by Wendy Byrne
“Done.” He hung up.
She waited a moment, since she knew he’d call back. The man continued to ignore her and gut his fish, which, except for the smell, worked out fine. She had more than enough to worry about. Besides the men chasing her, she had to wonder why she so easily enlisted Landry’s help without even thinking about it.
Her phone rang seconds later, interrupting her internal monologue. “Landry?”
“Got somebody on the way. Sit tight and I’ll pick you up. What’s the address?”
She crawled around on the floor until she spotted a card by the register and rattled off the address. “Thanks, Landry.” But he’d already hung up.
* * *
Landry immediately phoned Malone while fear held tight to his gut. “I thought your guys were following her. What’s going on?”
“That’s what we’d like to know. She got into the car of a known drug dealer and then led my officers on a crazy ride down the Dan Ryan Expressway.”
He shuddered. She took so many chances, her life expectancy had to be a couple of days rather than decades. “Right now she’s in hiding because some guys in suits are chasing her. Could they be yours?”
“Listen, Taylor, I’ll be honest with you. I think she’s clean, but you’ve got to admit hooking up with a bad guy and evading capture looks pretty bad.”
“Not if she thinks whoever’s chasing her are the bad guys. Since she doesn’t know she’s being monitored, shouldn’t she assume the worst?” Landry had to admit he had some questions of his own about the way the Feds went about doing their business.
“Point taken. Are you headed over there now?”
“Yes, and give us some space. I’ll take it from here on out.” Landry didn’t know how he’d do it, but somehow he had to convince Isabella to let him stick around before she got herself killed.
* * *
Isabella spotted the reflection of lights reverberating along the walls inside while the siren wailed loudly. But after a few minutes, the siren cut off unexpectedly.
Before she had a chance to panic, Landry barreled through the door. “Isabella?” He came around the counter and helped her up from the floor. “There’s a couple of guys in suits about a block down. I’ll swing around the alley and pick you up back there.” Without another word, he went back through the front door.
She glanced toward the fish man. “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome,” the man responded in perfect English.
She couldn’t help but smile as she moved toward the back of the store. After a minute or two, she opened the back door an inch or two.
With the dumpster next to the door she couldn’t get a full glimpse of who or what was coming. She had to trust Landry.
After a quick touch on the handkerchief for good luck, she dove for the alley just as Landry’s car squealed to a stop. She rushed inside and buckled her seat beat. A few seconds later, she settled back in the seat.
“Don’t relax yet. I saw a couple in a car down the block that looked pretty suspicious.” He tapped on the steering wheel. “What happened?”
“Before Sergio got a chance to tell me anything, they T-boned the car.”
“Did they kill him?”
“I don’t think so, but he was knocked out.” She slid down in the seat as far as she could as the car bounded out of the alley. “Which reminds me, call in and find out where they brought him.”
Landry called into the station while she fought with the emotion and adrenaline swirling around inside. When he hung up and looked at her, he had a weird look on his face.
“No body.” He said the two words like a death knell.
“What do you mean? They guy was passed out cold not even ten minutes ago. He had blood all over him.” A shiver wormed its way down her spine. This could not be happening. Unconscious people do not disappear.
“Maybe he came to and took off. That kind of thing happens all the time. The guy might have had some warrant or been an illegal.”
She glanced at him. He was definitely failing the BS meter.
“Yeah, right.”
He winced. “Seems pretty unlikely, doesn’t it?”
“Ya think?” Her heart rate hadn’t returned to normal, but at least it wasn’t doing that babooming thing inside her chest any longer. “Why do you think that black and white shut down their siren?”
He glanced in her direction and shrugged but didn’t comment.
“Somebody threw their weight around and got them to stop. No doubt after they removed the body from the accident scene.” A combination of curiosity and fear made her voice peter off at the end.
“What are you thinking?” He moved the car into traffic, resuming a normal speed.
“Barring Lieutenant Thomas himself calling off the black and whites and Sergio having a miraculous recovery, those guys chasing me had to be Feds.”
Chapter Thirteen
Landry parked the car along the curb in front of Lou Mitchell’s. Located in the west loop, the restaurant was a mainstay in Chicago and one of her favorites.
He got out and came around to open her door. “Come on, Isabella, you look like you could use a good meal.”
With the adrenaline from earlier slipping out of her body, she felt shaky and once again way too vulnerable. Landry put an arm about her shoulder and led her inside. She nestled inside the warmth of his body, enjoying the tiny respite for however long it would last.
The hostess sat them at a table away from the window at Landry’s request. She smiled before depositing a couple of cups of coffee on the table. He squeezed in next to Isabella in the booth.
He smiled. “In case you need some help eating.”
“Yeah, right.” Despite his overbearing attitude, she moved closer. If she were into PDAs she would have kissed him, but that sort of thing was definitely against her constitution.
“You going to tell me how you ended up in Chinatown?” He took a sip of coffee and hung his arm across her shoulders.
