The creek formed a clear little pool beneath the stone arch of the bridge. The water’s calm, glassine surface wrinkled with each wind gust. Golden fingers of sunlight poked through the leafless canopy of trees surrounding them. From the bridge she could look straight down and glimpse the silvery flash-and-dart of minnows.
He joined her on the bridge, pointedly ignoring the view. His cool, smoky stare riveted to her.
Why, his face is sweaty, she noted. But it was quite brisk weather up here, practically no humidity. She felt chilly even with her wool blazer, while he had no topcoat at all.
She pointed toward some mossy boulders half-submerged at the water’s edge. “Those always put me in mind of green-upholstered stools. Aren’t they fascinating?”
His stony silence implied he couldn’t care less. Constance noticed how his shadow seemed long and sinister in the waning light. She’d left her sunglasses in the Jeep, and when she looked up at him she was forced to lift a hand to shade her eyes from the low sun.
“Miss Adams,” he began, laboring to speak, “I confess I don’t give a tinker’s damn about those rocks. Now…are you going to unlock that cabin or not?”
Or not? His pointed emphasis on those last two words altered her mood. Suddenly she was fully aware of his intimidating physical advantage over her. She wondered, for just a moment, what might happen if she said not. But she decided she didn’t want to find out.
“Of course.” She gave in, stepping around him and walking down off the bridge. “But to be frank, Mr. Henning, I can’t imagine you being very…at home up here. As you can see, this is a nature lover’s hideaway. The place isn’t even wired for electricity.”
“I’ll use a portable generator,” he replied curtly. “It’s just for vacations, anyway.”
By now her dislike for this rude, intimidating man made Constance desirous of discouraging him. Like Hazel, she wasn’t simply interested in selling the cabin—she wanted to match it up with someone who appreciated its rustic charms. This creep would be bored by the Grand Canyon.
She unlocked the heavy padlock, slid it from the hasp, and swung the front door wide open, flooding the dark, musty interior with light.
“Pretty basic,” she told him, which was certainly true. The unfurnished cabin was partitioned into two rooms, with a sleeping loft over the largest.
Only a few braided rugs covered the floorboards.
“I need a little more light,” he told her, crossing to one of the shuttered windows. He slid it up, slid back the bolt lock on the heavy batten shutters, and swung them wide.
She only wanted to be rid of this man. She stayed back in the doorway, saying nothing to further a sale.
He glanced around indifferently.
“Well,” he said after a few moments, adding nothing else. She noticed that his eye coloring was variable according to the light—the smoky tint she noticed outside seemed almost like a teal blue in here. He really was extraordinarily good-looking, if one could see past that sneer of cold command. And that ashen complexion…it seemed curiously unhealthy in light of his robust build.
“Thank you,” he told her with another cursory dismissal. “I’ll give it some thought and call you.”
Despite her desire to be rid of him, Constance could hardly believe her ears. The man had been downright desperate to see the place. But now, clearly, his tone was cold—he had no intention whatsoever of calling her, she could tell.
“Fine, Mr. Henning,” she replied with a bare minimum of civility. Never mind her wasted time; at least she’d be rid of him. “Now I really must get back to Mystery.”
“Let me close the shutter and window,” he offered quickly as she started toward them. She could have sworn his limp seemed more pronounced when he crossed to the window. For the first time, she noticed the small tear in his trousers on the back of the left thigh. A dark stain ringed it. The tear and the stain was at odds with the man’s impeccable attire, and she wondered if it had anything to do with the fact that he was in a hurry.
“You forgot to bolt the shutter,” she pointed out as he turned to join her.
“No, it’s fine,” he assured her, his tone brooking no debate on the matter.
She was on the verge of pointing out that it clearly was not locked—she could see a seam of daylight where the shutters failed to join tightly.
Then she spotted it on the bare wooden floor, brightly illuminated in the sunlight flooding through the front door: a glistening scarlet drop that could only be fresh blood.
For a long moment she paused, on the edge of her next breath, cold dread filling her limbs as if they were buckets under a tap. She glanced around and spotted another drop, another—several of them, all marking places where he had walked.
A terrible sense of foreboding gripped her. She had to grab hold of the door to steady herself. Henning, meantime, had stepped outside, waiting for her to lock up.
“Mr. Henning?” she said without turning around.
“Yes?”
“Are you…I mean—Mr. Henning, are you…bleeding?”
The moment she asked, some instinct warned her she should have pretended not to notice. His next comment verified her instinct.
“I’m sorry you had to notice that, Miss Adams. I truly wish to God you hadn’t.”
Fighting a sudden, watery weakness in her calves, she turned toward the yard to confront him. And encountered the single, unblinking eye of the gun in his hand.
Chapter 3
The moment she spotted the gun, Constance felt her heart surge. For a few seconds, an exploding pulse made angry-surf noises in her ears.
He wasn’t actually pointing it at her, but he certainly hadn’t pulled it out for show-and-tell, either.
“I’m sorry, Miss Adams,” he repeated. “You’re too observant for your own good. It would’ve been much…simpler if you hadn’t noticed those bloodstains.”
