Fear shone too bright in Mara’s eyes, but underlain with something else as she studied him. Steel. Encouragement.
And trust.
Jesus. Her fear nearly tore him apart, but it was the trust, trust in him to get them out of this hell, that scorched his insides like battery acid. After he’d doubted her, she still trusted him?
***
Mara slid from the SUV into the fog. Trees and underbrush surrounded the small party. Mist blotted out the sky. Despair lancing her heart, she shivered against the chill. How will anyone ever find us in this wilderness?
“Move,” Rousso ordered, gesturing to her with his wicked black pistol. “This will be right place, or you will pay for your man’s deceit.”
Her man. No longer. But Cort wouldn’t risk her life, even now that he despised her.
Twyla Hauptman had driven the rented SUV, with Rousso and her in the back. The bumpy ride on the rutted track stretched her nerves as taut as her tennis racquet. Swollen and puffy, her bloodied cheek throbbed. Rousso offered her a tissue. She refused. She would take nothing from the bastard.
Cort hopped down from his pickup, in front of the SUV, with Hugo holding a gun on him. She’d known as soon as she heard Hugo speak he was the behemoth who’d accosted her in her foyer. She would recognize that raspy voice anywhere, anytime.
Cort’s grim features were granite, his eyes set in cool, piercing bullet-gray. A mask of vigilance. He led the way down a narrow path to what appeared to be a log shed with a rotting wooden shingle roof. Beside the camp, the lake shimmered through the rain’s blurry curtain. No “fountain” in sight. The spring lay in the woods.
His clever attempt at dividing the enemy buoyed her. Some. Enough to layer her terror with determination. So far only in the form of poison-filled glares Rousso’s way. Not that she got any reaction. But at least her heart rate slowed from four Ghz to one. Well, maybe two.
She’d failed Cort when he began to trust her, betrayed his precious trust. Rousso must’ve known about the Maine cabin from some earlier conversation he’d overheard. Even her general “halfway across the country” must’ve clued him in. Why did she tell Cassie anything? She’d ruined everything.
Love for Cort welled up inside her, an ache that gripped her heart for what she’d lost. She was her father’s daughter after all. He’d betrayed everything he believed in for a chance at fortune. She’d betrayed Cort’s trust, and for nothing. Her chest ached as if she inhaled broken glass.
Worse for him, she’d proven him right. Trust no one. Not even himself. He would retreat into these woods. He would exist, not live, his days behind a wall of loneliness.
That is, if they lived through this day. The thought nearly brought her to her knees.
Suck it up, Mara Lin.
She swallowed a hot, hard lump and straightened her shoulders. Since that first night she met him, she’d learned to be stronger in the face of danger. To survive this day, she had to be strong. She had to be brave. She had to be smart.
Any chance with Cort was blown to hell. But maybe she could help give them both a chance to escape. She could scream at the idea the Centaur gang could end up with the crown jewels. Any chance of redemption for Cort would be lost.
She’d seen in Cort’s eyes he was primed to take advantage of an opening. She would do anything to create that opening.
Anything.
When they reached the small fishing shack, Rousso shoved her toward Twyla. She stumbled on the rough ground. As she dropped onto all fours, pebbles stabbed pain into her palms. She bit her lower lip against an automatic outcry.
“Son of a bitch!” Cort spat. “You didn’t have to hurt her again.”
“Just reminder. This will be truth,” the Centaur thug sneered, his accent even thicker with the tension rife around them. “Or Hugo will hurt Mara. Sometimes my large friend does not know his strength.”
His mouth a grim slash, Cort pointed to a sheet of weathered plywood weighted to the ground with a football-size rock. Dead leaves and evergreen needles littered the surface. “That’s the hiding place.”
Mara pushed to her feet. Blood droplets bubbled from abrasions on her palms. She opened her hands to the drizzle. Use the pain to focus.
Twyla tugged Mara’s braid to pull her closer. She now held Hugo’s pistol. Maybe they didn’t trust King Kong with a gun for more than a few minutes. Mara, Hugo, and Twyla stood no more than five feet from the lake shore, a good twenty feet beyond where Cort and Rousso jockeyed for position beside the plywood.
