"The dog." Dash's eyes narrowed even further. Gideon could feel the other man's muscles tensing beneath his fingers.
"Is it the same breed you met up with in Shana's house?" Gideon wanted to know. But the iron-hard muscles under his fingers told him the answer.
For a full second they all stared at the fellow in the Panama hat who was walking down the street with a dun yellow dog on a leash. The dog was ugly and had a pit bull-shaped head.
"Now, me," Peter said, casually looking away. His voice was suddenly nonchalant. "I'm only here for a day or two. Gotta buy me some fun gew-gaws for Sean and Cam."
Gideon let go of Dash's arm. He forced himself to the same state of relaxation Peter was aping. "Funny thing, that. I just developed a powerful hunger for one of those pear things."
"I believe they're mangos," Dash remarked, with a yawn. "And I think I'll join you in the indulgence."
"Whatever you do," Gideon said in a lazy tone and smiling. "Don't lose sight of that dog."
For the first time in two days, he felt a spurt of optimism. This might turn out to be easy, after all.
~~~
"Oh, Jesus," Shana moaned.
Seated on a filthy stone floor with her arms around her upraised knees, Olivia watched Shana push herself to a sitting position, and then set one hand against her head.
"Does my head ever hurt," Shana remarked.
"It'll fade," Olivia promised her. A single light bulb burned on a wall past the iron bars that closed them in. Solid stone walls surrounded them on all other sides. There wasn't a window in sight.
"What happened?" Shana shifted to a more comfortable position, while still holding her head.
"We've apparently been abducted," Olivia replied calmly. She wasn't feeling so calm inside, however. They'd been kidnapped.
Shana looked around. "Brittany here?"
"Not so loud." Brittany hunched cross-legged beside a mattress-less iron cot. Both her hands were on her head. "You promise this headache gets better?" she asked Olivia.
"I'm pretty sure your head will start to feel better," Olivia returned, "but I can't tell you where we are — or even what time it is."
"I can tell you what time it is." Shana took her hand from her forehead to look at her wrist. "Damn," she then whispered.
Olivia smiled thinly. "They took everything."
"Who?" Shana asked.
As if in answer, footsteps sounded from the hall around the side of the stone wall. An oversize fellow strode into view. He was the size of an NFL linebacker, and Olivia was pretty sure he was the one who had pressed the handkerchief soaked in ether to her face. He was followed by two, equally disreputable-looking cohorts. The men wore green fatigues and scuffed boots. Olivia thought it a bit overboard, but ammunition belts crossed their shoulders.
Definitely overboard was the expression on the huge fellow's face as he turned to look into the cell.
Shana glanced down at her tank top and shorts, now well-smudged with dirt. "Oh, I don't look that bad," she muttered.
"Silence," growled the big man. He walked up to the iron bars and glared in turn at each of the women. "I am Leo," he said. "The Lion."
Definitely over-the-top, Olivia sniffed to herself.
"It was ordained by the Almighty," the big man said, "that you would fall into our hands." His lips lifted in what Olivia supposed was a smile. "We have everything we need now, everything necessary to begin our conquest of the evil, capitalist empire." Olivia could see his mouth could have used the services of a good orthodontist as he continued the grimacing smile. "Nothing," he told the women. "Nothing can now stop us."
Shana smoothed the front of her tank top and cleared her throat. "So good of you to share your career aspirations," she said. "We have no problem with them. No problem at all. We hope you'll succeed in your bid to overturn the evil capitalist empire. The empire sure hasn't done anything for me lately. So if you'll just let us be on our way — "
"Silence!" The leader glared at her. "The dirty capitalist whore will shut her mouth."
Shana turned to Olivia gape-mouthed. "Did he just call me what I think he called me?"
Leo's eyes burned in a way that dried up all of Olivia's spine-stiffening private mockings. "Hush," she whispered to Shana.
"You." Leo turned his oddly burning eyes toward Olivia. "You are the leader."
Olivia widened her eyes and put an innocent hand to her chest. "I am?"
Leo pointed. "You will now tell me what the back door is."
