Nowhere to Run

by Suzanne Brockmann

  Felipe grabbed her around the waist and pulled her tightly to him. “I do love it when you’re jealous,” he murmured. If they hadn’t been wearing the helmets, he would have kissed her. Instead, he just smiled into her eyes and ran his hands down her back, pulling her hips in closer to him. “But no, Diego’s not a woman. You saw him on TV, on that news report, remember?”

  Carrie nodded. She remembered. “I’m really sorry about before,” she said softly. “Seriously, Felipe, I won’t behave like that again. I know I don’t own you. I know I never will. If I forget, just…remind me.”

  She’d been so quick to believe the worst of him. Of course, little Billy had called him Daddy, and she’d simply followed that to its obvious conclusion.

  The truth was, she was ready to doubt Felipe Salazar. Was he a killer? She didn’t think so. But if the least little bit of evidence showed up that worked against him, she’d probably start to doubt his innocence again.

  And yet she loved him. It was a strange and powerful emotion, to be able to overlook the fact that this man was wanted by the police for murder.

  Felipe started the motorcycle, and Carrie climbed on behind him, wrapping her arms around his waist. He drove slowly toward the beach, careful never to exceed the leisurely speed limit of the side streets.

  They approached a patrol car, and Carrie tensed. But Felipe didn’t slow, didn’t even seem to notice. He was utterly cool, and they passed with no problem. The police officer didn’t even glance in their direction.

  And then they were at the beach. Felipe parked the motorcycle and they walked toward the food stand.

  It was odd, being out in the open. They were in plain sight of anyone who happened to drive by. Except they were surrounded by dozens and dozens of people who looked just like them. Shaggy-haired young men in bright, funky bathing suits and dark glasses. Young women of all shapes and sizes, with all styles and colors of swimsuits, with all lengths and shades of hair. They milled around the sandwich stand. They sat on their towels on the nearby sand, or perched on top of the picnic tables that were scattered across that part of the beach.

  It was the perfect place to hide. They were daringly hidden in plain view. No one would think to look for them here.

  Except, hopefully, for Jim “Diego” Keegan.

  Felipe found an empty picnic table in the shade, near a pay phone. Taking Carrie’s hand, he pulled her toward it. He sat on top, not on the bench, and assumed the same relaxed slouch as the other kids. Carrie sat next to him.

  “You look tense,” he murmured. “Loosen up. And take off your overalls and shirt. You’re the only one out here still dressed.”

  She stood up and slipped out of her pants. She rolled them up and set them next to her on the table. The gauze shirt she unbuttoned, but left on.

  “Relax,” Felipe said into her ear. “No one’s going to look for us here.”

  She tried to loosen her shoulders, but it didn’t seem to help. Felipe looped an arm around her neck, pulling her close. And then he kissed her.

  It wasn’t a little, polite, out-in-public kind of kiss. It was a huge, devouring, explore-the-tonsils, bone-melting kiss.

  He released her, melted bones and all, keeping that possessive arm around her neck. She sagged against him, glad he was holding her up.

  No one was watching. No one in this crowd of students had even noticed Felipe kissing her as if the world were coming to an end.

  “Much better,” he said with a flash of his straight white teeth. “Now you have that same hormone-glazed expression in your eyes that the other kids have.”

  “I do not,” she said, insult tingeing her voice, knowing he was right. She pinched him in the side.

  He squirmed away, laughing, but still watching the parking lot. “Do, too. You know, you look about sixteen in that bathing suit. It’s real heart-attack material.”

  “Well, you look barely old enough to vote, so that makes us even,” she said.

  He took her hand, lacing his fingers with hers. “I wish I’d known you when you were sixteen,” he said, stopping his keen perusal of the parking lot to look searchingly into her eyes. “You were probably one of those really smart, sexy girls. I bet you had every guy in high school following you around.”

  Carrie laughed. “I was a total nerd. No one followed me anywhere.”

  “I would have,” Felipe said.

  She glanced at him. “You would’ve scared me to death.” She laughed. “You still scare me to death.”

  He looked out across the parking lot, squinting into the sunlight as he searched for Jim Keegan’s car. “Really?”

