RENEGADE'S REDEMPTION

by Lindsey Longford

  “You can’t stop me.” She yanked at the links he still held.

  “I have to.” He looked around the room, at the stand, the chest of drawers, the beds. “If you leave, Scanlon will pick you off like a sitting duck.”

  “That’s what you want, isn’t it?” Appalled, she dug her heels against the floor, her sneakers scraping the wood as he half lifted, half pulled her toward the bed she’d slept in. “And then you’ll get your thirty pieces of silver.”

  “Is that what I want, Elly?” He closed the second bracelet around the iron post of the bed, below the heavy knob that topped it. “If you say so.” Hunkered down, he searched for the key. Finding it, he stuffed it into his pocket and swiveled to look at her.

  He looked like a man caught on the rack, tortured to the breaking point, she thought vaguely. “Don’t do this to me, Royal, please.”

  “Elly, if you run from here, you’ll run straight into Scanlon. You’ll have no protection at all.” He reached to touch her knee, and she jerked away.

  “Don’t touch me. Just … don’t. I couldn’t bear it.”

  His eyes were remote and distant. “Whatever you say.” He stood up and strode to the window.

  Later, she would remember his expression in that moment as he turned away. Now, though, she fought to sort through the mess she was in. Tugging at the restraint, Elly sank onto the bed, her sneakers sliding off with her abrupt movement. “You have to unlock these. Don’t you see what you’re doing?”

  His bark of laughter was harsh, self-directed. “No, damned if I do. Not anymore.” His shoulders slumped forward, and he raised his arm, resting his forehead on it.

  “Why are you doing this to me, Royal?” She rattled the links against the bed pole. “It’s unforgivable.”

  “I’m trying to save your life.” He whirled to face her, and his expression was dreadful in its pain and torment. “I’ll do whatever I have to do to keep you safe.”

  “You’re taking away my choices, Royal. You’re making yourself responsible for me. You’re not. I have the right to make my own decisions about my life, make my own mistakes.” She jerked angrily against the cuff. “I’m not your responsibility.”

  “You are. I created this mess. I have to make it right.”

  “At my expense?” She rattled the chain again. “I’ll never forgive you for this, Royal. I couldn’t.” Meeting his gaze, she willed him to understand. “You know about pride, Royal. I have mine, too. Don’t steal it from me.”

  “Will you promise to stay here? Where I can protect you?” Harsh with control, his expression was bleak.

  “I won’t promise anything. But if you keep me chained here, you’re killing me as surely as Blake tried to.”

  Royal winced.

  “This is wrong. Can’t you see that?” She held her wrist out to him.

  “You’re right.” He reached down into his pocket. The key flashed between them as he looked down at it. “Elly—”

  “Don’t ask, Royal.”

  He inserted the key, twisted and took off the handcuff. “I have to ask. Please don’t leave. I’m begging you.”

  “You can’t make me stay here with force.” Rubbing her wrist, she never took her eyes off him.

  “No.” Kneeling before her, he touched her wrist gently, and grimaced as she flinched. “I can’t use force against you, Elly, even for your own good. I’m not asking you to trust me, but will you stay because I’m telling you it’s the safest thing for you?”

  Anger and sadness commingled. “I don’t know. That’s the best I can give you. It’ll have to do.”

  “Elly, I don’t want anything to happen to you.”

  “Listen to me. I don’t need rescuing. I don’t need a knight on a white horse using me as a decorative accessory while he proves his manhood. Blake did that do me. I swore I’d never let it happen again. Don’t try to rescue me, Royal.”

  They never heard him come in.

  He was just there suddenly, framed in the doorway. “Isn’t this touching?”

  Lunging to his feet, Royal turned around, stepping in front of her and the shiny blue-steel gun her ex-husband pointed at her. “Scanlon.”

  “Blake!” Elly stepped out from behind Royal and to the side, separating herself from Royal, giving Blake two targets, giving one of them a chance.

  “Very noble, Abigail, or would you prefer your nom du jour, Elly?” He turned the gun on Royal. “But your gesture is wasted. If you make a run for it, I’ll shoot your … lover. He is, isn’t he, Abby? By now?”

