She saw him then, stretched out in front of the fireplace hearth on the priceless Oriental rug, one of the pillows from her bed tucked under his head. One hand was splayed on his belly, the other buried beneath the pillow. He'd removed his loafers and crossed his big feet at the ankles. His head was cocked toward her as though he'd been watching her as he fell asleep. His expression was grim.
The lion asleep but not at rest, she thought whimsically as she got to her feet. Though she was absolutely certain she hadn't made a sound, his body tensed and his eyes flew open. "Are you all right?" he demanded without a hint of sleepiness in his tone.
"I have to wee."
His mouth relaxed. "Ah. Guess that happens a lot now, huh?"
"Every three hours like clockwork." She padded off to the powder room, feeling his gaze following her.
He was looking at Morgan's masks when she returned. He'd turned on one of the end table lamps and folded the duvet. "You feel up to talking before you go upstairs to your bed where you belong?"
She shook her head. "I'm too tired to yell at you tonight."
His mouth slanted. "Okay, I'll take a rain check. In the meantime, you need to know that Folsom's arraignment is scheduled for tomorrow morning, ten o'clock in federal court. Randolph and Gresham and I will be there, along with the prosecutor."
She felt a rush of satisfaction. "And me, I'll be there, too. I want The Weasel to know how much I loathe him for what he did."
Rafe watched her mouth firm and her chin come up. His little brown-eyed scrapper. An unfamiliar emotion moved through him. "Are you sure you're up to it?" he asked, watching her.
"Oh yeah, I'm up to it." She frowned. "I'll need to call the patients scheduled for the morning, though, and reschedule their appointments for later in the week. I'll have to check my book but I think my first appointment is at eight."
"Seth's coming to pick me up at seven. We'll take you and Lyssa out for breakfast."
Her gaze sharpened. "What do you mean, seven? Surely you don't intend to stay?"
"No choice. Seth has the wheels." His grin started in his eyes and spread with a sensuous slowness to his lips. "Don't worry, Princess. I'll bunk down here. This time."
"This time and every time," she muttered, only to see those eyes flash with wicked laughter.
"Want to bet?"
She shot him a dark look. "Go to hell, Cardoza," she muttered before stalking out.
"Like daughter, like mother," she thought he said as she swept up the stairs.
* * *
Chapter 10
« ^ »
The transport van stank. The prisoners scheduled for court appearances were crammed three in a seat, watched over by two brutally muscled, hard-faced marshals with shotguns. Jake Folsom sat close to the rear, jammed against the van's side wall by a hairy, tattooed Hell's Angel twice his size who smelled like puke.
Shoulders wedged sideways, Jake stared straight ahead. Some men broke under the humiliation. Some fought back, only to end up pissing blood from bruised kidneys.
Unlike a lot of the fish in the tank, Jake knew the game. The marshals wanted a model prisoner? No sweat, Jake Folsom was a damn role model.
He had been a snot-nosed kid picking pockets and snatching purses when he'd discovered he could con social workers and cops alike by turning himself into whatever they wanted him to be. They wanted to see him as a sad, neglected kid so they could feel like heroes riding to his rescue, that's exactly what he'd given them. They'd wanted a reformed delinquent to prove the big bucks they'd spent on intervention had worked, hell, he could play that easy. A woman wanted a man to love her for her brilliance or her personality instead of the size of her breasts, fine by him.
He didn't have a read on the judge yet, but he would. The jurors, though, that might be a challenge.
Rage seethed like hissing snakes in his belly whenever he let himself think of the humiliating scene in Arlene's prissy pink bathroom.
His mind darkened. That stupid cow. She was almost as much to blame for what happened as Cardoza. How many times had he told her not to open the door to strangers? For her own safety, he'd said so she wouldn't get suspicious. Did the dumb bitch listen? Hell no, just opened the damn door and invited the Feds inside like they were honored guests.
He'd made a mistake by not making an excuse to remain behind in Canada as he'd planned. For peanuts, too. The measly fifty grand she'd recently inherited from her great-aunt. Less than the cost of the S-class Mercedes "Michael Carlyle" had on order with a dealership in Vancouver. Once he'd wiggled out of this charge, he intended to make her pay—after he'd cleaned out her savings account.