Maybe it was the influence of too many movies, but the possible significance of his words made her go numb with fright.
That same fear must have addled her reason, she decided, judging from her next comment—which surprised her at least as much as it seemed to surprise him.
“You deceitful bastard!” She spat the words at him with a contempt unmitigated by her fear.
Bastard…the word had a B-movie feel in her mouth, yet it came out automatically from the depths of her anger and indignation. If she had been burned by a dishonest fiancé, this was infinitely worse. So far as she knew, Doug had never sunk to the level of holding a gun on someone.
However, even more surprising than her comment was his reaction to it.
The impact on him was visible and startling. Something desperate and frightened flashed in those variable eyes of his. Not anger, precisely, but somehow she had touched a very raw nerve.
“No,” he told her. “No. It’s…”
His voice trailed off, and he waved his free hand in a dismissive oh-what’s-the-use gesture. “It’s not what you think,” he finished, offering no more.
“Mr. Henning, please, I don’t—”
“It’s Quinn Loudon, not George Henning.”
“Well who ever you are, I don’t understand. You say it’s not what I think it is. I assure you, I don’t know what to think.”
He still stood outside in the newly gathering darkness. Instead of answering her, Loudon cast a nervous glance back toward the road. The temperature was going down with the sun, and she saw him shiver in his business suit.
“Come with me,” he told her.
Alarm made her pulse race. “Where…where are we going?”
“Look, just get a grip, would you? We’re not going anywhere. I’m not a rapist or a killer, and believe me, I don’t want you here any more than you want to be here. Right now I just want to hide the cars behind the cabin, and I want you in my sight while I do it, all right? Do you think both vehicles will fit back there?”
“I really couldn’t tell you,” she said cautiously. “Hiding cars from
the law isn’t my specialty.”
“Who said I’m hiding anything from the law? Maybe I am the law.”
She looked at the gun in his hand. “No you’re not. You’re just a criminal swaggering around like a big man, frightening unarmed women. What’s next, a raid on a daycare center?”
Now anger did indeed spark in those compelling eyes of his. But he slipped the gun back into its holster under his jacket.
When she still refused to move outside, he seized her under one elbow and tugged her out into the yard. His grip felt strong as a steel trap and intimidated her into passivity. He could do plenty of damage without a gun, she had to admit to herself with a chill inching down her spine.
“Get in,” he ordered her, opening the passenger door of the Jeep.
The moment she did, she remembered the keys were in the ignition. By the time he’d limped around to the driver’s door, she had managed to lock both doors and scoot behind the steering wheel.
She keyed the ignition and the engine coughed to life. She ground the gearshift into reverse just a moment before he smashed out the driver’s window with the butt of his gun.
She went nowhere. The parking brake held. His hand like a warm vise pressed into her throat.
“Don’t test me,” he growled in a low, rough voice. “I’m a very desperate man, Miss Adams.”
Only one question looped through her mind: Would he really hurt her?
One part of her didn’t think so—some things about him just didn’t seem to tally up as criminal—a violent criminal, at any rate. His speech, for one thing, and his appearance.
Then again, she recalled bitterly, he wouldn’t be the first callow man who fooled the decent with good tailoring. Doug, too, had been a natty dresser with impeccable manners. And face it, she admonished herself. He’d played her like a piano.
Closing her eyes, she surrendered the need to fight. The crime playing out now wasn’t about credit cards and sweet lies of love. She knew nothing about the man before her. The only thing she did know was that he was at least giving her a warning—something Doug had never done. If she was a fool and underrated the man’s evil capacity, she could end up dead. So she had to take heed. She had to.
He leaned one meaty shoulder through the window and took the car keys. She moved over into the passenger’s seat as if he burned her.
Noticeably favoring his hurt left leg, he climbed in and drove the Jeep around back. He parked as close to the cabin as he could.
“Should be just enough room for my car,” he muttered, thinking out loud, his face lean and pale.
“You’re not really an investment advisor, are you?” she asked as he pushed her in front of him as they went around the cabin for his car.
He shook his head. “I’m a lawyer. I’m with the U.S. Attorney’s Office out of Billings. Or at least I was,” he added in a bitter afterthought.
A great cover, she told herself, for a criminal to pose as the law.
On the other hand, she did note he had the serious lawyerly type down pat.
Except for the hole in his leg.
They got into the Lexus and moved it to the rear of the cabin. In the ensuing silence, she finally asked the question she feared she already knew the answer to. “So what’s wrong…what happened to you?”
“I was shot,” he told her bluntly. “About three, four hours ago. At the courthouse in Kalispell.”
She ratcheted up her courage a few more notches and asked, “By whom?”
“I couldn’t tell you the gentleman’s name. He was one of these rude assholes who shoot you without introducing themselves.”
She said nothing. There was no point in tossing back a retort, such as maybe he was shot because he was doing something he shouldn’t have. By the tight expression on his face, she wasn’t going to get any more information out of him. For right now at least.
When he did finally say something, mostly to end the painful silence between them, he was still evasive.
“I understand how all this must appear to you, but the process of observation defines only one reality. Others you haven’t observed are just as real.”
