by Liliana Hart
“Tell me what your plans are for my niece. I don’t want that list to make it out of the bank vault. Do you understand?”
“Oh, I understand, Mr. Valentine. Now it’s time for you to understand that I’m the one calling the shots. I don’t want any more screw ups, and your men thus far have seemed less than competent.”
“And you’d better understand where the money’s coming from,” Angelo said. “Don’t disappoint me. And one more thing. A little change from my earlier orders. I want Rachel brought to me alive. Do what you want with the man and anyone else who gets in your way, but I want Rachel to know what happened to her father before she dies. And I want her to know who’s going to end it all.”
It was everything Angelo could do not to rub his hands together in anticipation. Rachel had caused him considerable trouble, and it was only fair he paid her back in full. Nobody messed with Angelo Valentine, and the knife he carried in the sheath at his side would guarantee it was the last thing Rachel would ever remember.
“Whatever you want, Mr. Valentine,” the visitor said, smirking. “But a kidnapping is going to make my price go up by a hundred thousand.”
“Or I could kill you now, and find someone else who is more accommodating,” Angelo countered.
“You could certainly try.” The visitor got up from the chair and walked away calmly, the small smile never wavering.
Angelo didn’t take a breath until the front door closed.
Chapter Eleven
Dawn was just breaking over the horizon when Shane stepped out of the house.
Gravel crunched beneath his feet and he looked the stolen Honda over thoroughly to make sure no one had tampered with it. He grabbed one of the disposable cell phone out of the front seat and a look at the screen told him Wildcat hadn’t tried to call. Not good news. He shoved the phone in his back pocket and left the protection of the garage area. If there was going to be a showdown, he wanted to be prepared and take every advantage of the land and any resources at his disposal.
Unfortunately, the land they were stuck on had a whole lot of nothing, and there were no resources that he could see in any direction. The dilapidated barn sat in the middle of acres of six-foot high wheat. Trees were nonexistent and there were no houses.
Shane figured they’d been lucky up to this point. If Wildcat had turned against them their chances for survival had decreased significantly, and it was a danger to stay in one place too long. His old commander was brilliant at combat tactics, but Shane still held hope that his friend would come through for them in the end. Old habits were hard to break.
Shane had used up more than half of the hour he’d given Rachel as a time gauge. He’d had enough time to think of a plan, but there were a lot of things that could still go wrong. There were too many variables that factored into keeping Rachel safe, and he wasn’t afraid to admit he was being overly cautious where she was concerned. Maybe he’d lost his edge since Maggie’s death. He’d been stuck behind a desk for two years looking for missing persons and tracking down people who were defrauding their insurance companies.
This was not the time to lose confidence in his abilities now that Rachel’s life was on the line, he thought.
He headed back toward the house and Rachel when he felt the vibrations under his feet. A black SUV, windows tinted black and dirt flying from under its tires, came up behind him. Shane had the gun in his hand in an instant and hunkered down in the tall stalks of wheat, training the weapon on whoever was about to get out of the vehicle.
The passenger side door opened and a pair of denim clad legs stepped out. The woman was petite and her blond hair grazed just above her shoulders, framing an elfin face. Shane would have thought she looked like a perky high school cheerleader if hadn’t been for her eyes. She had cop eyes, intense and assessing as she looked around the area for possible threats. She wore a shoulder holster over a casual white t-shirt and thick-soled Vibram boots under a pair of baggy jeans. He had her pegged for a Fed, despite the government license plates on the SUV or the casual clothing.
It was the driver of the SUV who finally pulled Shane’s curiosity away from the woman. Jones Daugherty walked around the back of the vehicle and joined his companion. Jones had always been a big man, but he seemed like a giant next to the petite woman, and it looked like he’d been hitting the gym hard over the last couple of years. Other than being a little thicker across the chest, he still looked the same—the same blond hair cropped close to the skull in a military style and the same intricate tattoo that ran from his wrist to his elbow.
