by Rebecca York
“I thought you said you could walk away from me.”
“That was before those men showed up at your apartment.”
“Maybe they just wanted you for questioning.”
“You believe that?”
“No,” he answered, weighing the pros and cons of letting her drag him into the swamp with her.
Something was going on. Something he didn’t understand. If Grace Cunningham didn’t know what it was, she had her suspicions. He’d started off wanting to know what had really happened to his brother. Now he was starting to think that John Ridgeway might be only one piece in a complicated puzzle, and maybe this meeting was the best chance to get some answers.
“All right,” Brady sighed and watched her let out the breath she’d been holding. He pulled back onto the road, then exited and turned around, heading for Frederick instead of the Camp David area.
They were only an hour from Frederick. Was that a coincidence? Did Grace suspect that they’d be heading in this direction? Or was he reading extra meaning into everything that happened?
He spared her a quick glance. She was sitting rigidly in her seat, her hands twined in a death grip.
“You know where to find Karen’s house?”
“I’ve never been there. I assume we can get directions.”
He drove for another quarter mile, then said, “Give me some background. I want to know more about you.”
“Why?”
“So I can get a good feel for whether you’re lying.”
“Nice.”
“Start talking. Where did you grow up? I don’t mean a vague nod to Chicago. What part? What high school did you go to? What kind of grocery story did your mom patronize.”
She looked as if she was having a silent debate with herself. Finally she said, “Okay. Not Chicago.”
He made a rough sound. “Why did you tell me a story?”
“I didn’t know you very well. I didn’t want to get my family involved.”
That might make sense—in a strange sort of way.
“So now that you know me better, where did you grow up?”
She sighed. “I’m from the Silver Spring area. I went to Montgomery Blair High School. My dad worked for the Maryland state government. My mom taught elementary school. They gave me a good home.”
“That’s a strange way to put it.” He wished they were somewhere else besides the car—where he could watch her eyes when she answered his questions. She was speaking carefully. So—was she lying? Or shading the truth? Apparently she still didn’t know him well enough to be straight with him.
Her next statement took him by surprise.
“I was adopted. They really wanted a baby, so they worked through a lawyer to get me. I think they used some money they’d inherited from an aunt of Mom’s.”
“Did you ever try to contact your birth mother?”
She hesitated for a moment.
“That’s not a difficult question.”
“I tried. I didn’t get anywhere. The records were sealed.”
“So you had a good childhood?”
“Yes. Did you?” she asked, turning the tables on him. “I know your mom divorced Mr. Ridgeway. Then later married your father.”
“Well, actually, he divorced her. It was nine years before she met my father. That’s why there’s eighteen years difference between me and John. And why he had more…privileges than I did.”
“His father was wealthy?”
“Yes. John inherited a substantial trust fund. I had to work for a living. I was good in math. Good with electronics. I went to a community college—then the University of Maryland. I had college loans. And I borrowed money to start my computer-repair business. From there I got a job with the Light Street Detective Agency. I still did computer work, but I became interested in some of their investigations—and they brought me into that end of the business.”
When he realized he’d volunteered a lot of information, he stopped talking abruptly.
“You’re leaving stuff out,” she said.
“Like what?”
“Your wife and daughter died,” she finished.
His hands gripped the wheel. “You know about that? What did you do, research me?”
“No. I already told you, I was researching Ridgeway, at his request.” She paused. “And he used to talk about you. He said you did a lot of work for him. He said he got you back on your feet after you…”
“After I drank myself into oblivion,” he finished.
“You don’t have to put it that way.”
“How would you put it?”
“You were self-medicating.”
He snorted. “You know the phrase—recovering alcoholic. Some bodyguard. I could crap out on you at any time.”
“You won’t.”
“How do you know?”
“You said you stopped by your brother’s house. You didn’t join his wife in a drink when you found out about John’s death.”
“How do you know Lydia had a drink?”
“I’m making assumptions, based on what her husband said about her.”
“Which is what?”
“She was an aristocrat. She had connections that opened doors for him. But he was disappointed that she didn’t want children. And he was disappointed that she started drinking in the afternoons when she was bored.”
“Yeah. That’s pretty accurate.”
He watched her. She knew a hell of a lot more about him and his family than he knew about her. But one thing he did understand. She was withholding information. He wanted to demand that she come clean with him. But he suspected that would be a waste of time.
IAN WICKERS MANAGED to keep from slamming down the phone. Pulling out his pocket handkerchief, he wiped a film of perspiration from his forehead, then replaced the white linen square in his pocket.
It had taken some time to get through to the Chief of Police in Fairfax County. But as far as the chief knew, none of his officers had taken a prisoner away from Ridgeway Security.
Which had led to a couple of questions that Wickers didn’t want to answer. So he’d pulled rank with some National Security bullshit.
