by Tara Janzen
“Ten times?”
“Ten,” she confirmed.
And the wizard was still a bargain.
Con nodded, glad to have the information and highly doubting that Daniel Killian was Warner’s mule. Nobody who’d bled for the flag would roll over and hustle contraband for the likes of Erich Warner, not for something as New Age hocuspocus as a magic statue. Those SF boys were grounded in the real world with a vengeance.
No, Con’s money said somebody else had sent the former Special Forces operator.
“So the DIA wants their statue back,” he said, giving in to a slight grin. They definitely would have sent somebody when they’d picked up the chatter on Beranger’s auction, and they would have definitely picked up the chatter. Hell, everybody else had, and Killian was just the kind of guy they liked-skilled and connected to the community. Nobody would have suspected someone of the spy-master’s standing and privilege of having stolen the thing. Certainly no one had yet figured out that the spymaster had been underhandedly dealing them all a stacked and marked deck for years, and in the process lining his pockets with boatloads of money and the kind of power that shook Third World countries like a paint mixer.
“Sure looks that way.” Scout knew as much about the Memphis Sphinx as he did. He’d made sure of it. She knew where it had come from, and she’d know what kind of guy the Defense Intelligence Agency would send to get it back.
Former Special Forces was perfect for the job, less easily held accountable than an active-duty soldier. The deal would be a private contract, and Con doubted if the other two gringos at the Posada were on his team. They didn’t fit the profile.
“Killian’s got good intel,” he added. “The kind of information the DIA would have. He certainly showed up at Beranger’s right on cue. If he becomes a problem, let’s do our best not to kill him.” Garrett had been SF, and there were other ways to get people out of the picture, at least for a while. “He gets a pass on this job.”
“Roger that,” Scout said.
DIA, CIA, Con didn’t give a damn who wanted what. He’d killed every assassin the spymaster had thrown at him, no matter what agency he’d culled for his hit men, and he wasn’t planning on changing his standard operating procedure anytime soon. But Killian appeared to be a different story. He was a soldier, and for his own sake, he needed to fail in his mission.
Whereas Ms. Suzanna Toussi, he’d concluded, needed to succeed, brilliantly. She needed to find the Sphinx, get her hands on it, and report back to Erich Warner, telling him exactly where it was being kept, and extend an open invitation for him to come and get it.
Con, for one, was only too glad to help her, though he doubted if she would much like his methods.
“Did Jo-Jo get a line on the woman yet?” he asked.
“No.” Scout shook her head. “But she hasn’t been listed on any flights out of here, so she’s lying low somewhere.”
“Unless she headed out on the roads.”
“Maybe,” Scout said. “But that’s the long shot, Con. Traffic on the bridge is backed up halfway to Asunción, and heading into the interior isn’t her best bet for escaping the Paraguayans. And most of all, if she’s working for Warner, she’s still got twenty hours to pull this thing off, and if she’s working for Warner, she knows better than to fail.”
Con agreed. He’d be doing the woman a favor by bringing her to Costa del Rey and putting her under house arrest, whether she appreciated the fact or not-but he needed to get her first.
He stuck the cigar between his teeth and stretched his arm all the way out, then stretched his fingers. There was no pain. Good.
He pushed off the stone wall and handed the statue to Scout.
“I’m going to go get Ms. Toussi.” If she hadn’t flown the coop, then his money said she was going to end up at the Posada Plaza sometime tonight. If not, Daniel Killian was a good place to start looking for her. She sure as hell wasn’t going to go back to the Gran Chaco.
Scout nodded, holding the gold and granite sphinx close to her chest. She was worried, he could tell, but there wasn’t a damn thing she could do to save him-tonight or any other night.
“I should go with you,” she said.
“No. I might need to cover a lot of ground. Relay any information Jo-Jo comes up with. I’m heading back to the Posada Plaza.”
“What you need is somebody to watch your back.” She stood her ground. “You’re not alone out there, and you know it.”
