“Are you all right? They didn’t hurt you?”
“The damn freak burned me.” Movements rife with fury, she pushed up her sleeve to display an angry, round wound.
Son of a bitch’s cigarette. Cort clutched her shoulders, then held her closer. He’d encase her with his whole body if he could. Over her head he stared down the alley where the men had disappeared. If he had laser vision, he’d cut through buildings and incinerate Yerik and his goon.
“How bad is it?”
When a clatter on the pavement announced arrivals, he released her.
Casting a glance around him, she pulled the sleeve down. “Stings like hell, but don’t tell Mom. Here she comes with the police.”
***
“Kind of late for you, Kaplan. Out on the town?” As if Cort could picture the rumpled FBI agent doing anything but working. He propped his cell phone under his chin as he wrestled with a corkscrew.
“If you call still being at my desk out on the town.” Pencil tapping echoed through the connection.
“You have news for me or your usual threats and warnings?”
“Funny guy. No threats but I can deliver the other two. Your detective friend informs me the car involved in Danita Inglish’s death has been found in long-term parking at San Francisco International Airport.”
“Anything like clues inside? The killer’s gun’s too much to hope for.”
“Bingo,” Kaplan said. “Wiped clean of course. And sitting on the seat beside a dead man. Big dude wearing a dark windbreaker.”
“Sounds like the guy I saw running from Inglish’s building.”
He flipped the lever and the wine cork popped loose. They’d purchased a bottle of local wine, a V. Sattui pinot noir. Mara preferred red wine to white, like he did. He’d urged her to let him open it now. She could use a little mellowing after being terrorized.
“Looks like it’s him,” Kaplan said. “Local rent-a-thug who won’t be missed, according to the detective. Took a slug to the temple.”
“He was probably Inglish’s killer.”
“And a clear warning. No witnesses. If you want to turn the ring piece over to me and let the FBI handle the case like you wanted before, I won’t object.”
Cort nearly dropped the phone. Stop? Let the FBI run with the ball? Tempting, considering Mara’s safety. But with Colonel Yerik in the mix, he had to keep going. “Kaplan, your concern warms the cold corners of my heart. But like you told me before, people will talk to me or Mara easier than to the Feds. I’ll stick with it. For now.”
“Don’t say I never gave you an out, Jones. You and the lady watch your backs.” With that the agent disconnected.
Too many disparate details and no more ring pieces. Cort stowed his cell and carried the open bottle and two goblets into the living room.
Mara glided down the stairs, brightening the room. Barefoot and wearing a red silk caftan, she moved with such sensual grace, his breath caught. As he settled on the couch, anticipation rippled desire through him. He poured them some wine and handed her a goblet.
“You’re brooding. Bad news?” She curled up on the other end of the sofa—not beside him—and tucked her feet beneath her. She sipped her wine, staring into it as if seeking answers.
No answers for him there, but maybe a duller edge to his returning headache. He sipped the wine and savored before downing a healthy slug. He didn’t know wine but he knew what he liked. Fruity, nice and dry. “You’re the quiet one but I’m brooding? Not bad news. Hell, except for a thug in long-term parking.” He recounted his conversation with the FBI agent.
“Don’t even consider trying to convince me to stop, if that’s what has your forehead all knotted up.” She sank into the cushions and closed her eyes.
“Too late. You’d still be in danger.” What was she wearing under that slithery garment? Maybe nothing? He slid closer and soaked in her just-showered scent. “How’s the arm?”
They’d bought burn cream and bandages on the way back to the condo. She’d winced but hadn’t complained as he tended the ugly wound. Every dab with cream stabbed him in the gut. Hurt him more than it pained her.
“Okay. Ibuprofen helped. I’ll heal.” She settled back and sipped more wine.
Except for her abnormal quiet, she seemed back to herself after her ordeal. She’d held up like a trouper while the cops questioned them and even afterward. Su Lin had glared but said nothing when he and Mara swore the attack was a mugger after her purse. She recited a generic description—average height, average weight, ski mask. Both the patrolman and her mother shook their heads. He bet Mrs. Marton gave her sister hell for falling for the thug’s line. Ice still gripped his gut when he thought about how Yerik had terrorized Mara.
