Live Ammo

by Joanna Wayne

  Chapter Seven

  Paralyzing dread ripped through Alexis. She struggled for a steadying breath and willed her heart not to pound its way out of her chest.

  This was all her fault. She knew not to come here with Tague, knew she couldn’t trust anyone. But then Scott had called and the fear had launched her into panic mode.

  Now there was only one way out. She had to talk fast and convincingly and give the best performance of her life.

  Avoiding eye contact, she absently turned to watch sheets of rain assault the window. “I don’t know what you’re talking about, Tague, but if that’s some new line to get in a woman’s bed, it isn’t going to work.”

  “Don’t play games with me, Alexis—or would you rather I call you Melinda?”

  “Why would I? And keep your voice down or you’ll wake Tommy.”

  Tague padded across the room, his bare feet almost silent on the carpet. He closed Tommy’s door quietly and then walked to the foot of her bed.

  “I know all about you, Melinda. You might as well be honest with me.”

  “The truth is that I don’t have a clue what you’re talking about.”

  “If I had any doubt about your identity before walking in here, the terror in your eyes when I called you Mrs. Hayden washed it away.”

  “Of course I was terrified. I woke up and you were standing over me like some sick voyeur. It’s a wonder I didn’t scream.”

  “Look at me when you talk, Melinda. And either stop with the lies or I call the local sheriff now.”

  He wasn’t bluffing. Her options shrank to none, except to try to make Tague believe her.

  She finally met his penetrating gaze. “How much do you know?”

  “What I read on the internet. That you set your house on fire with your husband in it and then took off with Tommy in the middle of the night.”

  “I didn’t set the house on fire. Scott did. I was the one who was supposed to die. And then he would have made it look like an accident. Since I didn’t die, he blamed it on me. And for the record, Melinda is not my real name. I took it when I became an actress. So let’s just stick with Alexis.”

  “Is that your real name?”

  “No, but it’s grown on me.”

  “Okay, Alexis, why would your husband try to kill you?”

  “Because when I threatened divorce, he flew into one of his barbaric rages. No one rejects Scott Hayden.”

  “If that’s true, why didn’t you go to the police and tell them what happened?”

  “If you think they would have bothered to even hear me out before throwing me in jail, you have a lot to learn about Hollywood justice, Tague Lambert.”

  “Every cop in Hollywood can’t be crooked.”

  “No, but every cop in Hollywood has heard of Scott Jeffery Hayden. He’s pure genius in the world of directing. His last five films have topped box-office revenues for weeks on end. He’s a legend. I’m the sick wife. The details of my mental and emotional breakdown were covered in all the blogs and gossip tabloids. So why would they believe anything I had to say?”

  “I’m not big into the tabloids. Did you have a mental breakdown?”

  “No, I was perfectly sane when I tried to kill Scott.”

  “Murder doesn’t sound particularly sane.”

  “How about self-defense and saving Tommy from an egocentric monster?”

  Tague walked to the side of the bed and wrapped his hand around the heavy wooden poster of the headboard. “What happened?”

  “It was two months before I fled the burning house with Tommy. It was late, nearing midnight, but Tommy was sick and wouldn’t stop crying so I was walking him to try and calm him.”

  “Where was Scott?”

  “I’m getting to that. I knew he wasn’t in bed, but I figured he was in his first-floor study working or else taking a midnight walk on the beach as he was prone to do when he was frustrated with a project.”

  “Did he know Tommy was sick?”

  “I’d told him. I doubt it registered. He had little to do with Tommy except when cameras were rolling.”

  “Go on.”

  “Our bedroom and the nursery were on the second floor, but that night I climbed the stairs to the third floor. All of a sudden Scott came rushing from one of the guest rooms. I knew he was furious and high on drugs. I backed away from him, but he just kept coming.”

  “Was he alone?”

  “Yes. He shoved me against the wall and then grabbed Tommy from my arms. The next thing I knew he was dangling Tommy over the balcony and screaming at him to shut up.”

  Alexis shivered as the memories sent icy fingers crawling up her spine.

  Tague sat down beside her. “My God, Alexis. No wonder you tried to kill him.”

  “I begged him to hand Tommy back to me, but he wouldn’t listen.” Her voice shook and she wrapped her arms tight across her chest. “I snatched the antique saber from the wall at the landing. I told him I’d gut him like a pig if he didn’t hand Tommy back to me. He laughed—and took one hand off Tommy’s kicking, squirming body.

  “I fell to my knees and begged. Finally, he shoved Tommy into my arms and stormed away. I threw the saber at him as hard as I could. It hit him in the arm, but he was so high and enraged he didn’t even know it had hit him. At least not then.”

  She broke out in a cold sweat. “I’m not crazy, Tague. But I knew that night that I’d either have to escape or I’d end up killing Scott. The next day I asked him for a divorce. That’s when he told the police and the psychologists that I’d tried to kill him for no reason.”

  “And you were hospitalized with a nervous breakdown?”

  “Yes, though the private sanatorium where I was placed was more of a spa with the doors locked than a true hospital. But I was nuts during my confinement, crazy with fear that Scott would fly into one of his rages again and kill Tommy.”

