Love And Lies

by Dawn Stewardson

  “A walk?” she said nervously. “You mean like on the beach? Where people have been known to get shot at?”

  “That’s what I said in the note.” Cade tugged off his sweatshirt. “I didn’t say it was the truth.” He unsnapped his jeans.

  TALIA POURED herself another cup of coffee, glad Cade had suggested they have breakfast in the room. Even before he’d ended up back in bed with her, she hadn’t wanted to spend any more time than necessary surrounded by other people. She wanted every possible minute alone with him.

  When she smiled across the table at him he said, “Happy?”

  “Extremely.”

  “Well, you’ll be a lot happier once we get out of here.”

  She nodded, although in the bright morning light things really didn’t seem half as scary as they had last night. Oh, she still didn’t intend to take any chances. But Cade had a gun now, and he’d assured her his cop uncle had taught him to shoot well.

  So she’d acquired her own armed bodyguard, and she certainly wasn’t going anywhere without him. Even with him, the only place she’d be going was to talk to Bud.

  “Should we check in with Harlan?” she said, glancing across the table again.

  Cade looked at his watch. “He’s probably in the dining room. And my note said we’d see him at eight-thirty, so I’m sure he’ll be here by then.”

  “Or sooner,” she said as someone knocked on the door.

  “Talia?” the someone called. “You in there? It’s me, Gerr.”

  “What’s he doing here?” Cade muttered.

  She shrugged and headed for the door, checking the peephole just to make sure it really was Gerr. It was, although instead of yesterday’s sophisticated look, he was dressed in Western attire today—checked shirt, jeans and cowboy boots. When she opened the door, he looked curiously past her at Cade—then at the bed they’d torn apart with their lovemaking.

  “I was watching for you in the dining room,” he finally said, looking at her again. “And when you didn’t come in, I thought I’d try up here.”

  “Yes…well,” she mumbled, her face hot, “Cade and I had something to talk about, so we thought we’d get together for breakfast and just have it in here.”

  “Uh, sorry to interrupt then, but can I come in for a minute?”

  Stepping back, she glanced at Cade. He was eyeing Gerr with a decidedly hostile expression.

  “I brought you something else you’ll probably want to talk about.” Gerr shoved the door closed, then held out the denim jacket he’d been carrying over his arm. “Either of you ever see this before?”

  Cade shrugged. “There are an awful lot of denim jackets in the world.”

  “Yes, but I found this particular one hidden behind a bush near the road to town. I decided I’d just take a walk in that direction first thing this morning, to see if there were footprints or anything. And the jacket was right about where our guy would’ve been standing last night. There was a pair of leather gloves, too.”

  Cade walked over and reached for the jacket. He looked at the label, then at Gerr. “Size forty-two. That’d be about right, wouldn’t it. And now that I think about it, Roger does have a jacket like this. He wore it on the ferry on the trip over here. Remember, Talia?”

  “Yes, but are you two saying Roger was our shooter, after all?”

  “Does an alligator live in the swamp?” Gerr said.

  She glanced at him, thinking for a tiny second that seemed like a strange saying for a New Yorker. Then she went back to thinking about Roger.

  “But last night,” she said, “you both agreed there’d be a smell of gunpowder on his hands if…Oh, my Lord. That’s where the gloves come in.”

  “Bingo,” Gerr said. “And the jacket would have protected his sweater from traces of cordite. There’s no smell on it now, but there sure could’ve been last night.”

  While Gerr was talking, Cade wrapped his arm around Talia’s shoulders—just as well, given the sudden dizziness she was feeling.

  Roger was working for Joey Carpaccio. Roger was their informer. And the shooter, too, so it looked as if she and Cade had been wrong. Joey probably didn’t have two people on the island. Roger had been doing double duty.

  She almost said so to Cade, then realized she shouldn’t. Gerr didn’t know about the mole. Or about anything else to do with the jury, for that matter. And until Bud and their trial judge—not to mention the sheriff’s department and whoever else might be involved—got everything sorted out, she and Cade probably shouldn’t be saying much to anyone.

