Behind Closed Doors m&f-1

by Shannon McKenna

  She stole in to the empty room, drawn by a shelf of photographs that bore the look almost of an altar. There was a photo of Victor and her father as a skinny boy of twelve. The eighteen-year-old Victor was wearing a thin tank top. His muscular arm was flung over his little brother's neck, and a cigarette dangled out of his mouth.

  There was a faded pencil portrait of her grandmother, a pretty dark-haired girl with pale eyes, and a photo of her when she was a handsome older woman, from which the portrait that hung over the credenza was copied. Raine studied a school photo of herself, in the sixth grade at Severin Bay Middle School. She remembered the itchy lace on the collar of that hateful green velvet dress.

  The last photo was of her father's sailboat. She stood in front of it, along with her mother, Victor and an unknown man. The strange man was dark-haired and handsome, with a thick mustache. He was laughing. Something about him made the back of her neck prickle, but the thought would not rise to the surface. It flashed away, like a fish disappearing into dark water, accompanied by a pang of sharp, sick anxiety. She forced herself to pick up the photo and examine it.

  It was a rare sunny day, and her mother was glamorous and beautiful in a yellow halter sundress, her hair tied back with a silk scarf. Victor’s arm was flung over Alix's shoulders, and his other hand was ruffling Raine's hair. She remembered the bathing suit with the green frogs on it, the green frog sunglasses that matched it. Victor had yanked on her braid for some reason, hard enough to bring tears to her eyes. Then his cool, dragging voice, faintly accented, echoed through her memory. “Oh, for God's sake, Katya, toughen up. Don'/ be a crybaby. The world is not kind to crybabies.”

  She'd blinked the tears back, glad to have the sunglasses for a shield. She could at least pretend not to cry.

  The same frog sunglasses were sitting next to the photograph. She reached for them, convinced that her hand would go right through them like a hologram. They were real. Cold, smooth, hard plastic. She stared down at them, marveling at how small they were. It started in her stomach, a sick roiling. Fear, spiraling wider, higher. Running, screaming. Water. A dizzy green blur; Blind panic.

  “Katya,” came a low voice from behind her.

  She spun around with a sharp gasp. The glasses dropped to the carpet with a thump. No one but her mother knew her former name. No one had addressed her by it in sixteen years.

  Victor Lazar stood in the door, his hands shoved deep into the pockets of his fine wool trousers. “Sorry, my dear. I didn't mean to startle you. I seem to be making a habit of it.”

  “Yes, you are.” She breathed deeply, trying to stop trembling.

  Victor indicated the photo still clutched in her hand. “I was referring to the photograph. The little girl is my niece, Katya.”

  “Oh.” Raine placed Hie photo on the shelf. The obvious next move was a polite inquiry as to his niece's well-being. She didn't want to draw more attention to the photo, but with every second that ticked by, her lack of comment drew more attention to it than any comment ever could. “She's... a pretty little girl,” she faltered. “Where is she now?”

  Victor picked up the photo and looked at it. “Fm afraid I don't know. I lost touch with her many years ago.”

  “Oh. I'm sorry.”

  He nodded towards the glasses that lay on the carpet. “I kept those as a memento of her. The same ones she is wearing in the photo.”

  She scooped them up and put them back in their place. “Um, excuse me,” she stammered. “I didn't mean to—”

  “Think nothing of it.” He gave her a soothing smile. ''Speaking of spectacles, I see you are still wearing your own.”

  She was ready for this one. “I'm afraid I don't see well enough to do my work without them.”

  “What a pity,” he murmured.

  She summoned up a businesslike smile. “So. Shall we begin? I need to hurry if you want the letters Fedexed tonight, so—”

  “How goes your fiery romance with our mysterious security consultant?”

  She pressed her trembling lips together. “I thought I made myself clear last night. I have nothing to say about—”

  “Oh, come now. Last night you told me you never wanted to see him again. He must have made a very strong impression indeed.”

  “I am not interested in discussing Seth Mackey. Now or ever.”

  “He is using you, too, you know,” Victor said. “Or if he is not, he soon will be, the world being what it is. Does he deserve such stoic loyalty from you just because he is capable of giving you an orgasm?”