But there was definitely one noticeable difference. Shane had never seen Wildcat squeeze a colleague on the ass and whisper a suggestion lewd enough to make the colleague in question blush.
“Come on out, Ace,” Wildcat called out. “I know you’re out there somewhere. I can feel you staring at me. We need to talk.”
Shane wasn’t really left with any other options. Wildcat was standing between him and Rachel, and his first priority was keeping her safe. Shane stood up slowly and left his hiding place, keeping his weapon trained on the enemy. The action left a bitter taste in his mouth since it was his closest friend at the other end of the target.
Jones met Shane’s steady gaze and glanced at the gun in his hand, laughing a little at the sight. He held his hands up in a sign of surrender. “Don’t shoot, Ace. Though I probably shouldn’t be worried about you hitting me since you’ve been playing private eye for the last couple of years. I bet you’ve lost all your instincts, spying on cheating wives and looking for lost kittens.”
“Like hell, I have,” Shane said indignantly, wishing he hadn’t had the same thought mere minutes before. “Any time you want to go a round just say the word. Who’s your friend?”
“We’ll get to that. I figure I should start out by telling you I got trapped in Chicago for a couple of days,” Wildcat said. “It’s a real mess up there, and I couldn’t leave in the middle of it without drawing suspicion my way. People have a tendency to keep an eye on IA men since we’re considered the bad guys. And the lady you’re pointing the gun at is my fiancée. She’s a lot meaner than I am, and she’ll get real nasty if you shoot me. I’ve already been fitted for my tux.”
“Special Agent Carrie Layne,” she said, nodding in his direction and giving him a smile meant to put him at ease. “I’ve heard a lot about you. And most of it was fairly entertaining. Maybe you could show me the tattoo you got in Afghanistan some time.”
“Geez, Wildcat. You told her about that,” Shane said, feeling the heat rush to his cheeks.
“There are no secrets between us. Which means your secrets aren’t safe either,” Jones said, putting an arm around Carrie’s shoulders.
Shane signed and lowered the gun. “Maybe we should go inside and talk about this.”
***
Rachel heard the beeps that signified someone was trying to get through the metal door. She didn’t want to take the chance that it wasn’t Shane, so she grabbed a sawed off shotgun from her stash and pointed it at the door.
The door opened and a huge man filled the entryway. He was taller and more muscled than Shane, which wasn’t an easy feat, and she figured the man could have passed as a fighter in the UFC. Or maybe even the Incredible Hulk. She pumped the shotgun before he could get a foot over the threshold.
“Whoa, honey,” Wildcat said. “Let’s not jump to conclusions.”
The giant of a man stepped to the side and revealed a tiny blond woman, but Rachel looked over her head to the man behind. She breathed a sigh of relief when she saw Shane rounding up the trio. He seemed unharmed and unconcerned about the strangers who had invaded their sanctuary.
“It’s okay, Rachel,” Shane said. “I’d like you to meet Jones Daugherty and his fiancée, Carrie Layne.”
Rachel looked at the man square in the eyes and didn’t bother to put down the shotgun. “You’re late, Agent Daugherty. Have you come to help us or did you spend the last two days setting up a way to tr
ap us here?”
“Are you always this suspicious?” Wildcat asked and took a seat at the kitchen table.
“You could say I’ve learned to be cautious over the years,” she answered.
“I have to say I’m curious to know the answer as well,” Shane said. “Especially after I’ve gone to all the trouble to assure Rachel that you’re the most trustworthy friend I have. Now would be a hell of a time to be wrong about that.”
“I assure you, Shane, that Jones has had nothing but your best interests at heart since you called him,” Carrie said defensively. She gave Shane a hard look and squeezed her lover’s hand in a reassuring gesture.
“Put the gun away, Rachel,” Shane said as he nodded to the woman his best friend had chosen to spend the rest of his life with. “Let’s all sit down and talk this out.”
Rachel put down the shotgun and took the chair next to Shane. He lounged like he hadn’t a care in the world, and she tried to emulate him. The lack of sleep over the past couple of days was beginning to catch up with her, and she found all she wanted to do was climb back into bed.
