Bounty Hunter Ransom

by Kara Lennox

  “Like Cory? No, I’m not making that mistake again.” He took one last bite of enchilada. “You stay here. Wayne has turned this house into a fortress. You’re safe, as long as you stay behind locked doors, and that’s where I want you.”

  She folded her arms. “I hate it when you order me around.”

  “Tough. If you want me to help, you play by my rules.”

  “Like you’d quit looking for Sara? With that million-dollar reward out there?”

  He huffed out an exasperated sigh. “It’s not about the damn money. Hell, if I earn the reward, I’ll give it back. I’ll donate it to charity.”

  “Oh, that I’d like to see. The Charity for Under-privileged Bounty Hunters?”

  “You really don’t have a clue what drives me, do you?”

  “I know all I need to know.”

  Beau laid down his fork and went to the paper-towel dispenser. He ripped off a sheet and wiped his mouth. Aubrey realized she’d forgotten to get them napkins.

  “When will you be back?” she asked, hating the needy quality in her voice. It was just that she felt safer when he was around.

  “You sound as if you might actually miss me.”

  “Don’t hold your breath.”

  “I hope I won’t have to come back until I have Sara.” He turned and walked out of the kitchen.

  Aubrey took their plates to the sink. She’d hardly touched her food. She wished she could make herself stop quarreling with Beau. But every time they were getting along, she felt her physical attraction to him rearing its ugly head, found herself wanting to be close to him. She knew those feelings would get her into trouble. So she deliberately picked a fight, reminding herself in the process that she could not trust her heart where Beau Maddox was concerned. She had to trust her brain.

  BEAU CHECKED out as many leads as he could during the next couple of hours. Most of them were completely bogus, though his visit to Greg Holmes’s office produced more questions than answers.

  The outer door was locked, though it was only three-thirty in the afternoon. But there was a bell. He rang it several times, hoping to rouse Greg, if he was working in his inner sanctum.

  Through the window, Beau could just make out the office interior. He was about to give up when he saw the inner door open. But it wasn’t Greg who appeared—it was Summer. And she was adjusting her clothing in a telltale way.

  He suddenly recalled Summer’s comment about Patti from yesterday—“She’s banging her boss.” Looked like Patti wasn’t the only one.

  Summer jerked the door open. “What do you want?”

  “Any reason you’re so hostile toward me?”

  “It’s just that I’m busy, and I told y’all everything I knew yesterday.”

  “Except that part about Patti owing money to a drug dealer, and how he’d threatened to make an example of her? That’s what you told the tip line, right?”

  Summer’s eyes widened to the size of quarters. “How did you know that?”

  “Your voice is distinctive. So how come you didn’t tell us that last night?”

  Summer inched toward the door, but Beau kept himself between her and any possible escape. “It slipped my mind. I didn’t think of it until I heard on the news that she’d offed herself. And I started thinking about it. I wouldn’t put it past Patti to do something like sell her own baby. I thought the cops should think about all possibilities, you know?”

  “Or maybe you wanted to throw them off, in case they started to suspect what really happened to Patti.”

  Summer’s nostrils flared. “You’re not, like, accusing me of anything, are you?”

  “Just thinking about all possibilities, like you said. A woman is perfectly capable of killing a romantic rival.”

  Summer’s mouth moved, but no sound came out.

  “I’m not saying that’s what happened,” Beau said. If the police were right about Patti’s time of death, it would have occurred during work hours. Summer would have had a hard time getting away from the office for long enough to cook up a fake suicide scene, kill Aubrey, and hide the baby. But he wouldn’t rule out the possibility. “But it might occur to the police. The fact you gave them a bogus lead might not reflect too favorably on you.”

  “I didn’t call the police,” Summer said. “I called that tip line, the one Patti’s father set up.”

  Beau shrugged. “Your call has already been turned over to the cops. Along with your identity. I’m surprised they haven’t been here.” But he wasn’t really surprised, as incompetent as Lyle Palmer was.