  Yes, really. Carrie was scared that the part of her heart that Felipe had invaded would never be the same after he left. She was scared that she’d never meet a man who could stand up to her memories of this one. She was scared that she’d love him forever, long after he was gone, long after he’d forgotten her.

  And most of all, she was scared that she was wrong about him, that he had been involved in the Sandlot Murders.

  She didn’t answer him. Instead, she looked around in the late-afternoon light at the long, frothy line of water that pulsed and murmured at the edge of the sparkling white expanse of sand.

  “I love the beach,” she said. “You know, I was eighteen before I ever set eyes on the ocean, but I still loved it. I loved the pictures and the movies and TV shows. Hawaii Five-O repeats. Miami Vice. Flipper. Especially Flipper. Sandy and Bud, remember them? So I came out to Florida to go to college and see the ocean. Mostly to see the ocean.”

  Felipe was listening to her carefully. He was also looking around, watching the cars that came and went in the parking lot, and gazing at the people passing by on the sidewalk. But every time he glanced at her, she knew from looking into his eyes that he was paying attention to every word she spoke. It was a nice feeling, knowing that someone was honestly listening to her.

  “Everyone back home laughed at me because I wanted to be a marine biologist,” Carrie told him. “Everyone told me that ranchers’ daughters from Montana just didn’t become marine biologists.”

  “Why not?” he asked.

  She smiled and reached up to push his hair back from his face. “That’s what I asked, too. Why not?” She shrugged. “No one had a good enough answer, so here I am. A marine biologist from Montana.”

  Felipe took her face between his hands and kissed her. His mouth was so sweet, his lips so gentle. Carrie’s heart lodged in her throat, aching with love for him.

  He still held her face after he kissed her, gazing deeply into her eyes.

  Suddenly shy, and afraid that her feelings would show, Carrie pulled away. She looked down at her toes.

  “Does that help with our cover?” she asked. “Does it make us seem more like college students when you kiss me?”

  “That’s not why I kissed you,” Felipe said. “I kissed you because I wanted to. Because around you, Caroline, I have absolutely no control.”

  She looked up at him. He wasn’t smiling or teasing. His face was dead serious as he gazed at the parking lot.

  “No control,” he murmured, the muscles working in his jaw.

  Carrie gazed at him. No control. Over his body? Or over his emotions?

  Hope formed in her stomach like a fragile butterfly. Maybe she could make him love her. Maybe…

  FELIPE WAS AWARE he’d given too much away.

  Caroline sat next to him, lost in her own thoughts. How long ’til she figured out the control he’d spoken of losing had to do with his heart rather than his hormones?

  Of course, her jealousy earlier today had revealed to him that her feelings for him were more than merely casual. And sooner or later, she was going to run into someone who was going to translate te amo for her, and then she’d know.

  He loved her.

  What would happen if he told her? I love you, but we can’t be together because I’d fear for your safety.

  She’d laugh and talk him into ignoring his fears. She’d conv
ince him he was suffering from an overactive imagination.

  And then one day, someone like Tommy Walsh would follow him home. And then the next day, Caroline would be dead.

  No, he couldn’t tell her. He couldn’t take that risk.

  She shifted slightly and leaned her head against his shoulder. Felipe slipped his arm around her waist, amazed as he always was at how perfectly they fit together.

  She rested her hand on his knee, and he felt the sharp stab of desire. Tonight. Tonight she’d be in his arms again.

  But they had no place to stay, nowhere to go. God only knows where they’d spend the night. Maybe they could get a room in a cheap motel by paying with cash and signing false names in the registry. But it would mean standing under the watchful eye of the desk clerk as he registered, hoping the guy hadn’t seen the papers or the television news.

  Of course, his haircut made him look quite a bit different—

  Next to them, the public telephone began to ring.

  Felipe was up on his feet in an instant. He answered it before it had completed the first ring.

  “Yes?”

  “Who’s the blonde?”

  It was Diego—Jim Keegan.

  “Oh, man,” Felipe said, relief rushing through him. “You don’t know how good it is to hear your voice.”

