Slater's Revenge

by Claudia Shelton

  Another piece of the puzzle had just fallen into place. Hard to believe Roxy was involved, but this, along with the fact her name had been on the list her chauffeur Ed had given him of people who knew Darla was pregnant, sealed the lead. If Roxy was involved with CT, no telling who else might be.

  “How long have you had this?” He kept his voice calm, noncommittal. Yet, his insides were already ten steps ahead.

  Macki paled as she picked up the crystal. Turning it one way and the other, she appeared to be trying to wrap her brain around what she was seeing.

  He touched her arm. “How long?”

  “About two years.” Chin quivering, she clutched the object to her heart.

  Most cases were centered around recent upheavals. More and more, this one appeared to have been building for quite a while. Something was off, though. She should have been screaming mad. Furious at the thought someone had set her up. She wasn’t. Why?

  Turning to face him, she bit her lip and laid the piece back on the counter. She tipped her chin upward and looked him in the eye. “I know the routine, Agent Slater. You know what you have to do. Go ahead, ask.” She sucked in a body of air. “Ask me the next question.”

  He steeled for the answer. “Why did Roxy give you the so-called healing stone?”

  “Because she’s the one who found me bruised and bleeding in an alley off D Street. She carried me to her place. Cleaned me up and held me as I cried.” She paused, her hands trembling against each other.

  What the hell was she talking about? Drake had conveniently left this part of her life out.

  “Don’t you see, Josh? Roxy can’t be behind this. She’s the one who saved my life that night.”

  Chapter Fourteen

  Mackenzie poured a shot of bourbon then lightly touched her lips to the smooth liquid fire. Josh had taken the crystal, camera, and transmitter to his room. Tomorrow, he’d ship the items to OPAQUE for analysis.

  Walking back to the counter, he gave her a stonewall stare. She ignored the expression and poured him a drink. At least he had the courtesy to roll the glass between his hands before setting it to the side. Evidently, she was the only one who needed courage.

  Downing a gulp of her drink, she felt the sting all the way to her core. She came up spitting and coughing. Eyes watering, she sucked in a deep breath then exhaled.

  Josh reached over to the mini-sink and added a good dose of water to her glass of bourbon. After setting the drink back in front of her, he took a seat on the high-top chair across from her at the counter. “I know this won’t be easy for you, Macki. But the bottom line is that we’ve got to fit the puzzle together. Can you help me?”

  “You mean tell you what happened that night.”

  He nodded. “Plus anything else that seemed off around that time.”

  She climbed on her own stool. This might be the hardest thing she’d ever had to do, but there was no one she’d rather have in front of her right now. “Guess you think I’m too close to the situation to know who to trust.”

  His silence said everything.

  “Okay. I’ll make it short and to the point.” That she could do. Details could wait until he asked for them. She trailed her fingertips across the almost clear drink then placed them against her tongue. Much better. Maybe having that night out in the open would dilute the pain she’d kept hidden from the world.

  “Whenever you’re ready.” Josh settled back on the chair.

  “I’d been working vice on D Street for a couple of years. Sure, a few people didn’t like me being there. Nothing major.” She inhaled. “If there wasn’t a big sting going down, then I made my own rules most times. Get the perverts off the street. Book the dealers. Make sure the runaways didn’t get pushed into a stable. Plus, I made friends with Roxy and some of the girls.”

  She stared off in the distance then returned her gaze to him, smiling. “I collared a lot of men I know from my charitable endeavors. To this day, they don’t realize it was me who got them taken downtown.”

  Josh grinned along with her, but she was smart enough to know that was the agent following the routine. She wondered what the man inside him thought. What would he think of her in a few minutes?

  “Nothing unusual that night,” she said. “It was about one a.m. A light rain. Not many people on the sidewalks. I tagged a guy cozying up to one girl and then another. Never saw him before, but something about him had everyone gathering together. Not making eye contact.