  Summer cast a worried look over her shoulder at the door she’d just emerged from. Then she lowered her voice. “Look, it wasn’t my idea to call. Greg told me to do it. This office isn’t exactly on the up-and-up. He’s the one who doesn’t want the police snooping around here.”

  Now here was an interesting twist. “What do you mean by, ‘not on the up-and-up’?”

  “He writes policies on people who don’t really qualify for life insurance. Then he takes kickbacks when they die. And I never told you any of this,” she said hurriedly as the door opened and Greg emerged.

  He scowled at Beau. “What now?”

  “Just checking up on a few details.” He debated about whether to put Summer on the spot and reveal to Greg what she’d just told him. Then he decided she might be a good source for him later if he protected her now. He wanted to know more about the phony insurance scam. If Patti knew about it, if she was romantically entangled with Holmes, it’s possible she’d threatened to blow the whistle on him if he didn’t leave his wife or pay her money. Certainly that would be a strong motive for murder.

  “Look,” Holmes said, grabbing Beau by the upper arm. “I’m happy to answer questions for the cops. But I don’t see you flashing a badge, so I don’t owe you any explanations. I want you out of this office, and I don’t want to see you again.”

  Beau resisted the urge to flatten Greg Holmes with one well-placed punch to the nose. Getting slapped with an assault charge wouldn’t help him find Sara. So he let Holmes manhandle him out the door as Summer looked on wearing a smug smile.

  Still, Beau didn’t let Holmes have the last word. “I have friends on the Payton police force. One word from me, and they’d be all over you like ducks on a june bug. So I might tone down the hostility if I were you.”

  Holmes’s mouth went slack as he considered the implications. Beau left him with a smile.

  The smile didn’t last long, though. He still didn’t have any strong leads that would help him find Sara. And the longer she was missing, the shorter the chances of finding her unharmed—especially because there had been no ransom demand.

  He was hungry, he realized. He wished he’d eaten more of those first-rate enchiladas at the Clarendon house. But it had been hard to enjoy his meal with Aubrey sitting across the table from him, accusing him of being a coldhearted, mercenary bastard.

  He wished there was some way to get past her barriers. It amazed him that she’d let him be intimate with her physically while she so totally mistrusted his motives. Maybe it would help when, a couple of months from now, he testified at Gavin’s parole hearing. He’d put Gavin in prison, but maybe helping him get out would make Aubrey—

  He cursed viciously. Why was he worried about this? Why did Aubrey’s forgiveness matter? She was a pipe dream, a teenage fantasy he was determined to hold on to. He and Aubrey had nothing in common except the past…and one unforgettable sexual encounter.

  One big, incredible mistake.

  He headed for Dudley’s Blue Note, where he’d arranged to meet Craig. Craig had heard a few things through the grapevine and wanted to fill Beau in. Unlike Lyle Palmer, Craig had always welcomed Beau’s help on a case. But Craig wasn’t big on taking credit or receiving commendations or congratulatory phone calls from the mayor. He just wanted to get the job done, whatever it took.

  Sara Clarendon wasn’t Craig’s case, but that didn’t stop him from wanting to see it cleared.

>   Dudley’s was quiet tonight, Beau thought as he claimed a stool at the bar and ordered himself a Bud. One booth was filled with uniforms, rookies Beau didn’t know. With each passing day, he felt more and more out of touch with the department.

  Craig swung through the revolving door a few minutes later. He’d changed out of his work clothes and into ragged running shorts and a T-shirt, and he carried a gym bag. He spotted Beau, nodded toward the back, then headed that way. Apparently he didn’t want to sit where a lot of people would see them together.

  “I’d be skewered if anyone knew I was doing this,” Craig said without preamble. “But I copied the case file as well as Patti’s rap sheet for you. I can’t give it to you in here, but we can walk out together. It’s in the gym bag.”

  “Why the cloak and dagger?”

  “Palmer’s on my case. He’s in charge of the Clarendon baby kidnapping, and he doesn’t want anyone upstaging him.”