Before he split for Canada, he'd take care of Cardoza. The Fed was a dead man walking. Only the time and place of his execution had yet to be decided. The Fed's own .45 would be the means, the same one the grinning SOB had shoved into his gut. His belly was still black and blue.
It hurt to move. It hurt to breathe. Jake had passed an edgy sleepless night in that noxious hellhole cell planning the sequence and placement of each shot. He knew enough about anatomy to keep the bastard alive a long time. Long enough to reduce him to begging—not for his life, but for the coup de grace. It was then he planned to shoot the bastard in the throat, then walk away, leaving him to choke on his own blood.
After that he would take care of Daniela—and that marked-up brat of hers.
* * *
"Ever been to court before?" Seth asked Danni as the three of them rode up to the second floor in the elevator.
"A few times to offer expert testimony."
She wrapped her icy fingers a little tighter around the strap of her shoulder bag and tried to ignore the nerves making her heart pound and her mouth dry. Next to her, large and comforting and protective, Rafe glanced down and smiled. Clean shaven, with his thick hair glossy and well brushed, he looked polished and confident in his suit and tie. "You doing okay?" he asked quietly.
"So far," she said as the car stopped and the doors slid open. The oatmeal she'd forced down for the baby's sake had congealed into a lumpy ball in her stomach, and her legs felt wooden.
"My money's on you, Princess." Rafe slipped his hand under her elbow as they exited and kept it there as they headed toward the small knot of people halfway down the long, wide corridor.
Case was there, she realized with a little flurry of gratitude, looking reassuringly competent and appropriately professional in a conservative blue suit. Next to him stood his shaggy bear partner whose name she'd forgotten, looking rumpled and grumpy in a truly ugly green-and-beige plaid sports jacket and wrinkled brown trousers.
The third person in the group was a willowy African-American woman with close cropped hair bleached nearly white and strongly defined features. Nearly as tall as Case in her three inch heels, she'd dressed for both impact and chic image in a superbly tailored bronze-and-black houndstooth check jacket over a black silk shell and a pencil slim black shirt. An expensive looking briefcase was slung over one elegant shoulder.
Danni read her as a power player who knew how to use her exotic beauty and height as a weapon to both intimidate opposing counsel and hostile witnesses while at the same time bedazzling male jurors. On the other hand, Danni knew, less favored female jurors might resent her for the very things their male counterparts found so fascinating.
Danni felt both reassured and worried as she sneaked a peek at Rafe's face. Sensing her gaze, he glanced her way—and winked. She felt a bubble of laughter rising to her throat and wondered if he'd been deliberately trying to put her at ease. She suspected that he had and was grateful.
Spying them approaching, the prosecutor placed a slim hand on Case's arm and drew his attention to them as well. "It's a good day in the neighborhood, boys and girls," Prudy's sometimes moody, always intense husband said with a cocky grin that registered one notch below Rafe's for testosterone power. The four cops shook hands and Rafe officially handed over her ring as evidence. Case gave Danni a brotherly hug before introducin
g the federal prosecutor.
Felicia Hall-Jones had a firm handshake and a brisk, no-nonsense manner. In contrast, her throaty voice had an exotic island lilt that Danni found charming. "Dr. Fabrizio, I assume Agents Cardoza and Gresham have explained that this is merely a hearing to present probable cause for the charges against the defendant and to record his plea," she asked after the two of them had exchanged pleasantries.
Danni nodded. "Will the judge let him out on bail, do you think?"
Ms. Hall-Jones shrugged. "A toss-up. I'll present Folsom as a flight risk, his attorney will cite his good character and lack of previous convictions, etcetera. Judge Bonaventure tends to lean toward the side of the good guys, but not always."
"Well, if it isn't the lovely Ms. Hall-Jones," a voice boomed, rocketing off the thick walls like a cannon shot in a phone booth.