“I brought the files on the agents you asked for,” Jones began and handed over a folder at least three inches thick of papers.
Rachel gave Shane a curious look and waited for him to explain.
“We’ve already determined that someone in the FBI has been feeding information to Angelo,” Shane said. “And more than likely that same agent is responsible for your father’s disappearance and the murder of Agent Culver, since only an inside person would know when and where Culver and Dom were meeting. I want you to look through the files of these agents and see if anyone looks familiar to you.”
He handed her the file and she flipped back the blue cover with the confidential seal stamped across it. “This could take awhile. I had no idea so many agents had worked on trying to catch my father or any of his men.”
“These agents are from all over the country,” Shane said. “Not just Chicago. Your father had interests in several states.”
Rachel began flipping through the pages and Shane turned his attention toward Agent Layne. “How do you fit in here?” he asked. “Are you IA like Jones or do you have a personal interest in the Valentine case?”
“I’ve never been assigned to any of the Valentine task forces directly,” Carrie said. “I work in the Violent Crimes Unit, so sometimes my cases overlap with the guys in Organized Crime.”
“Not many agents would be willing to risk their career for people they’ve never met.”
“I’m not like a lot of agents,” she said. “If Jones asks for my help, I’m willing to give it because I trust him. He had to stay in Chicago on an assignment and he needed someone to stock this house with food and extra clothing. I was glad to do whatever I could to help, despite it going against Director’s orders. Sometimes the results outweigh the consequences.”
Carrie’s eyes were passionate and her kewpie doll mouth was pressed in a serious line. Shane could tell she meant every word she said and was loyal to Jones. That’s all he could ask for his friend. “You picked a good one,” Shane said to Wildcat. “Though how you got her to fall in love with you is a mystery.”
“What can I say? I have charm to spare,” Wildcat said with a shrug. “Maybe I can loan you some. You’re not looking your best right now.”
“I’ve been shot and lying in bed unconscious for two days. How the hell else am I supposed to look?” Shane turned his attention to Rachel to get her support, but her attention was riveted on the file in front of her.
Shane cursed viciously when he saw the picture of himself in her shaking hands. It was his old FBI photo and the pages attached to it described his job on the Valentine task force. Plain and simple, he’d been the one asked to steady the crosshairs on Rachel’s father and pull the trigger if necessary. He thanked God it hadn’t been necessary.
“What is this?” Rachel asked.
Wildcat winced and Carrie looked on with sympathy at the both of them. Shane kept his expression blank and wondered how to begin. He might as well get it over with, he thought. She wasn’t going to like the outcome either way.
“When I first joined the Hostage and Rescue Unit I was given your father as a target,” Shane said, his throat suddenly dry. “In fact he was my very first target. It was a hell of an assignment for someone as new as me to the job.”
He remembered the congratulatory slaps on the back and looks of envy from some of his other coworkers. It had made him feel like a king at the time, but now it made him feel like the lowest form of life. His military record had been undisputable, which was why the director had passed the file his way.
Shane got up from the table and went to find the makings for coffee. The silence behind him was deafening as he poured dark grounds into the filter and added water. He tried to find his words carefully, but they stuck in his throat. There could be no more secrets between them if he wanted the chance to have a future with Rachel.
Distracted, Shane left the coffee on the counter and returned to his seat next her. “I wasn’t pulled onto the team to assassinate your father. A sniper is not an assassin. That’s an important distinction for all of us, and being called to take out a target was never something my unit handled lightly. At the FBI, snipers were called in as a last measure to protect something or someone in imminent danger.
“Intelligence found information that your father had copies of some very important documents from Homeland Security and the military. Documents involving weapons. Intelligence also told us that Dom had set up a meeting with Lex Torrino out in New Jersey to sell the information for several million dollars. It was common knowledge that Lex had ties to terrorist groups, so it was a matter of national security that he never get his hands on those documents. I was set up as a precautionary measure in case the documents were in jeopardy of disappearing. My instructions were to take out both targets if it looked like the briefcase was going to be part of a switch or if Lex got too greedy.
