Mori could feel her blood pressure rising, creating a tightness in her chest. The thump of her pulse pounded in her ears. He really thought she’d crawl to him and give in, just like that?
Her fingertips dug into the arms of the distressed-leather chair. “The only arrangements we’re making today go like this: you assure me no other people are going to be hurt, in exchange for which I don’t turn you in for the bomb-setting bastard you are.”
OK, probably not the wisest choice of words. A brief, thunderous flash of rage crossed Michael’s face. His tanned complexion took on a reddish hue all the way to his well-groomed coif of dark hair, which was just beginning to silver at the temples. Then the moment passed, and his face settled back into a neutral expression. His brown eyes held both fire and ice, though. He was pissed. Well, good, so was she.
Mori started as an oversized gray-and-black cat jumped on the coffee table between them and settled on its haunches, staring at her with golden eyes ringed in black. The cat’s back was to Michael, its tail twitching in nervous sweeps.
Funny-looking animal, although Mori wasn’t fond of cats and had never been around many. This one had a small head, and its ears were likewise small and rounded. A spark of recognition jolted through her. This was no domesticated house cat.
“A jaguarundi?” She couldn’t take her eyes off the animal, which stared back at her with a hostile show of teeth. “Why would you take one out of its habitat and bring it here?”
The small member of the puma family had been crowded out of its Texas habitat and was believed to be extinct here, but could still be found in Mexico and South America. Plus, these were aggressive, solitary animals unsuited for captivity. That Michael would bring one here as a pet was incomprehensible.
“Very good. Yes, he’s a jaguarundi, but Travis here is in his native habitat, actually.” Michael sipped his tea, an almost delicate gesture for such a large man. “I keep several on retainer.”
“On retain—” Mori looked back at the cat, which she swore was laughing at her now. A freaking jaguarundi-shifter. They had to be rare, so why they’d let themselves be answerable to one of her kind was hard to grasp.
Except, they all shared an endgame, didn’t they? Survival.
She’d be damned if she’d talk private business in front of one. “If you want to talk to me, you’ll ask your pet”—she jerked her head toward the feline, who’d begun to lick his left front paw with nonchalant arrogance but stopped to hiss—”to take his personal grooming elsewhere.”
Michael’s smile spread slowly and sent chills skittering down Mori’s backbone. “As you wish. Travis, take your brother and drive up to Houston. I’d like a complete report on this handsome new volunteer our Mori seems to be on such friendly terms with. So friendly he even picked her up at FBI headquarters yesterday. Name’s Jack Kelly, I believe.
“Find out who he is, and who his friends are. Find out where he lives.”
CHAPTER 7
Mori had always known Michael Benedict was a bully. An arrogant jackass who always got his way in the school yard of life, whatever means necessary. But until now, she’d never thought him evil and she’d been wrong. Evil was tanned and wealthy and privileged and thought the world revolved around his wants and needs.
They sat silently, staring at each other, while the shifter went into Michael’s private bathroom off his office and changed. In human form, Travis the jaguarundi was a small-boned, slim-hipped man with caramel-colored hair and a nervous habit of tugging on his earlobe. He tugged as he exited the bathroom, tugged when he nodded at Michael, and tugged as he closed the door behind him to go on his nefarious assignment. Kell. God, Michael already knew about him.
As soon as the door clicked shut, Mori rounded on Michael, standing so she could tower over him, at least as long as he remained seated. “You do not go after my coworkers. They have no part in this.” Those cats could tear Kell apart, and he’d never see it coming. If they went after him at work, they’d hurt Taylor as well, or even one of the college kids if they happened to drop in at the wrong time.
Michael steepled his fingers — big hands, powerful hands — in front of his face in an infuriatingly calm gesture. “Your mother called me last night after you left the ranch. Did you know that? Said you were fucking some guy and that’s what had you digging your heels in. I figure it’s the one who picked you up yesterday.”
He’d been having her followed. How had she not considered that? She’d been stupid and naive, that’s how.