"Uh...excuse me?""
Leo's mouth twisted. "You pretend ignorance."
"Oh, we're not pretending," Brittany said.
She was hit with a hissing growl from Leo.
"I forgot. The dirty capitalist whore should keep her mouth shut," Brittany mumbled, and made a quick pantomime of locking her lips.
To Olivia's dismay, the leader turned his burning gaze back to her. "The virus developed by the infidel whore of a scientist is defective."
The women went silent. He knew about Anja? Olivia thought, and swallowed. Not to mention he knew about her very dangerous virus?
Shana made the next logical deduction. "What? You mean after all that, Anja's virus doesn't even work?"
"Silence," the linebacker snarled at her. He turned back to Olivia. "But you know the key, the missing ingredient that will prevent the virus from weakening."
"Uh...I do?" Olivia asked.
The linebacker's over-full lips pressed together. "I must know the secret. What will turn the virus off? You will tell me."
"Well, uh, I'd love to." Olivia put on her best difficult-customer voice. "I truly would — if I had any idea what you were talking about."
An impressive sound, part snarl, part explosion issued from the linebacker. He cocked the gun he held and shot it into the ceiling. Dust and rocks clattered to the floor. Then he half-turned and gestured to his cohorts. "Get the virus."
"Uh..." Shana, visibly shaking, waved her hands. "Listen. This seems to be a big misunderstanding. If we put our heads together, I'm sure we can work it out."
The linebacker ignored her. He accepted a syringe handed to him by one of the cohorts. Olivia felt her stomach sink to her toes.
"I imagine this will refresh your faulty memory," the linebacker said. "I imagine you will magically remember the key to turning off the virus...once we have injected you with it."
"Oh, boy," Brittany breathed.
All three women attempted to back away. It was a spacious, if dirty, cell.
"And to think," mused Shana. "I chose to come here, rather than walk over to the low-down, lying bum of a man who was there on the street right in front of me and who could no doubt blow all three of these idiots away with a single shot from his oh-so-talented gun."
"I'm thinkin' about that," promised Brittany, bumping into her as they got herded into a corner.
"Do any of us know what this virus is going to do?" Olivia wanted to know, her heart in her throat.
"Ouch!" Brittany exclaimed, as one of the men grabbed her arm. "Stop that! No." She struggled, but was easily subdued and Olivia saw the linebacker sink the needle into Brittany's arm.
"Damn," Olivia breathed, then felt her own arms taken and a sharp prick that signaled she'd been injected, too.
Shana hissed. "That stung."
"Yes," the linebacker said with a wide smile. "I feel sure you will remember the key now." With a wave of his hand, he gestured the other two men out of the cell. The door clanged behind him. Laughing merrily, Leo led the men around the corner and they tramp, tramp, tramped away.
"Great," Shana said, rubbing her arm. "This is just great."
Brittany's eyes were red. "I'm going to die, and then who's going to take care of my kids?"
Olivia drew a deep breath. "You are going to take care of your kids." Though privately she admitted she had no idea how they were going to get out of this. Anja had made it clear, as had Gideon, that the virus could be extremely dangerous.
It w
as something of an understatement to say she was out of her depth here.
Olivia rubbed her stinging arm and wondered: was this what Gideon had been trying to tell her? Had he been trying to make her understand that his world was way out of her depth? Had he simply been trying to protect her?
She sighed deeply and stared at the bars of their underground prison. It was a hell of a time to consider Gideon might have had a point, all along.
~~~
It did turn out to be easy. Gideon supposed he should have questioned that. The man they followed, apparently a guard out on a grocery run, was oblivious they were behind him. He led the three agents to a sprawling villa, something the men quickly determined had more boundary length than guards to protect it. A simple frontal assault gained them entry. After that, Gideon merely followed the trail of guards turning wild-eyed to intercept them. He presumed his path led to the women.
"I think Hollister hired his guys for their looks rather than their competence," Peter remarked, after they had bashed the sixth, and what appeared to be last, man at the end of a long hall.
