by Fiona Brand
“You can’t go back. It’s not safe and, as a witness for the prosecution, we don’t want you there. We can recover any physical evidence when we move on the house.”
“It makes sense for me to go home. The concussion is minor and Alex knows I hate hospitals. If I elect to stay in, he will be suspicious. The second he finds out, he could insist on having me removed to a private clinic. Besides, I’m safe. He’s not hitting me or pointing a gun at me.”
Given the last interval between “accidents,” the way she saw it, she had a week before he rigged another. By then, he would be behind bars.
“The answer’s still no. You’re not supposed to know this, and I wasn’t going to tell you because it’s damned scary. If Bayard finds out, I will lose my job. Lopez isn’t Alex’s real name. It’s Chavez, Rina. Alejandro Chavez.”
The Chavez cartel.
Her stomach turned.
Colombia. Brutal killings. Mass graves.
The Chavez cartel was Colombia’s preeminent drug operation. For years Marco Chavez had run the family business like a dictator. After his death his son, Alejandro, had been just as efficient, but much more secretive. A killer at age twelve and despised in his own country, Alejandro had been labeled a dangerous psychotic.
And she had married him.
The room spun, the sick feeling turning to raw panic. She had let him touch her, kiss her. She had let him inside her.
Revulsion shuddered through her. No wonder Esther had run, no wonder she had gone against the principles of a lifetime and stolen from Lopez. She had known who he was. She had been desperate to stop him, desperate to get them both away. “How long have you known?”
“Don’t look at me like that.” Taylor shook her head. “A few weeks. I wanted to tell you.”
“I understand why you couldn’t.” Cesar had known all along. He had introduced her to Alex; he had agreed to the marriage. The betrayal was incomprehensible. “Cesar—” Her voice sounded thick, her head was pounding.
Taylor was crouching down again, gripping her arms. “Don’t go there. I promise you, it doesn’t look good. I’ve been studying reports and profiles for weeks, looking for an out. I couldn’t believe it, either.”
“Alex is blackmailing him.”
“He gets a hold over everyone, but they still take his money, and they still commit the crimes. It’s called selling out.”
“To protect me.” She had to hold on to that; no matter what, Cesar was her father. She understood him in a way no one else could. Cesar was brilliant, but only at business. Without Esther in the equation, the Chavez cartel would have swallowed him whole.
Alex had held her hostage for more than twenty years. He had formulated a plan to contain and control her and extract her memories. The scope of the deception and the passage of time that had passed were almost incomprehensible, but one thing was clear. He wanted the money. He would never stop until he had it. Once he had it, he would kill her.
Another salient fact registered. It was cartel money. Even if Alex were imprisoned or killed, the cartel would remain. The missing thirteen billion dollars couldn’t be erased by a prison sentence or one death, no matter how significant; they would still want their money.
Esther had died trying to get free of the cartel. Regardless if Alex were caught or not, the only way out for Rina was to remember the account numbers and do what Esther had intended: turn the money over to the authorities.
She pushed to her feet and found her handbag. The movement sent stabbing pain through her skull. She needed to go back. She needed to remember the numbers and get rid of the money. It was the only way. Once she was safe the horror would recede; she would stop remembering. She needed to capitalize on the fear and adrenaline, keep pushing—
“What are you doing?”
“I have to go back. I’ve started to remember.”
“Rina, no.”
Rina gritted her teeth. Once she had pills she would feel better. A few more minutes, then she could leave. All she wanted was to sit somewhere quietly—in the dark. “I need to get into Alex’s study. He has things, things that disappeared from the crash site. There’s a tape. It could vindicate Cesar.”
“It’s too dangerous. He’s a killer. His father was a mass murderer.”
Weariness swept her. “I was safe enough before. I’m safe enough now, as long as he doesn’t find out I’ve recovered my sight. Even then, Alex won’t kill me. I’m no use to him dead. He’s trying to make me remember. He wants the account numbers.”
