Sasha stretched to see over the counter, but not to inspect the skirt. She wanted another peek at the poor creature who’d struck out in the foster-care department. The content critter was doing his best to lick the panty hose off his mistress.
“Stop fussing,” the woman scolded, giving the leash a tug. “I swear, Stony, I’d pack you off to Austin in a heartbeat if Jeffrey could keep you in his dorm.”
“Since you can’t, maybe you should consider going home, changing into shorts and going outside to play ball or stick with him.”
The woman stared as though Sasha had spoken in tongues. “I beg your pardon?”
“Or find him a home with an owner who can give him the time and attention he deserves. Don’t you realize that Stony is missing Jeffrey as much or more than you are? And as you’re all that’s left, he’s obviously looking to you to give him some attention.” She gave the dog a look that basically said, “Lots of luck, fella.”
The woman was anything but appreciative. “Who do you think you are? Where’s Gray? Dr. Slaughter!”
When he didn’t show, she started pulling the dog to the door. “I’ll come back another time when he’s not tied up—and has qualified help. Better yet, I’ll find another clinic. The only reason I came here was because it was close. Stony, damn it, come.”
A moment later, when Gray did appear, wiping his hands on a paper towel, all that remained outside was a cloud of red dust. “What happened?”
“Uh…nothing.”
“Did Frank come back?”
“No.” There was no way she could avoid telling him. “Some woman wanted you to drug her dog.”
Gray frowned and glanced outside again. “You mean put down an old, sick dog?”
“And here I thought the government had the edge on euphemisms,” Sasha replied, wrinkling her nose. “Not put down. Drug, as in behavior altering. But she decided not to wait. No, that’s not true, I’m afraid I wasn’t as diplomatic as I could have been.”
He only let his gaze linger on her for an instant. “No, pragmatic and sharply to the point is more your style. Why didn’t you come find me?”
She accepted the jab as her due. “Stony isn’t sick.”
“Stony…Jeff Harvey’s Stony? There’s nothing wrong with him.”
“That’s what I told Mrs. Harvey. So…” She shrugged because the lingering dust cloud spoke for itself.
Gray was surprisingly accepting. He only wandered from window to window, generally looking as though he wanted to be anywhere but there talking to her.
“I was out back picking up trash that raccoons had tugged out of the garbage,” he told her. “If you had called, I probably wouldn’t have heard you anyway.”
With that he retreated down the hallway. As relieved as she was that he hadn’t said something more cutting, she was equally surprised at how noncommittal he sounded. If she didn’t know better, she could have guessed he’d taken a pill himself.
Things fell back into a monotonous lull again. Sasha tried to kill more time by paging through the mutilated magazines in the reception room between periodic visits with J.M.’s answering machine. Gray remained out of sight, and it was so quiet in the building she felt as though she was alone.
Right at four Jessie woke. Her soft mewing had Sasha thinking of Stony and his desperate attempts to be close to his mistress. Not at all liking the parallel she saw, she took the dog outside for a quick potty break and brought her up front.
Back at the desk, she found a pair of scissors in the top drawer and a brush under the sink in the kitchen, and went to work grooming the dog. Jessie seemed of a mixed mind about the makeover, but she made it clear that she liked being talked to by nudging Sasha with her nose every time Sasha fell silent. Just as Sasha was cleaning the brush for the last time, the phone rang. She resisted her first impulse to snatch up the receiver, aware Gray was back in his office this time; when she’d passed there, the door was closed again.
But after the third ring she wondered if she could be wrong and picked up.
“Clinic.”
“Yes, I need some information,” a woman replied. “My regular vet in Sonora is on vacation, and I’m looking for a place to board my cat while my husband and I take a six-week cruise to…”
Sasha stopped listening, her mind stuck on the idea that someone would consciously stick a family pet in a cage with strangers for a month and a half while they partied. What was wrong with people? No wonder Gray acted fed up and burned out.