Mara sent the widow her version of Cort’s death stare, then averted her gaze. She didn’t dare look at Hugo, whose beefy hands could crush her. Instead, she focused on Cort.
His gaze flickered toward her and away with no hint of emotion. “No deception, Rousso. This is an old root cellar, wood lined with stones, used to store potatoes and other winter vegetables back when this was a year-round farmstead.”
Rousso’s eyes widened. “In the ground? But the dampness, the weather?”
“Gold and jewels would be fine in any case. But remember the verse—’STEEL WITHIN THE WOODEN HOLD.’ Leon must’ve reinforced the original.”
Mara’s chest tightened so she could barely breathe. Handing over the jewels was a death sentence. The longer to open the “wooden hold” and pull them out, the longer they lived to stop this travesty. She scrambled for an idea.
“Rousso, why does Centaur want these crown jewels so much?” she asked. “There must be others much easier to steal.”
“Not your concern,” he barked. “Is just important.”
“I bet your boss has private collectors lined up to buy either pieces or the whole collection,” she went on. “You’ll be in big trouble if that hiding place is empty.”
“He’s in trouble with his boss already,” Cort said, studying his enemy. “All those deaths, the cops, the fuck-ups. I hear Centaur doesn’t allow mistakes.” He made a slashing motion across his throat. “What about it, Rousso?”
The flush on the Centaur agent’s face and the fever in his eyes screamed of desperation. “Perceptive, Jones. But you will not trick me to reveal more. Open it.”
Cort knelt on the damp grass. He brushed away the winter’s detritus with his hands, then picked up the rock.
“Do not.” Rousso raised his pistol.
Mara recognized the longer nose on the weapon’s muzzle as a silencer. Who would hear them in these woods anyway? The inanity of it nearly provoked a giggle. She started to shake off the delirium but a spasm in her cheek made her gasp.
“Wouldn’t think of it,” Cort said mildly, not even looking up. He tossed the rock aside. The plywood lifted easily and flipped over and out of the way.
Mara was too far away to see into the hole no matter how she craned her neck.
Twyla took a step forward. So did her brother.
“Stay there,” Rousso ordered the widow. “Keep gun on her.”
Glowering at the man, Twyla returned to Mara’s side. The brother took another step, and another, then hovered midway between the two groups. Curious but afraid to cross Rousso.
Everyone’s attention was on the hiding place of the Gramornia crown jewels.
And not on Mara.
She tore her gaze from the dark hole to study the older woman. With the hood covering her perfectly teased and sprayed helmet, Twyla’s peripheral vision was impaired. Sure, she had the gun. At the moment aimed only generally toward Mara. Twyla didn’t look any more comfortable with that pistol than Mara would be. And the rain was making the grip slippery, less than secure. Could she use the gun if she managed to wrest it away? She would have to.
God help me.
If she screwed up, she would die. Cort next. Hell, they were both going to die anyway. No way would Rousso let them live. She drew in a deep breath to steady her fried nerves.
Cort, what do I do?
But his focus was on the hole. If she made a move, could he react in time?
“What the hell’s in the
re?” Twyla’s grating whine yanked Rousso’s head toward them and yanked the chance from Mara.
Rousso stepped closer to the hole and peered inside. “A steel safe. Water and fireproof kind. Good. For last time, open it.”
Cort drilled both hands through his hair and shook off the rainwater. On his belly, he reached inside. A metallic clank resounded through the small clearing. Again. And again.
“What?” Rousso scowled, exasperated.
Cort sat back on his heels and erupted in a belly laugh. More of an animal howl than mirth. Not quite what she expected.
“I can’t open it without the ring. The whole ring,” Cort said, as he subsided into a chuckle. He shook his head, amazement on his face. Respect too, if she read him right. “My old man created an unbeatable puzzle. No one involved in the burglary, himself included, could retrieve the jewels without the others. I thought the raised symbols were a key to something. Shit, the symbols are the key.”
He slanted a glance toward her. Checking on her wellbeing? Sending a message?
A key. Of course. Damn, she wished she could see. But this might be their chance. She was ready—on the balls of her feet, arms loose. God, did she dare? She would have only one chance.