  “You okay?” Cade asked, giving her shoulders a little squeeze.

  She nodded, but it was a lie. As much as she’d wanted to know who’d been shooting at her, finding out didn’t make her feel any better. After spending six weeks with the other jurors, the fact that one of them could turn around and try to kill her made her feel downright ill.

  Cade gave her another concerned glance, then looked at Gerr. “What made you go have a look? Just a hunch?”

  “Not exactly. Remember after Liz drove us back last night? How when we got out of the van Roger wanted to talk to me?”

  Talia and Cade nodded.

  “What he wanted was to make sure I didn’t think he could’ve done the shooting.”

  “But he knew that,” Talia said. “I mean, he pointed out there was no smell of gunpowder. And you and Cade both agreed it couldn’t have been him.”

  “Right. I’d already said I knew it wasn’t him, but there he was, trying to convince me. And that got me wondering why he hadn’t just let it drop. That’s the writer’s mind at work. We’re always thinking about motivations. At any rate, that’s why I thought I’d have a look-see.

  “But now I’m wondering about something else,” he went on. “Roger doesn’t know me from Adam. So it had to be you he was shooting at, Talia. You know why?”

  She glanced anxiously at Cade. She knew she couldn’t say that Joey Carpaccio had one of the jurors in his pocket, but she didn’t have a cover story on the tip of her tongue.

  “The answer,” Cade said, bailing her out, “is pretty straightforward. It isn’t obvious when you first meet him, but our friend Roger is kind of unbalanced.”

  “Really?” Gerr put so much interest into the one word that Talia was certain his next book would feature an unbalanced juror.

  “I wonder if he went back to get the jacket this morning,’’ Talia said, trying to do her part by changing the subject. “After you already had it, I mean. I wonder if he figures somebody’s on to him.”

  “I don’t know,” Gerr said. “But maybe the more important question is what we’re going to do now that we know it was him. I guess we should call the cops, huh?”

  Talia glanced at Cade again. The obvious thing to do was just tell Bud the whole story and let him call all the authorities.

  The look Cade gave her said that was what he was thinking, too. Then he made an almost imperceptible gesture with his thumb, suggesting the best thing they could do was try to get rid of Gerr.

  Before they had a chance, though, there was another knock on the door.

  THIS TIME Cade played doorman. And this time it was Harlan.

  “Who’s that?” Harlan hissed, peering in at Gerald Asimov. “And what’s he doing in there? I need to talk to you two.”

  Cade stepped out into the hall and pulled the door almost shut. “That’s the lawyer-writer I told you about last night. The guy Talia had dinner with. And he just showed up.”

  “But I need to talk to you,” Harlan said again. “It’s important. About—” he looked up and down the hall “-the mole.”

  “Right. We want to talk to you, too. Just give us a minute, okay?”

  “Well, don’t be any longer, huh? Because this really is important.”

  “We’ll be there as soon as we can.” Cade waited while Harlan walked the few steps to their door, feeling as if he’d been thrown into the middle of some cloak-and-dagger theatrical piece. Then he turned and we
nt back into Talia’s room.

  “It was Harlan,” he told her. “My roommate,” he explained to Gerr.

  Gerr nodded. “While you were talking to him Talia and I started thinking that calling the cops might not be the best idea just yet. I mean, we’ve got this jacket, but when they ask Roger if it’s his he’ll probably say it’s not. And that’ll be the end of the story.”

  Cade nodded. “Maybe you’re right. But look, our deliberations start at nine-thirty, so we’ve got to be down in the conference room by then. And there’s something we have to do before that, so…”

  “No problem,” Gerr said. “But I’m going to have a shot at talking to Roger. I’ll see if I can get something more solid on him, and then we can call the cops.”

  “I don’t think that’s a good idea,” Cade said firmly. “You don’t have any idea how he’d react.”

