Covert Kisses

by Jane Godman

  Laurie began to reach inside her jacket, but shock slowed her down and Grant moved faster. Throwing down the rock, he had his own gun out before she could make a move to get hers. Surprisingly nimble for such a large man, he vaulted over the edge of the cart, landing neatly on his feet beside Cameron’s unconscious body. Prodding his one-time friend’s body with the toe of his boot, he seemed satisfied Cameron wasn’t coming around anytime soon.

  “Is he okay?” Laurie hated the wobble in her voice, but the wound in the back of Cameron’s head was bleeding badly. Somehow a dangerous killer training a gun on her was less important than the fact Cameron was lying injured at her feet.

  “Hopefully not.” In contrast, Grant’s voice was cheerful, his smile unconcerned. “Throw down your gun.”

  With a hand that shook wildly, Laurie did as he asked. Her gun landed close to Cameron’s outstretched fingers. No matter how hard she willed him to move them, to pick up the gun, nothing happened. Things like that only happen in movies.

  “Can’t we call someone? Let them know where he is?” She wouldn’t plead with Grant for herself. For Cameron, she would go down on her hands and knees and beg.

  His smile vanished abruptly. “Who? Bryce? Vincente? The Delaney brothers to the rescue?” Grant spat the words at her as he stepped forward to grab her. His hand was so big it encircled her upper arm. “You think I’m going to fall for that?”

  “But Cameron is your friend.”

  “No.” He started to drag her away. Laurie tried to dig her heels in, but she had no chance against his superior strength. Relentlessly, Grant propelled her forward. Desperately she looked over her shoulder at Cameron. Be alive. Don’t die. “He was my friend once. Before he stole the only thing that ever mattered to me.”

  The only thing that ever mattered to him. Carla. She tried to focus. In the hands of a disturbed and ruthless killer, the only weapons Laurie had at her disposal now were her wits and the snippets of knowledge she had about this man. She had to try to use those to her advantage. Her biggest problem was she didn’t know what role she should play. For someone whose job involved playing a part, it was intensely frustrating. If Grant killed these women because they resisted him, then she had to avoid coming across as antagonistic. But if he killed them because he believed he was rescuing them from the awfulness of their existence, then she had to try not to appear vulnerable and in need of his heroism.

  Those were the thoughts that flashed through her mind as Grant hauled her across the crater to his patrol car. In the end, her deliberations led her to the conclusion that, for the time being at least, she should keep quiet and read the situation. Years of undercover work had taught her how to think on her feet. She hoped it would stand her in good stead during this, the most perilous situation she had ever faced.

  * * *

  He really should lift his head, but it was easier to stay like this with his nose pressed so far into the sparse grass that he was inhaling dirt. The strangest thing was the lack of pain. There was pressure in the back of his skull, but nothing hurt. Even so, his brain registered that he should be hurting. He could feel the blood, sticky and warm, oozing from the wound at the back of his skull. That couldn’t be good, and...

  Laurie!

  Clutching at the tufts of grass in his hands, Cameron attempted to claw himself upright. It felt like the biggest mistake of his life. Like someone was using a power tool to fire six-inch nails directly into the back of his head. He didn’t just see stars; whole galaxies swam before his eyes. Gasping for breath, unable to even utter the groan that wanted to rise from his lips, he collapsed back onto the grass. Waves of nausea and dizziness rolled over him, and he closed his eyes until the sensation passed.

  Cameron forced himself to think. Even with his head hammering out the devil’s own drumbeat, he could work out what must have happened. Grant must have been waiting for them when they came out of the mineshaft. Probably, he had watched them go in. How had he managed to hide from them so he could sneak up behind them and hit Cameron on the head? He replayed the minutes before that excruciating pain had struck him. As they exited the shaft, Laurie had been white as a sheet. She’d leaned up against the old railway cart and Cameron had joined her.

  My God, he was hiding in there! We gave him the perfect opportunity. Grant probably couldn’t believe his luck when we turned our backs on him.