  “Are they actually calling it a kidnapping now?”

  “Palmer is. Anything to puff up his image.”

  “How about the shell casings?”

  “The ident section found one clear fingerprint.”

  “Yes!” Beau was elated at the news. If they could identify the shooter, they might find Sara. Though Beau hadn’t figured out how it all fit together, he was reasonably sure it did.

  “Don’t get too excited,” Craig said. “They put it in AFIS, but so far they haven’t found a match.”

  AFIS was the Automated Fingerprint Identification System. Every felon and every person arrested in the whole country had had his fingerprints entered into the system, as had other people fingerprinted for legitimate security reasons—like cops.

  “Hell.” That meant it was likely the shooter didn’t have a police record. That most likely eliminated Charlie and Cory. And Lyle Palmer. Beau was ashamed to admit he was hoping Lyle had gotten himself involved in a murder, or at least a coverup. He hadn’t forgotten the detective’s unprofessional behavior at the scene of Patti’s death, and more recently. He told Craig about the iffy search of Lyle’s motorcycle, and Lyle trying to dig the bullet out of the wall with his knife.

  “The guy is a menace,” Craig agreed. “But more stupid than evil, I think.”

  “I have a couple more suspects for you.” Beau told Craig about Greg Holmes and Summer. Craig didn’t take notes, but he didn’t have to. He had almost perfect recall of any conversation. “And I have one more idea—just a vague suspicion, really. It’s Patti’s brother, David.”

  “Oh, we’re checking out both him and Wayne, don’t worry.” Every cop knew that violent crimes were committed more often between family members than strangers.

  “I did a little illegal search earlier today,” Beau said. “I climbed the fence at the Clarendon estate and sneaked into the house. David has a home office there.”

  Craig groaned. “Maddox, you’re a disgrace. I can’t use anything you found.”

  Beau took a sip of his beer and said nothing.

  “So, what did you find? You could at least steer me in the right direction.”

  “David Clarendon is into some serious, serious debt.”

  “Oh, that. Yeah, we already found that out. A huge mortgage on his own house, and a vacation house in Sedona. A Porsche. At least seven credit cards, all of them maxed out. But the guy’s pulling in a healthy six figures. Most people earning that much money do rack up some debts. And we didn’t see any evidence it’s about to crash in on him.”

  Beau felt a sense of relief to hear Craig dismiss David’s debt as a motive for murder. David had never been Beau’s favorite person in the world, but he was Aubrey’s cousin.

  “You have a history with this guy, right?”

  “Known him since he was a snot-nosed kid. He was quite the manipulator. All the adults loved him, all the other kids hated him.” Except Aubrey. She always gave David the benefit of the doubt, and David had carefully cultivated her loyalty. That was why Beau had to be very careful about expressing any suspicions toward David around her. If he somehow got David in trouble—even if he was guilty—that would be the nail in the coffin of his relationship with Aubrey. Earlier today she’d jumped at the chance to exonerate David of lying.

  “Any word on the autopsy?” Beau asked, changing the subject.

  “It’s scheduled for tomorrow morning.”

  “What about Charlie Soffit? Did they swab his hands?”

  Craig shrugged. “I’m out of the loop on that. But Gary over in ballistics already eliminated Soffit’s gun as the one that fired the bullet at you and Aubrey.”

  “He might have had another gun. He might have disposed of it.” But Beau realized that, like Aubrey, he was grasping at straws. Soffit probably wasn’t the shooter.

  “So what are you going to do next?” Craig asked.

  Beau didn’t know. He was flat out of leads. His vision of returning to the Clarendon house by night-fall—the triumphant hero with Sara in his arms—was quickly disintegrating.

  Chapter Ten

  A flurry of tips came after the six-o’clock news, and again at ten. By now Aubrey was so tired she was responding by rote, typing in exactly what everyone said. But she no longer felt able to evaluate the information. The best she could do was fax copies of the transcripts to the police. If they wanted to do something with it, they could. She had to get some rest.