  “I eased over to him. No… Wait. He gave me one of those hand waves to come and talk. From there I latched onto him. Waited for the hook to set. Then, he took me by the elbow, you know, real gentlemanlike. He smelled of expensive men’s cologne and beer. I remember thinking that didn’t match up. Then we walked down the street discussing arrangements.”

  She tilted her face toward the ceiling, trying to forestall the tears. Telling the story was harder than she’d thought it would be. Lowering her head to face Josh, she wrapped her hand around the glass of diluted bourbon, struggling to steady her shaky fingers. As she lifted the drink to her lips, the jostling sloshed the liquid down her chin. His hand closed around hers, taking the glass from her grip as she opened her eyes.

  “Take your time,” he said. “When you’re ready, tell me everything that happened that night.”

  She nodded, swiping the back of her hand across her chin. At least she’d stopped shaking. “I reached to call my backup, and the man who’d been coming on to me slapped his hand over my mouth. Someone from behind us yanked me into an alley. There had to be two, maybe three of them.” She caught herself gasping for breath. “They didn’t just rough me up, they hit me. Knocked me around. At first…I fought. Finally, I just tried to protect myself from the next blow.”

  “Did they—”

  “No. But they let me know they could do whatever they wanted.” She struggled to calm herself. Struggled to share the next things that happened. They weren’t about the fear. Or the pain. Or the degradation. They were about the second she felt most vulnerable. The scariest moment of her life.

  “At some point, they yanked off my wig, laughing as they tossed it to the side. I could barely breathe. All I could do was curl against the wall and wait for what might come next. Finally, a man brushed the side of my face with his fingers. They were dense yet smooth, like he got manicures. Without any emotion, he said I looked like my mother.”

  She heard the tremble in her voice but shoved it aside. “He kept stroking the back of his knuckle up and down my cheek as he told me to consider this my one and only warning. To take my pink-fringed vest and get the hell off D Street. That I should go back to my world at Hotel MacKenzie before I had an accident like my mother.”

  Hearing the words come out of her mouth seemed surreal. This was the first time she’d let herself relive the entire scene. She felt the wetness rolling down her face, but she wasn’t sad, wasn’t scared at having shared this with Josh.

  Memories flew apart, angling to the forefront of her mind. “As he walked away, in the darkness, all I could hear were his footsteps. Then he stopped and said something about Drake getting the message. I left town the next day. Once the bruises healed, I came back to Riverfalls. My part of Riverfalls.”

  Josh stood up from the stool. “Did you ever tell Drake this happened?”

  “No. Don’t you see?” She gently shook her head. “I thought they meant they’d kill me, and send my uncle the message. I couldn’t do that to him. Drake gave a huge chunk of his life to take care of me after my parents’ death. I couldn’t dump something else on him, so I just kept it bottled up inside all this time.”

  Josh folded her into his arms. Felt good. Felt needed. Felt right. His gentle hold, his cheek against the top of her head, combined to give her strength enough to let the sobs come, and once the crying was finished, she felt lighter. The tears hadn’t made her weak, instead they’d released her enough to shatter the fear inside.

  “Everything’ll be okay, Macki. I won’t le
t anyone hurt you ever again. I promise.” He kissed her forehead. “Okay?”

  She nodded, crushing against him to absorb all the courage he had to give. They both knew he couldn’t always protect her, but the promise was all she needed.

  He stepped back to his side of the counter, looking perplexed. “Even if you didn’t push your call button, backup should have seen you weren’t on the street. Why didn’t they come?”

  “About ten minutes before, an all-night diner was robbed four blocks over. Customer and waitress shot. I told the squad car to go.”

  “Convenient, don’t you think?”

  She ran the coincidences through her mind. “The squad was only a couple minutes away. Besides, I was good at keeping the collar around long enough to pass him off to another undercover cop.”

  “Did the robbery turn out to be a major case?” Josh asked. “Were the victims killed?”

  “Minor flesh wounds. In fact, the jerk forgot to empty the register.” Her cop instincts kicked in. “You’re right. Too convenient. I was set up.”