“Numbers. That’s plural.”
“Two accounts, and, no, I don’t know what they are. Yet.”
Taylor went still. “Oh, shoot. So that’s what’s been happening.”
Baby was on his feet, aware they were leaving. Rina gripped his harness. The smooth leather, Baby’s warmth against her leg was an anchor. “Taylor, he doesn’t know I can see.”
The possibilities inherent in the situation were huge, and Taylor was adding them up. No one was closer to Alex than Rina. She lived with him; she had free access to his study.
The curtain swished aside. The doctor stepped into the cubicle, a carton of painkillers in her hand. Her gaze zeroed in on Taylor. “Are you with Mrs. Lopez?”
“No,” Rina cut in, before Taylor could reply. “She’s not.”
The doctor directed a cool glance at Taylor. “Then you shouldn’t be in here.”
Taylor held up her hands and backed out of the cubicle. Rina could see she wanted to argue, but she didn’t want the scene Rina was threatening when she was supposed to be undercover.
“Tomorrow night,” Taylor said flatly. “That’s your deadline. Keep in touch.”
Sixteen
Rina walked through the sunlit house with Baby, her movements stiff and slow, courtesy of the eggshell tenderness of her head, as she refamiliarized herself with the rooms.
Being able to see was powerful and overwhelming, the light almost too much for her eyes, even with dark glasses. She would find herself staring, her mind frozen, the sensory overload too much when for years she had been trained to use every sense but sight. Even the simple motion of walking felt strange. She was used to memorizing her routes and counting out steps, her movement through a space a three-dimensional calculation. When she reached for her toothbrush she knew exactly how far to extend her hand from her body, and the small downward motion required before she could grasp the handle of the toothbrush. Everything was placed where it always was, but she kept missing her objective, her mind caught between two systems.
This morning when she had made herself a hot drink, despite the fact that the jug was in its usual position and she could see it, she had somehow managed to miscalculate and burn her fingers. If she had closed her eyes, the accident wouldn’t have happened.
She paused in the sitting room and stared at the bookshelves that lined one entire wall. She picked a book at random and opened it to a page. With an effort she could identify individual words, but it was like learning a foreign language; en masse the words were a jumble. The difficulty she was having with the written word posed an unexpected problem. She wanted visual stimulus and, if possible, evidence, but if she couldn’t understand the written word, searching Alex’s files was going to be that much more difficult.
Flipping the book closed, she slid it back into its place on the shelf. The gold lettering on the spine caught her eye, a date, 1500. Somehow, numbers were easier; her mind grabbed them, no questions asked. She concentrated on the writing above the date, Ferdinand of Aragon. It was a book on Spanish history. She checked books at random, and several more turned out to be history tomes: English, Spanish, French and South American. Some of the material appeared to be written in Latin. There were a large number of books on the Second World War and Nazi Germany. She frowned. The amount of historical reference material Alex owned was substantial and some of the subject matter was surprising. He had never once indicated he had any interest in history. If he talked about anything at all besides b
usiness, it was usually art or current events.
The sound of a door closing alerted her. Alex had been at home most of the day to keep an eye on her, he’d said. To make sure she didn’t have any more accidents.
Rina had stayed in bed and pretended to rest. When Alex had left for a meeting, she had managed to search his private suite, but she hadn’t yet got into his study.
Slipping into the soft easy chair closest to the bookshelves, she ordered Baby to lie down, then eased her head onto the rest and pretended to be dozing.
Alex paused at the door to the sitting room. Gaze concealed behind the lenses of her dark glasses, she stared at an empty space somewhere in the region of his left shoulder and repressed a shudder. She hadn’t looked into his eyes. If she did that he would know.
Sometime during the afternoon he had changed from casual clothes into a suit. According to Therese, he had a meeting this evening, which meant he should be out of the house for at least an hour.