  “How long were you there?”

  “Six weeks.”

  “And how long were you home before he set the house on fire?”

  “One week. Looking back, I’m sure that was the plan when he came to the hospital to pick me up playing the role of loving husband.”

  “And you escaped the burning house with Tommy and ran.”

  “It’s all I knew to do. But I don’t expect you to believe me, Tague. Why should you when no one else does?”

  “Right now, I honestly don’t know what to believe,” Tague said. “If what you’re saying is true, there must be a way to get help for your husband and keep you from being arrested for trying to save yourself and Tommy.”

  “There’s only one way to keep Tommy safe, Tague. Let us leave here tonight. Please, just let me go. Do it for Tommy if not for me. If you have a conscience at all, you won’t return my son to that monster.”

  “You mean your stepson, don’t you?”

  “Yes.” But he was hers in every way that mattered.

  Tague sat down on the edge of the bed. “I can’t let you just walk out of here, Alexis.”

  Tears burned at the backs of her eyelids. “Please, Tague. Just pretend you never met me. Would that be so hard to do?”

  “It would be impossible. Besides, what kind of life can you have if you’re always on the run, always pretending to be someone you’re not? You’ll constantly be looking over your shoulder to see if Scott is closing in on you. That’s no way for you or Tommy to live.”

  “It’s a million times better than the alternative.”

  “Not necessarily.”

  “I’m wanted for kidnapping. I’ll go straight to jail. Tommy will go to Scott. If you turn me in, nothing you can do will change that.”

  “If you’re telling me the truth, I can prove it. Give me a week, Alexis.”

  “A we
ek of what? Waiting for Detective Hampton to identify and arrest me? Waiting for Scott to show up and kill me before he takes Tommy home with him?”

  “A week to investigate the situation. If your husband is the man you describe, you can’t be the only one who’s experienced his rages. There has to be evidence out there to prove your case against him.”

  “I don’t have a week.”

  “You will if I keep you safe and out of jail.”

  “How would you accomplish that?”

  Tague raked his fingers through his hair. “I don’t know yet, but I’ll think of a way. I just need time to explore my options. Will you agree to that week?”

  “Do I have a choice, other than sitting here while you call the sheriff?”

  “No.”

  “Then I agree. What do we tell your family?”

  “As little as possible. Now we should both try to get some sleep. I’ll need my mind crystal clear tomorrow. We’ll talk again after daybreak.”

  “Fine.” Unless she got a chance to make a break for it before that.

  “By the way, just in case you have any ideas about sneaking out of the house, I’ll be spending the rest of the night in here,” Tague said.

  So he was a mind reader, too. “How is this going to work if you don’t trust me?”

  “My way.”

  She still had a say about one thing. She tossed him a pillow. “There’s an empty bed in Tommy’s room.”

  “Later, maybe. Right now I’ll just settle for a chair.”

  She lay back down, flicked off the light and stared at the ceiling. She needed to put what had just transpired into some kind of perspective. All she could come up with was that she was being forced to put her trust in the rugged cowboy with the boyish charm and the determination of a mad bull.

  Him against Scott Jeffery Hayden.

  Heaven help them all.

  * * *

  “HAVE YOU LOST your mind?”

  That was exactly the response Tague had expected from his brother Durk. He would have probably said the same after hearing the bizarre tale Tague had just related.

  But Tague would be playing an unfamiliar game in a strange milieu. He needed someone he could count on to bounce ideas off of, and there was no one whose opinion he trusted more than Durk.

  Tague moved the phone to his left hand so that he could make notes with the right one. “Call me crazy, but I have a hunch Alexis is telling the truth.”

  “By Alexis, you mean Melinda Ryan?”

  “Turns out Melinda is an alias, too. Her Hollywood pseudonym.”

  “I wouldn’t call you crazy, Tague,” Durk said. “But naive might fit. The woman’s an actress, remember? She’s used to performing. Playing the role of innocent woman can’t be that difficult for her.”

  “I saw one of her movies. Believe me, she’s not that good of an actress.”

  “Then maybe she should be a writer. She has a damn good imagination. Or else she’s mentally unbalanced, just as her husband claimed. In either case, you are now harboring a fugitive. That can ensure you reservations at one of our beautiful, fun-filled Texas prisons.”

  “I realize that. But what if she’s telling the truth? Then turning them in to the law might mean sending an innocent woman to prison and a two-year-old kid back to an abusive father.”

  “I admit that’s a tough call.”

  “You got that right. Still, I guess I shouldn’t have brought you into this. No need for both of us to commit a felony.”

  “Of course you should have called me. We’re brothers. The good thing is we can afford a bulldog of a defense attorney to keep us out of prison if it comes to that. So what’s your plan?”

  “To harbor the fugitive and her son while I investigate her story and try to prove that the legendary Scott Hayden is really Jekyll and Hyde?”

  “Hard to believe he could be so successful and still able to hide that kind of character flaw.”