The man deliberately making his arrival known to all and sundry had a prodigious Orson Welles belly as well as the temperamental actor's flair for making dramatic entrances. Of average height, he had carefully styled iron gray hair, hypnotic blue eyes and a perfect tan. His navy pinstriped suit screamed custom tailoring and the well-tended hand he extended toward the prosecutor sported a diamond pinkie ring that fell easily into the category of a major rock.
Danni's first impulse was to dismiss him as a bloated buffoon—until she saw the nearly imperceptible narrowing of the prosecutor's shrewd eyes. The dislike between the two was nearly palpable. Ms. Hall-Jones didn't strike her as a woman who squandered her emotional energy on lightweight adversaries.
"Counselor," the prosecutor said with a polite smile as she allowed her hand to touch his briefly—and with a subtle distaste that the other man caught instantly, though he recovered quickly.
"You are looking ravishing as always, Felicia," he said, lifting a well-shaped brow that seemed almost feminine. "I do envy you that lovely bone structure."
Her self-possession unruffled, Ms. Hall-Jones reached out to flick an imaginary speck of lint from his lapel. He wore a pink carnation in his buttonhole and a diamond tiepin that was nearly as large as his pinkie ring.
"I thought you only trolled for high-profile capital cases these days, Addison," she said with a smile that was subtly shaded toward derision.
"Alas, homicides are on the decline thanks to such stalwart members of law enforcement as these." He swept Case and his partner a condescending look before settling his gaze on Rafe.
It was subtle, the change that came over Tandy. The merest flicker of an eyelash, the slight tightening of facial muscles. Even his nostrils flared, like a hyena catching the scent of a lethal predator. His voice when he spoke, however, was affable.
"Agent Cardoza, we meet again."
"Looks that way, Counselor." Rafe's voice held only icy contempt. His eyes, too, were about as friendly as a winter dawn.
Tandy managed a credible smile. "You seem to have recovered without any ill-affects."
"Count on it."
Recovered from what? Danni wondered, but before she could ask Rafe to explain, Tandy shifted his attention her way. "Addison Tandy, at your service ma' am. And you are?"
"Dr. Daniela Fabrizio," Ms. Hall-Jones said before Danni had a chance to answer for herself.
Recognition flashed in the attorney's eyes an instant before his lips scythed into a smile. "A very great pleasure, Doctor. I've been looking forward to making your acquaintance since speaking with my client early last evening."
"Mr. Tandy," she said politely, but with no warmth.
Smile fading, Tandy dropped his gaze to her midsection before returning it to her face. There was a ruthless cunning behind the showy exterior, she realized. And a cruel cast to his thin mouth.
"Am I correct in assuming you intend to claim the child you're carrying is my client's, Doctor?" His tone was pleasant enough, she'd grant him that. His choice of words, however, had the men surrounding her instantly on guard.
"I wouldn't go there if I were you, Tandy," Rafe warned in a tone that was barely above a whisper, and yet the hair on the back of her neck suddenly shivered.
"It's not a claim, Mr. Tandy," she said, refusing to be intimidated. "It's the truth."
His mouth smiled once more, but his eyes had a calculating glint. "I certainly wouldn't presume to doubt a woman of your impeccable reputation and family background, Dr. Fabrizio." He nodded and started to turn away. He paused, however, as though struck by an afterthought, and glanced again at her belly. "If we do find ourselves going to trial, however, I would be remiss if I didn't ask the judge to order a paternity test."
He left her speechless.
Rafe had no such problem. The name he called Tandy was graphic—and, in Danni's opinion, completely appropriate. She only wished she'd said it first.
* * *
The anteroom off the courtroom was little more than a box with a table and three straight-backed chairs. A vent in the ceiling provided the only ventilation. Alone and still chained, Jake cast an impatient glance at the wall clock that was the only adornment on the beige walls. There were still forty minutes to cool his heels until court convened. To distract himself, he tapped one foot against the floor, the cheap prison clogs making a slapping noise against the terrazzo floor. With each movement of his foot, the shackles rattled, fueling his growing anger.
He heard a quick tap on the only door before it opened, admitting his attorney.
"About time you got here, Tandy," he snarled as the marshal closed it again. "I've been in this stinking shoebox for almost an hour."