Yeah, they both knew it. Two guys had been on his ass for months, staying out of sight, just on the edge of his radar, moving through the shadows, moving like he moved, following him, but keeping their distance. He didn’t know who in the hell they were, but he knew they were here, in Ciudad del Este. He could almost smell them.
They hadn’t been at Beranger’s, though. They didn’t give a damn about the Memphis Sphinx. They were in Paraguay for one reason-to kill him, like the others before-and like the others, they didn’t have a clue what they were up against.
And like the others, he’d bury them in this damn country.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
Ciudad del Este
Oh, God. Suzi hurt everywhere.
She followed Dax up the stairs to his room in the Posada, dragging her feet, every muscle in her body aching. Three hours of moving junk around in the gallery had taken its toll. She was tired, hungry, wet, and far from done for the night.
Hell, five frickin’ flights, and then she had to ditch him. It wasn’t going to be easy. The boy was in full-out rescue-the-woman mode. Under any other circumstances, she’d be charmed senseless, but she had only one card left in her deck of tricks, and she would need to be on her game and alone to play it-the Levi Asher card. Levi was the only piece of live bait left in this town, if he even was still in this town.
It wouldn’t take her long to find out, no more than a couple of phone calls.
Oh, yes, she had her Plan B all mapped out, the sexual pervert plan. The thought alone was enough to exhaust her.
At the fifth landing, they stumbled onto the Posada Plaza’s welcoming committee, the Latino transvestite tag team of Marcella and Marceline, which was about the only thing to go her way all day. The two elevator specialists played right into her one-card hand, and there they were, coming down the hall, front and center, dressed to kill in buckles, snaps, and bustiers, fake white lace and tight black polyester, flowered scarves and stiletto heels.
Beautiful.
“Hola, chico,” one of the “girls” called out to Dax.
“Marceline,” he said with a short nod.
“Chica, cariño… “ the other “girl,” Marcella, crooned, her warm amber-colored eyes rimmed in thick black eyeliner and sweeping over Suzi from her head to her toes.
“Hola,” she said, a little uncertain, then turned to Dax. “What did she say? I didn’t get that last word.”
“Hey, darling,” he translated.
“Cómo estás, chiquita?” Marceline added.
Suzi gave Dax a little poke in the side.
“How you doing, baby?” he said, reaching back and taking her hand, keeping them moving forward.
“Can you tell her I’m fine?”
“Liar,” he said, tightening his hold on her as they passed the Latinos in the hall.
“Bueno,” she said, looking back over her shoulder. Good. She was doing good.
Marcella shook her head, tsk-tsking, then rattled off a few comments.
“He’s calling you a liar, too,” Dax said, “and he wants you to know that you can tell him everything. He’s your new best friend.”
“I could use a friend,” Suzi said, barely keeping up with him, stride for stride.
“Not that one, babe. Marcella would just as soon sell you as hold your hand.”
Actually, Marcella was exactly the friend she needed, once she ditched Dax, and yes, she had a plan. She was a girl, she needed things, and he was a guy, he’d go get them. She wasn’t going to be an idiot about it, but
it was simple, and simple plans usually worked.
The two “girls” had turned to follow them and were catching back up. In a couple of steps, Marceline slid in next to Suzi and started making conversation, smiling and obviously asking questions, her heavily made-up eyes alight, her head cocked slightly to one side, her tone deeply inquiring-and, well, just deep all around.
“What should I say to her, help me out here,” she said, giving Dax’s hand a squeeze.
“He,” he used the gender pointedly, “wants to know what… uh, happened to you. Why you look so…disheveled, when you left here looking like a princess on a, uh, cake, or something to that effect.”
“Princess?” Suzi said.
“On a cake,” he repeated. “And he thinks I’m a real jerk for letting you get in this condition. Cálmate, Marceline.”
He tightened his grip on her hand when they stopped at his door, and with his other hand, he dug in his pocket for the key.