  She didn’t answer. Her foot poised to run toward him, she placed it firmly on the floor.

  “Much better. Smart, even for you. I know you won’t leave him. And if he tries to rush me, why, Abby, the detective knows I’ll put a bullet right through your pretty little head. I don’t remember you being this pretty, by the way. Congratulations, Detective.”

  “Good-looking Smith & Wesson, Scanlon. Big .357, long barrel. Not overcompensating by any chance, are you?” Royal edged toward Elly, a movement she felt rather than saw.

  She didn’t let her gaze drift toward him.

  “Excellent, Gaines, that psychological dig of yours. But pointless.”

  “Where are your muscle men? Why are you doing the dirty work this time?” Elly spit out the words, loathing this man she’d let rule her life for so long.

  “Hard to find good help these days.” Blake Scanlon frowned. “They made too many mistakes. I can’t afford any more errors.”

  “And why is that?” Royal’s foot edged infinitesimally her way.

  Blake tapped one finger against his chin. “Didn’t Elly tell you why she went back to our home?” He smiled, and chills ran over her. “Ah, I see she didn’t. Such a shame you’re so predictable, Abby. Not wanting to involve other people. But that’s your fatal flaw.” His gaze flicked to the floor, back to them. “Now, Detective—are you enjoying my irony, Gaines, my references to the career you sent down the toilet?”

  “Can’t quit laughing,” Royal drawled.

  “Go pick up the handcuffs and sit on the bed. Put one cuff around your wrist. Now, Gaines. Or I’ll switch my rather beautiful scenario for one more immediate, one that involves Abby’s blood and brains spattered around the room. Do you like that plan better?”

  Elly didn’t breathe as Royal stared at her ex-husband and then moved across the room. “Okay. I’m sitting, I’m putting on the cuff. See?” Royal swung the metal in front his face. “Now what, Scanlon?”

  “All right. Very good. Abby, go over and pull the cuff around the metal rod of the bed. Put the other cuff on your wrist.”

  “No.”

  “Elly!” Royal’s voice was scratchy, and she didn’t dare look at him as he threw her words back at her. “I don’t need rescuing, thank you very much. Do what he says.”

  “No.” Gripping her hands together, she shook from head to toe. “He’s going to kill us both, Royal. I’m not going to make it easy for him. Don’t you get it?”

  “I get it, Elly. But do what he says. Please, sweetheart.”

  “Very good advice, Detective, and I’m touched by your concern for my former wife. But Abby’s right. Make no mistake. I am going to kill you both. It’s merely a question of how.”

  “Blake, you don’t have to kill Royal. He doesn’t know anything. He was only helping me.”

  “He hasn’t told you he was working for me, has he?” Blake stepped farther into the room, staying well clear of her and Royal.

  She nodded stiffly. “He told me.”

  “Foolish, but, Abby, he was going to die anyway. With you. In a car accident, as he supposedly brought you to me to discuss our custody of Tommy. I hoped it would look as if you’d run off with your lover and kidnapped our son. But Gaines kept delaying. He wasn’t doing what he was supposed to. So I sent Harold and Markey to give him a little encouragement.”

  “They were very encouraging,” Royal said, his voice filled with menace. The handcuff rattled against th
e bedpost.

  “You knew where I was? All along?” Elly tried to follow the slippery trail of her former husband’s thinking.

  “Of course. I told Gaines where you were. Actually, Abby, you deserve congratulations. You weren’t easy to find. You were very cautious. Now go do what I told you,” he said with silky humor, “or I’ll shoot your detective friend. Can you live with that?”

  She couldn’t. She sat. She worked the links under the iron top of the bedpost, clicked the smooth metal around her own wrist.

  “Splendid.” Blake walked completely into the room. “One more point, Abby. You have something I want. The tapes. And my son. First, where’s Thomas?”

  She clamped her trembling lips together.

  “You’re being stupid, Elly. I’ll find him eventually. When you don’t return, whoever has him will get in touch with the authorities or your parents, and I’ll have my son back where he belongs. I expected you’d leave him with the Williams woman, but you didn’t.”

  “What else were you expecting, Scanlon? I’m curious.” Royal’s knee nudged hers.