Michael pulled a slip of paper from the pocket of his suit coat. “Your associate Mr. Stedman was most helpful in sharing information with me, thinking me a reporter.” He looked up at her. “You really should hire more loyal workers. He said the new volunteer’s name is Jack Kelly, just off active duty in Afghanistan. Injured in service to his country. It would be a pity for him to come all the way back to Houston a hero, only to die because of a selfish little girl who refused to do her duty and honor her commitments.”
He tossed the paper on the table, crossed his legs, and leaned back in the chair with a rustle of distressed leather, making her feel stupid and childish standing there with her feet in a rigid stance and her hands tightened into fists. God, Michael was threatening Kell. He’d done nothing but try to help her, to look for something to fill his days with meaning while he recuperated.
He’d been battle tested, but not for this kind of battle. This one, he couldn’t possibly win.
She had to stay calm. “I haven’t been with anyone in a long time, and you know that if your spies are as good as you think. I barely know the guy; he only showed up three days ago and was nice enough to give me a ride home after you’d implicated me in that bombing. I didn’t see you rushing to my defense. So leave my coworkers alone.”
She’d find time to chew Taylor Stedman a new one later. In fact, when all this blew over, Taylor would be joining the ranks of the unemployed.
Michael gave an exaggerated sigh. “Really, Emory. You should have learned when you went screwing your way through college in some sort of childish rebellion that I don’t care who you fuck, or how often. It doesn’t change your responsibilities. You’ve reached the age of twenty-five, and now you’re mine until I tire of you. That was the agreement, and I thought my birthday message would make it clear how seriously I take it.”
Mori looked at the muted diagonal pattern etched into the thick carpet. The flowers. The note. Her mother’s words. It all added up, but she needed to hear him say it. “You implicated the Co-Op in the bombings so I’d run to you for help. I understand that. But I have to know. Did you set the bombs? Kill the governor and all those innocent people?”
Michael’s chuckle caused Mori’s heart to thud unevenly. “That was a goddamn stroke of brilliance, if I do say so myself.” He closed his eyes as if reliving a vacation memory, not congratulating his own genius in killing hundreds of people. “It stopped those industrial meetings, maybe for good. Ended the expansion talks that would have wiped out more habitat. It let me put a plan in place to control the politics in Austin. And it got the attention of my spoiled, stubborn wife-to-be. Win-win-win-win.”
Mori sat down hard. “You wanted to get my attention and change politics in Austin, so you killed the governor? Hundreds of people who did nothing wrong? You’re insane.” Not to mention a megalomaniac. If his gene pool held the future of their people, they deserved to die out. Mori would be doing the world a favor by ending the line.
“What makes you think the governor is dead?” Michael walked to his desk and retrieved an appointment book.
Mori frowned at him. Carl Felderman’s body hadn’t been found, but neither had dozens of others. Witnesses had seen him in the stairwell at some point before the building collapsed. One man claimed to have seen him leave in a dark sedan, but after Felderman never surfaced, the guy’s claim had been dismissed as post-bombing hysteria. “What do you mean? If the governor’s not dead, where is he?”
Michael returned to
his chair and flipped a couple of pages on his calendar. “Let’s just say he’s been detained while we convince him it’s in his best interests to change his environmental policies. You’ll be seeing him again soon.”
Mori rubbed her temples, which pulsed with the stirrings of a monster headache. She couldn’t even think about what his cryptic comments about the governor might mean, except that she was glad the man was alive. She might not like him personally, but she didn’t want him dead, especially because of her.
“Labor Day’s just over a week away. Did you realize that?” Michael held up his calendar, as if Mori might dispute this earth-shattering revelation.
“Why do I care about Labor Day?” Not only was a tropical storm forming in the central Gulf, but she had a few other problems on her plate — like being suspected of terrorist activities and figuring out a way to avoid becoming a brood mare for Michael Benedict.
He leaned forward, slapped the calendar on the table hard enough to make Tina’s tray rattle, and rose to his full, looming height. “You’re acting like a spoiled brat, so I figure I should speak in a language you’ll understand.”