“When I got off at 87th, you hadn’t gotten there yet. Sergio had no visible weapons and was in the car alone, so I figured minimal risk.” She winced and hoped he wouldn’t pursue further, but knew better.
“That makes perfect sense. You are Superwoman, after all.” She could practically feel the tension emanating from him before he continued. “And he drove to Chinatown because he was hungry for some good Chinese? What did you find out after all that?”
“That’s just it. He didn’t get a chance to tell me anything before we got T-boned by the bad guys.” She turned to look at him. He was so close she could feel his breath on her face. For some odd reason it scared her, but in a good way. “You know the rest. That’s all I know.”
“You sure about that?”
She nodded. He then reached into his pocket and pulled out her prescription. Grasping the bottle, she clumsily opened the top and downed a couple of pills with a few meager sips of water.
“I could kiss you for that,” she said.
“Nobody’s stopping you.”
Instead of arguing the point, she gave him a quick peck on the lips. It was hard to miss the smug look on his face. For right now, he was her hero. She would have been happy if he would have brought some aspirin, but prescription pain killers? He could do no wrong in her book. At least for the next ten minutes or so.
She took a sip of coffee and placed her order for a cheese and mushroom omelet. After the waitress walked away, she continued with their earlier discussion. “It’s got to go back to Malone. Why, after being all over me for a couple of days, is he laying low?”
“You haven’t been around the station. Do you want him to harass you at home?”
“I want him to be predictable. Laying back and seeing what unfolds makes me nervous.” She chewed on her lip. “What kind of candy-ass detective does that?”
“One who isn’t too nervous about the status quo.”
“If I had his home address, I’d be knocking on his door as we speak. Do y
ou think the lieutenant has it?”
“Doubt it. I don’t see how that’s going to help you. He’s only going to stonewall you like he has all along.”
“But it would make me feel better, screwing with him on his home turf.”
“Isabella, you’ve got to look at this logically. You can’t let this whole thing get overshadowed by your emotions. And you can’t take stupid chances with your life.”
Landry didn’t understand there was a difference between passion and emotion. “But—”
He held up his hand to stop her. “Does finding Lou really make a bit of difference?”
“Obviously somebody thinks it does or they wouldn’t have kept me away from Sergio.”
“True, but there’s still got to be more to it than that. The idea that finding Lou is going to be the magic answer to this whole thing doesn’t make a lot of sense. I’m sure it’s part of the puzzle, but it can’t be the whole enchilada.”
Even though she hated to admit it, Landry was right. She suspected finding Lou would only add to the mess rather than straighten things out. But still, Lou was the only half-way decent family member she had. It would make her feel a whole lot better if he was safe. Besides, she had this pesky little voice in her head telling her to find out more about her father even if she kept trying to ignore it.
They finished their meals with little conversation. At this point, she was too exhausted to either think or talk. The painkillers, combined with too little sleep, were overriding the pot of coffee they’d consumed.
By the time they got into his car she felt like she’d been run over by a Mack truck. Now it wasn’t only her arm that ached. Instead, everything from her forehead to her toenails screamed in pain. Luckily, the painkillers were taking the edge off. She closed her eyes and immediately fell asleep. When she opened them again, they were in front of Landry’s apartment.
She turned a lazy half-open eye out the window. “I thought you were taking me home.”
“Never said that. You’ve had a rough day and it looks like you haven’t had a good nights’ sleep in weeks. Why don’t you crash at my place?”
The offer was tempting, and she was too exhausted to do anything but follow his suggestion. “I’ll just crash for a little bit. I can’t be wasting the day like yesterday…or was it the day before?”
He chuckled. “It all runs together, doesn’t it?”
“I slept like crap last night.” She plopped down on the couch. He sat next to her. “Being back there made me…I don’t know…it felt creepy.” She shrugged. “I couldn’t bring myself to sleep in my own room.”
“I’m sure it will get easier with time. Maybe you should stay here for a while until this all gets worked out.”
She gave him a goofy smile. “You’d like that, wouldn’t you? I’d be at your beck and call.”
He laughed, the sound rumbling through his chest. “Okay, you and I both know even on a good day—no, make that a great day—would that ever happen. You’ve always got to move to your own drum beat.”
“True.” She snuggled close as the effects of the pills started to kick in big time. “But I was thinking, could you help me move my stuff downstairs into the spare apartment. I thought maybe if I painted, and gave my place a face lift I’d feel better.” She shrugged. “Truth is, if I thought I could have done it, I would have moved my bed downstairs last night by myself.”
“I’m sure you would have.” He patted her unruly curls, which she suspected at this point were completely out of control. “Why don’t you stop talking and get back to sleep? I’ll get my cousins to go over there this afternoon and move your things downstairs. Then you can pick out some new paint colors.”
“Sounds like a plan.” She took a deep breath and started to nod off. “You have cousins all over the place.”
“We Irish like to procreate.”
“So I’ve noticed.”
* * *
By the time she awoke with her head on Landry’s lap, her legs sprawled across the couch, day had turned into night. He was watching college football on TV and she felt like a new woman.
