It was the tears that had gotten to him finally. Even for the few seconds when he’d been certain they were blackmail of the worst kind, they’d still clutched at his heart. It almost killed him when he realized they were real. Nothing had mattered then, except his desperate need to make the mistake up to her.
She had let him. She’d reached out to him, asking him silently to soothe the pain he’d caused, give her back the trust he’d taken away. The tenderness of that surrender caught at his heart with a stabbing ache. The passion she’d summoned to match his need was something he would remember all his days.
He had tried to take her self-respect and wound up losing his own. She had abandoned her pride for the sake of her need, and in the process returned his self-respect to him.
He’d said something about allowing himself to be used, doing whatever she wanted. That must have been where his agreement to this wild conspiracy had come from. That was all right, then. He was obligated to her. And the Benedicts never shirked a debt.
If he was going to go through with this, he’d make a damned good job of it. No half measures, no mercy. He almost wished Berry was going to be on hand when they took the boy, wished he’d try to stop them. In the mood he was in, Kane thought, it would be a great pleasure to mend his manners for him.
Luke, in the pilot’s seat beside him, took his gaze from the controls of the plane that was winging through the late evening and studied him a moment. With wry amusement in his dark eyes, he said, “Don’t look so grim, son. If they catch us, the charge will only be kidnapping with maybe assault and battery thrown in for good measure. The worst that can happen is they’ll clap you behind bars and throw away the key.”
“A regular bundle of cheer, aren’t you?” Kane answered. “I knew I brought you along for something.”
“You brought me along because it’s downright awkward to pull off a decent kidnapping with public transport.”
“There is that.” The fact that his cousin could make anything from a Learjet to a crop duster behave as if an angel was at the controls, plus had friends who didn’t mind lending their company planes, also played a part. More than that, Luke was a good man to have at your back.
“That you needed a referee was only an afterthought, I suppose,” Luke added, his expression bland.
“Now why would you think that?”
Luke gave him a brief look. “I can read the signs. You’re in deep manure, buddy, with no way out except to paddle like hell. Only what you can’t see is that fertilizer makes the roses bloom.”
“Meaning?”
“Stop paddling, fool.”
“An expert, are you? That mean you and April are all straightened out?” The jeer was a low blow, but better than dignifying the rest of his cousin’s observation with an answer. He’d been forced to tell Luke the whole story before he’d agree to be a part of this rescue effort. Could be he’d told him too much.
“Yeah, well, we all screw up from time to time,” Luke said as hard lines formed around his mouth. “You’re just doing it on purpose.”
“You don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“I know you’re making Regina pay for what Francie put you through. That strikes me as more than a tad unfair.”
“Mind your own damned business.”
Irritation flashed in Luke’s eyes. “A fine argument, Counselor, so profound, so articulate, so logical. You should wow a jury with it sometime.”
For a moment, anger burned in the pit of Kane’s stomach. Then it faded as he realized Luke was right. Not that he had any intention of admitting it. Turning his head to stare out at the faraway glow of a town on the dark horizon, he said, “I won’t have to worry since this is going to get me disbarred for life.”
“No problem. Melville can take over the whole trial instead of just jury selection.”
Kane gave a morose nod. Trial strategy was one of the things he’d discussed with Luke and Roan the night of the open house. “He’s all set to kick things off anyway, when we get started on Monday.”
“You’re all right, then. He’s a good man.”
It was, in the lexicon of Turn-Coupe, fulsome praise. Kane agreed, and they let the subject drop. After a few minutes, he turned in his seat to glance toward where Regina sat in the main cabin. She was leaning back with her eyes closed.
Luke, noticing where his attention had wandered, spoke on a quieter note beneath the engine roar. “So have you thought about what you’re going to do with Regina and the boy afterward?”
“Why would I do anything? They’re not my responsibility.”
“Fat chance she’ll have of staying ahead of Berry if he’s bent on getting the boy back, then, but I guess that’s not important. You’ll have kept your part of the bargain, now won’t you?”
“Exactly,” Kane said.
Luke muttered something he didn’t quite catch, but it seemed best not to ask him to repeat it.
It was some time later that Kane got to his feet and moved back to where Regina was sitting. She hadn’t stirred in so long that he figured she was asleep, and he was right. Taking a light blanket from a side bin, he shook it out and draped it over her. As he tucked a fold behind her to hold it in place, his fingers brushed her hair. The silken touch scorched his nerve endings as if he’d brushed against a live wire. He straightened abruptly, but didn’t move away.
She looked so fragile lying there. Shadows of exhaustion lay like purple bruises under her eyes, and her freckles stood out against the paleness of her skin. Her mouth was tender and moist, her lips slightly parted as she breathed in the even cadence of sleep. She was so defenseless yet delectable that he was torn by a strong urge to sit down and pull her into his lap. The only trouble was, he couldn’t be sure whether his impulse after that would be to protect her from all comers or ravish her himself.
God, what was he coming to that he could even think of such a thing? She was driving him crazy, stirring up dark corners of his soul that he’d thought decently mastered in adolescence. The fierce ache of need she roused in him was like an addiction. The more he had of her, the more he wanted, and the more he wanted her, the more it seemed who or what she was, or where she was leading him, made no difference compared to the need to hold her in his arms.