  “Likewise,” Diego said. “I drove by and saw you, but just as I was about to stop, I got this sense that I was being trailed. I don’t know. Emily says when she got pregnant, I got paranoid. Maybe she’s right. Still, I thought it would be smart to be cautious, you know?”

  “Where are you calling from?” Felipe asked, glancing back at Caroline. She was watching him, trying to listen from her seat on the picnic table.

  “I’m at a pay phone downtown,” Jim Keegan said. “We got us a friendly line, Phil. No taps, no one listening in. So spill it. I know you didn’t kill those guys in the sandlot. I got a truckload of questions. Let’s start with the girl.” He laughed, and Felipe had to smile at the familiar, husky sound. “I drive by, and I see you giving this great-looking blonde mouth-to-mouth. Who is she?”

  “Her name is Caroline Brooks,” Felipe said, glancing again at the great-looking blonde in question and lowering his voice so she wouldn’t hear him. “Do you remember the lady I locked in the trunk of her car at Sea Circus?”

  “You’re kidding,” Jim said. “You used to talk about her so much, Emily was convinced you’d be sending out wedding invitations within the year. How long have you been seeing her? What’s going on? Is she helping you hide?”

  “I never went back to introduce myself,” Felipe admitted. “I haven’t been seeing her at all.” He told Jim what had happened at Schroedinger’s restaurant, how by sheer chance, Caroline had been there that evening, how she had unwittingly blown his cover.

  His friend was silent for a moment. “Then she’s the same woman you left the restaurant with,” he said. “That’s why her name sounded familiar. We still don’t have a picture of her, but the PR department is working on getting one to release to the press—along with a statement, my friend, that calls her your ‘hostage.’”

  Felipe swore softly.

  “Apparently, the boyfriend’s getting ready to tape an impassioned plea to you, trying to convince you to let the girl go. It’ll be carried by all the local stations—”

  “Boyfriend?” Felipe said.

  “Uh-oh,” Jim said. “She didn’t tell you she has a boyfriend?”

  “No.” Felipe turned his back to Caroline, afraid that the sudden jealousy that was making his stomach churn would show in his eyes. Boyfriend?

  “Some ad exec. His name is—hang on a sec.” Felipe could hear the sound of pages being turned as Jim skimmed his notes for the man’s name. “Robert Penfield. The Third. Lah-di-dah. Big bucks, no brains. The guy’s a real load, Phil. He’s been doing the circuit of news programs and talk shows, milking the situation. Apparently, he was at the restaurant, when you quote, unquote ‘kidnapped’ Caroline—”

  You two-timing snake… That’s what Caroline had called him when she’d thought he was involved with Jewel, too. No way would she have been so vehement if she’d been doing some two-timing of her own, if she’d been hiding a boyfriend from him.

  “He’s not her boyfriend, this Penfield guy,” Felipe said with sudden certainty. “A dinner date, maybe.” He turned back to look at Caroline. “Do you know someone named Robert Penfield?” he said to her.

  She stared at him blankly.

  “The Third…?”

  Recognition dawned in her eyes. “I was having dinner with him at Schroedinger’s.”

  “Have you been out with him before?”

  “No,” she said. “I only met him that afternoon.”

  “I was right,” Felipe said to Jim. “He was her dinner date.”

  “He’s been implying that she’s his fiancée,” Jim said.

  “She didn’t even recognize his name at first,” Felipe said.

  “Maybe that’s simply a testament to the overwhelming power you have over women,” Jim teased. “When you’re around, old what’s-his-name’s forgotten.”

  “You got anything else for me, man?” Felipe asked. “Any good news?”

  “Only bad,” Jim said. “Really bad.”

  Felipe braced himself.

  “The police just released the ballistics report to the press,” Jim continued. “Your police-issue handgun fired the bullets that killed Tony Mareidas and Steve Dupree out in that sandlot.”

  “Oh, man.” Felipe closed his eyes. This was bad news.

  “Was your gun ever taken from you in the past few weeks?” Jim asked. “Was it ever missing for any length of time?”

  “No.”

  “Maybe while you were asleep? Or, um, otherwise preoccupied perhaps…?”