“I’m sorry,” she said the moment the woman stopped talking. “We’re totally booked through New Year’s Day.”
As she turned to replace the handset on the cradle, she saw a pair of worn boots beyond the phone. Running her gaze up along the redwood-length legs, she met Gray’s unsmiling gaze.
“When you didn’t pick up, I thought you were outside again,” she began. “Okay, you’re right. I’m all wrong for this job. But, Slaughter, not even you would think much of a person who would abandon a so-called beloved pet for six weeks in order to go on a cruise.”
He didn’t reply at first and his face remained a blank mask. He simply crossed to the front door and locked up. Then he flipped off the light switch. “Put her back in her cage,” was all he said as he disappeared down the hallway.
Sasha sat in the vacuumlike silence until she heard the thud of the back door. With a whimper, Jessie set both paws on Sasha’s knees.
She leaned over to scratch under the sad-eyed dog’s chin. “It’s not about you, Miss Mess. I’ve hurt him…and I’m going to end up hurting you. But no way am I locking you away again. Not at this hour. If you’re game, c’mon.”
The idea of closing early appealed to her greatly, since she’d been feeling like some carnival game target all day. At least the house would offer a modicum of privacy and protection—as much privacy as she could find with Elias breathing down her neck, and as much protection as her gun offered. All she needed was for Gray to continue playing Invisible Man the way he had this afternoon.
23
Las Vegas, Nevada
2:26 p.m. PST
“I have to speak with you.”
The childish voice had Melor Borodin passing back the new shipping manifest for the stolen air conditioners he was moving on behalf of an associate in California. Motioning to the waiting driver that he should get going immediately after switching the product from one truck to another, he retreated deeper into the warehouse where it was less noisy.
“What did I tell you about phoning here?” he demanded.
“Please don’t be angry with me. I was careful. I’m at a pay phone away from the station.”
At least the bubble brain retained something of his directives, Borodin thought, scanning the activity in the rest of the warehouse. The situation here didn’t make him any happier. He had too few men to move too much inventory. If someone didn’t give him good news soon, the feds were going to make a killing after taking possession of the inventory he couldn’t dump in time.
“All right, all right.” He struggled to find patience for her. “I am like a bear with bad mood because no sleep, da? Your fault.” He rolled his eyes at the bullshit, but heard her sigh with either relief or pleasure. Who knew? Who cared?
“My news may help,” she replied. “I think she’s surfaced.”
“How do you know this?”
“I believe she’s using an alias. As you asked, I’ve been working as many hours overtime as they’ll let me to see if something turns up. Luckily, we have people out with summer colds, and we’re also short due to vacations.”
Borodin pinched the bridge of his nose. Damn, the woman could go on. Into the phone, he said, “And I am forever grateful. What is news you have to tell me?”
“I’ve come across a search from that funny-named town you said to watch for in Texas. Bitters? It’s shown up. The police there just ran a background check on an Anna Diaz. Now, it’s a Louisiana license, but the last address for her on the computer was—are y
ou ready? Sasha’s. On top of that, by the looks of her MVD photo she could be Sasha’s twin.”
So that’s the name she was using. Borodin wondered what the connection was between the two women, but was more interested in knowing why the cops out there were checking on her. “Who is this Anna Diaz?”
“Ah, this is the fascinating part—you mean was. Talk about weird. She’s dead.”
Borodin had culled Officer Gloria Carney from the flock to create his very own spy. Eager to see conspiracy and threat everywhere, she was also the least likely female on the LVMPD to have a love life. So he had inveigled himself into her good graces, convincing her that he was being hustled, virtually stalked by Sasha in revenge for the brief relationship he’d had with her mother. He’d explained how Tatiana Mills had been attractive for her age, but soon proved obsessively jealous and demanding of his time. Borodin had played to Gloria’s sympathies and her moral outrage, asking her to gauge whether Tatiana’s daughter, Sasha, was a serious stalker he needed to fear. The queen of the Lonelyhearts Club, who could never compete and secretly resented the effortlessly sensual Sasha, had been more than ready to oblige.