  Cameron had no idea how long he had been unconscious. Laurie could have been in Grant’s power for a few minutes or for longer. He doubted it was hours. The feel of the sunlight on his back and shoulders told him it wasn’t yet noon. It can’t be hours. He had to keep telling himself that. If he let himself give in to the feelings of despair that were threatening to overwhelm him along with the pain, he would lie here wallowing while Grant killed her.

  Take it slowly this time. Keeping his grip on the grass, he managed to claw his way to his knees. The world swam out of focus a few times, but, panting with the effort, he took a moment to celebrate. It felt like he had climbed a mountain, but he hadn’t passed out or lost the contents of his stomach. And so far, his head was still in place. A bloodstained rock was on the ground inches away from him, and his gaze caught Laurie’s gun where it lay close to his fingers. Cameron’s lips tightened. The knowledge she was defenseless spurred him on, and with another agonizingly slow movement, he got himself into a sitting position with his back against a wheel of the railway cart. Reaching out, he snagged Laurie’s gun and held it in his lap. Not that Grant was going to be coming back for him. He had what he wanted. He had Laurie.

  Reaching into his pocket, he fumbled his cell phone free. Feeling like he was performing every action in slow motion, he got into his contacts. Don’t be busy, Bryce. It went straight to voice mail.

  Almost sobbing with frustration, Cameron tried Vincente’s number. The feeling of relief that flooded through him when he heard his brother’s voice was so intense he almost passed out again.

  “Cam? We did it. Warren and Nichols are officially out of here—”

  “Listen to me.” As he cut across Vincente’s celebratory tones, Cameron’s own voice sounded like sandpaper rasping over gravel.

  “My God, Cam, you sound like shit. What happened?”

  “I don’t have time to explain. Grant has Laurie. Get Bryce and come out to the Hope Valley coal mine right now.”

  “Should I call the police?”

  “Not yet.” He was about to end the call when he thought of something else. “And Vincente?”

  “Yes?” It was strange how, even in a phone call, you could hear concern in another person’s voice.

  “Bring me a clean shirt, plenty of water and some extra-strength painkillers.”

  Cameron was counting on one thing. He knew exactly how Grant planned to kill Laurie. He was so sure, he was prepared to stake everything on it. Pinning all he had on it. If he was wrong... He squeezed his eyes shut. He couldn’t be wrong. If he was wrong, then Laurie was already dead, and that, well, that just couldn’t be. No, Grant would want to savor killing her. Cameron didn’t believe a bullet to Laurie’s head would be enough for him. The thought made him wince. Since wincing sent a thunderbolt of pain through his skull, he decided it was an activity he should try to avoid.

  Reaching up a tentative hand, he made an attempt to feel the back of his head. It wasn’t a good idea. There was too much blood to feel anything much, and the action caused an immediate return of his former giddiness. Sighing, he waited for some sign of his brothers’ arrival.

  They didn’t let him down. He didn’t know what Vincente had told Bryce, but the two of them must have broken records to get from the transportation depot on the other side of town to the mine in the time it took them. Bryce was driving Cameron’s car, and it bounced wildly across the uneven surface of the crater before coming to a halt a few yards from where he was sitting.

  “If
the suspension on my car is ruined, I’ll know where to send the bill,” Cameron said, as they hurried toward him.

  “Did Grant do this?” Bryce’s eyes skimmed the blood that had soaked the collar and shoulders of Cameron’s shirt.

  As Vincente held out a bottle of water, Cameron saw the flash of anger in his older brother’s eyes. He accepted the water gratefully, drinking long and hard before he spoke. “Yes. Not content with shooting me last night, he decided to try to bash my brains out this morning.”

  Bryce looked ready to explode with rage. “That bastard shot you? Why the hell didn’t you tell us?”

  It was obvious that Vincente, although equally angry, was going to keep a grip on his fury and be more useful than Bryce, whose anger was in danger of raging out of control. Laurie needed them to be focused. Cameron held out a hand to Vincente. “Help me get up.”