Mori wanted to stand, to move away from him, but she knew he’d still tower over her. Plus, the look on his face scared her. He’d dropped the benevolent, patronizing jerk persona, and his full power shone through the straight line of his mouth and the ice in his eyes.
But she’d be damned if she showed fear, even though he’d be able to scent it. “And what language might I understand?”
“This. You have forty-eight hours to come to me with an apology and show me the gratitude I deserve for waiting patiently for you until you turned twenty-five instead of taking you at eighteen.”
He took a step closer, and Mori tightened her death grip on the arms of the chair. “I have forty-eight hours, or what?”
Michael’s gaze never left hers. “Or I put the plan in place to do the same thing in New Orleans on Labor Day that I did in Houston. And then I come and take you, take what’s mine. I’m done trying to coax you in like a skittish colt at your granddaddy’s ranch. We both know I can take you any time I want, in any way I want, and as roughly as I want. It’s your choice as to how this plays out.”
He propped a big hand on either arm of Mori’s chair and leaned over her, close enough for her to smell the coffee on his breath and his minty aftershave. “You won’t find being with me unpleasant, Emory. I’m told I’m a very good lover. I can touch you in ways that will make you beg for it, in ways your college boys or your little soldier couldn’t imagine.”
Michael stood, and once again, Mori felt dwarfed by his size and power. She could never overwhelm him, and they both knew it. She didn’t have it in her to kill him, and they both knew that, too. He had enough reach and enough money to find her if she tried to run away.
Which left her one option, her ultimate threat and the only thing she knew he wouldn’t want to risk — her life.
To her surprise, her knees didn’t quiver when she rose to her feet. Now that it had come to this, an eerie calm washed through her and her voice was strong and steady. “Let me speak in a language you will understand, Michael. You will forget about your warped threats for New Orleans. You will call off your jaguarundi thugs and leave my coworkers alone. You will forget whatever it is you’re trying to do with the governor. And you will take a nice little cup and jack off in it under a doctor’s supervision. If those things happen, I might — might — consider having your children and giving you visitation privileges.”
Michael’s tight smile widened into a grin. “Those are some mighty big demands coming from a woman with nothing to back it up. I’ll do those things, or what? You’ll try to kill me?”
Clearly, he didn’t see her real trump card, so she gave him a cold smile in return. “No, I won’t try to kill you, you jackass. I have a lot of more effective options.” She rocked back on her heels and stared at the ceiling, pretending to think. “I could find a nice big bottle of sleeping pills and wash them down with a fifth of tequila. Or I could go to the top of the Chase Building and splatter myself all over a downtown sidewalk.” She shifted her gaze to the water outside. “Or I could walk into the Gulf of Mexico and just keep on walking.”
She looked him in the eye, challenging him. “I’ll kill myself before I let you touch me or hurt anyone else. You have forty-eight hours to decide.”
Mori was on the floor before her brain registered the pain from his fist’s impact. By then, he’d wrapped his hands around her neck and jerked her to her feet again, holding her off the ground a few seconds before slinging her away from him. She landed with a hard crash against the sharp corner of the table, the wood chipping into the side of her arm. Tina’s tray crashed to the floor, and from her vantage point, Mori watched, dazed, as tea spread over the thick, cream-colored carpet.
The world hung motionless as Mori tried to focus, the blood feeling too heavy as it coursed down her cheek where his ring had cut into her, the rasp of her breath too loud, the clink of ice too brittle as Michael picked up his glass. She heard liquid pouring from a bottle, and the stench of bourbon assaulted her nostrils.
But by God, she’d gotten through to him. Finally. And his fury told her he’d taken her threat seriously. He’d retrieved his whiskey bottle from the floor and taken a drink during business hours.
Mori climbed to her feet and waited for the dizziness to pass. “Forty-eight hours,” she whispered. “And I do as I threatened.”