  “Stranger things have happened,” Tague reminded him. “Remember that wealthy Texas woman a few years back who volunteered in nursing homes for years, even won humanitarian awards for her service? Then when she died in a car wreck, they found her own mother starving to death and chained to her bed in the back room of the woman’s house.”

  “That’s one of the extreme cases. But you’re right. People have been known to hide a multitude of sins even from those who are close to them.”

  “And that’s especially true with people who have money or influence,” Tague said. “Scott Jeffery Hayden has both. But he can’t have fooled everyone. There must be a few people who’ve seen his dark side.”

  “And you plan to find them and make them tell all.”

  “I plan to give it a shot. That’s where you come in.”

  “The finding them or the torturing them into testifying?”

  “Let’s start with finding them. I figure I’ll need some of the best private investigators in the business. You know more about that kind of thing than I do.”

  “That’s what running a big company will do for you. If I were you, the first person I’d call is Meghan Sinclair.”

  “A woman?”

  “All woman, and she uses that to her advantage whenever needed.”

  “Has she done work for you before?”

  “No, she’s not into corporate cases.”

  “Then how do you know her?”

  “I never kiss and tell.”

  “Nuff said. How do I reach her?”

  “I’ll email you her contact info as soon as we hang up.”

  “Any other investigators that you’d recommend?

  “Jackson Phelps. He’s retired NCIS. Nothing gets past him. He has done some work for us and did a bang-up job. I’ll pass his contact information along to you, as well. You might want to wait until you’ve talked to them before you pursue anyone else. They’ll have their own ideas for how best to get this done.”

  “Good idea. Now all I have to do is decide what to do with Alexis and Tommy. I want to keep Mother, Aunt Sybil and Grandma out of this, so that rules out letting them stay here.”

  “Not to mention that Detective Hampton will no doubt pay you a visit when he identifies Alexis from her fingerprints and finds out she’s missing.”

  “I’m sure I’ll be first on his list.”

  “Have you thought about Galveston?” Durk asked. “I’m sure you could find a condo to rent somewhere on the beach. That would at least get her out of Dallas.”

  “I’d rather find her a house somewhere isolated enough that she can take Tommy outside without the risk of anyone seeing them. I figure Hampton will put out an APB on her as soon as he realizes he’s let a wanted woman slip his grasp.”

  “What about Dad’s old fishing cabin on Lake Livingston? That’s isolated.”

  “And probably full of spiders. Maybe even snakes. I don’t think anyone’s used it since Dad bought that golf and fishing condo on Toledo Bend.”

  “Which we should find time to use more often,” Durk said. “But it’s not isolated. So that leaves…”

  “The hunting camp.” The solution came out in stereo, both having thought of it at the same instant.

  “It’s perfect,” Tague said. “Clean. Roomy. And isolated. I’ll give the caretakers a week’s paid vacation.”

  “Of course, the fugitive might be afraid to stay out there by herself. When those coyotes howl and the owls hoot, it can get a little spooky.”

  “She won’t ever be there without me.”

  “You plan to be with her every second?”

  “That’s the current plan.”

  “Cozy.”

  “I can’t very well conduct an investigation without her input.”

  “Just be careful you don’t
go falling for her. She’s a married woman and a wanted criminal.”

  “Right. I plan to keep my head on straight and my pants zipped.”

  “I’m looking at Melinda Ryan’s picture on the computer right now, bro. Unless you’ve become a eunuch since I’ve seen you last, I’d say you’ve got your work cut out for you.”

  “I’m up to the task.”

  “Good. But all kidding aside, be careful. This could spin out of control faster than you can hog-tie a crippled calf and whistle ‘Yellow Rose of Texas.’”

  “Check.” He’d be careful. He just prayed his hunches were right.

  And that he had time for lots of cold showers. He had the feeling he was going to need them, regardless of what he’d promised Durk.

  * * *

  “I’M LOOKING FORWARD to working with you too, Meghan. If you’re half as good as Durk claims, I’m sure we’ll find what we’re looking for.”

  “Just promise me you won’t kill the messenger if you don’t like my findings.”

  “I’m just after the truth.”

  “That’s what they all say—until they get it.”

  “I don’t have a dog in the show. I’m just looking to protect the innocent—whoever that might be.”

  Tague finished the call and jotted down a few last notes. So far, so good. He and Alexis had come up with a plan for what they’d tell his family. And Meghan Sinclair was on board. He hadn’t been able to connect with Jackson Phelps yet, but he’d left him a message.

  Now he just had to make it through breakfast with the family. He pocketed his phone, dropped the notebook into the top of his duffel and zipped it. He was ready to roll.

  He smelled the bacon and heard the chatter and laughter long before he reached the kitchen. Family. There were times he could use a little less of them, but he couldn’t imagine life without them. He knew they’d always be there for him.

  The way Durk had come through for him this morning even though he had serious doubts about Tague’s involvement with Alexis. The way his mother had welcomed Alexis when all she knew about her was that she was with Tague.

  He took his family and life on the ranch for granted, too often forgetting that it wasn’t that way for everyone. Alexis hadn’t mentioned family at all, except for the husband who’d tried to kill her.