He’d thought about calling some of the other jurisdictions in the area. But if they didn’t have Karen Hilliard, then he’d have to go through the same story again, and he was willing to bet his Ridgeway pension that Yarborough hadn’t made a mistake about the name of the jurisdiction on the cop car. The man might be a son of a bitch, but he was no fool. He knew exactly what was involved. And he wouldn’t have let Officer Burton Temple take the prisoner unless he’d been shoved into a corner.
The problem now was that the Fairfax County Police didn’t have an officer named Burton Temple. But somebody had taken Karen Hilliard away from Yarborough. Who the hell was that? And that wasn’t his only problem. Patrick Frazier, the pushy deputy chief of Ridgeway Consortium, wanted to be confirmed as the next CEO of the consortium as soon as possible. Or, more likely, it was that bitch of a wife of his, Barbara Frazier, who was doing the insisting. Barbara was ambitious for her husband, more ambitious than he was for himself.
AS THEY REACHED the outskirts of Frederick, Brady wished he’d thought to bring his computer when they’d bailed out of La Fontana. He could have gone to a hot spot and called up Mapquest to get directions. Instead, he stopped at a gas station and filled his tank.
When Grace saw him start to slide the card into the credit slot, she jumped out of the car and grabbed his arm.
“Don’t!”
The touch of her chilled fingers against his skin made him go still.
“They can track you through your transactions.”
He gave her what he hoped was a cocky grin. “They could—if it were in my name.”
He held up the plastic rectangle for her inspection—so she could see the name Barry Logan in the front.
“I acquired the identity a couple of years ago when I was working for the Light Street Detective Agency. I use it when I don’t
want to reveal my real name.”
“Handy. If you’re on the lam.”
The way she said it made him wonder if she knew more about the subject than she was saying.
After paying for the gas, he bought one of those rectangular maps that never folded back up the way they came. On it he located Snyder Road, which turned out to be a country lane east of the city and about fifteen minutes from where they were.
He found the number on the mailbox and slowed. The house was in the middle of a scraggly field, up a narrow, rutted lane, and he didn’t particularly like the setup. The structure was old and weathered, with faded gray shingles and peeling white paint on the door and window frames. A detached garage had once stood in back of the house, but it had collapsed and lay in an untidy heap in the backyard.
Beside him, Grace was sitting rigidly, staring at the sagging residence.
“Have you ever been here before?” he asked.
“No.”
“Does it look like the kind of place where a woman who attracted my brother would live?”
She took her lower lip between her teeth, then released it. “No. She’s too classy for a place like this.”
“Even as a hideout?”
“Maybe not.”
He gave Grace a sharp look. “Are you sure that was her on the phone?”
“Yes.”
Instead of stopping, he kept going past the house.
“What are you doing? We have to…” Grace’s voice was high and strained.
“Check out the area,” he finished for her.
The next house was at least a seventy-five yards away. He saw a car parked in front of it and a woman hanging laundry on a line outside.
After driving about a half mile, he turned around and started back, scanning the fields on either side of the road. Grace was doing the same.
At least he didn’t see anyone hiding in the weeds.
Maybe they were in the stand of woods a hundred yards away, waiting for him and Grace to go into the house.
He turned to her. “You’re determined to go in there?”
“I don’t think I have a choice.”
“There’s always a choice.”
She huffed out a breath. “Okay, I want to do it.”
Of course, he didn’t have to go with her. But he wasn’t going to leave her unprotected. “Stay close to me,” he said as he pulled into the gravel parking area, reversing the direction of the car so that it was pointed down the driveway.
“If there’s trouble, we’re getting out of here fast,” he said firmly.
“What about Karen?”
“We don’t even know if she’s in there.”
He pulled the gun from where he’d set it on the floor before climbing out and inspecting the area.
Grace had also climbed out, and he motioned for her to follow him to the front door.
When he knocked on the door, he thought he heard a voice within, but nobody appeared.
Pushing the door open, he stepped into a living room that was furnished with the kind of ugly orange-stained maple furniture that had been popular fifty years earlier.
When he heard a noise from down the hallway, he froze. It sounded like a groan or a plea.
Despite his instructions and Grace’s earlier agreement to stay close to him, she darted into the hall, then into a bedroom where he saw an ornate brass bed.
A woman was lying on it, one of her hands chained to the brass rail above her head. Her black dress was pulled up around her hips, and she wore no panties.
Grace gasped. “Karen! What happened? Were you raped? What?”
Brady followed Grace into the room.
“Help me,” the woman on the bed begged, her voice slurred as she clawed at something on the arm that was shackled to the bed.
Grace drew in a sharp breath as she ran forward, leaning over to pull down the woman’s skirt while Brady studied her. She must have been good-looking and well-groomed to have attracted John Ridgeway, but now her ash-blond hair was matted, her blue eyes were bloodshot and her pale skin was splotched.
She’d sounded coherent when he talked to her on the phone an hour ago. Now she looked dazed. She was drugged, sick or injured. Or all three.