When he left just minutes later, Rina walked toward Alex’s study. When she stepped through the door, she closed Baby out. “Sorry, boy, you can’t come in here.”
Letting Baby into Alex’s personal space was the equivalent of leaving a calling card. If he smelled dog or found a dog hair, he would know she had been there.
Thirty minutes later she gave up on trying to access his computer. She was used to a voice-activated system with Braille keys. English type and the garish color pulsing from the screen were beyond her. She concentrated on searching his desk drawers. The top one was filled with pens and notepaper. As she slid the drawer closed, the light caught on an indentation in a notepad. Pulling the pad out, she stared at the blank page.
The notepad was in the water…ink smeared, numbers dissolving.
For a moment she hovered on the brink, then the wisp of memory slipped away.
Frowning, she slanted the pad so the light picked out the indentation. She sat down at the keyboard and entered the series of indented numbers and letters. The password wasn’t accepted. Almost an hour later, after searching through every file she could find, she checked her watch. She was out of time. Apart from the moment with the notepad, nothing had stimulated her to remember anything more, and she hadn’t found anything that looked remotely useful as evidence. If Alex kept details of his criminal activities, they were either in computer files, or kept elsewhere.
As she pushed to her feet, a tiny glowing light caught her attention. Adrenaline pumped. A discreetly placed video camera was situated in the corner, aimed directly at her. Whether Alex found out she was snooping in his office or not was no longer the question, it was when; she had been on camera all along.
Tires crunched on gravel.
Ripping the top two sheets off the notepad, she shoved them in her pocket and replaced the pad in the drawer. She closed down the computer, positioned the chair where it had been, walked from the room and collected Baby.
Seconds later, Alex paused by her office door. “I thought you would be in bed.”
Rina slipped off the earphones of her voice computer and swung around on her swivel chair as she normally would. Keeping her head up and her gaze straight ahead, she stared past his shoulder. “I get tired of lying down. My head aches just the same sitting up.”
“If you need anything, buzz Therese. She’s staying on late tonight to make sure you’re okay. I’ve got one more meeting.”
She forced a smile and tried to slip back into the groove of being the resigned half of a dysfunctional married couple. “Don’t worry. When I’m finished here I’m going straight to bed. I didn’t get much sleep last night—doctor’s orders. Will you be late?”
Her skin crawled as he studied her face. He seemed fascinated by the cut on her temple. The butterfly plaster was still in place, but the split skin was visible on either side. Combined with the bruising, it wasn’t a pretty picture, and it would scar. “Not tonight. It shouldn’t take more than an hour.”
She smothered a yawn and didn’t have to manufacture a wince when the movement of her facial muscles pulled at the cut and the bruised areas. “Then I’ll probably see you in the morning.”
She listened to the sounds he made as he walked upstairs to his suite. Minutes later, the front door closed behind him. She waited until she heard the sound of his car leaving, then headed back to his study to see if the series of numbers that had been indented on the notepad would open his wall safe.
An hour later, after giving up on the safe combination, searching his trash can and even his adjoining bathroom, Rina walked back out to the sitting room looking for Baby. A cold prickling at her nape warned her. She spun, but not soon enough to avoid the blow.
Seventeen
Dully, Rina heard Baby growl. He was crouched low, his gaze fixed on Alex. Holding her nose, Rina pushed to her knees in time to see Alex lash out at Baby with one booted foot.
Moving a step back toward the open French doors, he lifted a gun and trained it on Rina. “You can see.”
Baby growled, stalking forward. The barrel of the gun swung toward Baby’s head. Movement out on the patio flickered. A large figure charged through the open French doors.
Cesar’s gaze locked with Rina’s. “Get down.”
The first slug caught him square in the chest. Cesar attacked Alex with a grunting roar. The second shot sliced past Rina’s ear, close enough that she felt the pressure wave.
The two men grappled and went down. The gun skidded across the floor.