  He was doing it again; twisting the world around himself like a black hole with his low, insinuating voice. Making her doubt herself. “What you ask is inappropriate,” she said. “This whole conversation is inappropriate.”

  Victor's laugh was beautiful, rich and full. It made her tight, nervous voice sounded ineffectual and prissy. It made her feel dull and humorless. A fool for not agreeing with everything he said.

  He pointed at the photos. “Look here, my dear.” The faint Russian flavor in his voice intensified into a perceptible accent. “See this? My mother. And this boy here, my little brother, Peter. Nearly forty years ago I ran away from the Soviets. I worked and schemed, made money for the bribes and the papers to bring my mother and brother here. I built this business for them. To do this I made many compromises. I did many, many inappropriate things. One must, because the world is not perfect. One becomes accustomed to it—if one wishes to be a player. And you do wish to be a player, no?”

  She gulped. “On my own terms.”

  Victor shook his head. “You are not yet in any position to dictate terms, little girl. The first step toward power is to accept reality. Look the truth in the face and you will see your way more clearly.”

  She clenched something deep inside herself and resisted the pull of his charisma. “What on earth are you talking about, Mr. Lazar?”

  Her voice was clear and sharp. It broke his spell.

  He blinked, and an appreciative smile flashed across his face. “Ah. The voice of truth. I talk too much, do I not?”

  She wasn't touching that one. Not with a ten-foot pole. She kept her mouth shut and concentrated on inhabiting her world, not his.

  He chuckled and placed the picture back on the credenza. “No one has had the nerve to tell me that in years. How refreshing.”

  “Mr. Lazar... the letters?” she reminded him. “The ferry will be here soon, and I—”

  “You are welcome to stay here tonight, if you wish.”

  Her skin crawled at me thought of a whole night at Stone Island with no one but Victor for company. “I wouldn't, ah, want to put your staff to any extra trouble.”

  He shrugged. “My staff exists to be troubled.”

  Your world, not his, she repeated to herself, with a deep, calming breath. “I would prefer to go home tonight”

  He nodded. “Good night, then.”

  She was bewildered. “And the dictation?”

  He gave her a charming smile. “Another day.”

  The man at the marina flashed through her mind. “Oh, yes. Mr. Lazar, I met a man this morning who gave me a message for you.”

  His smile hardened. “Yes?”

  “He was a well-dressed blond man in his thirties. He wouldn't tell me his name. He was missing a forefinger on his right hand.”

  “I know who he was,” Victor said curtly. “The message?”

  “He said to tell you that the opening bid had doubled.”

  The humor and charm that animated Victor's face was gone. Beneath it was cold, hard steel. “Nothing more?”

  She shook her head. “Who was he?” she asked tentatively.

  “The less you know, the healthier you will be.” In the fading light, he looked suddenly older. “Do not encourage this man, Raine. Avoid him in every way possible if you should see him again.”

  “You don't have to tell me,” she said fervently. “Ah. You have good instincts, then.” He patted her shoulder. “Trust them. With trust,
they grow stronger.” He picked up the frog glasses, turning them over in his hands. “Another thing. Take these.”

  “Oh, no, please.” She backed away, alarmed. “They're a memento of your niece. I couldn't possibly—”

  He pushed the glasses into her hand, closing her fingers around them. “You would be doing me a service. Life marches on, there is no stopping it. It is very important to be willing to let go of the past, no?”

  “Ah... yes, I suppose so,” she whispered. She stared down at the glasses, afraid that the strange panic would seize her again.

  They lay quiet in her hand. Cool, inanimate plastic.

  “Good night, Raine.”

  It was a clear dismissal. She hurried out of the room. God forbid that the boat leave her here, stranded on an island full of ghosts.

  She thought about Victor's cryptic words on the ferry, with icy wind whipping through her hair. Let go of the past. Hah. Her hand dug into her pocket and closed around the frog glasses. As if she hadn't tried. As if it were that easy. Her life got more complicated by the day. Now she had the mysterious blond man to watch out for, as well as Victor.

