by Cindi Myers
“Now you’re just trying to frighten me.” The tactic was working, too, though she’d never admit it to him.
“You’re right. I am trying to frighten you out of meeting with this guy I don’t trust as far as I could throw him.”
“If I make sure he’s aware that other people—the task force—knows I’m meeting him, he won’t try anything,” she said. “Right?”
Instead of confirming her evaluation of the situation, he leaned forward and switched on his emergency flashers. “Did he say he knew something about your sister’s disappearance?” he asked.
“No. He just said he’d be happy to talk with me about Lauren. He acted like he knew her. I mean, he called her Lauren and said she was a lovely person.” The way he’d said it—“such a lovely person”—had been a little creepy, but that was probably just Rand’s dislike of the guy rubbing off on her.
“When are you supposed to meet with him?”
“Why do you need to know that? So you can crash the meeting and scare him off?” It would be just like him to charge in, his dog barking and lunging, ruining everything.
“I won’t scare him off. And I won’t crash the meeting. I’ll come as your escort.”
“You told me yourself he doesn’t like law officers. If you come along, he’ll clam up and won’t tell me anything.”
“We won’t tell him I’m a cop.”
“Then how do I explain this random guy who invited himself along?”
“Tell him I’m your boyfriend and I’m very jealous and overprotective.”
The words sent warmth flooding through her. Hormones again. It was getting pretty warm in this car. Maybe she should roll down the window. “That doesn’t say much about me, that I’d hang out with a jealous and overprotective guy,” she said.
“Just tell him I’m a friend.” His expression softened. “Please. I’ve got good instincts and I don’t have a good feeling about this.”
The “please” did it—that and the fact that she was beginning to have her own reservations about a private meeting with Richard Prentice. He was probably harmless, and he might not know anything about her sister, but she should cover all the bases by talking to him, and also staying safe. “All right. You can come with me. But you have to not act like a cop.”
“What do you mean by that?”
“I mean, no strong-arming the guy, or firing questions at him. Let me do the talking. And the dog has to stay behind.”
He glanced at Lotte, clearly torn. “Nothing says cop like a police dog,” she said.
“All right,” he said. “But if he makes a wrong move, I won’t keep quiet about it.”
She sighed. And she’d thought questioning Richard Prentice would be the hard part—he’d probably be a piece of cake compared to handling Rand Knightbridge.
* * *
THE NEXT MORNING, Rand waited for Sophie in front of the duplex he rented in the south end of Montrose. Marco Cruz lived in the other half of the building, but he wasn’t home today to give Rand a hard time about being reduced to wearing civilian clothes and leaving his weapons and his dog behind, like an ordinary civilian. But, given Prentice’s animosity toward the Rangers, Rand’s only choice was to make this visit incognito.
Sophie had insisted on driving, too, though it had been Rand’s idea to have her pick him up at the duplex—just in case Prentice had someone watching Ranger headquarters. He wouldn’t put it past the man.
Her rented sedan turned the corner and glided into his drive. He jerked open the door and climbed in even before she came to a full stop. “Hello, Rand.” She lowered her sunglasses and looked him up and down.
“Do I pass the test?” he asked, buckling his seat belt. He’d dressed in khakis and a blue sports shirt with a subtle pinstripe. Nothing too fancy.
“You clean up nice, Officer.” A smile played across lips outlined in cherry red.
“I could say the same about you.” In addition to the red lipstick, she wore careful makeup that accented her big brown eyes and beautiful skin. Her hair was up, with tendrils curling around her temples. Her blue dress, of some silky material, clung in all the right places. She smelled good, too, like something expensive and exotic. She looked elegant and beautiful—the kind of woman who would appeal to a billionaire who could have anything, or anyone, he wanted.
He pushed the thought away. Sophie was too classy to go for a lowlife like Prentice. The man might have more money than kings, but money couldn’t buy morals. “Have you thought of what you’re going to say to him?” he asked as they headed out of town.
“I lay awake all night thinking about it. To start, I want to know how he knows Lauren, and when was the last time he talked to her. I’ll ask if he knows why she was in the area.”
“It’ll be interesting to find out if he really knows anything.”
The entrance to Prentice’s estate was unmarked by any sign but, unlike other properties in the area, featured a stone guardhouse set back thirty yards from the road and a heavy iron gate. A guard stepped out to meet them. Sophie lowered her window. “I’m Sophie Montgomery,” she said. “I have a meeting with Mr. Prentice.”
“Yes, Ms. Montgomery, we’ve been expecting you.” He nodded to Rand. “Who’s he?”
“This is my friend Jake Peters.” It was the name they’d agreed on, in case Prentice had a roster of the task force. Jacob was Rand’s middle name and Peters was his mother’s maiden name.
“Mr. Peters is not on our list of authorized guests,” the guard said.
“I am a single woman and Mr. Prentice is a stranger to me,” she said frostily, also as they’d rehearsed. “He can’t expect me to come to his house, in this remote location, alone.”
“Wait here a moment.” The guard retreated to the stone hut and made a phone call. He was back a moment later. “Someone will be along in a moment to escort you to the main house. Wait here.”