  But first, she wanted to talk to her uncle Wayne before he went to sleep. Dinner had been an odd affair, with sporadic, disjointed conversation. Aubrey had sensed a definite tension in the air between David and Wayne, though nothing overt was said. Now she wanted a private word with her uncle.

  She found Wayne sitting up in bed, watching TV. He looked even frailer in his pajamas than he had in street clothes. But he managed a strained smile for Aubrey.

  “Come in, dear. If I haven’t said it before, thank you for all your hard work. You’ve stuck your neck out for this branch of the family far more than you’re obligated to.”

  “I’m part of this family,” she said, pulling up a chair. “I’m so sorry I stayed away for so long. I always thought there would be time later to mend fences.”

  “Time is the one thing my money can’t buy.”

  “Are you in a lot of pain?” she asked, hoping she wasn’t getting too personal.

  He shrugged. “Some days are worse than others. It’s a worse pain, though, to see your own children die. I never thought I’d have to live through that.”

  Aubrey hadn’t seen Wayne grieve at all for Patti. His concern had seemed to be solely for Sara, until this moment. She realized he had tears in his eyes.

  “I still loved her. Even after everything she did—all the lies, the stealing, the drugs, the criminal record. She was an embarrassment to this family, but I still loved her. Maybe if she’d known that, she’d have…” He shrugged.

  “But she did turn her life around,” Aubrey pointed out. “She was trying, anyway. You have to believe that, Uncle Wayne. She was trying to be a responsible mother, and she loved Sara.”

  “She did go to the trouble of making out a will,” he said thoughtfully. “That surprised me. So out of character for a girl who always indulged in the moment to plan ahead.”

  “Speaking of wills…I was a bit surprised to learn that you’d left everything to Sara.” She tried to sound casual. “And David tells me you named me as trustee.”

  Wayne nodded. “I don’t know why it would surprise you. I certainly couldn’t leave that job to Patti.”

  “But what about David?”

  “Oh, he doesn’t know anything about raising children. You’re close to Sara. You’ll do what’s best.”

  “But David…” She didn’t know how to put it into words without being rude and nosy.

  “Why did I disinherit him?”

  “David told me the terms of the will. But he acted like he didn’t care.”

  “Well, he always did have a strange attitude about money,” Wayne said dismissively. “It�
��s never been something that worried him, anyway.” He paused, picked at some invisible lint on his blanket. “I suppose you think my decision is very arbitrary. But if I’d favored one of my children over the other, the will would surely have been contested in court. No, this way all the money will be evenly divided among my grandchildren. If David has children some day, they’ll get a share.”

  Aubrey supposed her uncle’s explanation made some sense. She changed the conversation to more practical matters. “Detective Palmer is sending over an officer to monitor the tip hotline so we can all get some sleep. I didn’t want you to be alarmed if you saw a stranger.”

  “I’ll sleep like the dead tonight, dear, don’t worry.” He shook a pill bottle that had been sitting on his nightstand. “These little wonders will see to that.”

  Aubrey kissed him on his papery cheek, squeezed his hand and left him to his rest. Poor man.

  She said good-night to David, who had agreed to deal with the expected visitor. “No offense, cousin, but you look a mess,” he’d told her, giving her an affectionate hug.

  She didn’t deny it. She’d brought only a minimum of clothing and cosmetics with her when she’d left her house yesterday, a lifetime ago. She hadn’t imagined she’d be away for long. Tomorrow she would have to get some more clothes or do laundry.

  Beronica had made up a room for Aubrey on the second floor, next door to Wayne’s. After taking a warm shower to help her relax, Aubrey climbed into her nightshirt and slid under the covers, grateful for the energetic air-conditioning that kept the hot humidity at bay. Her mind whirled in circles as she closed her eyes, but fatigue won out and she slept.

  Sometime in the night she woke from a frightening nightmare. In it she was reaching for Sara, but then someone dropped her down a dark hole. She woke up in a sweat, gasping for breath, the baby’s cries still ringing in her ears.