She struggled to a sitting position desperate to avoid the awkward nose-in-Landry’s-crotch situation. “Wow, those pills are a wonder drug. I can see how people get addicted.” Her sling had become cockeyed during her nap, and it took a few moments to straighten it out.
“You hungry?”
She blew the hair out of her face. “It seems like for the last couple of days all I do around you is either sleep or eat.”
“I’m here only to serve.” He gave her a mock salute.
“In my dreams.” She stretched, putting her feet on the leather coffee table in front of the couch. “Sorry I held you captive like that, sprawled all over you.”
“There are worse things than having your mouth by my dick for a couple of hours.” He gave her a rueful smile.
She giggled, even though she never did that. This time around her relationship with Landry was having a weird effect on her. “I’m sure.” Maybe when she eliminated sex from the equation, she had a clearer sense of who he really was without getting all caught up in the complications of physical intimacy.
“Why don’t we get cleaned up and go get something to eat. By the time we’re finished with dinner, my cousins should be done with the move at your apartment.”
“For real? They’re just packing me up and moving me?” This had to be the nicest thing anybody did for her in a very long time.
“Yeah. I told them to keep track of all the sex toys and lingerie for later use.” He laughed. “Hey, you’ve got to pay me back somehow, don’t you? I was hoping…”
“And here I thought you were all about being noble.”
He pointed to his chest. “This is Landry you’re talking about. I always have an ulterior motive.” He got up from the couch and gently pulled her along with him. “Now let’s get ready.”
It didn’t take her long. Since she still had a couple of things stashed there, she took a shower and changed into new underwear and a different sweater. Her hair, well, it was her hair so there was only so much she could do with it. A riot of curls cascaded to her shoulders after she eliminated the frizz with a little gel.
“Where we going?”
He closed the door behind her. “Let’s drive and see where we end up.”
They drove through a residential neighborhood on the far north side. He circled the block a couple of times before he pulled to the curb and parked.
“I didn’t see any restaurants around here.” Then the thought dawned on her. She couldn’t be sure if she was mad or not. “You’re taking me to a family thing, aren’t you?”
He looked like a little boy when he shrugged. “They love you.”
“No, they only tolerate me because they want you to settle down. I stick out like a sore thumb.”
“Why do you get so hung up on stuff like that? So you look different than me and my family, what’s the big deal? I’m black Irish like my dad, but my mom’s a carrot top.”
Didn’t he get she looked different than everybody, in a bad way. She couldn’t claim allegiance to any one racial or ethnic group, and being around Landry’s family made it all the more obvious.
“But you’re all Irish. Some of your relatives speak Gaelic. Talk about your forgotten language. Who speaks Gaelic nowadays?” Despite her reluctance, she got out of the car and walked with him down the block.
“What does that have to do with anything?”
“I’m not sure. I just know I’m so different than everybody else in every way possible, I’m not sure I’m of the same species.”
“Okay, now you’re being overly dramatic. What happened to the Sanchez I know and love? She would have said, ‘Go screw yourself, Landry.’ I’m not so sure I like this mellower version of you.” He rested his arm about her shoulders.
“I couldn’t very well say that when you’re being so nice to me…well, except for taking me to some damn family gathering.”
“It’s a wedding. My cousin, Liam, you know, the black sheep of the family because he’s a lawyer.”
“True.” She chewed on her lip. “I do have that in common with your family. I do hate lawyers. They always screw up my cases.”
“See, common ground.” He pulled open the door. “And on top of that, he married Antoinette Gilliani. They actually got married in Italy about a month ago. This is the party after the fact.” When she turned to gawk at him, he smiled and continued, “Yes, Liam has further established himself as the black sheep by marrying a nice Italian girl. I’m sure her father is thrilled as well.”
“This could get interesting.”
When they walked together inside the small hall, his mother pulled her into a giant hug, followed by his father, then his grandmothers, Siobhan and Kate.
“Wonderful to see you, Isabella.” His mother’s smile got bigger as she glanced from Landry to Isabella and back again.
Kate held tight onto Isabella’s hand. “I haven’t seen you in a month of Sundays, lass. Where you been keeping yourself? Did my grandson do something he shouldn’t have?” The woman glared at Landry.
Isabella giggled. “He’s been a perfect gentleman. No need to worry about that.” She gave him a cheeky smile then gave Kate a kiss on the cheek.
“Good. I’d have to box his ears if he wasn’t behaving himself.”
“Nice of all of you to support me. I’ll just take Isabella to the bar now.” Landry led her away with a hand at the small of her back.
It didn’t take long for her to abandon any reservations she might have had and enjoy this island of normalcy in her now-chaotic life. First, his cousin Erin yanked her onto the dance floor to join in the Electric Slide. They even had her try her hand at Irish dancing, which she was horrible at, but tried the quick and complicated steps anyway.
She’d forgotten how much fun she could have with Landry and his family. Maybe it felt okay because there were a whole host of Italians mixed in with the Irish. With her coloring and hair, she could have passed for half the relatives on the bride’s side which made her feel like she sort of fit in.