“How many houses does he have?” Sophie whispered when the guard had walked away.
“I think there are a couple of places where the help live,” Rand said.
A Jeep roared down the road in front of them and slid to a stop inches from the rental car’s bumper. The driver, also dressed in desert camo, motioned for them to follow, then turned the Jeep and headed back up the road.
They drove up the gravel drive, around a curve and up a hill. At the top, Sophie gasped and stomped on the brake. “You’ve got to be kidding,” she said.
The place was definitely a castle, but more Disney than Dusseldorf. Constructed of gray stone, it featured crenellated battlements, towers and turrets...even a drawbridge, though there was no moat. “It’s like something you’d see in Vegas,” she said.
“Being rich obviously doesn’t guarantee good taste,” Rand said. “But I suspect it’s another of his ploys to goad the government into buying him out. He tried to get the feds to buy the land and incorporate it into the national park. When that didn’t work, he threatened to build a triple-X theater right at the park entrance, but the county passed an ordinance making such places illegal. Finally, he built this monstrosity. I suspect he thought if he created a big enough eyesore, the public would push for its removal.”
“But you can’t see the building from the road.”
“You get a great view of it from the Pioneer Point overlook in the park, though. It actually blocks a view of the Curecanti Needle, one of the most famous natural rock formations in the country.”
She shook her head and drove on.
They parked under an arching portico and a stone-faced servant who looked and acted like a bodyguard ushered them into a great hall reminiscent of a medieval stronghold. “Mr. Prentice will see you in the library,” the man said, and led the way to a pair of large wooden doors.
The room in question was indeed filled with books, and with a Nati
ve-American pottery collection that, if it was authentic, would command hundreds of thousands of dollars. Rand wondered if any of it was legal, or if Prentice had acquired it from the network of grave robbers who ransacked the pueblos.
“This place is a real fortress,” he said, standing close to Sophie in the middle of the room. “I saw at least three guards from the hallway.”
“You don’t know that they’re guards.”
“Right. Maybe he’s recruiting his own football team. Why does one man need that kind of protection?”
“I imagine someone with a lot of money could be a target.”
“Or someone with a lot of enemies.”
“So sorry to keep you waiting.”
They turned as Richard Prentice approached. He looked small in the massive room, with more gray in his hair than in the pictures Rand had seen and a slight paunch showing in spite of his expertly cut suit. He walked forward to meet them, hand outstretched to Sophie. “Ms. Montgomery, I’m delighted to meet you.” He ignored Rand completely, which was fine by him. He had no desire to shake this man’s hand.
Rand followed Sophie to a love seat upholstered in butter-colored leather and sat beside her. Prentice took the matching chair opposite. “Your message said you’re looking for your sister, Lauren Starling. How can I help you?”
“She’s been missing since late May,” Sophie said. “Park rangers found her car in Black Canyon of the Gunnison Park, but no one has seen any trace of Lauren. I found your business card in her apartment in Denver and I wondered if she’d been to see you.”
“I’d heard of her disappearance, but I’m afraid I can’t be of any help to you. I haven’t seen Lauren in four or five months, at least.”
“How do you know her?” Rand asked.
Sophie shot him a pained look. All right, he’d promised to keep his mouth shut, but honestly, Prentice was so oily and smooth, Rand wanted to put him on edge.
“How did you and Lauren know each other?” Sophie asked, her voice soft, less demanding than Rand’s.
“We met at a fund-raiser in Denver earlier this year, to raise money for an orphanage in Guatemala that is a special interest of mine.”
Prentice was interested in Guatemala, all right—as a source for the illegal workers he used in his drug and prostitution operations. Some of the victims of the human-trafficking ring the task force had broken up last month had been from Guatemala.
“We ran into each other in the bar after the dinner,” Prentice continued. “She’d clearly had a little too much to drink and I was concerned, so I offered to take her for coffee. We ended up talking for quite a while. She confided her troubles to me—the end of her marriage, her recent diagnosis of mental illness and her worries over her job.”
He definitely knew a lot about Lauren, though he could have gleaned all that from newspaper accounts of her disappearance. “Did you stay in touch?” Sophie asked. “Have you talked to her since that night?”
“A few times. Just casual phone calls.” He leaned forward, one hand on Sophie’s knee. “I hope it doesn’t distress you to know this, but your sister was a very troubled woman. She tried to keep a positive face on things around the people she loved, but she was able to let her guard down more with me. I urged her to seek professional help, but she resisted the idea.”
Sophie shifted slightly and gave Rand a warning look, perhaps sensing that he’d been ready to take Prentice’s hand off at the wrist. “Lauren did struggle with depression, especially in the months immediately following her separation and divorce,” she said, the words carefully measured. “But recently she was on medication to control her mood swings and was doing very well.”
“Perhaps she wanted you to think that.”
“When was the last time you spoke with her?” she asked.
His eyes narrowed and he might have frowned, but his forehead remained perfectly smooth—the result of BOTOX, or merely remarkable self-control? “We spoke briefly on the telephone perhaps a month ago. She called to ask if I knew of any job openings in television. She was convinced she was about to lose her position. She sounded desperate. I wanted to help her, and told her I would ask around. She promised to call me back, but I never heard from her again.”