  In one quick blink, she glanced where his foot pointed under his bed.

  Scanlon pivoted toward him. “Incidentally, Detective, if you’re wondering, I found you through property records.” Laughing, he sat down on the bed opposite them, out of reach. “Well, I didn’t. My source traced you through your former partner and his brothers. Not a difficult task, I hear. A fisherman last night spotted the lights in the cabin. That was that. And here I am.”

  “Blake, if you kill us, it doesn’t matter. No one knows where I left the tapes.”

  Next to her, Royal started.

  “So, she really didn’t tell you, Detective? Shame. Noble Abby. You wanted to protect him, didn’t you? You might have saved yourself if you’d told him. But probably not. No one would have believed you, and my plan was already set in motion.”

  “The plan to kill both of us and make it look as though we were lovers running off together?” The metal links rattled again with Royal’s words.

  Blake nodded. “Yes, Detective. That one, the plan that leaves me a grieving father whose wife abandoned him when he’d given her everything. But I want those tapes, Abby. They’re not at the house. I’ve torn it apart. Even disemboweled Thomas’s toys. That was a mess.” He waggled the gun between them as he mused, “You wouldn’t have sent them to your parents. You’re too noble to endanger them. Your veterinarian friend Meggie knows nothing—”

  “What did you do to her?” Elly pulled against the cuff.

  “Nothing. We talked. I could tell you kept her in the dark, too. The tapes weren’t in your tacky house or your car. So you’ve locked them away somewhere, some place you can get to any time you want. You’ve really impressed me, Abby. I didn’t think you could.” He pointed the gun at Royal. “But I’m bored with all this discussion. Where are those tapes?”

  “What’s on the tapes, Scanlon? Satisfy my curiosity, will you? Since you’re going to shoot us anyway.”

  “Oh, I’m not going to shoot you, Detective. And I know you think you’re buying time. You’re not. You and Elly are going to die in a rather kinky scene, handcuffed there, together, candles blazing romantically.”

  Royal yanked forward, and Elly’s arm scraped along the horizontal bar of the metal frame. “Sorry, sweetheart.” The glance he shot her was frighteningly fierce. “Hang in there.”

  “Not much else she can do, is there?” Blake asked reasonably. “Unfortunately for you both, those candles are going to start a fire. Tragic, really.”

  “Elly, what’s on the tapes?” Royal reached up with his free hand and cupped her chin. “Tell me. You don’t need to keep any more secrets.”

  “All right.” It was a relief to tell him. “There were five tapes. I’d hidden the first three. I went back for the other two, and Blake’s friends ambushed me. You’ll never find the tapes, Blake. None of them.” She smiled. “Never. But others will. Sooner or later. And then you’ll be destroyed, no matter what you do to me.”

  “You underestimated her, Scanlon.” Royal’s smile was terrifying.

  “Apparently I did.” Blake scowled.

  She shifted awkwardly towards Royal. “Blake knew I’d found the tapes. That was why he tried to kill me the first time. I found messages on the answering machine. There were electrical outages, and the machine had to be reset, and I heard these old messages to Blake. He thought I was too stupid to understand, or he would have made sure they were completely erased. There was a message from Mike Gannon. I knew who he was. I bought miniature, voice-activated tape recorders and hid them in Blake’s office. So that I could buy mine and Tommy’s freedom.”

  “My God, Elly.” Royal reached to her hand and held it. “Mike Gannon’s behind the biggest land deal in the state’s history. The one that’s going to turn ten thousand acres of timber into concrete city. If it’s crooked, nasty or illegal, Gannon’s got a finger in it. Drugs, smuggling in illegal immigrants. Zoning laws. Bribery. He’s on every cop’s list. But he pays his taxes, he’s discreet and no one’s pinned anything on him. Too much money behind him. Too many politicians in his pocket. You must have been terrified.” His grip on her hand was warm and gave her strength.

  “I’ve been frightened ever since I found the first tape, but I thought I could use the tapes as insurance. I thought I’d be safe if Blake knew I’d release the tapes tying him to Gannon.