“Gringo?” Marcella said.
“Sí?” He jimmied the key into the lock and got the door open without bothering to look up.
Before Suzi stepped inside, the “girl” rattled something off in Spanish and blew her a kiss-and oh, my God, just like that she racked up another new low, getting hit on by a guy in a miniskirt wearing eyeliner.
Dax closed the room door behind them, then locked it, bolted it, and used the worthless chain, and throughout the whole security procedure, such as it was, he held on to her hand.
More telling, she held on to his-and at this point in the day, that was about all the encouragement he needed, for all the good it was going to do him right now.
“I don’t suppose you’ve got something to drink?” she asked.
“Sodas? Water?” He had a few things.
“Gin martini?”
He grinned. “Kentucky gold.”
He let go of her hand and walked over to the small duffel bag he’d set on the bedside table. Behind him, he heard her cross the room and open the balcony doors. When he found his flask, he unscrewed the top and walked over to where she was standing, looking out onto the street.
He handed her the flask, and she took a small sip, holding it in her mouth for a moment before swallowing.
“Bourbon,” she said.
Whiskey, neat.
He took a bigger swallow when she handed it back, and then he gave her the flask-and my, wasn’t this cozy, just the two of them, having a drink. He had a plan, and in a minute or two, he was going to put it in motion.
But for a minute or two, he was just going to enjoy the view.
“What did Marcella say?” the view asked. “There at the last, when she was running on?”
He could have made up half a dozen things, but went ahead and told her the truth.
“First, Marcella is a ‘he,’ not a ‘she,’ and he goes both ways, and if there were three ways to go, he’d go that way, too, for a price, and he said you have the most perfect ass he’s ever seen.”
Dax tended to agree, but he didn’t think this was the time or the place for his opinion on the subject, not when she was close enough for him to see the amber highlights in her eyes, the sheen of dampness on her skin-and something he shouldn’t have missed.
His brow furrowed.
“When did this happen?” he asked, turning her face into the light. She’d been scratched, high up on her cheek, almost into her hairline.
He carefully smoothed the auburn strands of her hair away from her face.
“When we came out of that window at Beranger’s.”
“Hell,” he muttered, sliding his thumb across her cheek, just below the injury. “I thought I was more careful with you than that.”
“It’s just a… uh, scratch,” she said, her voice breaking just a little, and yeah, he understood. They were alone, and safe, and suddenly close enough to make something happen, and he was touching her.
Sex.
That’s what he was thinking could happen.
“I’ve got some antibiotic cream in my pack.” Geezus, she was beautiful. It just wrecked him, the way she looked.
“I already put some on, at the hotel.”
Sex.
Just sex.
“Good,” he said, nodding his head like a little antibiotic cream on a scratch was rocket science.
Just soft mouths and soft…
“I had a tube in my suitcase-ah, hell.”
Yeah, her luggage. He’d kind of forgotten about that. Actually, he was having a little trouble remembering a lot of things, like his plan, the one where he walked out of here and left her all by her lonesome in this room while he scooted back to Beranger’s to get sopping wet in one of those basement cisterns.
That plan was losing its appeal faster than a lightning strike.
“I think I can get your stuff back-your suitcase, your shoes, everything you left at the Gran Chaco.” It was a long shot, but not impossible. “I know some guys… some guys who can…uh…”
The thought ran out, because she was looking up at him, her gaze softening into a languid, mesmerizing stare.
“Thank goodness,” she said, her voice sweetly sincere. “Dax?”
“Yes?” When she sounded like that, the answer was bound to be yes.
“I’m hungry, and really tired. Could you go get us something to eat?”
And there was his plan, the solution, his exit strategy, all laid out for him-except he wasn’t all that interested in going now.
Hold on, boy-his brain kicked in-let reason be your guide.
He was all for reason. Right.
“There’s a restaurant down the street,” he said. “A churrascaria, a lot of grilled meat, some different kinds of bread, fruit. I could head down there.”