  “No. I sleep with it under my pillow,” Felipe said. “And I’ve been sleeping alone.” Except for the past few nights, and hopefully again tonight….

  “Then I’m right,” Jim said. “Richter’s got a man inside the St. Simone Police Force—and it’s someone with enough rank and power to falsify a ballistics report.”

  “A captain,” Felipe said.

  “That’s what I figured, too,” Jim said.

  Felipe told him about the mysterious Captain Rat, Richter’s partner. “Last week I got a glimpse of Richter’s personal schedule on his computer,” Felipe said. “He’s got a date to meet with this Captain Rat tomorrow at three-thirty.”

  “Where?”

  Felipe laughed humorlessly. “That’s the catch. I don’t know where.”

  A fourteen-or fifteen-year-old kid hovered nearby, waiting to use the pay phone. Felipe turned and gave him a steady look, and within moments, the boy nervously walked away.

  “Okay, look,” Jim was saying, “I’ll go and do some more checking around. The bitch about this Richter investigation is that I don’t know who the hell knows about it, and who is clueless. And I don’t want to ask—I don’t want anyone to know that I know. Damn, it’s complicated. And meanwhile, no one’s asking me if I know, because they don’t want me to know what they know.” He swore disgustedly. “Phil, I’m honestly thinking of just bringing it all out into the light.”

  “Not yet, man,” Felipe said. “Don’t do that yet. Until I know who the man on the inside is, I can’t risk coming in. And without me, you’ve got nothing.”

  “I got nothing now,” Jim said. “Maybe it’s time to shake the hornet’s nest, see who gets mad.”

  “Not yet,” Felipe said again. “Maybe in a few days—”

  “I’m worried about you, Phil.”

  “I’ll get by,” Felipe said with a quiet confidence that wasn’t feigned. At least not entirely. “Don’t do something that will put you—and Emily—in danger.”

  Jim Keegan was silent, and Felipe quickly told him about the tape he’d made and left in Rafe’s van. “Just in case,” he added.

  Jim was still silent. Then, finally, he spoke. “Maybe you should
just lie low,” he said. “Stay out of sight. Let me nose around a bit more. I’ve checked out all but two of the police captains, all but Captain Swick and Captain Patterson. Personally, I find it hard to believe Patterson could ever be involved with Richter. He’s such a straight arrow. Swick, on the other hand…”

  “He’s never liked me,” Felipe said. “I’ve overheard him using…derogatory language in reference to…my cultural background, shall we say?”

  “He’s a bigot,” Jim stated bluntly. “But that doesn’t automatically make him a criminal.”

  “He lives down near the water, doesn’t he?” Felipe asked. Come to think of it, Donald Swick lived in a very nice house right on the Gulf—a house way too big and expensive for a man who’d been on the police force all his working life.

  “Yeah, over on Casa del Sol Avenue,” Jim said. “His wife’s out of town. He’s been putting in quite a few extra hours, working with Chief Earley, trying to track you down. The media’s been eating it up. Captain Swick and Chief Earley, the modern Untouchables.”

  “Man, I got a feeling about Swick,” Felipe said. “I’m going to check him out.”

  “Let me,” Jim said. “You stay hidden.”

  “No, I’ve got to do something,” Felipe said. “You look into Patterson. I’ll check out Swick’s house.”

  “Phil, at least find a safe place for Caroline and leave her there.”

  It was Felipe’s turn to be silent. “Can you guarantee that wherever I put her, Tommy Walsh won’t find her?” he finally said. “And can you guarantee that if I do find a safe place, she’ll stay put?” He shook his head, even though Jim couldn’t possibly see him over the telephone line. “No, she’s staying with me, Diego. That way I’ll know she’s safe.”

  For once, Jim didn’t argue. He just chuckled quietly. “It happened, huh, Felipe? You finally met your match.”

  “No—” The word wasn’t even out of his mouth before Felipe recognized it was a lie. Diego was right. Caroline was the only woman he wanted, the only woman he’d ever want. After he said goodbye to her, he might as well enter a monastery.

  “Oh good, and we’re in denial, too.” Jim’s chuckle got louder. “You poor bastard, you don’t stand a chance.”