  And then there was Seth Mackey. Her knees buckled, and she grabbed the railing. She shouldn't get involved with Seth. He was a wild card, strong and restless and arrogant. He could derail her. But he countered the sad, lonely chill Stone Island had given her. He was a roaring furnace of life-giving heat She craved it, even if it burned her.

  Her heart hurt when she thought of the halting, bare- bones story he had told her of his mother's death. She ached for the pain he'd tried so awkwardly to gloss over. It made her furious. She wanted to punish anyone who had ever hurt or neglected him, to protect the innocent little boy he had once been. Tears sprang into her eyes. She thought of Victor's long-ago words at the dock.

  Toughen up, Katya. The world is not kind to crybabies.

  All her life she had tried to follow Victor's hard advice. She was finally realizing the truth. The world was not just unkind to crybabies. The world was unkind to everybody.

  She blinked as the wind blew the tears out of the corners of her eyes, mourning for all that foolish, wasted effort at self-control. The lights on the shore melted and swam into a soft wash of color. So did something inside her chest that had been brittle and frosted for years. She let it melt, with a dawning sense of wonder. More tears slipped out, and she let them fall. She might as well cry. It didn't necessarily mean that she was weak. It meant that her heart wasn't dead.

  And that was good news.

  He was going to kill them. Both of them. Then he was going to kick his own ass, hard, for having been stupid enough to collaborate with such dickheads as the McCloud brothers.

  Connor stopped limping up and down the room, and flopped into a chair with a disgusted sigh. “Get over it, Mackey. She's the best bait we're ever going to find. You saw the tape. You heard them talk. He wants her. We could wrap this up quicker than we thought if—”

  “She froze him out He may never approach her again.”

  Davy McCloud grunted and crossed his long legs. “Nah. Not Novak. Now he probably wants to teach her a lesson.”

  Seth’s stomach rolled. “That's why she's leaving town. First plane to anywhere out of SeaTac tonight.”

  The two brothers exchanged long, knowing looks. “Oh yeah?” Davy asked. “Gonna tell her everything?”

  Seth spun around in the chair, and rubbed his reddened eyes. His mind swam with grisly images of what that man had done to Jesse before he killed him. He couldn't stop the images, couldn't block them. Couldn't let Novak get his hands on Raine. Couldn't.

  “Look at it this way,” Connor said, in the voice of one trying to reason with a lunatic. “She's bait whether we use her or not. Now you have a God-given excuse for sticking to that chick like glue. It's all you ever wanted to do, so get into it, already. Enjoy it.”

  “No. I want her out,” Seth repeated. “It’s too dangerous.”

  Connor shook his head. “You can't pull her out of this without ripping out all the stitches, Seth,” he said gently. “Don't fall apart on me. I need your techno magic to pull this off.”

  “Do not condescend to me, McCloud,” he snarled.

  Connor just stared at him, his pale gaze calm and unnerving.

  He hated admitting he was wrong. It made his jaw hurt. He closed his eyes and tried to organize his thoughts. “I have to be right on top of her. Guarding her” he conceded grimly. “Not just tailing.”

  The two brothers exchanged long, silent looks, and Seth turned away. It reminded him too much of Jesse. Not that there had ever been much silence when Jesse was around. Jesse had never shut up.

  God, he was so angry. At the McCloud brothers for still having each other when his brother was dead. At Jesse for getting himself killed like an idiot. At Raine, for getting herself mixed up in this fucking snakepit when she obviously didn't know enough to come in out of the rain.

  What maddened him most of all was the image of Jesse in the back of his mind, doubled over laughing. One would think that the ungrateful little jerk would appreciate his big brother's efforts to avenge him. But no. In death, as in life, Jesse just had to be original.

  He opened up one of the black plastic cases full of Kearn's gizmos. He grabbed a cell phone, pried it open, and started messing with it. “What are you doing?” Davy asked

  He sifted through the transmitters in the case. “Putting together a present for my new girlfriend,” he said. “A cell phone with a Colbit beacon in it. I'll dust the rest of her stuff, too. I want to know where she is at all times, when I'm not with her. Which won't be often.”