Michael’s voice was tight with rage. “The timetable’s changed. Twenty-four hours and I take you — with or without your consent. I continue with plans for New Orleans. And I’ll kill your new boyfriend while you watch.”
CHAPTER 8
Sitting in the outdoor dining area of Niko Niko’s, Kell shoved his chair as close to the building as it would go in hopes of soaking up a little air-conditioning. He swiped his hand across the condensation on his water glass and scrubbed his wet palm across his face. What he wouldn’t give to be at Cote Blanche. The temperature would still be one step shy of meltdown, but at least he wouldn’t be frying from the radiant heat of concrete and steel.
A tropical storm had formed in the lower Gulf, moving at a crawl. Bad thing: slow-moving storms often mushroomed into hurricanes. Good thing: Tropical Storm Geneva had already started sucking a tiny bit of the humidity out of the air. The concrete was still hot enough to bake the soles of his feet through his running shoes, but at least he hadn’t sweated all the way through his shirt. Yet.
Kell had propped his cell phone against a votive holder on the table while he demolished a plate of calamari. Finally, the little screen lit to signal an incoming call. About damned time. He was waiting to hear from Robin, who’d been tailing Mori by air. He was waiting to hear from the colonel, who wanted an update. And he was waiting for Nik to share the results of the past two days spent sniffing around the bomb site, psychically speaking.
He picked up the phone and looked at the screen; Colonel Rick won the jackpot.
Now he had to figure out how to tell the man — who so far hadn’t shown any sign of possessing a sense of humor — that not only did he have no leads, but he also might have the hots for the primary suspect. This assignment was shaping up not to be his finest hour. “Kellison.”
“Where are we?” Colonel Rick Thomas’s voice vibrated with the low notes of authority and the high notes of hard-ass.
“We’re following up on some leads, sir.” Technically true. Nik was bringing some drawings, Robin had put in a lot of flight time, and he…Well, he’d invited the potential terrorist to go on a running date.
“In other words, you’ve got jack shit.”
Kell winced and took a sip of his water. “Pretty much.”
An uncomfortable silence swelled over the line. At least Kell found it pretty miserable.
“Here’s the thing, Colonel. My gut’s telling me the Co-Op had nothing to do with that bombing. Emory Chastaine’s got nothing to red-flag her as a ter
rorist. Obviously, Homeland’s watching her every move and hasn’t come up with anything, either. The Co-Op has no history of violence; in fact, all their public statements denounce extreme forms of activism. And the assistant director’s a dickweed, but he’s not smart enough to have pulled off that bombing. Has it occurred to the higher-ups that the terrorist was the one who called in the tip?”
“Of course it has. But even if the bomber is someone with a grudge against the Co-Op or Ms. Chastaine, she’s our way in.” The colonel paused before continuing. “Have you gotten close enough in the organization — with this Emory Chastaine — to be sure they’re clean and that she’s a random scapegoat? Sure enough to pull your team off the case?”
Damn it. He was sure Mori wasn’t the bomber, but she was hiding something and it could involve the bombing. Her response to being wrongly accused was too detached. He might be horny, but he wasn’t blind.
“Jack, your silence says more than your words — which haven’t told me shit.” The colonel’s voice barked through the phone so loudly Kell pulled it away from his ear a couple of inches. “Until you can tell me with a hundred percent certainty that Emory Chastaine is innocent, stay on it. Stay on her. Hell, fuck the woman. I saw the file. She’s not bad looking. Tell me you haven’t been bunking with the Rangers so long you forgot how to sweet-talk a woman between the sheets.”
Kell’s tongue stuck to the roof of his mouth, and his words came out muffled. “Good idea, sir.” He waited to hear a laugh or chuckle — something — to indicate the colonel was joking. Right. No sense of humor.
During their months of Ranger School torture and bonding, Robin had called Kell a tight-ass. Actually, “tight-ass puritan” were her exact words, and Kell had blown her off. But she might be right, because the idea of seducing Mori to wheedle secrets out of her offended him to the core.
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