food had always worked for her. She’d grabbed the box of sushi out of instinct. Packing cookies or baby food didn’t come naturally, which probably said a lot about her, all sad.

  The child’s cries had faded, which could mean almost anything.

  Mostly, it meant that they’d taken a child inside the cabin. If it was Stacy, a three-year old couldn’t sit still in a van forever. Would the nanny be with her?

  With a lifetime of experience to call on, Fee deliberately pushed aside her grief and fear for the people she’d left behind. Staying focused, she crept around to the back of the cabin. Monty had said there was gas and well water but no electricity. It would be growing dark in there. Could she draw them out? Or should she fake it, carry the box of soporific sushi up to the door, and see what happened?

  A little of both maybe. Still hiding in the shrubbery, she threw a good size rock at the metal cover on the well. When that didn’t produce immediate reaction, she threw another.

  She heard a man’s sharp voice raised inside. She needed to be closer to hear what was being said.

  Leaving the bike and the box of food leaning against a tree, she crouched down beside the thorny bushes that hadn’t been cleared from this hilly side of the lot. The back door creaked open, and she scuttled closer to the house, out of sight of the well.

  “You’re hearing things,” a man’s voice shouted in irritation. “There’s nothing out here.”

  “Shhh,” a woman’s voice replied. “You’ll wake her.”

  Huh, a man, a woman, and a child. She wished she knew how quickly the narcotic sushi would work. She was pretty sure it wouldn’t be fast enough if Lee was on the way.

  She crawled back to the bike while the man cursed and stomped back into the cabin. It wasn’t as if he could see anything without a flashlight. Maybe he’d returned for one. She crawled faster.

  A lanky figure leaned against a tree beside her bike. She almost had two heart attacks until she recognized Harvey.

  “Good going back there, Lucretia,” he said cynically. “You almost had us thinking you were one of the gang.”

  “And you changed your mind why?” She climbed on her bike and slipped the wristlet on her stick over her hand. “Or did you come to take your stick back?”

  “I’m reserving judgment, but the mayor is pitching fits and chairs, so no, I don’t want the damned stick back. You have a plan for poisoning whoever is in the cabin?”

  Fee almost smiled at the idea of Monty pitching chairs. She’d like to know at whom, but she had to stay focused on her goal. She’d really wanted to have her own café, but if she couldn’t have that, she’d be satisfied with rescuing Peggy’s daughter.

  “Soporific sushi, but it will take time. I’ll see if I can deliver it and leave. If they kill me, tell everyone I tried.” She climbed on her bike and pedaled up to the front door before Harvey could say another word.

  Mariah’s hulking Scots geologist husband climbed out of the van, nearly startling her into falling over. “No weapons in here,” he announced, closing the door and leaning against the sagging rear of the vehicle, invisible to the cabin. “Good job on the tires. If I’m abandoning Mariah to her own devices to look after you, it’s good to know you’re not dumb.”

  “Right.” Not knowing how to react to people who actually trusted her, Fee pulled her bike up to the porch and marched up the stone stairs, box and stick in hand. Knocking, she called, “Delivery from Mr. Lee.”

  Hushed voices murmured through the cheap, single-panes. It was chilly now that the sun was down, so the windows were closed. Fee knocked again, as any impatient delivery person might. Footsteps resounded across the wooden floor.

  A short but muscular young man yanked the door open. In the darkness, she couldn’t tell if he had a gun under his jacket, but she had to assume he did. She held up the carry-out box. “Mr. Lee regrets his delay and sends this to hold you over.”

  “Tell him the kid’s running a fever and we’re leaving in half an hour.” He took the box and slammed the door in her face.

  No, you’re not, Fee thought, fighting back panic, unless Lee arrives soon.

  That was when a man she recognized walked out of the bushes with an assault rifle. Gonzalez.

  Thirty-three

  Monday, evening

  “Of course I wish the child to be found,” Lee said stiffly, sipping his wine but ignoring his sushi. “I fail to see how this inquiry involves me.”

  Monty gestured for Mariah to back off. He could almost envision ghost juice dripping from the dusty tattered threads of the net she’d removed from the ceiling. But in his experience, just encouraging people to talk worked without ghost guts.