“What do you mean, the key?” Rousso demanded.
“The safe is locked. Did you think he’d leave it here unlocked for years? To open it, you need a key. Each of the five raised symbols has to fit its matching slot. Only then can it be turned and the tumblers will fall into place. I need the complete puzzle ring.”
“Move back.” When Cort obeyed, Rousso withdrew a penlight from his windbreaker pocket. He aimed it inside the hole and studied what he saw for a moment.
“Yes, this is right. Clever.” He backed up and gestured to Cort to resume his position beside the in-ground safe.
He returned the flashlight to his pocket and instead withdrew the three pieces Cort had yielded earlier, plus a fourth. Falco’s, Mara assumed. He tossed them to the ground beside Cort.
“That’s only four,” Cort pointed out as he tried to fit the last piece with the others. “This is an outside piece. Where’s the missing one?”
Everyone turned to Twyla Hauptman.
Mara had assumed Rousso possessed it along with the others. Twyla kept herself and Hugo in the game by maintaining possession of her one asset, even though she shared the inside wording with Rousso. It probably suited him to use her and her brother for his schemes to obtain the others.
“No, absolutely not,” Twyla snapped. “I ain’t givin’ up my George’s ring piece.”
“You foolish bitch,” Rousso spat. “Yours must fit with others to open safe and retrieve jewels.” He waved his pistol toward her.
Mara forced herself to breathe evenly. In. Out. Easy now. She watched Twyla. And Twyla’s pistol. Not Rousso. One gun was all she allowed herself to think about.
Hugo turned toward the one who’d been ordering him around. “Don’t you swear at my sister,” the big man ordered. “She’s been helpin’ you.”
“Sorry, Hugo,” Rousso said, in an oily tone that boded no good.
Would he shoot his two allies? As well as Cort and her? Her pulse pounded and her stomach roiled.
“You shouldn’t yell,” Hugo said. “I don’t like yelling.”
“I did not mean yell. We want to see crown jewels, all of us, do we not?”
Hugo nodded deliberately, in almost comical slow motion. Twyla scowled, still reluctant to give up her only insurance.
“Twyla, the ring, if you please.”
“Fuckin’-A,” she whined. “Reckon I got no choice. But you better not try nothin’. I got a share of that treasure coming to me.”
“Of course. Your share.”
She reached across her body with her left hand to her right-hand jacket pocket. The unnatural twisting motion compromised her right hand’s steadiness. The gun dipped. As she withdrew the ring piece, the gun wobbled. Slipped in her wet hand.
Chapter 29
Mara took a deep breath and swung up her left arm against Twyla’s right arm. Knocked the gun loose. A loud crack split the silence. The weapon fell to the ground.
Hugo bellowed.
Mara blinked away the aftershock and fumes. With her right hand, she snatched the ring. Emitting a Serena roar, she executed a perfect serve.
The ring drilled into the lake with a sharp splash.
Mara’s ears rang from the gun’s report, but she heard Twyla screech like a wounded owl. “My ring, my ring!”
Mara risked a glance across the clearing. Cort wrestled Rousso for his gun.
Yes!
The smaller man seemed to have some martial-arts moves, but Cort was bigger, stronger. Prison had taught him how to fight dirty, to fight for his life.
She dived for the dropped pistol. Had to get it before the behemoth came to his sister’s aid. She scrabbled around on the ground in the ferns and new grasses. Came up with the weapon, fumbled the wet metal but held on.
The screaming banshee recovered and charged her.
Panting, her heart racing like a greyhound, Mara pushed to her feet. Across the clearing, the cracks and thumps of hand-to-hand combat lured her to search out Cort, but she kept her eyes on her opponent.
“Stop right there!” She held the pistol in both hands. She willed her grip to be steady and firm, as if she knew what she was doing.
Twyla halted, her face a twisted mask of hatred, clown garish with rain-streaked makeup. “You slope-eyed bitch! You wade in and get that ring or I’ll kill you.”