He didn’t like it. It was galling. It was also scary. The sooner she was out of his life, the sooner he could repossess his common sense and be himself again.
Bringing her on this trip was a bad idea. He and Luke needed to move fast and by instinct if they were to have any chance of success. The last thing they needed was a woman slowing them down.
She’d refused to stay behind. Short of locking her up, there had been no way they could prevent her from coming with them. She could get them into Berry’s apartment without their having to circumvent normal security, she’d said, and the boy would also be easier to manage. Both things were probably true. Still, he wished she was back in Turn-Coupe. She was an extra person to be safeguarded, another soft, warm body that could be harmed if they made a misstep. It was bad enough being responsible for her son, a child who might get in harm’s way if there was trouble; keeping an eye on Regina, as well, was one worry too many.
At the same time, he had a grudging respect for her refusal to stay behind. She obviously distrusted Berry every bit as much as she adored her son. She was terrified the kid would be hurt if she wasn’t there to protect him. As if she could protect a gnat.
Still, she hadn’t yelled or screamed or begged. She’d just set her jaw and looked at him and Luke as if they were Neanderthals without a set of finer feelings between them. Who knew? Maybe she was right.
He admired a great many things about her. She might have her faults, but she also had a rare kind of strength. She did what she had to do and didn’t count the cost. She fought her demons instead of letting them conquer her. She stared defeat in the face and didn’t flinch. Not many could say the same.
He didn’t like admitting that, either.
; When the trial was over, she would be out of his life. She would go away somewhere with her son and that would be the end of it. No doubt it would be for the best.
He reached out once more, taking a fine strand of her hair between his fingers again, feeling its tingling warmth. He had wondered, with Pops that first day, if it would burn. It did, it had, and he would carry the scars his whole life long.
The landing in New York was uneventful. The paperwork for the return trip was a major pain, but something that had to be done. It took time, however, so it was late when they reached the apartment. That was fine because everyone should be asleep. With any luck, they could be in and have the situation under control before the bodyguard and nurse knew what was happening.
Berry was not supposed to be in residence, which was one reason they had chosen tonight. A check with his law firm had revealed that he was scheduled to arrive in Baton Rouge this evening for the start of the trial on Monday. That was one complication out of the way.
They breezed past the doorman, who greeted Regina and asked about her trip with such smiling, single-minded attention he hardly seemed to notice she had two strangers behind her. Once they were upstairs, Kane used Regina’s key, then pushed the apartment door open and let it swing back on silent hinges. He glanced toward the spot where he had positioned her down the hall, making sure she was out of the way. She gave him a small wave, her face reassuringly calm.
Taking out the handgun that nestled under his belt at the small of his back and holding it ready, Kane nodded at Luke, who was also armed. In tandem, they slid inside and whipped away from the door, pressing their shoulders to the near wall. They waited in strained silence while searching in the dimness for movement, listening intently for sound.
Nothing.
It was clear. They moved forward.
Regina had described the layout of the apartment in detail, including the sleeping arrangements. Her room should be the first on the right of the long hall that opened from the living room. The nurse ought to be in the one at the far end on the same side, with the boy’s bedroom sandwiched between the two. Berry’s master suite lay across the hall, while the bodyguard had a smaller room next to it.
With Luke behind him, Kane skirted overstuffed leather furniture and heavy tables while blessing the sound deadening effects of Berber carpet. The two of them were helped, more than expected, by the lambent glow of millions of city lights that filtered through the expanse of uncovered glass in the penthouse walls. It penetrated everywhere, turning the interior into a milky, brownish gray underworld.
The door of the bodyguard’s bedroom was closed. Kane and Luke stationed themselves on either side of it. At Kane’s nod, Luke reached out one hand to turn the knob. They sprang inside and rushed the bed.
There were two people under the covers. The bodyguard was just heaving himself up, reaching for a handgun that lay on the bedside table. Kane lashed out with a hard kick that made the man grunt with pain as he crashed into his bed companion. Then Kane lunged to jerk the man in the bed over and chop a hard forearm across his throat. Shoving the muzzle of his weapon under the bodyguard’s chin, he said in hard warning, “Freeze, if you like breathing.”
The woman in the bed, an overblown blonde whose raccoon circles from smudged eye makeup were visible even in the uncertain light, uttered muffled curses as she fought free of the covers. Seeing Kane hovering over her lover, she dragged in her breath to scream. Luke, skirting the bed, placed the muzzle of his handgun gently between her pendulous and very naked breasts. She changed her mind.
Within seconds, the bodyguard, sleep stupid and with laughably tiny black briefs covering his crotch beneath his beer belly, was securely tied and gagged. So was the nurse. They made swearing, protesting noises as Kane and Luke left them roped together in the middle of the bed, but were ignored without a qualm.
Kane started toward the living room to summon Regina. It wasn’t necessary; she was already inside. She emerged from Berry’s study, tucking a small, square object into her shoulder bag as she walked. Kane wondered briefly what she’d found to repossess besides her son before annoyance banished the question from his mind.