“What happened to you?” he asked. Had she been sexually assaulted, or did someone want to make it look that way—to distract them from what was really going on?
She blinked, trying to focus her blue eyes on him. As he stared into those eyes, he went still. He’d seen her before. No, he’d remember her. He was sure of it. He’d never met her before. Had he?
“What happened to you?” he repeated, his tone demanding answers.
Once again, she clawed at her arm, her fingernails digging a hole in her blouse. Below the fabric he could make out some kind of mark on her skin, but he couldn’t see what it was.
Grace sat on the edge of the bed, leaning over to stroke the other woman’s hair back from her face.
Karen blinked. “Grace, what are you doing here?”
“You called me.”
“Did I?”
“Yes. Tell me what happened to you.”
The woman on the bed only shook her head.
“She’s in bad shape.”
“Yeah.” He switched his attention back to the blonde. “Focus! What happened?”
“They took me…” she said vaguely, her voice trailing off.
Grace sat down on the bed and pulled ineffectively at the handcuff. “Who? Who took you?”
“Don’t know. Maybe the Pal…” Again she failed to finish the sentence.
Grace gasped, then turned pleadingly to Brady. “We have to get her out of here. She needs a doctor. And whoever handcuffed her could be coming back.”
“Yeah.”
He needed information. “Where did you meet Ridgeway?” he asked.
She licked her lips.
“Where?”
Once again, she made an effort to focus on him. “Party…”
“Whose party?”
“Bar…”
“You were paid to seduce John Ridgeway?”
“Yes.”
“By whom?”
“Terrorists.”
“From where?”
She gave him a vague look.
“For God’s sake, you can’t interrogate her now,” Grace interjected. “We’ve got to get her out of here. See if there’s something you can use to cut the chain on the handcuff.”
He started out of the room, then looked back to see Grace leaning over the captive, talking soothingly to her. Karen was thrusting her head toward her left arm, making sounds that Brady couldn’t hear.
He’d like to know what she was trying to say. He’d like to know what the two women were to each other because it sure looked as if they were more than casual acquaintances.
Maybe whoever had chained Karen up had given her a hallucinogen, and she wasn’t even in touch with reality.
He wanted to get the hell out of the house. But he wasn’t going to leave the woman there, chained up like the victim in a sadomasochistic movie.
“Be right back.”
In the kitchen he began rifling through drawers. He found some ragged towels and old knives and forks. Nothing that looked as if it was going to cut through the handcuff chain. Maybe it would be easier to take the rails of the brass bed apart. Perhaps he could use a rock from outside.
Grace came running back down the hall. “There’s something wrong with her. I think she’s having a convulsion.”
“We’ll get her to the hospital.”
He had just opened the kitchen door and started back down the hall with Grace when an explosion shook the house, and they were thrown to the floor. As debris rained down from the back of the house, they both started coughing.
Sitting up, he looked at the destruction around them.
Grace also pushed herself to a sitting position. Her dark hair was covered with plaster dust. “Brady. Oh God, Brady, what happened?”
“A bo
mb,” he answered, just as fire sprang up from the bedroom. The bomb must have gone off right next to Karen Hilliard—right where they’d both been a few moments ago.
Flames sprang up in the hall.
“Get back.” He took Grace’s hand and pulled her away from the fire.
“We have to get her out of there,” Grace gasped, her eyes wide with panic.
Could they?
He dragged a struggling Grace to the kitchen sink. To his relief, it worked. As cold water gushed out of the faucet he soaked three of the towels. Wrapping them around himself, he ran down the corridor again, but he couldn’t make it past the flames.
When he saw the bed engulfed by the fire, he knew there was no way Karen had survived. They’d lucked out by going into the kitchen. Otherwise they’d be cooked, too.
When Grace tried to run past him, he grabbed her. “No! She’s dead.”
Grace moaned.
The fire was eating its way toward them, and he knew they had to get out of the house before it was too late. “Come on.”
When Grace resisted, he grabbed her arm and led her toward the back door.
“No. Please,” she gasped. “Help me. We’ve got to get her out of here.”
He saw she couldn’t wrap her head around the truth. “I’m sorry. It’s too late. Nobody could survive in there.”
She looked back toward the burning bedroom, and he saw tears in her eyes. He didn’t know whether they were caused by her emotions or by the smoke that was billowing around them.
“Get down where there’s more oxygen,” he told her.
When Grace resisted, he pulled her toward the floor, and she came down beside him on her hands and knees. At the floor level, it was easier to breathe.
“This way.”
Coughing, he led her toward the front door, which was the only way they could go without running into the flames that were creeping toward them.
They were both choking when he reached the front door, reached up to grab the knob and turned it.
He was about to step outside when a bullet slammed into the front door, inches from his face.
Chapter Eight
Brady returned fire, then jumped back, slamming the door behind him.