  Gerr shrugged. “Even somebody who’s mentally unbalanced isn’t going to do anything if other people are around. And when I left the dining room Roger had just come in. So I’ll go back down and catch him while he’s eating. And I’ll play it really cool. I’ll just start a conversation, with his jacket over my arm, and take it from there. With any luck, he’ll get upset enough that—”

  “Gerr,” Cade interrupted, “the man was shooting at you and Talia last night. Trying to get him upset really doesn’t strike me as a rational thing to do.”

  “Cade’s right,” Talia said. “It just wouldn’t—”

  “Hey, will you two relax?” Gerr started for the door. “I’m not going to do anything dumb. And maybe I’ll get something to help put this guy away. At any rate, I’ll check in with you later.”

  Cade swore quietly as Gerr headed out. “This is getting really nuts,” he muttered. “First Harlan starts playing amateur detective. Now our resident writer’s doing it. And somehow they’ve both hooked themselves up with us—two guys who’d be the last ones I’d pick if we were choosing teams.”

  “Who would you pick first?” Talia asked. “Roger Podonyi?”

  “Very funny.” He forced himself to smile, knowing she was only trying to lighten the mood. “You shouldn’t have to ask who I’d pick first.” He took her in his arms. “And that’s why I can’t stop worrying about something happening to you before we get out of here,” he added, pulling her close and holding her, wishing he never had to let her go.

  “Everything’s going to be fine,” she murmured at last. “All we have to do is go and talk to Bud, put the mistrial wheels in motion.”

  “Right.” Reluctantly he released her. “But first we’ve got to collect Harlan.”

  Talia nodded. “I wonder how he’s going to feel when we tell him about Roger. I mean, about our finding out who the mole is when he couldn’t.”

  “He’s probably not going to be very happy about it. Actually, though, he said he had something important to tell us about the mole.”

  “Oh? Do you think he found out something? Between the time you snooped on his computer and now?”

  “Who knows? But whatever he wants to talk about, we can’t let him ramble on. The sooner we see Bud the better. So no messing around, okay?”

  Talia gave him a smile so sexy it sent a rush of desire through him. “Can we mess around for just another minute?” She moved closer again.

  He reached for her once more, resisting the urge to kiss her. If he did that they might never get around to seeing Bud. So, instead, he simply held her, breathing in the fresh-from-the-shower scent of her hair and thinking how great it was going to be when they were back in the real world.

  Once they were they’d have the luxury of enough time to be together. They wouldn’t have to settle for only stolen moments. Still, he told himself, closing his eyes, stolen moments were better than none at all.

  Chapter Fifteen

  The knock on his door made the mole jump. “Yes?” he called, glancing nervously around, checking that both his laptop and cell phone were locked away in his suitcase—even though he knew they were.

  “It’s Harlan Gates,” his visitor announced. “I need to talk to you for a minute.”

  Wondering what the hell Harlan wanted, the mole opened his door a foot or so.

  Harlan pushed his glasses up on his nose and looked into the room. “You’re alone, huh? Okay if I come in?”

  “Well, actually, I was just getting ready to go down to the conference room.”

  “This is real important. And there’s plenty of time till nine-thirty. I want to show you something,” he added, waving the sheets of paper he was holding.

  The mole shrugged and opened the door wider. “What’s up?” he asked as Harlan came in and pushed the door closed. “What’ve you got there?”

  Harlan didn’t say another word. He simply handed over the pages.

  It took a single glance at the top one to start the mole sweating. “What’s this?” he asked as casually as he could.

  “Oh, come on, you know what it is. So let’s not fool around.”

  “How would I know what it is? It’s not in English.”

  “No, it’s in code. But I’ve got another copy that I decoded. And I know you sent the original.”

  “Sent it where?”

  Harlan shrugged. “Okay, have it your way. I just thought you might want to explain it to Bud yourself. It might’ve made them go easier on you.”

  “Harlan, I…” He hesitated, trying to quell the sick feeling in his stomach.

  He’d known he’d get caught—somehow, by someone. From the day Joey Carpaccio’s friends had first come to see him he’d known this was how things would turn out. And he’d also known he’d be dead meat if they did.