He pulled himself back to present worries. “Too many questions and too many seemingly insignificant details. Every new clue, every new event tumbles through my head and causes a shift like the pieces in a kaleidoscope. Until I see no pattern at all. We’re as far away as ever from finding the location of the crown jewels.”
She rallied and sat up straight, brisk and back into the puzzle. “One of them will make it all click. Maybe Danita’s daughter has her mother’s ring piece or knows where she hid it. Like in a safe deposit box. My apartment building has locked storage areas in the basement. Maybe hers does too and she stashed it there.” She poured more wine.
He raised an eyebrow. She never drank more than one glass of wine. “Rough dinner with Mom? Or are you still shaken up?”
“Both. A little. Mom’s worried about me, doing this search with you.”
“Hanging out with the Jeweler’s ex-con son.”
“Actually no. More about the danger. Even before today’s mugging. She seemed quite impressed with you. She thinks you’re sexy.”
He grinned, satisfaction and sensual energy flaring. “What does her daughter think?”
She drank some wine and set down the glass. “She agreed to look through her stuff in storage to see what she has of Dad’s.”
Cort saw the ambivalence on her expressive face. Both mother and daughter hoped she’d find nothing incriminating, but if there was a ring, at least they’d have an answer. High price for success. “And the other question?”
She affected a puzzled look but the flush on her cheeks gave her away.
“Come on. Give. Mom revealed all.”
“You wish. You were right that whatever Cassie overheard, we misinterpreted. Dad fell in love with Mom but she married him for security.”
“To get out of the restaurant job she’s been forced to come back to many years later. That’s it? That’s all?”
“What? You thought she gave me an X-rated version?” She swung her feet to the floor and pushed to her feet. “You can stay here drinking wine. It’s been a long day. I need Z’s.”
WTF. He reached for her hand. “Hey, sweetheart, you’re wearing that slinky red thing and sharing my wine and you’re going to bed? Alone? Remember last night? You’re not still afraid of letting go? Or are you playing games?”
“No games. I don’t mean... sorry.” Her dark eyes held no guile, only pensiveness. “Just I have some thinking to do. About the rest of what Mom said. That’s all. Okay?”
He didn’t understand. But he nodded.
Halfway up the stairs, she turned back. “I forgot to tell you. While I was at Seoul Food, I got a text message from my airline source. More enigma to confuse matters.”
After her odd rebuff, he couldn’t work up much enthusiasm for whatever she’d dug up. “Yeah?”
“Get this. During the two days after André told Cassie he had to go to France, they have no record of anyone named André Rozmer or any permutations of the two names boarding any flight commercial or private out of D.C. or Baltimore.”
***
After Cort heard Mara close the door to her room, he pulled out his cell phone for the call he dreaded.
“Don’t you know the difference between the time zones, Jones? Middle of the night here.
”
“Sorry, but you don’t sound like I woke you.” A good thing. He needed Thomas Devlin alert.
“I don’t sleep much. You wouldn’t have called if it wasn’t important. What’s up?”
“I fucked up. Yerik got to Mara.” A sharp intake of breath on the other end. “She’s all right. A warning, but, Devlin, he fucking burned her! My fault.” Shit. He’d meant to hold it together. He closed his eyes and breathed.
“I’ll take it out of your hide later. Tell me.”
As calmly as possible, Cort related Yerik’s assault and warning.
“This wasn’t your fault,” Devlin said when he finished. “You told Mara to stay put until she saw you. She didn’t. She went into that parking lot unprotected. Trust yourself. You saved her, didn’t you?”
“Same thing she said.” They’d argued about who screwed up. He was supposed to be protecting her, but no use flogging the same dead horse with the man whose help he needed. “I can’t let her go down with me. Can’t you speed things up? Get Yerik and his thugs out of the picture?”