Rand had to bite the inside of his cheek to keep from commenting on the fact that Prentice had failed to tell the Rangers any of this. In fact, he’d denied knowing Lauren Starling at all.
Sophie knotted her hands in her lap. “The last time I talked to her, she said she was working on a new story—something big that would show the station how valuable she was to them. She sounded very excited.”
“She never mentioned anything like that to me. What was this story about?”
“She didn’t say. I was hoping you’d know.”
“I’m afraid I can’t help you. I’m sorry.” He stood, signaling the meeting was at an end. “I don’t mean to rush you, but I have other business I must attend to.”
“Of course.” Sophie rose also. “I won’t keep you. But do you have a powder room I can use? I just need to, um, freshen up.”
This was part of their plan, too—to get her into another part of the house to look around while Rand kept an eye on Prentice.
“Certainly. Back into the hallway, and it’s the first door on your left.”
She crossed the room quickly, leaving them alone. Prentice turned to Rand, his expression hard. “I hope I’ve satisfied you that I have no designs on Ms. Montgomery’s person.”
Did this guy rehearse his stilted dialogue in the mirror? Or did everything he knew about acting come from old black-and-white movies? “Sophie is worried about her sister,” Rand said, doing quite the acting job of his own, playing the role of mild-mannered innocent boyfriend. “And your wealth and power intimidate her.” Maybe flattery would make him lower his guard a little. “You can understand her wanting a little moral support.”
“Since you’re such good friends with her, perhaps you can persuade her to give up this fruitless search and accept that her sister has most likely succumbed to depression and taken her own life,” Prentice said. “That’s what the authorities believe, isn’t it?”
“That’s what they’ve told her.” What he had told her, though her staunch refusal to accept such a verdict—and Prentice’s insistence that she do so—was adding to his doubts. “But she says she won’t stop until she’s tracked down her sister. That’s why she’s here, tracing Lauren’s last known whereabouts.”
Something flashed in Prentice’s eyes—alarm? But too quickly the expression was gone. “Lauren did not come to the Black Canyon to see me,” he said.
“I’m sorry I kept you waiting.” Sophie rejoined them. Her voice was bright, but she was paler than before, and when Rand took her arm to escort her out of the house, he felt her trembling.
Outside, she handed him the keys and walked around to the rental car’s passenger side. She waited until they were in the car, driving away, before she spoke. “He’s lying,” she said. “Lauren has been in that house, and recently. Today even.”
“Why do you say that?”
“I smelled her perfume. It’s a very distinct scent—Mitsouko. Not very many women wear it.”
“Maybe he has a girlfriend who does.”
“It would be a big coincidence.”
“Coincidences happen.” Though less than some people liked to believe.
“Lauren was there. I can feel it.” Her voice broke and she turned to him, her face a mask of anguish. “We’ve got to find her and we’ve got to help her, before it’s too late.”
Chapter Four
“Tell me everything, exactly as it happened.”
Graham spoke softly, his expression neutral and nonthreatening, but Rand thought Sophie looked ready to bolt. They were back at Ranger headquarters, in the conference room w
ith Graham, Carmen and Simon. The rest of the team—border patrol agent Michael Dance and Montrose County sheriff’s deputy Lance Carpenter—had joined them. In her blue dress, Sophie looked like a bright bird in a sea of brown uniforms, but he couldn’t tell if her obvious agitation was from fear or excitement.
“I already told you,” she said. “Prentice said a lot of nonsense about how upset Lauren had been. Then I excused myself to go to the bathroom and I smelled her perfume. She’s been in that house recently. Maybe she was even there while I was there.” Her lower lip trembled and she fought to control her emotions. “We’re wasting time sitting here. We need to go get her.”
“Richard Prentice said he’d talked to Lauren on the phone a month ago?” Graham asked.
“He said ‘about a month ago,’” Rand confirmed.
“That’s the first time he’s admitted even knowing her,” Michael said.
“He said they met at a charity function for Guatemalan orphans,” Sophie said. “He gave me the impression they were good friends.”
“Yet she’d never mentioned him to you?” Simon asked. “Who’s going to resist dropping the name of a famous billionaire if he’s their buddy?”
“Lauren wasn’t like that,” Sophie said. “She wasn’t a snob. She didn’t care how much money you had or how powerful you were. She was as likely to have morning coffee with a panhandler she met on the street as with the bank president.”
“But are you sure you’d never heard her say anything about Richard Prentice before?” Graham asked.
“I’d never heard of him before I found his business card in her apartment.” She gripped the sides of the chair, knuckles white, as if ready to leap up. “What does it matter if she knew him or how? Lauren was in his house. I’m sure of it.”
“He said she was very depressed about her divorce, and afraid of losing her job,” Rand said.
“Of course he said that,” Sophie said. “He wants us to believe she committed suicide.” Her voice broke on the last word, and she ducked her head. Rand offered her his handkerchief, wishing he had something more to give her—some proof that her sister was all right. She shook her head, refusing the handkerchief.