Rina lunged at the weapon. The gun felt unexpectedly heavy and warm in her grip. A chill gripped her as Alex rose to his feet, the movement fluid.
Cesar wasn’t moving. Grief clawed at her and her hands shook, but she kept the gun steady. She had never fired a weapon, she could only hope that the gun worked when she pulled the trigger, because there was no doubt in her mind that she was going to have to shoot Alex.
The smell of blood filled the room, some of it hers, most of it Cesar’s, and it was having its effect on Baby. His muzzle was peeled back from his teeth, a low vibration issuing from his chest.
Baby crept closer to Alex. Alex glanced at the gun Rina held in her hands. For the split second he stared at the weapon, she had the uncanny notion that he didn’t register the threat, that she herself was close to invisible, without substance: unimportant. He had gotten so used to walking all over her that he didn’t believe she would have the guts to pull the trigger.
She kept the barrel of the gun trained steadily on his chest. Alex wasn’t a tall, bulky man, but he had always kept in good shape, and that was never more in evidence than now. In a black T-shirt and black pants, his skin tanned, his hair cut neatly against his skull, he looked sinewy and powerful. Without the business suit and the persona that went with it, there was an animalistic quality about the man who stood in front of her, and she wondered that she could ever have missed it, no matter how “blind” she had been.
With a curious, flickering smile, Alex stepped over Cesar’s sprawled form. In that moment Baby lunged, a streak of gold fur and muscle. With a ferocious baying he engaged, his teeth sinking into the arm Alex instinctively flung out.
With a muffled grunt, Alex attempted to physically pry Baby’s mouth open with his free hand and break his grip. Blood flowed down his wrist and coated the back of his hand. With a short, vicious kick, he shook Baby off.
The thump of helicopter blades jerked Alex’s head around. Lights strobed across the patio. In the distance, gunfire erupted. His gaze fastened on hers, cold, calculating. A split second later he was gone.
Rina kept the gun pointed at the open door. Baby crept toward the place Alex had been, teeth still bared, instinctively avoiding Cesar’s body. Rina stared at Cesar. He was dead. There was no mistaking the complete lack of animation.
The whine of the helicopter reached a crescendo as it lifted off. Grief sliced through the stasis that gripped her. For a split second, when he’d come through the door, Cesar had been the father she had known as a child, big
and rambunctious and protective. To intervene like that, he must have known what Alex had intended. If he hadn’t charged in and knocked the gun out of Alex’s hand, she wouldn’t have had a chance. Alex would have shot Baby and dragged her onto the helicopter with him.
The sound of the helicopter faded. She let her arms drop so that the gun was pointing at the floor. If Alex had taken her with him, she would have been dead. Not soon, perhaps not for weeks or even months, but eventually. He would have tortured her until her mind gave up what he wanted. Once he had the numbers, and the money, he would have killed her.
Baby growled. The gun swung back up as if it had a life of its own. Rina called Baby to heel. Baby ignored her and every hair at the base of her neck stood on end. Now that the helicopter had gone, it was pitch-black outside. She was acutely aware of a myriad of sensory details, the thick scent of blood, the breeze flowing through the open French doors, the distant cascade of water from the fountain at the front of the house.
Someone was on the patio.
A shadow flickered. Baby launched with a bloodcurdling baying. Glass shattered as his shoulder caught one of the partially open doors and flung it wide. A sharp oath was followed by high-pitched keening, the sound terminated by a dull thud, then a scuffling sound, which receded into the distance.
Silence closed in, thick and oddly muffled. She was having trouble retaining her focus. Her breathing was too rapid and her hands where they were wrapped around the gun were shaking.
She lowered the gun. Her nose felt swollen, she was unable to breath through it, and the back of her throat tasted of blood. A throb of black humor surfaced. She was beginning to get used to the blood.
A dark figure flowed through the open French doors. Rina froze. He was armed, a large, black handgun gripped in both hands and pointed directly at her.