  Moving position so he could get a better look at the back of his brother’s head, Vincente drew in a sharp breath. “We need to get you to a hospital, Cam.”

  “Can’t.” Cameron couldn’t risk shaking his head. “I told you. Grant has Laurie.”

  “Tell us where he is. We’ll go after him.”

  Cameron gripped Vincente’s hand briefly. This was the brother who had always thwarted him, driven him to distraction, given him every possible reason to dislike and distrust him. Now, without asking questions, Vincente was prepared to put himself in Cameron’s place and face danger on his behalf. The love he had never before been able to feel for his older brother rose up now, powerful and compelling, tightening his throat.

  “The three of us will do it. Together.”

  Reading the determination in his eyes, Vincente nodded to Bryce. Together they moved into position on either side of Cameron. Hooking their arms through his, they raised him to his feet. The world swam out of focus again and he sagged against their support, before forcing himself to remain upright.

  “If you won’t let us take you to a hospital, where do you want to go?” Vincente asked as they moved slowly toward the car.

  “Tell me it’ll be somewhere I can get my hands around Grant Becker’s throat.” Bryce seemed to be holding his whole body rigid.

  “Eventually, yes. But for now, take me to the lake house.”

  Vincente frowned as he helped to ease Cameron into the back of the car. “The lake house? Don’t you want us to start searching for Laurie?”

  “I know where he’ll take her.” As Bryce started the engine, Cameron did his best to concentrate on staying upright in his seat. “He’ll wait until dark before he makes a move. If we’re going to follow them, we’ll need a boat.”

  * * *

  Laurie had been in enough jail cells to know she wasn’t getting out of this one through her own efforts. Of course, she’d never actually been locked inside one before. This cell was about six feet by eight, with brick walls and a solid metal door. Light came in through a barred window set high up out of reach at one end. The only items in the room were the bed, which was free of bedding, and a bucket. This place was old. Laurie, used to seeing cells with observation windows and stainless steel commodes, sensed its age in something other than the lack of modern facilities. There was a feeling of disuse about it. This was not a cell that was occupied regularly.

  Since she had made the journey here in the trunk of Grant’s patrol car, she’d had no idea where she was geographically. Attempting to judge the time she had been lying there, bumping around in the darkness, hadn’t been easy, but she thought it was about an hour. Approximately sixty minutes from the time Grant had shoved her roughly into the trunk at gunpoint at the old mine. Which meant she could be anywhere. Laurie summoned up a mental map of the region. He could have stayed on his home territory and driven west, remaining in West County. Or he could have been heading into Park County, even, judging by the speed he was driving, possibly making it as far south as Teton County. It wasn’t impossible that he’d taken her across the state line and gone north into Montana. Since there was no way out of this cell, there was no real point in speculating. She supposed she would find out soon enough once Grant returned. Her whereabouts mattered only in the sense that she felt a powerful need to know where she was in relation to Cameron.

  The image of him lying facedown on the ground, bleeding from the wound in his head, rose up in her mind, and panic threatened to overwhelm her. She wasn’t gagged—what use is a gag when there’s no one around to hear your cries for help? were the words Grant had used when he’d left her here—and a strangled sob escaped her lips. Cameron has to be okay. Stubbornly she forced herself to refuse to acknowledge there could be any other possibility. We’ll get out of this somehow. At the moment, she was struggling to see how, but she was determined to keep fighting to find a way. Anything else wasn’t in her nature. Dragging herself back to the present, she went back over the details of her arrival at this place.

  When the car had halted and the trunk popped open, Laurie’s eyes had taken a few seconds to adjust to the bright sunlight. Grant’s bulky figure looming over her had caused her to automatically shrink back into the cramped space of the trunk. Muttering a curse, he had hooked one arm under her legs and, with the other around her waist, swung her out of there as easily as if she had been a reluctant child.