  Josh nodded. “Seems like Coercion Ten’s been in your life for quite a while.”

  A fact difficult to wrap her brain around.

  “By the way, the guy who threatened me dislocated my finger and told me it would be worse next time. Then I heard a car drive off. Wasn’t long after that Roxy found me.” How? The alley was dark. “I must have called out for help, and she heard me.”

  Shaking his head, he grinned. “That’s something we’re going to ask her. Along with a few questions on the crystal with the camera in it. Did she tell you where she got the rock when she gave it to you?”

  “Roxy didn’t give me the crystal in person.”

  “Who did?”

  “Darla.”

  “Your chauffeur’s wife?”

  “Yeah,” Macki said. “When Darla first came to town, she was a working girl on D Street. Then Ed took her in, and she became my personal cleaning lady. They’ve been married about a year now.”

  His brow furrowed. “So, how did Darla end up with the crystal?”

  “Once I got back to Riverfalls, Roxy called me, wanting to send a healing gift, as she called it. She gave it to Darla. Darla brought the gift to me the next time she cleaned.”

  Mackenzie couldn’t wrap her head around much more today. There’d been too many coincidences. Coincidences she couldn’t ignore. Coincidences she should have noticed as a policewoman. Maybe she hadn’t been as good at law enforcement as she’d thought.

  Josh grabbed his cell phone. “Who put the crystal on the shelf?”

  “I did. There were instructions inside the gift box on exactly where to place the crystal. Even the fact that once the crystal was placed, it should never be moved or the healing power would be lost.”

  “What did Roxy say when you thanked her for the gift?”

  “I never thanked her. The night you got to town was the first time I’d seen Mama Roxy since the night she saved me out on the street.” Mackenzie was mad as hell at a lot of people right now, but mostly herself. “Don’t you see? I was so damn scared I ran from who I was and never went back. You have no idea what it’s like to run from the past. It’s hell, Josh. Pure hell.”

  He grabbed a glass of water and gulped it down. “Roxy was probably just a conduit to get the camera crystal inside your penthouse.”

  “I guess.” She narrowed her thinking to keep from going crazy with all the what-ifs flooding her mind. “What’s been happening all these years?”

  “CT’s been setting you up. Like money in a bank, they’ve had you in their sights for a rainy day.”

  “Then why send the email? Why open themselves up to you finding the device? How can that be leverage?”

  He leaned heavy against the counter. “They’re trying to mess with my mind. To throw me off balance.”

  She eased her hand next to his. “Have they succeeded?”

  He cocked the corner of his mouth and winked. “What do you think?”

  “I get the feeling no one has ever messed with you and survived. Not unless you decided to give them another chance.”

  “Damn right.”

  His expression, tone, and stance said he was proud of himself. He’d done his jobs as an OPAQUE agent without regret.

  She brushed her palm across the back of his hand. “You’re very much a loner in this world, aren’t you? You don’t trust many people. Don’t give them enough credit that they’ll understand what makes you tick. I’d understand. Why won’t you let me see what eats at you every single day?”

  He stood his ground. Didn’t respond.

  She no longer saw Josh as the boy she’d given herself to; in his place was a man who’d devoted his life to others. Who thought of others more than himself. What more could a woman ask of a man? He’d responded with kindness when she’d needed a shoulder to cry on, yet had known when to give her space. What more could she ever want in life than to know that she meant something to him?

  The tenderness in his eyes, connecting his gaze with her own, was one that said he still felt the weight would crush her if she knew. “Some things are my load to carry. Just mine.”

  “That’s a shame. Because I’ve now realized that whatever happened to either of us in the past, is just that…the past. What happens from this moment forward is the future.”

  He looked away. “I don’t know what you want from me, Macki. But some things you’re better off not having.”

  She nodded then walked toward her bedroom. Stopped at the doorway and glanced back. “Maybe. But I’m not asking for anything more than your friendship tonight.”