But what interested him now was Tatiana’s daughter. How had she come across a dead woman’s ID, and one who looked so much like her, no less?
“For what reason do they ask of her?” he queried.
“Would you believe she’s an arson suspect?”
It was too delightful. Strictly by-the-book Sasha accused of arson. At least it explained why she was still in that ridiculous-sounding place.
“Have they arrested her?” he asked. His people hadn’t given any indication of that, and if this news proved accurate, he would eunuchize them himself.
“If they haven’t yet, it sounds as though they might.”
Under no circumstances could that be permitted. To free herself, Sasha would talk. He didn’t know how much she knew about all his interests, but she’d alluded to enough the last time they were face-to-face. Add to that her devotion to her mother and he didn’t have to question that she would ruin him in this country if he didn’t destroy her first.
Once again he glanced around the warehouse still too full of merchandise. He needed time, otherwise it wouldn’t be just the feds after his ass; his customers expected him to be an efficient and reliable conduit. Their vengeance would have no statute of limitations, and they didn’t recognize state, let alone international, boundaries.
As his man Yegor stuck his head out of the main office door to hand off another manifest, he said into the phone, “Hold a moment.” Then to the shaven-headed man he called, “Have we heard from Lev or Akim yet?”
“Nyet. But it has been two hours. The call comes at any moment.”
“Let me know the instant you hear.” Then into the phone he said, “Darling, I must meet with you.”
“So you’re pleased?”
“There are no words.”
“Tonight?”
She sounded so hopeful, he smiled. “You think I can wait that long?”
She laughed, a little giddy, a little self-conscious. “I’m still on duty, you know.”
“What was I thinking, forgive me. It is this ID you mentioned. It would be so helpful to see a copy of it. Perhaps I can recognize this woman, maybe she worked for me as former employee. Perhaps Tatiana and Sasha used her to watch me. I think I remember someone at the restaurant…” He let the idea dangle and waited for Gloria to take the bait.
“Then of course, I’ll manage. When and where?”
He mentioned the parking garage of the abandoned building soon to be torn down to make way for a new casino. He knew she would like it because it was where they’d first sojourned. “Say…one hour? Unless you can take an early dinner? We could dine on each other, my stukachi.”
“Oh, I’d love to so much…but I’d better not risk it. I wasn’t kidding about being shorthanded here.”
Borodin accepted the news with a heavy sigh and ended the call, murmuring, “Don’t make me wait too long.” Disconnecting, he then headed for his office.
Arson. This would not do at all. But he had an idea of how to get Sasha out into the open again, even if she had to take on the devil himself to get free.
When he returned to the front office, he found Yegor on the phone. “Akim,” the man said, passing it over.
Borodin said into the mouthpiece, “I have new orders for you.”
24
Bitters, Texas
4:45 p.m. CST
Gray yanked open the kitchen storm door and punched the inner one so hard, it hit the stop and bounced back at him. He didn’t care, just as it didn’t matter that he’d closed the clinic almost two hours earlier than usual.
He went straight to the refrigerator and got himself a beer. It wasn’t what he wanted on an empty stomach, but he was thirsty enough to drink a keg. Maybe it would help take a bit of the edge off; hopefully the shower would, too. Then he intended to drive over to J.M.’s.
It had been several years since the attorney had been able to manage a full-time practice responsibly. Gray wasn’t about to criticize him for that. However, J.M. could pull himself together for occasional representation when he knew it was important. Well, this was important, and if J.M. had allowed himself to get dragged off course by one of his exes again, Gray wanted to know.
Drought conservation restricted his time in the shower, and it was a spare ten minutes later that Gray pulled on clean jeans and a T-shirt, and returned to the kitchen. Temporarily refreshed, he stepped into the room and saw Sasha’s mutt on a king-size bed pillow. One with a pillowcase no less. At the opposite side of the room, his houseguest’s curvaceous southern half was visible as she rummaged through the pantry.