"They all are rather comely," Dash agreed, with a glance back down the hall. One handsome face after another lay in unconscious repose.
Gideon felt ebullient. They'd done it. He tried the knob of the door before them. "It's locked."
"No problem." Peter reached into his hip pocket for his jimmy.
"Oh, for heaven's sake." Dash swiveled to land the door a perfectly calculated kick.
It eased off its jamb.
Both Peter and Dash gripped their revolvers, aiming forward. Gideon didn't bother telling them what they already knew: look before you shoot. The women were going to be in there.
With one swift move, Gideon kicked the door the rest of the way open. He and the men rushed in.
"Thank goodness!" Anja rose from a chair beside a delicate little table. She looked as calm and unruffled as if she'd been sitting in the lab's café. Beside her sat a man wearing an immaculately tailored linen suit and a baffled expression. He was still looking baffled a half a second later, after Peter had cold-cocked him.
"Hollister, I presume," Peter said, looking at Anja.
She nodded and her mouth tightened in the first show of anxiety Gideon had seen. "You can tell me how you managed to find me later. Right now you must get Walter." Anja clasped her hands. "I think he's locked somewhere downstairs. I — The last time I saw him he looked in a very bad way." Her eyes held what Gideon had never before seen in them: concern for a particular human being.
Gideon motioned to Dash. "Take Peter downstairs and see if you can find Walter." Then he turned back to Anja and asked the question that was at the top of his mind, the first question that had occurred to him since opening the door to the room. "And where are the others? How are they?"
"The others?" Anja's beautiful face drew into a frown. "What others?"
Dread fell over Gideon. He closed his eyes. He should have known it had been too easy.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
"How much longer do you think they intend to keep us here?" Brittany asked. After pacing for a while, she was cross-legged on the floor again, and yawning.
"I suppose they'll keep us as long as they damn well feel like it." Shana was poking her fingernail at the mortar gluing the iron bars to the stone wall, but stopped and looked over at the other two. "I hereby apologize. I apologize freely and completely. I should have walked right up to Dash in town there. I should have said, 'Why, hello, Mr. Dashwood. How good it is to see your martial arts expert, gun shooting expert, studly self. Oh, and by the way, I would be glad to serve as your willing slave until the end of time."
Brittany snorted. "I doubt you would have had to go that far."
"No?" Shana bit the finger she'd been using to scratch at the mortar.
"Nah. Just the slave part probably would have been enough," Brittany said.
Shana threw her a sardonic glance. Olivia snorted.
"Now, I on the other hand, I'm kinda glad I didn't go out and say hello to Peter, after all," Brittany said.
"You are?" Shana turned to her.
"Uh huh." Brittany scratched her arm where she'd been injected. "It would have given him all kinds of ideas, you know, like about how I might feel toward him."
Shana arched her eyebrows. "Which is...?"
"Not what he hopes. Or deserves. Uh uh." Brittany shook her head. "I ain't gonna fall in love again."
Both Olivia and Shana looked at her.
"But — aren't you in love with him already?" Shana asked.
Brittany threw her a horrified look. "Hell, no."
"Ah." The sardonic expression returned to Shana's face. "My mistake."
"And even if I were," Brittany went on. "I wouldn't do anything about it. I mean, a relationship...with a man..." She shook her head as she returned her attention to her injection site. "Being in love could make such a situation even more risky than otherwise."
Shana's sarcastic expression eased. "Yeah. I kinda know what you mean."
Brittany turned to Olivia. "What about you? Wish you'd spoken to Gideon out there on the street?"
"As opposed to being locked in a cell by some maniacal ideologues, you mean?" Olivia looked up at the earth ceiling musingly. "Well...considering the haranguing Gideon would likely give me — for the rest of my life — I don't think so."
Shana laughed. "That's the spirit. Die-hard to the end."
Olivia sighed. She wasn't being die-hard. She was being realistic. If Gideon ever found out about this, he'd have a fit. Olivia had gone and done her best to prove he'd been right all along. She couldn't be trusted.
At that moment the incongruous sound of "Old MacDonald Had a Farm" beeped through the stale air of the underground cell.