  He could still hear what Joey’s goon had said in that damn washroom: “We don’t want no retrial, see?”

  he’d muttered. “We want this over and done with….

  So we’re countin’ on you to deliver.”

  But he hadn’t delivered. Harlan’s discovery meant there would be a retrial. And it meant he was going to be dead meat—unless he could work something out here.

  Maybe Harlan would take a bribe to keep his mouth shut or—

  “Don’t get any funny ideas,” Harlan said. “Because I’m not the only one who knows about this. Cade and Talia do, too. They’d have come with me now, but they got tied up with somebody. And you’d never get away with bumping off all three of us.”

  The mole wearily shook his head. “Harlan, I could never bump off anybody. I’m not a violent man. I didn’t even want to do what I did, but I didn’t have any choice, and now…Just give me a minute to think, okay?”

  “Think fast.”

  He tried to do exactly that. If all three of them were on to him he could scrap the idea of bribery. He was sure neither Cade nor Talia were the bribe-taking type. Which really left him with only one option.

  All he could do was get the hell out of here. Off this island and right out of South Carolina. Then, if he changed his name, if he started over someplace where nobody could find him, where Joey couldn’t find him…

  He’d thought of that possibility long ago of course. Almost as soon as they’d roped him into doing this. It had to be possible to disappear. The world was a big place, and the Witness Protection Program helped people vanish all the time. So if you had enough brains and money why couldn’t you do it on your own?

  Oh, he knew it was a long shot. And a last resort. But it looked as if that was all there was left to try.

  “Time’s up,” Harlan announced.

  He nodded. “Okay, let’s talk about this. Because if I’m going down I don’t see any point in going alone.”

  “WHERE IS HE?” Talia asked when they opened the door and there was no sign of Harlan.

  “I don’t know.” Cade crossed to the bathroom and looked inside, then checked the balcony. “Where the hell would he go?” he muttered.

  Talia glanced around the room. Harlan’s laptop and printer were in their usual place on the dresser, and beside them were a few sheet
s of paper, neatly stacked.

  She gazed at them for a moment, thinking they hadn’t been there last night. “You’re sure,” she asked, “that he knew he was supposed to wait here for us?”

  “Positive. But he obviously got tired of waiting and went somewhere. Maybe he decided to go and talk to Bud without us.”

  “I can’t see him doing that,” she said, beginning to feel a little anxious. “Last night, he didn’t want any of us talking to Bud.”

  “Well, maybe you’re right, but let’s find out.”

  Earlier, they’d checked on what room Bud was in. But when Cade tried the number there was no answer.

  “Now what?” Talia said. Her sense that something might be wrong had started growing. “We should try to find Harlan, shouldn’t we?”

  Cade ran his fingers through his hair, then absently patted his sweater—where it was pulled down over his gun. Seeing that made her more anxious yet.

  “I think the best thing to do,” he finally said, “is find Bud and talk to him. Get the mistrial wheels in motion as you put it. Then we can worry about Harlan. So I’ll go look for Bud and bring him back here and—”

  “No, I’ll go with you.”

  “You’ll be safer here.”

  “Cade, I’ll be safe with you.” And she wanted to be with him. She didn’t want anything happening to him, and if Roger had figured out that Cade had voted guilty, too…Well, four eyes watching out for danger were better than two.

  “Let’s go,” she said, starting for the door before he could prolong the argument.

  They tried the dining room first, but there was no sign of Bud—and no sign of Roger and Gerr, either.

  Their next stop was the conference room. But not only was it empty, a note from their foreman was taped to the door. It said that the deliberations wouldn’t be starting until one o’clock and that everyone should make sure they were here by then so they could get going on time.

  “On time,” Talia said, “was supposed to have been nine-thirty. So why would Myron change that and waste an entire morning?”

  “I don’t know. It doesn’t matter, though, because there aren’t going to be any more deliberations. But look, I think we should go back upstairs. We can track Bud down from there.”