by Kylie Brant
“Are you still brooding about Beardmore?” Dare fitted her key into the lock and opened the door.
“Not really. I’m sure by tomorrow he’ll have come up with a way to spin this whole thing so that his candidacy gets a boost.”
“That shouldn’t be difficult once Delgado’s PD turns over the tapes he promised.” There was a clicking sound as Dare attempted to turn on the lights. “What’d you do, forget to pay your electricity bill?”
“Funny.” She pushed him aside, reached for the switch and flipped it. The house remained dark. “I must have blown a fuse.”
“Where are they?” Dare’s arms came around her, swept her figure, as he nuzzled her neck. “I can change them for you.”
Laughter sounded in her voice. “Well, you won’t find them in there.” Pushing his wandering hands away, she placed her purse and briefcase on the floor. “The fuse box is downstairs.”
Not having been blessed with night vision, she made her way through the living room and to the kitchen more by feel than sight. She found the flashlight she kept under the kitchen sink and switched it on.
“Do we have to take that?” Dare’s voice was disappointed. “I was looking forward to getting you alone in the dark.”
“Later,” she promised, leading him to the basement door and opening it. “We’re going to need this to change the fuse.” Carefully she descended the steep steps. Although the basement ran the length and width of the house, it was little more than a cellar, with as many twists and turns as a rabbit hole. Because her former apartment had afforded her much more space than this house did, she’d been forced to box many of her belongings and store them down here.
With the beam lighting their way, she wound her way through the rows of boxes and showed him to the small back area of the basement. Selecting one of the fuses from the neat row atop the fuse box, she handed it to him.
“Ah, Addie.” Laughter sounded in Dare’s voice. “Well prepared in case of an emergency. Why am I not surprised?”
Jabbing her elbow into his ribs, she said, “At times like these, being well prepared is—” She stopped, his hand against her lips unnecessary. She’d heard the noise, too.
Goose bumps broke out over her skin. “Probably a mouse,” she breathed.
“Vermin, maybe.” His voice was merely a breath of sound in her ear. He reached for the flashlight, switched it off. “But bigger than a mouse.”
The slight creak that sounded then was unmistakable. Someone was on the stairs.
“Is there another exit out of the basement?”
She shook her head in response to his whisper, and he crowded her against the far wall. Icebergs formed in her veins, owing nothing to the chilliness of the area. The footsteps were coming closer, heralded by a beam of light. As it swept back and forth it highlighted the gun held in the outstretched gloved hand.
“Where are you, A.J.?” Shock rendered her motionless for an instant. She wondered if Dare had recognized the voice, but didn’t waste time asking.
“We have to split up.” She barely breathed the words.
He shook his head violently. “Don’t even think about it.” His voice was no less lethal for being nearly soundless. “You stay here. I’ll cause a distraction.”
When she didn’t answer right away, he reached for her hand, squeezed warningly. “Okay,” she whispered, and waited for him to relax a fraction, release her.
Then she bolted away, scurrying as quickly as she could, slipping through a space between the wall and the furnace. Dare would be furious, but she couldn’t regret her action. She wasn’t going to stay there while he put himself in danger on her behalf. It wasn’t Dare’s battle to fight, and she wasn’t going to allow him to get hurt. It had been her job that had swept them both into danger.
And it was her brother who’d been sent to kill them.
“Funny, I don’t remember inviting you, Leo.” She used the cover of her words to mask the sound of her movements, as she crept further away. “Don’t tell me you’re lost.”
“It’s a long story.” She could hear him moving to where he’d last heard her voice, and she used his movements to disguise her own. “If you come out I’ll tell you about it.”
“I was never the brainless one. But you must be, if you think I don’t have this all figured out.”
“You never suspected a thing.” The sneer was apparent in his voice, and despite the blanket of darkness, she could picture his face, lip curled derisively. She’d seen the look numerous times. “Bet you didn’t know I was in your house almost every night, did you?”
He’d managed to shock her yet again. In her house? She heard his stealthy movements come nearer, and she stilled, holding her breath.
“Why’d you think I stopped by that first time, to chat about old times? I made a wax mold of your key, had one made, and I was in and out of here as often as I liked. Some of my old skills really come in handy.”
She’d taken advantage of his speech to inch further around a corner. “Why?”
“For your notes on the case, of course. Every night while you slept peacefully in the other room, I was in your briefcase. I knew everything you discovered, every action you were going to take. I was paid handsomely for passing that information on.”
“Who was paying you?” It was Dare who asked the question, and A.J. could feel herself tense. He was following her original suggestion, splitting up from her, so Leo would have two directions to contend with. She knew it was their only chance out of there. But fear for him was sending splinters of ice through her heart.
“It doesn’t matter.” For the first time she heard a note of uncertainty lace her brother’s voice. She knew in that instant that he’d been drinking. The false bravado, the courage he could only ever seem to gain with a liquor crutch, were dead giveaways.
“How much did you have to drink to convince yourself to go through with this?” she asked in a conversational voice, scooting along a wall and around another corner. “What’d it take? One bottle? More?”
“Shut up.”