“How do you feel about Spam and scrambled eggs?”
Gray picked up a glass out of the drainer and headed for the ice machine. “You’re not feeding that animal my survival food.”
Once the dispenser turned off, Sasha poked her head around the corner of the louvered door. “We’ll share. I admit, I’m getting hungry, but I’m not up to another trip to the café, or Bitters’s idea of a grocery. I doubt you are, either.”
“I’m not hungry.”
“You have to be, and so is she. And for more than the prison food you were serving next door.”
She was right; nevertheless some demon inside him resisted the sense of her words. “It’s called dog food, which is what she is, regardless of how you want to treat her. And speaking of…What’s she doing on my pillow? That mutt’s only had a sponge bath so far, and in case you’ve forgotten, she’s given every indication that she’s not housebroken.”
“She’s been doing great this afternoon,” Sasha assured him. “And technically the pillow is yours, sure. But it’s not off of your bed. I’ll want you to add it to what I owe you.”
“The point is you should have asked first. You’ve got a real talent for not asking.”
“No, the point is that she has stitches…and you weren’t here. Again,” she added with a challenging look.
Gray had a flashback to a time and place of false environments, of being tested and pushed and graded on his reactionary skills. It wasn’t so dissimilar to what she was subjecting him to. Only this time he didn’t have to respond with, “Yes, sir!”
“Keep playing fast and free with that money,” he said, “and you’ll have to find yourself another rich sucker to roll.”
Sasha set the canned meat on the counter with a sharp thud. “I didn’t roll anyone.”
This time his reply came easily. “You say. That’s all we have, though, isn’t it? Your word.”
Even as she turned away, he felt the nasty kick from his conscience, but his darker side egged him on to go for a full twelve rounds or for a KO. Under siege, he yanked open the freezer and grabbed a frozen dinner.
While Sasha eyed the package, she didn’t comment, but lined up ingredients beside the stove like pieces on a chessboard. As she reached for a skillet, he went to the
microwave he claimed to loathe and shoved in the beef enchilada dinner.
“Want a drink?” It grated, too, that he was no longer content with the silence that had suited him for almost two years.
“No thanks.”
“A glass of ice water?”
She shook her head. “And you wouldn’t drink it, either, if you left out the scotch. There’s something wrong with your town’s water.”
He had planned to leave out the scotch, but was fast changing his mind. “Just another thing for you to be relieved about when you leave here.”
She turned away from him and concentrated on chopping, frying and scrambling. He nuked then carried his meal to the table. The tantalizing aroma that wafted up from her pan made him accept that his dinner tasted like the mud pie it resembled.
When Sasha sat, it wasn’t beside him as before, but at the opposite end of the table, and she kept her eyes on her plate as he did his. What’s more, she didn’t stay there long, rising after only a few bites. Gray knew it was because of him, but his mouth watered as she passed, almost reaching for her plate. Stiff-necked pride saved him. Setting her plate on the counter, she checked the sheet of aluminum foil she’d set out for the dog in lieu of a bowl. While Jessie had done better, she hadn’t finished either. Dumping the dog’s remainders down the garbage disposal, Sasha was about to reach for her plate when Jessie whimpered.
“Looks like her problem isn’t only about prison food,” Gray drawled.
Ignoring him, Sasha shut off everything. “My fault, Jess. C’mon, baby,” she cooed, leading the animal outside.
She wasn’t gone long. By then Gray had not only finished his dinner, he’d inhaled her leftovers and almost finished washing up after her.
“I intended on doing that.” She patted Jessie, who settled back on the pillow. “But maybe I’m not to be trusted with soap and water, either.”
“You’re exaggerating.”
“And you’re welcome to live with a ghost.”
As she started to walk away, Gray grabbed her wrist, sending a splatter of soapsuds and water across the room. Before she could react, he had her so close they had to share the same breath.
Final Stand Page 15