“I almost have an arrangement. What’s underway takes time. Hang in there a little longer.”
“The coronation is less than a week from now. Time’s running out and I’m not even close to knowing where Leon hid the crown jewels. My life isn’t worth shit but Mara—” He hauled in a ragged breath. “She could die.”
Chapter 22
The next morning, Ellen Plante welcomed Mara and Cort to her modest row house. Mara hated the reason they’d come, but all too necessary. Someone was cutting down possible accomplices like trees in the woods where Cort lived.
And how André Rozmer fit into this puzzle was anyone’s guess. She hated continuing to sneak research behind Cort’s back but she could do only so much on her smart phone. She should’ve brought her tablet but had packed fast and forgot it. Not like her. Her chest felt clogged, as if her lungs had seized up.
“Thank you for seeing us, Ms. Plante,” she said to the woman seated opposite her on a comfortable looking green tweed armchair that matched the sofa where she and Cort sat. “I know this is a difficult time for you and your family.”
“Least I can do,” Ellen replied. Clad in a modest navy-blue dress, she was a slimmer, younger version of her mother. She clutched a wadded tissue. “You tried to save my mother’s life. She might’ve made it, too, except—” Her voice wavered and she wobbled her hand to indicate the attack on the ambulance. Words too painful to utter.
Mara knew exactly how she felt, tears never far away, the ache in her chest as if by a tight strap. She’d experienced the same raw anguish when her dad died. For Ellen to lose her mother to senseless murder, the grief must be compounded with outrage and helplessness.
She caught a glimpse of Cort beside her. Stoic as usual, except for the tourniquet grip on his knees. She didn’t sleep well last night and suspected neither did he. She would rather have spent the night in his arms but needed to sort out her jumbled feelings.
She ought to be able to come to a rational decision. But no. Her conclusions flipped like pancakes with every toss and turn in her lonely bed. When he cut his gaze toward her, she looked away, afraid she would show her turmoil.
Family photographs papered one wall. A dollhouse and a toy box stood in one corner along with a pink tricycle, its handles decorated with pink and purple streamers. The broken cake on the floor beside Danita must’ve been for Ellen’s daughter Shayla. Her fifth birthday. Tears burned Mara’s eyes.
“What is it you want to know?” Ellen straightened her shoulders and tucked away her tissue. “Something about the Gramornia crown jewel robbery? That’s the reason those men killed her, isn’t it?”
Relieved the connection to the robbery was out in the open, Mara nodded. She explained, beginning with how Leon’s death renewed the search for the crown jewels by several parties and ending with Cort’s and her reasons for the search. “Your mother was one of the museum guards suspected of complicity in the robbery eleven years ago.”
“If my mama knew where those crown jewels were hidden, you can bet she’d have turned them over to the cops years ago.”
Mara blinked. Did Ellen just admit her mother’s guilt? She and Cort exchanged a glance.
Ellen sighed. “Yes, Mama was part of that robbery. She gave the thieves the security information and looked the other way. Biggest regret of her life, she always said.”
“Did she ever say why she did it?” Mara asked gently.
“Me.” Ellen sniffled. “To my everlasting sorrow. She was a single mom with only a high-school education. She made a decent salary but wanted college for me. The Jeweler, your father—” she gave Cort an apologetic look “—offered her more money than she could’ve made in twenty years walking those marble floors. He got her to give him copies of the security set-up. Lured her in with promises of an easy life and a future for me. Never happened, of course.”
The success Ellen achieved since Danita lost her museum job proved the two women’s drive. She sensed Cort’s impatience so she dug for courage. “At the time, my father questioned all the suspects. Did your mama ever say anything about those conversations?”
Ellen’s broad forehead crimped in thought. “Only that she kept telling him she didn’t know anything. Same thing she told the FBI.”
“Did she ever talk about a ring?” Cort cut in with what was Mara’s next question. “Something the Jeweler might’ve given her?” Tension edged his voice.
“That jagged thing? Too big to wear? Lord, yes. What about it?”