The fat lawyer looked unruffled as he deposited his attaché case on the table, then pulled out a chair. "Regrettable, but unavoidable," he said as he took out a handkerchief and wiped the seat before settling his elephant ass.
"I'll make this short and sweet, Mr. Folsom. I've reviewed the government's evidence and I've met the star witness." He allowed a hint of a smile. "Dr. Fabrizio is a prosecutor's dream. Attractive, beautifully dressed, poised, with honest brown eyes and the face of a Madonna. The kind of woman a man just naturally wants to protect, even when he's figuring out how to get her into bed."
"A damn wedding ring is how. It's all or nothing with that bitch."
Tandy looked as though he'd just caught a whiff of something foul. "Be that as it may, sir, bottom-line, with her face and her testimony, this case is a slam dunk—for the opposition. Your only chance to avoid prison time is to plea bargain."
Panic rose before Jake pushed it down. "Bull. I watched the Michelson trial on court TV. You made mincemeat of that mealy-mouthed blond bitch who cried rape."
Impatience crossed Tandy's face. "Don't be naive, Folsom. Juries don't take kindly to counsel badgering a woman who's expecting a child, especially one who's claiming to have been victimized by that child's father."
Jake went cold inside. "What do you mean, expecting a child?" His voice came out too loud and too shrill, a break in his control that added to his rage against the woman trying to destroy him.
Tandy's face changed. "You mean you didn't know she was pregnant?"
Jake shook his head. "Last time we spoke on the phone she said something about having a wonderful surprise waiting for me in London." His mouth thinned. If he'd known, he would have found a way to make sure the brat wasn't born alive.
Conscious that Tandy was watching him, he schooled his features to reflect an honest dismay. "I had no idea. I swear it. If I'd known, I would have found a way to work things out."
Tandy studied him with eyes that missed very little. Jake kept his poker face in place and thought about summoning a tear or two. Apparently satisfied, Tandy pursed his lips and drummed his fingers as he reflected. Finally, his gaze sharpened.
"Look, why don't I have a private chat with that delicious Ms. Hall-Jones, see if we can do some horse-trading?"
Jake kept the sudden spike of hope carefully hidden. "What kind of horse-trading you have in mind?"
"A plea of guilty to one count of bigamy and an offer of reasonable restituti
on in exchange for a suspended sentence and probation."
It was tempting, Jake realized. Few states even bothered to bring cases of bigamy to trial, but this was a federal case. Still, even federal prosecutors liked to notch easy wins.
He could plead poverty, ask for time to raise the payback money. He'd make sure the judge liked him. Hell, he could charm anyone out of anything when he set his mind to it. Everyone but that bastard Fed with those green eyes that bored into him like lasers.
"Make the deal," he said, his spirits lifting. "I don't want my child born while I'm behind bars." It was a lie. He'd didn't want the child born period.
Tandy looked pleased as he rose. No doubt mentally counting the remainder of his fee—which he'd play hell getting—Jake thought as the fat bastard lumbered to the door and called for the marshal.
* * *
The conference room near the elevators seemed to pulse with tension. Danni sat at one end of the table, the prosecutor at the other. Between them, four large, grim-faced men listened silently as the prosecutor relayed Tandy's offer.
"On the one hand it would save you the trauma of testifying," Ms. Hall-Jones said, her expression carefully neutral. She hadn't seemed particularly surprised when Tandy had requested a prehearing conference. Nor had she expressed an opinion of the plea bargain Tandy had proposed. She had simply explained the proposal on the table.
"And on the other hand?" Danni prodded when the prosecutor remained silent.
"On the other hand, the scumbucket walks away with a measly slap on the wrist," Case's partner grumbled in a graveled voice.
Though Case remained silent, his expression showed that he agreed. Seth, too, seemed unhappy with the proposal and allowed his feelings to show clearly on his handsome face.
"Detective Petrov is essentially correct," the prosecutor said in her musical accent. "If Folsom reneges on his commitment to make restitution, the court can have his probation revoked and order him to serve his full sentence."
DADDY WITH A BADGE Page 13