  “He knows where is my pobrecita,” Mrs. G said, accepting the beer she’d requested and also ignoring the sushi. “He wants the papers mi esposo gave to this pendejo.” She cast a look of scorn at Haas.

  “I have no idea what you’re talking about.” Looking green, Haas practically inhaled the thick jambalaya and garlic bread Dinah had apparently decided he needed for what ailed him. He didn’t touch his wine.

  Maria Gonzalez took a mini-loaf of bread from Haas’s basket and slapped his sagging jowl with it. “Liar. Puto. You sold your soul to the devil. Eduardo had the key you gave him. With that key, he could have the papers anytime, you said.”

  Apparently fascinated, Lee absently reached for the sushi. Monty hoped Fee had poisoned it.

  “He lied,” Haas claimed, swiping the loaf and defiantly biting into it.

  “My Eduardo is a bad man, but he does not lie to me,” Mrs. G insisted. “He showed me the key. I knew the papers were dangerous. I put the key in the doggie’s collar where it wouldn’t be found.”

  Monty avoided the possibly poisoned sushi and gulped down sea bass so delicate it melted in his mouth and could scarcely be called food. Dinah was a genius.

  “We found the key,” Monty said, without saying they didn’t have it. “What does it go to?”

  Mrs. G looked from Haas to Lee, then crossed her arms over her ample chest. “To the papers that will put Lee behind bars forever. I will trade them for my granddaughter.”

  “They’re evidence in a case,” Haas admonished. “You can’t have them.”

  Which told Monty that Haas kept them in a locker that both he and Eduardo could access, for reasons only known to crooks. He hoped Walker had the feds in his contact list.

  Tearing her bread to crumbs, Mrs. G returned her attention to Monty. “We received a ransom note, the child for the papers. What do you think, Mr. Mayor?”

  That he wished Fee were here telling him they were all fishy. “Where’s Eduardo?” he asked, evading her question.

  Even an oblivious Null like him could see that he’d made the old lady nervous with that question. His gut knotted, waiting for the blow.

  “He is looking for the niña,” she admitted.

  That did it. An armed, angry, and dangerous gang leader was on the prowl, looking for the same prize as Fee. He didn’t have time for diplomacy. Monty caught Mariah’s eye and nodded at Lee.

  The plant tendrils were still swinging close to Lee’s collar despite his nervous chair shifting. Mariah smiled co
mplacently, swiped her fingers on the ghostcatcher, then brushed the plant away, theoretically smearing Lee’s neck with ectoplasm.

  Not that Monty entirely believed in Lucy voodoo, but he’d try anything to move this along. While Mariah played the role of waitress and filled water glasses, smearing ghost juice right and left, Monty pulled out all the diplomatic stops.

  “You think Stacy is nearby?” he asked as if they were discussing daycare.

  “Eduardo said he was asked here to trade the papers for our nieta. She must be here, but we cannot get at the papers because we have no key.” She cast Haas a withering glare.

  Damned Lucys, they’d created this mess. . . Monty slid a glare to the other customers lurking at surrounding tables. Non-Lucy Walker was leaning back his chair at the next table, listening to every word—and texting. Damned good thing Delphines had wi-fi.

  Cass was with Val, the black-robed death goddess, at a table with a bunch of unfamiliar old biddies. Sam had stopped toying with her stick. And Harvey wasn’t to be seen at all.

  He’d knock their heads later. Refilling Lee’s glass from a bottle of his brother’s best chardonnay, Monty asked, “I assume Stacy is close by, ready to be traded for these papers?”

  Monty watched with interest as Lee’s mouth tightened and jaw gripped, but ghost juice had demonstrated its power before.

  Words tumbled from Lee’s lips without his will. “She is fine. Her nanny is with her. I merely want what is mine returned.”

  Feeling his own jaw tighten in disgust at this admission of kidnapping, Monty turned to Haas. “Is there any chance you knew the key was in the dog’s collar?”

  “Gonzalez told me when he asked for the papers,” Haas admitted, looking surprised that he had done so. “He told me the kidnappers had used the dog as proof they had Stacy, but it had run away when he’d tried to dicker with them. He hadn’t known it had the key until Maria told him.”