Finally! Mara could barely sit still.
Just inside a rounded archway that led to a dining area and kitchen, she caught the slight movement of a pink sneaker and a black braid. Shayla. A small oval face peered out. Grief shadowed big brown eyes, and something else. Guilt? Surely she didn’t feel guilty for her grandmother’s death.
“The ring is what the killers were looking for. What we’re looking for,” Cort said, pulling her attention away from the child. “It might help lead us to the hidden jewels. We don’t think they found her ring.” He scooted to the edge of the sofa. “What did she do with it?”
Ellen plucked another tissue from a box beside her and blew her nose. “She dragged that ring with her wherever we lived. Said the Jeweler told her it was a key to the treasure. More than once she got ready to give the damn thing to the cops and confess, but she couldn’t face the idea of prison. Couldn’t bring herself to throw it away neither. Like that old story poem about the sailor and the albatross. You know the one?”
“Yes, ma’am. But the ring?”
“Gone. Seemed like a good omen to me the day that thing disappeared.”
“Gone?” Cort’s voice broke on the word.
“Lost is more like it. When she moved into that apartment. We were unpacking stuff and it just never showed up.”
“Did your mother have a storage locker or safe deposit box?”
“No bank box, and we went through every crate and suitcase in the basement locker. Good riddance, I thought then. But not now, I reckon. I’m sorry.”
Cort slumped against the cushions. “Not half as sorry as I am.”
Now was Mara’s chance. “Did she ever say my father asked her about the ring?”
Ellen shook her head. “Nobody ever asked her about a ring. Not until now.”
No proof for Global Insurance, but good enough for Mara. Dad didn’t know about the puzzle ring. He was innocent. She’d known it all along. Her shoulders relaxed. She closed her eyes, and slowly, silently, the dread and tension flowed away on an exhaled breath.
When she opened her eyes, in the doorway was Shayla’s small fretful face. The child chewed her lower lip and looked like she might burst into tears. Mara’s heartbeat quickened.
“When I was a little girl, about four,” she began, raising her voice a little, “I admired the cameo my dad gave Mom. The brooch was his grandmother’s and very precious to him. This cameo contained a small diamond chip. That
bit of shine and the beautiful woman’s silhouette drew me like a magnet. Little girls always seem to like shiny jewelry.”
Cort’s brows shot together so tightly in a WTF expression he could’ve held a pencil between them. Mara shook her head slightly and he said nothing.
Ellen’s eyes widened. She seemed not at all thrown by Mara’s off-the-wall family story. “I know what you mean. Mama used to have a gold necklace. It belonged to her mama but she had to hock it years ago. You know, after...”
“A shame to lose precious pieces with memories like that,” Mara said. She slanted a quick glance at Shayla. The child riveted her dark eyes on her. “When Mom was busy, I took to sneaking into my parents’ room and playing with her jewelry. One day I took out the brooch and put it on to wear to my best friend’s house. To show off, you know?”
Ellen nodded, apparently caught up in the story.
Cort sat back, his posture tense and his expression intent.
“Sometime that afternoon, the cameo fell on the floor. I stepped on it and broke the clasp. I felt terrible. Guilty and scared to death. What would I tell my mother?”
“What did you do?”
“The worst possible thing. I hid the cameo in my secret treasure box and hoped Mom wouldn’t know the piece was missing.”
Ellen smiled. “That so never works.”
“Too true. When she discovered the loss a few days later, she thought she left it on a jacket and it fell off. She didn’t blame me or even ask me or my sister about it.”
Cort followed her slight nod toward Shayla. When his brow smoothed, she knew he understood her subterfuge. “And you kept this guilty secret?” he asked.
“For two years.” Actually only five days. Her parents had argued about the loss. Her mom cried and shut herself in their room. Mara’d felt sick to her stomach. Even then she knew her father’s mantra by heart. Once a crook, always a crook. “Finally one day I confessed and handed the cameo back to my mother.”
Ring of Truth (Devlin Security Force Book 2) Page 20