  He jerked his eyes back toward her. “You’ve always got that. No matter what, I’ll always have your back.”

  Her voice trembled. “Would you sit in my bedroom till I fall asleep? It’s been a rough evening.”

  …

  For the past hour, after Macki had stretched out across her bed, Josh had sat in her room. She’d kicked her shoes off, yet hadn’t taken the time to change clothes. Finally, he moved his chair to the side of her bed so he could hold her hand. She’d slept, releasing his hand as she relaxed. At least for a while. Then, she’d started to toss and turn again.

  Sitting in the semi-darkness had given him a chance to think. Her idea that the past was the past and only the future stretched out in front of them felt like a cool drink on a hot afternoon. If he knew that would be the outcome of him confessing his dad’s shame, he’d do it in a second. But what if she turned her disgust and pain against him?

  In that case, he’d have only added one more horrendous thing to her dreams. He couldn’t do that. The past couple of days had opened his eyes, and his heart, to the love he felt for Macki. Not the girl he’d left behind, but the woman she’d become. The Riverfalls Macki who smiled and laughed, the philanthropic woman who helped the needy and made sure Hotel MacKenzie prospered. The woman who’d been physically and emotionally hurt, yet kept the pain to herself rather than cause others worry.

  He swallowed the lump in his throat. She was everything he’d ever want in a wife. Everything he’d want the mother of his children to be. She was everything.

  Suddenly, she sat straight up in bed, reaching out to him as a painful moan punctuated the air around them.

  He moved to sit on the bed, gathering her in his arms, holding tight. “It’s okay.” He stroked her hair, kissed her forehead, as she clutched his shirt. “I’m right here, honey.”

  Gradually, she let the nightmare go and lay back down. He slipped to the other side of the bed and stretched out beside her, pulling the bedspread to cover them both. Wrapping his arms around her, he pulled her close, and she turned into him, laying her head in the crook of his arm.

  “Thank you,” she whispered.

  “Get some sleep. Things will be better in the light of day.” He breathed in the scent of jasmine and vanilla as she inched closer to him, her breaths lapsing into contented sleep.

  Sleep tugged at him, too, but be
fore he rested he needed to make a decision. Would he stay and keep the past a secret? Would he stay and tell her the truth? He stroked his hand down her arm. Or would he complete this assignment and simply leave?

  Chapter Fifteen

  Josh’s insides rumbled with trepidation as he and Macki made their way to Lieutenant Grey’s house for the barbeque. All the way there, he’d replayed watching her suffer through reliving the night she’d been attacked. Her abuse, whether from CT or some unlikely pervert, still gnawed on his soul. Couldn’t have been easy living with that fear all this time, but she’d never have to face that night again. Josh would see to that.

  He’d find the bastard one of these days. One of them wouldn’t get up from the ground.

  From the looks of the parking arrangement surrounding Grey’s house, the small get-together barbeque scenario had turned out to be anything but small. Car after car lined both sides of the street in front of his house then stretched a good long way in both directions. How many people were invited to this barbeque, anyhow? Around the corner and halfway down the block, Josh angled his truck into a slot between a white minivan and a red roadster. Evidently, everyone from family guys to men of influence had shown up.

  “I don’t like this.” He glanced around then pulled the key from the ignition. What had made him think this would be a good idea in the first place?

  Macki checked her reflection in the visor mirror. “Since you got to town, you don’t seem to like a lot. So, as you always say, get over it. I’m not a fool, I paid attention to what my uncle said on the phone.” She flipped the visor up. “I promise I’ll be careful. Now let’s go enjoy the party.”

  Last night on the system, he and Drake had agreed that holing up in the penthouse wasn’t going to draw CT out. They’d devised outings where Josh felt he could be in control of Macki’s whereabouts with minimum public spaces. The barbeque, her charity gala meetings, dinner at a restaurant that booked reservations only, and on and on. That way CT would need to make a direct move, which would be easier to spot and deflect.