“Dom went to meet Lex in a very public train station at rush hour with the briefcase in hand. They each stopped at a kiosk and grabbed a cup of coffee before finding a table. They were getting down to business when an overzealous agent busted in on them before they could make the transaction. Civilians were everywhere and no one could hear orders over the shouts as agents jumped out of their hiding places with guns drawn. I knew it was a blown mission from that moment, but I had to wait for the FBI to officially cancel my contract to kill. It only took them a couple of minutes to get in touch with me. I didn’t even stay around to see what happened. My job was done as far as I was concerned. It turned out Intelligence had been wrong and your father’s briefcase had a bunch of real estate papers inside and Dom was going to sell Lex some property he owned in New Jersey.”
Even now Shane knew he’d just been doing his job and felt no remorse for what he’d always considered an important service for his country. “It was just a job,” Shane said. “One of many I was given over the years. Nothing more. Nothing less.”
“If it had come down to it,” Rachel asked. “Would you have killed him?”
Shane only hesitated for the barest of seconds before he answered.
“Yes.”
Rachel pushed back from the table and walked into her bedroom, shutting the door with a finality that scared the hell out of Shane. Would there ever be a point in his life where the mistakes of his past would stop coming back to haunt him?
***
Shane went back to the coffee pot and poured himself a large mug of the steaming liquid. Every sip tasted bitter on is tongue. He kept his back turned, wishing for things that could never be when Carrie’s soft voice interrupted his private thoughts.
“Let me talk to her,” she said. “She’ll understand you did what you had to once she has time to think about it.”
Shane didn’t answer her, but he heard Carrie’s light knock and the squeak of hinges a few seconds later.
“Hell, Ace,” Wildcat sai
d. “This is my fault. I didn’t even think about your information being in the file. I just grabbed it from my home office and drove straight here.”
“No, it needed to come out. I should have been honest from the start and told her sooner. She might not hate me so much now if I had.”
“You love her,” Wildcat said, surprised. “I’ll be damned.”
Shane took his coffee, tossed Wildcat a bottled water because he knew his friend never touched any kind of caffeine and settled back across from him. “I don’t know. I want her, but what I feel for Rachel, it’s not like it was with Maggie.”
“I’d worry more if it was,” Wildcat commented. “They’re different people. And you’ve changed since Maggie died. I’m not saying that what you felt for Maggie should ever be replaced, but that doesn’t mean it’s all that’s left out there for you either. You’re still alive, my friend. It’s time you started acting like it.”
“The last few days have made me realize that more than ever. I think I’m starting to feel my age.”
Wildcat leaned back his head and laughed. “Hell, you’re only thirty-two. I’m three years older than you, and I’m in the prime of my life. Maybe you need to take some vitamins.”
“Yeah, I’m sure that would help,” Shane said sarcastically. “Or it could just be the blood loss.”
“If you hadn’t been sitting behind a desk getting soft for two years, that guy in Tulsa never would have gotten a piece of you.”
Shane’s only response was a rude hand gesture. “What was the business in Chicago that held you up?” Shane asked. “Does it have to do with Angelo Valentine?”
“You could say that,” Jones said. “Christ, this whole thing has been screwed up from the beginning. Angelo’s been busy since you and Rachel left New Orleans. Bodies have been washing up from Lake Michigan on an average of one a day.”
“Anyone we know?”
“No, but your girlfriend does. Three days ago a tourist noticed Cleopatra Carlisle floating near Navy Pier with the zoom lens of a camera. The body was fairly fresh, and she’d been dead less than a couple of hours. Death was the standard MO used by Angelo himself—throat sliced to the point that the head was barely attached,” Jones said, making a slicing motion across his neck with his finger. “The file on Cleo says she was a close friend of Rachel’s. They roomed together at Loyola for four years, and Rachel was her maid of honor last Christmas. The husband was away on business at time of death.”