  Davy looked thoughtful. “Novak's less likely to make a move if you're always lurking around.”

  “Tough shit” he snarled. “Whenever I'm not with her, one of you guys will be watching. Armed and ready to kick ass. Is that clear? Now get out. I can't concentrate with you guys breathing down my neck.”

  Davy nodded in farewell and slouched his tall body out the short door frame. Connor started to follow, but he turned back, his eyes full of reluctant sympathy. “Look at it this way. The sooner we wrap this thing up, the sooner you can settle down and have ten kids with her.”

  “Fuck off, McCloud.” The words popped out, an automatic reflex.

  For the first time, he wondered why he reacted like that.

  Connor nodded as if Seth had said good-bye, or later, dude, or have a nice night. “Take it easy,” he said. “Keep in touch.”

  Seth turned back to his preparations, but the image Connor had put in his head quivered like a freshly shot arrow in a wooden post.

  He had never contemplated fathering a child. He was a textbook example of a guy who would make a rotten father. He was rude and crude and arrogant, he had a mean streak ten miles long, his moral development was questionable, to put it mildly, and he lacked basic social skills. Other than crusty, irascible old man Hank, he had no models for fatherhood Except for Mitch, of course. That said it all.

  As for the things he was good at, well, the list was short and telling. Spying. Stealing. Fighting. Sex. Kicking ass. Making money.

  Not the best skills for a babbling baby to learn at its daddy's knee.

  He'd grown up fully aware that his life bore no resemblance to what he saw on TV sitcoms and commercials for life insurance and breakfast cereal. Cynical little bastard that he was, it hadn't taken long for him to start suspecting that TV's perfect normal world didn't really exist anyway. He was comfortable with his own dark, gothic underworld. He knew its rules, its pitfalls. He didn't pine after fairy tales of marriage and family and cozy domestic bliss.

  Oh, he kept it together, more or less. He was registered to vote, he had served his country in the armed forces, he paid his taxes, they had his picture down at the DMV But his public persona was a means to an end. Hank and Jesse had been his points of reference, ambassadors to the world of normal. Without them, he was lost in space. So far off the grid, he didn't even appear on the screen.


  He'd gotten so good at shoving thoughts and feelings away. Now look at him. Fantasizing about Raine, pregnant. Holding his baby in her arms. The feelings that image provoked were so strong, they terrified him. Fear, for how unspeakably vulnerable that would make him. Anger, because anger always followed on the heels of fear. Anger of the ugly, gut-wrenching, teeth-gnashing variety.

  Anger and fear were a hell of a recipe for fatherhood Better if he stuck to kicking ass and making money. He'd inflict less damage on the world that way. He forced himself to concentrate. What was he doing? Gathering the hardware to take to Templeton Street. Right Revenge and ruin. Now there was something he could wrap his mind around. There he was on solid ground. Stick to what you know, the experts said. He threw his bag into the Chevy and drove through the streets, trying not to think about Raine or Jesse.

  He needed to think about ruin and revenge. Cold, careful and methodical. Novak wanted Raine. Seth wanted Novak. The formula was simple. She was bait Once he'd killed Novak, he would be free to take out Lazar, and that would be the end of the matter, unless some tight-ass tried to prosecute him for it. In which case he would fade discreetly out of sight and live the rest of what would pass for his life outside the bounds of respectable society. The prospect held few terrors for him. He'd spent half of his life there anyway. The rules weren't all that different. He had several alternate identities already set up and waiting for him: passports, credit histories, the lot. He had money socked away in out of the way places, and when it ran out, no problem. There was plenty of lucrative work in the underworld for a man of his skills.

  But he couldn't take a woman with him there. At least not a certain type of woman. Keeping a woman was definitely an on-the-grid proposition. Women liked family reunions, Christmas cards. Babies.

  It occurred to him that he hadn't been such a terrible brother to Jesse. Maybe he wasn't the type to remember birthdays, but he'd always been there when the chips were down, ready to kick ass.

  God. What was he thinking? A guy didn't qualify for domestic bliss because he could kick ass. Any thug on the street could kick ass.