She proceeded as if she hadn’t heard the venom-laced word. Maybe if she kept him diverted, Dare could find a way to safety. Their best chance was to coax Leo further into the basement, allowing them a chance at the stairs. “I know you couldn’t do it on your own.” She allowed a tinge of amused pity to enter her voice. “You never did have any guts.”
“Shut up!” The shout was punctuated with a deafening blast, and she pressed her face against the floor. He’d fired the gun. The knowledge was mind numbing. Even learning what he’d been involved in, she was still astonished. Still heart torn.
“Addie!”
Hearing the terror in Dare’s voice, she swallowed hard and answered. “I’m fine. My brother’s no better at shooting than he was at anything else in his pathetic life. What’s the matter, Leo? Didn’t get enough practice?”
“Hard to get any practice when I had the gun stashed in the old lady’s room.”
She stopped, in the middle of ducking down another row of boxes. “What?”
“You heard me.” He was back on top of his game, certain he had the upper hand. The beam of the flashlight he carried swept the rows as he stalked her. “Kept it safely above one of the ceiling panels. Gave her quite a start when I retrieved it today.” There was a shrug in his voice.
“You bastard.” Cold-blooded fury was pounding through her veins, melting the ice there. The scene in her mother’s room that afternoon took on a new meaning. She hadn’t slipped into one of her mental fugues—she’d been shoved, sadistically, by seeing a gun in Leo’s hand. “Did you ever once consider the memories that would hold for her?”
“She won’t even remember it tomorrow.”
A.J. held her breath when a beam played over the next row. It was probably her imagination that there was a hint of regret in his words. Leo, she well knew, felt sorry for no one but himself.
“Let’s stop this.” His voice was coaxing, the sound of his footsteps a
s he walked along in the row beside hers plainly audible. “You can’t believe I’m going to hurt you.”
She huddled on the floor, much too close to him to try answering.
“I didn’t let anything happen to you when you were kidnapped, did I? You weren’t hurt. Not really.”
Bile rose as she listened to him rationalize her kidnapping, attempted rape. Knowing that her brother had been behind that was something she doubted she’d ever get over.
He’d moved beyond her. She crawled in the opposite direction. “Maybe your buddies didn’t understand your directions well enough.”
“Tommy got out of hand. I heard that. But you came out of it okay, and you will this time, too. My orders are just to keep you and your boyfriend confined for a while. Nothing more.”
Did he really expect her to believe that? Did he believe it himself? She heard a slight noise, was desperately afraid it was Dare. To cover for him she spoke, deliberately sounding uneasy. “Are you sure?”
“I wouldn’t lie to you, A.J. I’m not going to hurt you.”
She heard a sound nearby. Terror clutched her heart when she realized it was Dare. Time was running out. She knew him well enough to be certain he’d try to overpower Leo, and she wasn’t going to allow him to endanger himself for her. Without questioning where the fierce feeling of protectiveness welled from, she took a deep breath, prayed that he’d follow her lead. “Okay. I’m coming out.” Slowly she rose, stood still, as the light swung across her, then back to steady on her. The glare blinded her for a second, and then the light went flying away in the midst of a crash.
Listening to the sounds of the struggle, A.J. ran for the light and turned it in the direction of the two men locked in battle. They rolled into and out of its beam. Dare smashed his fist against Leo’s jaw, and then the other man reached for his throat. She used the light to search frantically for the gun. If she could just get her hands on it, she could put an end to the scene.
The men broke apart for an instant, and she located the weapon. It had slid across the floor a ways, halfway between the two men and her. She prepared to spring for it when another voice sounded from the stairs.
“For God’s sakes, you fool. Shoot her!” For an instant there wasn’t a breath of movement. It was as if they were trapped in a frozen tableau. “Then get out of the way so I can finish McKay.”
She flinched as the bright beam spotlighted them, leaving the stranger shrouded in darkness. There was no time to wonder at the man’s identity. No time to wonder how he’d gotten there. Only one thing filtered to her brain. Dare was in imminent peril.
“I said shoot her, man! Or step aside and I’ll do it myself.”
As if the words shattered their inaction, Leo, Dare and A.J. simultaneously dove for the gun. Her brother got to it first. Time slowed to a crawl. His arm raised…he aimed…Dare grabbed him…
And a shot blasted through the room. A.J. watched as Leo staggered, clutched his chest. Dare dived for the gun, but her eyes were glued, horror-stricken, to her brother. His gaze locked with hers, blood seeping through his fingers. For an instant the rest of room faded away. She was by his side as he dropped to the floor, shrugging out of her jacket to press it futilely to the gaping wound.
“Addie, get down!”
Dare’s warning had her attention shifting. Two more shots split the silence, deafening in the small area. A tearing pain sliced through her shoulder. A moment later a weight hit her, rolled her across the floor in a dizzying arc. More shots sounded. Dare uttered a curse. Then she came to a sudden stop, her head slamming into something solid. She had a flare of panic for Dare’s safety before everything went black.
“You have no idea how happy I am to get out of that place.”
Dare figured he had a pretty good idea, given the pace Addie had set. She’d all but run to the car once they’d gotten outdoors.
“I hate hospitals!”