"Oh, my God," Shana whispered. "It's mind control."
"No." Brittany sat up straight. "It's my cell phone."
"Your cell phone!" Olivia jumped to her feet. "They must have dropped it."
"It's the super thin silhouette option," Brittany confirmed. "Maybe it fell to the side when they took all our stuff."
"Look!" Olivia commanded, combing the dim expanse of their cell as Old MacDonald Had his Farm once again.
Shana skipped around the edges of the cell while Brittany crawled on hands and knees. "Here!" Brittany cried, gingerly plucking a thin metal object from under the iron cot. "Spider," she moaned, and gave the phone a shake.
"Answer it! Answer it!" Shana cried, jumping up and down.
Brittany lifted the phone with the tips of her fingers and a grimace. "Hello?" She coughed. "I'm sorry, what?"
"What? What?" Shana wanted to know.
"It's the babysitter," Brittany told them, covering the receiver, then abruptly returning her attention to the phone. "What do you mean the boys' father came by? Blake? You must be kidding."
"What?" Shana exclaimed.
Brittany, scowling, held up a 'be quiet' hand. "No, it's not okay — What do you mean he came by to pick up the kids?" Her gaze, spitting, went to the two breathlessly waiting women. "The one time in two years I'm away from the kids, and Blake decides to show an interest in them! Can you beat that?"
"Brittany," Shana said.
But Brittany was talking into the phone again. "No, he doesn't have custody. What do you mean, you gave him the boys? You had no right to — What's that? I'm the one with the problem here? Look, lady — Huh? Your babysitting agency has a strict policy about custody disputes? But I'm telling you there is no dispute — Huh? I'm getting put on the 'deny' list? Well, thank you very much. That's just peachy. As if I'd ever want to use your stinking agency again!" By then Brittany was shouting, and she shut off the phone with a vigorous motion. "The nerve! That ditz gave my two sons to my ex without a fight, and then had the gall to tell me I can't use her stupid babysitting agency ever again!"
"Brittany." Shana spoke very softly. "Did it occur to you to mention to the babysitter that we're sitting in a friggin' dungeon?"
Brittany bli
nked. "Oh."
Olivia shook her head. "It doesn't matter. There's nothing a babysitter sitting in San Diego can do about our situation here on Maria Island."
"If we're still on Maria Island," Brittany added.
Shana groaned.
"But I do happen to know someone who might be able to help." Olivia made a beckoning motion with her fingers. "Hand me the phone."
"No." Shana breathed.
"I thought you were die-hard," Brittany agreed, even while handing Olivia the phone.
"It's the funniest thing," Olivia replied. "When I think of Mr. Ape Anti-Capitalist shooting the ceiling with his automatic weapon, and us with the doomsday virus in our bloodstreams — well, it all suddenly makes Gideon glow with a kind of hero aura."
"Hero, huh?" Shana was grinning.
"In comparison," Olivia made sure to point out.
~~~
"He doesn't know a damn thing." After two hours of interrogation, Gideon made this conclusion as he, Peter, and Dash left the room in which they'd sequestered Sebastian Archibald Hollister, III.
"Well, he knows a lot about himself," Dash temporized. He rolled down the sleeves of his wilted dress shirt.
"That's for sure." Peter sighed and ran a hand through his hair. "Hollister is more than happy to tell us just how smart he is and how marvelous his specially trained dogs were at finding Anja."
"Right." Gideon's jaw went grim. "And how he knew exactly what Hagar Subrahmanyam had when she called to sell him the vector and, basically, Anja."
"I checked ten minutes ago," Dash told them, "while you were hearing the story of the brilliant deduction yet again. Dr. Subrahmanyam is not in her office. Her assistant believes she left the island in her boat."
Peter leaned against the wallpaper decorating the hallway. "It sounds like she tried selling Anja to somebody beside Hollister, somebody who was disappointed not to receive the goods. The question is who?"
Gideon crossed his arms. "That is the hundred thousand dollar question, isn't it?"
Indiscreet Ladies of Green Ivy Way Page 23