“Well, you certainly can talk like a lawyer.” Or his guilty client, she thought pointedly.
He surprised her by smiling, although there was no mirth or playfulness in it. “I suppose I do. But I don’t put the noose before the gavel.”
He pushed her inside the cabin.
“With those shutters closed it’s getting dark in here,” he observed. “Any lanterns or anything?”
“Candles, I think,” she responded reluctantly. “Try the cabinet near the sink.”
He limped over, rummaged in the cabinet, and produced several squat votive candles and a box of kitchen matches. He lit two of the candles, and set both of them on the floor. Then, emitting a weary sigh, he gingerly sat down between the candles and supported his back against the cabinet. She noticed he was shivering again.
She was still holding her purse. She thought about her cell phone, then remembered that someone in her family should be calling her soon to check on her. Her fear, momentarily forgotten while they moved the cars, now returned in full force. The man had shown all the tenderness of a wounded lion. He wouldn’t take kindly to any more tricks. Staring at his large form and tough, weary expression, she suddenly realized the truth of the “eighth house.” She should have never come up to the mountains and shown the cabin. It had proven disastrous.
“Do you have to pace like that?” he sniped.
“I’m sorry. The gun makes me nervous,” she confessed.
“I put it away.”
“Yes, but it’s right there, handy. Isn’t it?”
He ignored her, sleeving beads of sweat off his forehead. His wound was getting worse, she realized when she noticed his pain-clouded eyes. Despite her fear and anger, she felt a twinge of pity for him.
“Who shot you?” she repeated. “The police?”
He shook his head. “Not the same police you have in mind. It was federal marshals.”
She halted, shocked into immobility. Federal marshals…his crime or crimes must be serious.
He gave a snort at the look on her face. “If you can’t handle the answers, don’t ask the questions.”
“You needn’t worry about what I can handle.”
She started pacing again.
“Will you please sit the hell down?” he demanded. “I’m getting a crick in my neck watching you.”
“I’ll sit down,” she agreed, doing so. “Now will you please tell me what’s going on, Mr. Loudon?”
For some time he simply ignored her question. Finally he nodded. When he spoke, his voice showed the strain he’d been through lately.
“I’ll leave out the names and just cut to the chase. Basically, I was sent out here from Washington, D.C., to assist on a massive, ongoing investigation into kickback schemes involving the Montana Department of Highways. Or I guess I should say allegedly involving them.”
“I’ve heard the word all my life,” she confessed, “but I’m not exactly sure what a ‘kickback’ is.”
“It just means a slice of the pie. Cost overruns are a venerable part of construction profits. You know, the doubling or even tripling of a project’s estimated price after the work is underway. Most in government understand this and seldom bring indictments over it. But lately there’s been a corps of new, reform-minded attorneys in the Justice Department. We’re trying to change the business-as-usual graft.”
He hesitated, as if trying to gather his thoughts. The front door stood open, the wedge of sky it revealed turning purplish blue in twilight. A breeze wafted, making the candles gutter. For a moment Constance smelled the clean, nose-tickling tang of the evergreens on the lower slopes. It only made her more miserable to be his captive.
“One day last spring,” he resumed, “I had to go see a certain judge in Billings. It was a touchy matter—I had already, under federal guidelines for internal review, subpoenaed certain phone and
financial information on some attorneys he knew on a social basis. I’m allowed to do that, without notifying anyone, so long as no charges are filed.”
This time when he hesitated, on a sharp intake of hissing breath, she knew it was his wound.
“Anyway, I intended to ask the judge’s permission to execute a search warrant. I wanted agents to seize the private financial records of a certain state legislator, a guy I suspect is at the heart of the kickback scheme.”
A spasm of pain crossed his face, etching his handsome features even deeper in the candlelight.
“I never did talk to that judge. The county sheriff and I were on the verge of knocking on his office door when we saw the door was open a crack, and the judge was inside with a…ahh, let’s call him an attorney who represents certain road-construction bosses. This attorney was also one of the guys I had been investigating. Right before my ears and eyes—and the sheriff’s—he hands a briefcase stuffed with money to the judge.”
“A bribe?” she encouraged him to continue when he hesitated.
“The wise guys never use that word. It’s usually called a contribution, but damn straight it was a bribe. I knew it and the sheriff knew it. Schra—I mean, this judge regularly rules on cases involving the attorney’s clients.”
He paused, and she watched him touch a dry tongue to chapped lips. “Does that thing work?” he asked her, pointing to the hand pump bolted to the sideboard of the sink.
“I think so. It’s cistern water, but up here it’s safe to drink.”
She resisted the urge to help him when he struggled to his feet. He pumped the air out of the pipes, then waited for the rusty water to run clear. She watched him cup his hand and drink greedily.
“Anyway,” he said, picking up the thread of his story again as he joined her on the floor, “I made one very stupid mistake. I forgot all about the hallway security cameras that are standard equipment now in courthouse buildings. The tapes are routinely reviewed, at fast speed, and any unusual events are reported. So there the sheriff and I were, caught on film outside the judge’s door. And of course the date and time were recorded, too.”
The Lawman Meets His Bride Page 3