Mara ignored the threat and prayed the widow had the good sense to stay put. The few Devlin employee self-protection classes she’d taken covered defending herself against muggers grabbing her from behind or coming at her with a weapon. Not against this spitting cat who would attack with tooth and claw. Twyla and her brother probably aided Rousso in murdering Falco. As repellent as taking a life was, she would shoot if she had to.
“Hugo! Help me!” Twyla yelled.
“I... can’t.”
Hugo was no longer vertical. He lay on his back, a beached whale. Crimson stained the light blue fabric of his windbreaker.
Twyla spun toward his weak croak. She ignored Mara and raced to her brother. “Hugo! Baby brother, speak to me!”
When the pistol had fired, the bullet struck Hugo. Twyla shot her own brother.
Weeping and wailing in near hysteria, urging him to hang in there, she tore off her jacket and wadded it against the bullet wound. Hugo lay still, apparently unconscious. Or dead.
No reason Mara could think of to keep the woman from tending him. She kept the gun aimed at the pair while she circled to where she could also keep an eye on Cort’s battle.
Rousso stood spread-legged behind him. Cort kept Rousso’s arm trapped against his body. He gripped the man’s hand with both of his. Tried to shake loose the pistol.
Oh God, please let him be all right. She wanted to help but allowed herself only brief glances his way. She couldn’t take her eyes off the other two. Twyla or Hugo might have another weapon.
Rousso kicked, sweeping Cort’s legs from beneath him. The men fell to the ground in a welter of limbs and guttural sounds. Cort maintained his grip on Rousso’s wrist. The pistol clattered onto the door of the safe, an arm’s length or more down in the hole.
Thank God! Mara bit her lip. If she cried out, she might distract Cort.
Rousso yelled and swung a fist.
Cort blocked the blow and with his other hand landed a solid punch on Rousso’s chin with a thunk of bone on bone. His head snapped back. Cort pounded him again. Rousso lay still. Cort pulled back his arm for another blow. His chest heaved. He let his arm drop.
He sat back on his heels and looked at her. “Mara?”
Before she could answer, the clearing filled with a dozen men and women in black flak jackets. They carried enough weapons to supply an army.
“FBI. Stand down.”
An agent in a rumpled suit marched over to C
ort and helped him up. Kaplan, she guessed. Another FBI agent relieved her of Twyla’s pistol.
“Thanks,” she said to the woman. “I don’t think I could’ve held that another second.”
A medical crew rushed in behind the initial invasion. And behind them, Thomas Devlin.
Her boss crossed to her as an EMT draped a blanket around her chilled shoulders. He clasped both her hands in his big warm ones. “Mara Marton holding a gun on anyone is a sight I never in my wildest dreams thought I’d live to see. How’re you doing?”
“I’m okay.” And to her surprise, she was. She wouldn’t let herself think about Cort. She couldn’t even look at him. Or the ache in her chest would become unbearable.
***
As if the weather gods knew the danger was past, the skies began to clear. The drizzle stopped and patches of blue appeared above the trees.
Things happened quickly after that. Cort stood to one side as agents cuffed and led away Rousso and a weeping Twyla Hauptman. The EMTs took Hugo away on a gurney. One told an agent the bullet had punctured the man’s lung but he’d probably live.
Live to stand trial, Cort thought with satisfaction. Hugo might be limited upstairs but he knew the things he’d done were crimes. Both Hugo and his sister would go to prison for a long time, nearly as long as Rousso.
He glanced at Mara talking quietly with her boss. She looked wet and dirty, and more beautiful than ever because she was okay. He’d known fear in prison, fear for his own life, how fear tasted and how it prickled his scalp and roiled in his belly. But that was nothing compared to the paralysis, the dry-mouthed cold sweats he felt seeing her held at gunpoint. The blanket the EMT gave him warmed his shoulders but the ice in his gut would take a long time to dissipate.
How the hell did she manage those fancy moves to save the day? He wanted to ask but she was better off if he left her alone. She’d said more than once he should trust himself. How could he trust himself when nobody else should trust him? Devlin had a clear field if he wanted her. Frozen barbed wire twisted in Cort’s gut but he forced himself to look away from them.
Ring of Truth (Devlin Security Force Book 2) Page 26