  “But then Blake tried to have me killed, and I knew I’d never be safe again. All I wanted,” she said brokenly, “was to live my life and take care of my child. I knew Blake wouldn’t hurt Tommy—oh, Blake would use Tommy against me to make me surrender the tapes, I knew that. I couldn’t leave my son. But I shouldn’t have gone back for the last tapes. I didn’t think you knew I had them, Blake, so I took the risk. For extra insurance.”

  Blake stood up impatiently. “I found one by accident at the office. That was when I knew you had others. Gannon and I agreed. You had to be eliminated, the other tapes found. I have to have those tapes, Abby. Or Gannon will kill me, too.”

  “I don’t care.” She wouldn’t cry in front of him, she wouldn’t, but, oh, for everything to end like this—

  “But I do.” Blake reached into the satchel and pulled out several candles, placing them strategically around the room. When they were all lit, their flames dancing in the windowpane, he turned to her once again. “You believe you won’t tell me about the tapes, but you will. Oh, not to save yourself pain. I won’t underestimate you again. You’ll talk to save him.” He leveled the gun at Royal and pulled the trigger.

  The explosion was deafening, and the shock of Royal’s arm and body jerking back against the bed had her screaming. Blood from his right shoulder soaked into the pillows and sheets as he slumped white-faced against the bed frame.

  “That’s a warning, Abby. The next bullet goes to his knee, then his belly. That’s a lot of pain. Death is one thing, pain another. Are you going to tell me about the tapes?”

  Sick with fear, she tugged at Royal’s slumping body. “They’re in separate lockers at the Tampa airport. The numbers and combinations are on my sneakers. Over there,” she said frantically as he pointed the gun at Royal again. “The ones I painted. The numbers of the lockers are on the sneakers, Blake!”

  He pulled out the shoes. “So they are. I have what I need, then, don’t I? Except for the locker keys. Where are they kept, Abby?”

  “At my tacky house! Taped to the bottom of the bedroom door!” She pulled at Royal’s cuffed arm.

  “Thank you, Abby. Markey missed them. But he’s paid for his mistake. Now it’s your turn.”

  Pulling the sheet off the bed, he draped it over the mound of clothes and placed its edge near one of the sputtering candles on the floor. Emptying the gun, he kept the silver cylinders in his hand, tossing one of them up and down and finally scattering all of them into the hall. Wiping the gun, he went toward Elly and forced her hand around the grip before letting t
he gun fall to the floor. Spotting the glitter of metal on the floor, he bent down and retrieved the handcuff key.

  Behind him, smoke rose in a lazy spiral from the sheet. “I think that finishes everything here. The tabloids will have a field day with this scandal, but I’ll bear it bravely.” He waved tauntingly. “Ciao, Abby. I’ll take good care of my son.”

  Smoke puffed up from the sheet as it glowed red.

  *

  Chapter 16

  « ^

  Choking on smoke, Elly coughed and pushed at Royal. Sparks were flying to the floor, the bedding. “Royal, help me.”

  He grunted. “The phone. Under the bed. I kicked it there when the bastard came in. Call Beau—” He coughed.

  “There’s no time,” she wailed, stretching her leg as far as she could. The distance last night had seemed so narrow when she’d finally crossed to him, when she’d risked herself to reach out for what she wanted and needed. Last night, the distance had seemed like the distance between life and death. Now, in fact, that small space was impossibly far and death unbearably near.

  Royal pulled himself as close as he could to the frame that imprisoned them. His eyes blazed at her hotter and more brilliant than the flames licking up the far wall. Encouraging her, sending her a message of faith and hope. And something else. “You can do it, sweetheart.”

  She couldn’t. The distance was too far. She was too short. Her glance swept the room. There had to be another way. The lamp on the stand was tall and skinny, its shade out of proportion. Shoving the lamp onto the floor, she worked it and its shade forward with her feet, directing it toward the head of the bed as Royal nodded.

  “That’s it, sweetheart. See if you can hook the phone and drag it closer.”

  If the phone had been at the foot of the bed, she couldn’t have reached it.

  The exhilaration that swept over her was crazy, insane, wonderful. They were still chained to the metal bed frame that was now hot to the touch. Hanging off the edge of the bed, she swept the phone toward them and picked it up. She tapped out the emergency number Royal gave her and handed it to him.