  Laurie had gained only a brief impression of her surroundings before he had set her on the ground and brought her into this building, but the phrase “miles from nowhere” seemed apt. They weren’t in a town, that was all she could say for sure. There were no defining features to the landscape, just a few hills in the near ground and a hint of mountains in the distance. The building itself gave her no clues. She got the impression of an institutional structure, squat and square. There was no one else around as Grant led her to a side entrance, along a corridor and into this cell.

  “Where are we?” She had tried for a pleasant, conversational tone.

  He hadn’t replied. His face had remained expressionless. “When I come back, you need to be wearing those clothes.”

  He pointed to a neatly folded pile on the bed. Without another word, he turned and left the room. Laurie heard the grate of the key in the lock and his booted footsteps fading as he walked back the way they had come. Since then, she had heard nothing. There were no sounds of traffic, no noises from within the building to indicate anyone else was inside here, not even any animal noises or birdsong outside. It was as if she was the last person left alive in this godforsaken place.

  But she was still alive, and even though Grant clearly had plans for her, she clung to that like a drowning woman clinging to a lifeline. Drowning. The word made her think of Carla, and she shivered. The clothes he had left were basic enough. Knee-length shorts, T-shirt, flannel shirt and sneakers with a lightweight waterproof jacket. It felt creepy to wear clothes Grant Becker had chosen for her, and Laurie thought long and hard about not changing into them. What would happen if she defied him? The cold light in those blue eyes was probably a good enough indication. She got the feeling she would be wearing these clothes one way or another and decided she would rather put them on herself than have him do it for her.

  It was only when she had finished changing that she considered her outfit. The colors were bright, the overall effect too young. The bubblegum-pink sneakers too cloyingly attention seeking. I’m dressed like a teenage girl rather than a grown woman. The thought sent a shiver of discomfort up her spine. Am I dressed the way Carla was when he met her at summer camp? The shiver up her spine became a hateful clawing finger, prodding her and convincing her she was right.

  Hard on the heels of her last thought came another. Did Grant bring the other women here? Did he dress them all this way? Was he, every single time, trying to resurrect his teenage romance with Carla? Laurie drew a deep breath. If that was the case, at least she finally knew what she had to do.

  She had come to Stillwater to be a substitut
e for Carla Bryan. Now she had to play the hell out of the role.

  Chapter 16

  Although Cameron still had the headache from hell, the nausea and dizziness had receded and the painkillers were starting to take the edge off. He could even move his head without getting the impression the pain elves were digging tunnels into his brain. Feeling like he had aged twenty years in the last few hours, he shrugged off his brothers’ offers of help and made his way through to his bedroom. Once he had gotten out of his clothes, he stood under the shower for a long time, leaning his right forearm against the tiled wall and letting the lukewarm water wash away the blood.

  If he was right—please let me be right—Grant would seize this opportunity. Within his distorted mind, he had been given a second chance to rescue Carla. He had failed the first time. Carla herself hadn’t needed his help. She had thwarted his attempt to be her white knight and paid for her independence with her life. Now he got to do it all again. How many killers got lucky this way? Cameron believed Grant would try to re-create the scene exactly; only this time he would want to succeed. He would make sure he figured as the heroic rescuer.

  Cameron was counting on Laurie having the same thoughts as him and playing along with Grant. If she antagonized him...the thought made him shudder. No, Laurie wasn’t that stupid. She was strong and smart, and she had her police training, including years of undercover experience, to draw on. If anyone could get through this, it was Laurie.

  For Grant to stage things exactly as they had been with Carla, he would have to wait for nightfall and get Laurie out onto the middle of the lake. Since he had no control over the weather conditions, and couldn’t summon the same storm that had blown up that night, Cameron figured Grant would make sure she got into difficulties some other way. Sneaking up on him wasn’t going to be easy, especially with an injured arm and what felt like a giant hole in the back of his head. Although he might not have been in any fit state to convey his gratitude to them when they turned up at the old mine, Cameron was glad to have Vincente and Bryce with him.