He started to turn away, but she stopped him with her hand on his waist.
“Thanks.”
That’s all she said, just “Thanks,” but that’s all he’d needed, just one more moment of hesitation.
Hell.
He was such a fool. He knew it, dammit, but he went ahead and did it anyway, slid his hand around the back of her neck and lowered his mouth to hers.
Big mistake-he was so instantly lost in the warm, lovely taste of her mouth, the mindless pleasure of her kiss, so sweet, so hot, so softly, erotically female.
She melted up against him, her body yielding in all the right places, and it was such a turn-on-but at some point, she was going to realize he’d cut her out of the deal, and if she’d already gone to bed with him when she discovered his betrayal, she was going to think he was the world’s biggest bastard, or even worse-and she’d be right. She’d feel used, and he’d feel like hell, and it would be damn hard work to come back from a dirty trick like that and maybe make a go of it, make some kind of relationship-the kind that had a chance at lasting.
Lasting relationship? Now there were two words that didn’t go together in his vocabulary very often-let alone in his life.
Okay, this kiss wasn’t nearly mindless enough. He was thinking, a lot, and even with this exquisitely hot and beautiful woman in his arms, he was thinking he needed to get the hell out of the room, before he did something he was going to love and she sure as hell was going to hold against him.
Damn. Talk about bad timing for an attack of conscience.
But then she opened her mouth wider, pressed herself closer, and his conscience did a nosedive. He slid his hand down over the curve of her perfect ass and pulled her in close, where he could feel her up against him, cradling him, and he deepened the kiss.
Oh, yes, he was going to go straight to hell for this and love every minute.
Unless he stopped.
And did the right thing.
“Suzi,” he whispered, pulling back from the kiss just enough to get his brain working again, and he immediately wished he hadn’t.
She stiffened in his embrace, then turned her back to him and leaned up against the balcony door.
“I’ll just go… get us something to eat.” And with t
hose few words, he won the Lame-Ass Idiot of the Year award, hands down, no competition in sight. “I won’t be gone very long,” he promised, but he figured she pretty much didn’t give a damn how long he was gone. Like maybe forever might be too soon for him to come back with a plate of barbecued meat and some nameless piece of fruit.
Well, perfect. Turning women down was not exactly his forte, so no wonder he’d blown it. Geezus.
He went and got a couple of tools out of his duffel bag and slipped them into the cargo pocket on his pants. He had some connections, still knew a few guys who could pull all kinds of strings, even as far south as Paraguay, and when he had the statue secured, if it was even in that damn crate hidden inside the cistern, and got back with the food, he was going to do his damnedest to get her out of Ciudad del Este-tonight, before sunrise and another day of disasters. For the kinds of guys he knew, it wouldn’t matter that the police were looking for her. Evading all and every law enforcement entity on the planet was their modus operandi-and they were the good guys.
But first, he had to get back to the gallery, before the damn basement flooded again.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
Suzi stood just inside the door to the balcony and watched as Dax crossed the street below. Once he disappeared into the crowd, she took the phone General Grant had given her out of her fanny pack and headed across the room, toward the door to the hall.
Within a minute, she had her assistant on the phone.
“Jane?” she said. “It’s Suzi.”
Jane Linden had been with her, on and off, for almost five years, working at different galleries Suzi had either owned or managed.
“Hey, Suz,” Jane answered. “What’s up? Where are you?”
“In a room with a view,” she said, being deliberately obscure, and with an answer like that, Jane knew not to pry. “I need a cell phone number for Levi Asher. Can you look in the dealer files on your computer?”
It wasn’t really a question. Between Suzi and Katya Hawkins, they’d nearly created the girl, taking her from being a half-wild street urchin with a few years of reform school on her résumé, to a sophisticated art aficionada with superlative job skills and exquisite taste. Between the two of them, she and Katya had given quite a few girls a second chance, including a couple of the Eastern European women.