Voice rough, he said, “I thought I told you to wait for the all clear.”
“The fighting stopped. That’s clear enough for me.”
“But you might—”
“I might what?” she asked, pausing as she came even with him in the dim room.
He made no answer, couldn’t have if his life had depended on it. What he had been about to say was that she might have been hurt. The mere idea of her catching a stray bullet or getting in the way of a cretin like the bodyguard made him feel sick to his stomach. He’d known he hated the possibility, just not how much.
“Nothing,” he muttered, and motioned for her to go ahead of him back down the hall to her son’s room.
Nevertheless, he reached out to halt her at the bedroom door while he checked to be sure there was no other guard. The only thing he could see in the pastel green glow of a night-light was a small mound in the single bed pushed against one wall. A very small mound.
At his signal, Regina went straight to the sleeping boy and pulled back the covers. She sat down on the bed and rolled him toward her. She made a hissing sound of mingled anger and pain.
The boy was limp, pale, totally unresponsive. Kane felt as if a giant fist had slammed into his gut. He stepped forward, put his hand on the small, thin neck, felt for a pulse. A second later, he let out his breath in sharp relief. The boy’s skin was warm. A light but regular pulse beat beneath it.
In quiet tones, Kane asked, “Is he always such a heavy sleeper?”
She shook her head in an emphatic negative. “I tried to tell you how it would be.”
So she had. The boy was drugged. It had seemed a minor point when she had mentioned it earlier. As he saw the effects, it was minor no longer.
For a tense instant, Regina’s eyes, limitless pools luminous with unshed tears, met his in the gloom. Then her gaze slid away as if she refused to let him see, much less share, her anguish. He wanted to share it, he discovered, needed to join her in it because it was a part of her, needed desperately to take it from her in any way possible. Stunned by the insight, he stood watching her.
She spun away from him. Moving with quick competence, she found jeans, a sweatshirt, socks, sneakers, then stuffed them into a kid’s bright-colored backpack. She handed these things to Kane, who swung the short strap over one shoulder. Then she rolled the boy in the bedspread that covered him and hefted him into her arms.
It went against the grain with Kane to let her carry the sleeping child, but he needed to run interference until they were in the clear. He checked the hall, got a high sign from Luke at its far end, then motioned Regina forward. They moved toward the living room. Luke ghosted over to join them there. Seconds later, they were at the front entrance. Kane transferred his weapon to his left hand, then reached out to open the door. At the same time, he instinctively reverted to courtesy, stepping to one side so that Regina, a woman with a burden, could go ahead of him.
The door swung open under his hand, would have crashed into him if he hadn’t leaped back. Light flared in blue-white brilliance as the living room chandelier came on. In that first second of blindness, Kane moved without thinking, dropping the backpack he held to leave his hand free, putting himself between Regina and the source of danger. Half-crouched, shoulder to shoulder with Luke, he faced the door.
The man who stood there was Gervis Berry. Kane had seen enough pictures of the square, burly funeral services executive to recognize him at a glance. If that wasn’t enough, the small pistol in the man’s fist, pointed straight at his belly, represented convincing evidence.
“Look what we have here,” Berry said with snide jocularity. “If it isn’t somebody making off with my boy.”
“Regina’s son, the way I heard it,” Kane answered as he straightened slowly, preparing for a less physical form of combat.
&
nbsp; “You think maybe it was a virgin birth?” The other man chuckled at his own mordant wit.
“I know you had nothing to do with it.”
Berry’s expression turned ugly. “She told you that, did she? I guess it means she’s gone over to your side, then. You being Benedict?”
“That’s right.” Kane’s voice was curt, his gaze watchful.
“Thought so. Wonder how this method of influencing a witness will set with a jury.”
“Witness?”
Berry gestured toward Regina with a careless wave of the weapon in his hand. “I figure she’s traded what she knows for your help here. But maybe that’s not all she’s trading. Maybe she’s still swapping personal service, the kind she put out on my account.”
“Gervis!”
That angry yet unsurprised exclamation from Regina would have condemned her even if she hadn’t as good as admitted the charge already. Even as he recognized that, he saw something else. She had stepped from behind him, was deliberately moving forward with the boy in her arms to draw the attention of the man with the gun. She must figure Berry wouldn’t fire at her. Kane wasn’t so sure. His stomach knotted as he saw the pistol barrel swing toward her.
“Don’t sound so shocked,” Berry sneered, watching her. “You think I shouldn’t talk like that because we’re family? Well, I thought so, too, and now look what you’re doing, siding against me, going behind my back. What kind of relative does things like that?”
“The same kind who used my son to make me do what you want, which is no kind,” she answered in low virulence. “We’re not family, never have been, never will be. And I’m glad, do you hear me? I didn’t like what you wanted me to do when all this started, and now I hate you for it.”
Berry jerked as if she had hit him. “Bullshit. You don’t mean it.”
“I do mean it,” she declared, her eyes flashing green sparks. “Do anything more to harm my son or take him from me, and I’ll kill you.”
“You’re not fooling anybody, baby,” he said on a nasty laugh. “This isn’t about any kid. What happened? Benedict here better at taking care of you than me, especially in bed?”
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