Recognizing the panic beneath her vehemence, he kept his voice soothing. “I know, honey. Here, let me.” He opened the passenger door of the car and helped her inside. Then, rounding the hood, he opened the opposite door and slid in beside her, reaching over to secure her seat belt.
“I’m not an invalid.”
“I don’t want you reinjuring your shoulder. You’re supposed to go right home and get some rest. The doctor was clear about that.”
Her lip curled. “He was a quack.”
“He was head of the trauma department, honey. You’re just holding a grudge because he made you spend the night there.”
She didn’t quite manage to hide her shudder. “The longest night of my life.”
His lips quirked. Most of the night she hadn’t even been conscious, due to the sedative they’d managed to slip her. He sobered quickly, remembering how she’d looked crumpled on the floor, still and bloody. The instant it had taken him to find her pulse had been the worst moment of his life.
He started the car and pulled from the hospital parking lot. He had no intention of taking her back to her place. Not after last night. Not yet. To distract her from the direction they were heading, he said, “What’d Beardmore want this morning?”
She gave a humorless laugh. “Despite his dismay at my near-death experience, he wanted to congratulate me on the case. You may now address me as Chief Deputy Assistant Attorney of the Felony Division.”
“You got promoted?” Keeping one eye on the traffic, he leaned over, placed a delighted kiss on her cheek. “Something must have changed his mood since you talked to him last night.”
At that moment A.J. couldn’t work up an answering enthusiasm. She, better than anyone, knew just how easily this case could have turned out to be totally different. There was, however, satisfaction to be had in thinking about Stanley’s reaction to the news. He wouldn’t relish having A.J. as his superior. The thought was cheering.
Belatedly she returned to her explanation. “What changed Beardmore’s mood was the tapes Delgado’s PD delivered today. Justice is showing definite interest in them, and he’s elated to be working closely with that department. It seems that a voice sounding suspiciously like Victor Mannen’s is heard ordering hits on Patterson and Connally.”
“Son of a—” Dare said, pounding the steering wheel lightly with one fist. “We finally got him.”
She slid a glance at him. “Not yet, but he must be running scared. He’s already retained legal counsel.”
“Paquin?”
Thinking of her nemesis, a small smile settled on her lips. “No, Paquin is going to be kept busy for a while defending himself from charges of suborning perjury. The testimony of those two witnesses he introduced at the prelim aren’t going to stand up to close scrutiny. We’re not going to drop that part of the investigation, even if Delgado is dead.”
She made no protest when he turned in to his apartment’s parking garage. Just the thought of returning home had her shuddering. She wondered if she’d be able to live in the house again after what had happened there.
Maddeningly, just the walk from the car to his apartment was enough to exhaust her. She sank into a chair as soon as they entered the apartment, despising the weakness she felt. “I need to call St. Anne’s.”
“I called this morning and explained to a Sister Katherine that you wouldn’t be by today.”
She opened her mouth to contradict him, but her protest was quelled by the look on his face. Arguing with him in this mood would be futile.
“Your mother had a good night and was in the recreation room with the other patients when I called.”
She looked at him sharply. “In the recreation room? She hasn’t joined the other patients in weeks.”
His brows lifted. “Then I take it this is good news?”
For the first time that day a real smile curved her lips. “Very good news.”
Sitting on the arm of her chair, he reached over, toyed with a strand of her hair. “You haven’t mentioned Leo.”
“I spoke to his doctor. He came through th
e surgery all right and his condition is guarded.”
Once that carefully empty voice would have maddened him. But he knew just how deep the emotional wounds went, knew just how difficult they would be to heal. Taking her hand in his, he toyed with her fingers. “I’m not sure how much you remember about those last few minutes that night.”
“I remember the stranger telling Leo to shoot me.” He hated the flat, emotionless tone she used. “I remember Leo going for the gun.”
“He got to it a split second before I did, but he didn’t aim it at you, Addie.” His gaze probed hers. It was important that she believe him. “He was pointing it at the man threatening you. That’s why he was shot.”
There was a dart of pain directly under her heart. She wasn’t certain it would ever go away. “I wish I could be sure of that.”
“I’m sure.” His voice was firm. He brought her hand to his lips, pressed a kiss on her knuckles. “I’m sure, Addie.” She gazed at him searchingly, a flicker of hope mingling with the despair in her eyes. “Despite everything else he did, I really don’t think he meant for you to be harmed.”
“Whoever he was working for had other plans.”
Dare’s face went grim. “Connally was able to talk to Leo this morning. I don’t think there’s any question who your brother was working for. He made an effort to disguise his voice, but it was Mannen, I’d stake my life on it. He never actually saw the man who was paying him, but he was ordered several times to divert you from the case. Last night he was supposed to keep us confined.” His jaw went tight. He wouldn’t share with her the conclusion he and Gabe had drawn, that Mannen had intended to dispose of all three of them once Leo had followed orders. Addie’s injury was the latest in a long list of grievances that Mannen needed to pay for.
She drew in a deep breath, released it. Immediately his gaze went to her face, examining it critically for any hint of pain. When he didn’t find any, he relaxed minusculely.
