by Anne Stuart
Michael reached for another cigarette. He seldom smoked more than two a day, but this had been a hell of a day. "The day you can't count on me, then I'll be gone. I don't do things halfway."
"That you don't, mate." Geoffrey looked over his shoulder at the burned out shell of the building. "You really think we got them all?"
"No."
Geoffrey swore. "Why not?"
"You've seen them. Which one do you think was giving the orders?"
"You've got a point. A bunch of dedicated fanatics, but none of them has the vision that some of their recent antics have required. And the ones we've got won't talk, that's for sure. So what's next?"
Michael leaned his head against the building and shut his eyes. He hated the smells, the noise, the stench of death and despair. And yet he'd stepped back into it so easily, breathing in that stench, moving with lethal accuracy. That should have told him, better than anything, that he couldn't turn his back on his way of life. Only death would free him. There was no room for a woman like Francey Neeley in his life. No room at all.
"What's next?" he echoed, staring at his smoke out of half-closed eyes. "Malta?"
"Malta?" Geoffrey said. "I thought they were traced to Gibraltar."
"That's what Ross tells me, but I was never known for being gullible. According to Ross, his operatives have told him the Cadre's planning something in the area of Gibraltar. But I've picked up a hint or two from my own sources, and my money's on Malta."
Geoffrey nodded. "Will he let you go?"
Michael grinned savagely. "Can he stop me?"
His old friend nodded. "I'd like to see his reaction when he finds out you've gone."
"No, you wouldn't. He can be quite nasty when he's in the mood. Watch yourself around him. Get yourself transferred as fast as you can."
Geoffrey laughed. "You're turning into an old maid, Cougar. I've got enough to worry about, with the Cadre's leader still loose. I can't waste time worrying about my boss's temper."
"Your funeral," Michael said absently. And then his gaze focused, sharpened, on Geoffrey's narrow face. "And it just might be," he added.
"I'm invincible," Geoffrey said. "I've been in the business as long as you have, and I still get a kick out of it. Nothing's ever going to get to me."
"There's a difference between Malta and Gibraltar, you realize," Ross Cardiff said, his face screwed up as if he were tasting something nasty.
That was one of the things Michael disliked most about Ross. His sour expression, his whine, and the fact that he never swore. Anyone else might say there was a hell of a difference between the two islands, but not Ross.
"I'm aware of my geography," Michael said blandly. Ever since Ross Cardiff had been put in charge he'd had little recourse against the man's pettiness. His only act of aggression was to never let Ross know just how much he despised the man. For his pettiness, his narrow-mindedness, his bloody stupidity that had cost people their lives.
"Yes, I forgot," Ross murmured. "You went to Willingborough. They teach young gentlemen such things, don't they?"
Michael allowed himself a small, savage smile. He'd gone to the prestigious school on scholarship, a working-class boy who'd had to use his fists to even survive the first year. But Ross persisted in thinking of him as part of the affluent upper classes, and Michael allowed him to do so. Knowing that it drove Ross crazy was one of the small indulgences he allowed himself.
"They do," he said. "I still think Gibraltar's a blind."
"And you think I'm fool enough to fall for it? It doesn't say much for your confidence in my ability to lead."
Michael wisely said nothing. He'd never known anyone possessing fewer leadership abilities than Ross Cardiff, who'd achieved his current status through brownnosing and the general bloody-mindedness of the bureaucracy, and now he and people like Geoffrey Parkhurst paid the price for it.
Instead he shrugged. It had been six days since he'd left Geoffrey in Northern Ireland, six days in London to consider his current theory. He wasn't about to apprise Ross of the details. He didn't trust the man's discretion any more than he trusted his intelligence. "It's just a hunch, Ross," he said, trying to sound ameliorating. "You don't need me in Gib, and you know it. You've got enough people there already, people who know the layout, know the drill. Let me see what I can come up with in Malta."
"And if I refuse?"
Michael kept a rein on his temper. "What possible reason would you have for refusing? I'm at loose ends right now. I wasn't due back for another month. Let me have that time to see what I can stir up. Or tell me why not."
Ross's small-featured face was a picture of frustration, and Michael wondered for a moment if the man was hiding something. He'd never been good at keeping things secret, a serious drawback in intelligence work. Michael never trusted anyone or anything completely, even his own instincts, but for the moment he put his doubts on hold. He had no reason to doubt Ross, it was just that something didn't quite fit together, and that was probably attributable to his general incompetency.
"Go, then," Ross said, literally throwing up his small, well-manicured hands. "You're right—we don't need you. You're not indispensable, you know, Mr. James Bond-complex. You're an agent, no better, no more important, than a raft of other agents. It would do you well to remember that."
"I'll remember," he said, his voice expressionless, and he had the pleasure of seeing Ross clench his small white teeth.
"Be in touch," he snapped, his voice his characteristic whine. "When you come up empty, you can take your next assignment."
His interview was over. Michael got to his feet, careful not to appear too fit. In fact, he was almost back to full strength; the last bout of surgery had been just a minor inconvenience. But he wasn't ready for Ross to know that. "I'll do that," he said. "Everything all right with the Neeley woman?" He kept his voice diffident. He didn't particularly expect to fool Ross; what the man lacked in political savvy he more than made up for in acuity when it came to people's real interests, real needs.
"Just fine." Ross, too, could be bland. "When will you be taking off?"
"I've got tickets for today."
"And what if I'd said no?"
Michael only smiled.
"Too bad, though," Ross murmured as Michael limped to the door. "You'll miss the funeral."
Michael glanced back at him, his hand on the polished brass doorknob. "Anyone I know?"
Ross smiled, a small, smug little grin, tinged with the appropriate regret. "Didn't I mention it? I believe you knew him as Geoffrey Parkhurst. Not his real name, of course. He ran afoul of one of the Cadre's mines. A shame."
"Yes," said Michael dully, wishing he could smash Ross's tiny teeth down his throat. "A real shame."
It was astonishing to Francey how little had changed during the time she was gone. Within a day her apartment, including her poor neglected refrigerator, was back to normal. The cockroaches and silverfish stopped their midnight scuttling as the battle waned back into the occasional skirmish; the neighborhood, always oblivious to her presence, was equally oblivious to her absence and return.
Even work hadn't changed. She'd considered calling in, saying she was never coming back. After all, that was where Patrick and Caitlin Dugan had come into her life.
Robin Hood Associates had been created by Francey and several of her friends from Sarah Lawrence to take from the rich and give to the poor, the needy, the deserving. Francey had the undeniable ability to cajole large amounts of money out of very wealthy corporations and individuals for the benefit of worthy causes, and she'd put that skill to good use for people who deserved it. And then for the Cadre. She had nothing else to keep her busy, and a penance to pay. Money diverted into Patrick Dugan's bloody coffers could have gone somewhere else, and she'd been part and parcel of that highly successful fund-raising. She needed to atone.
She'd thought A Peace of Green had sounded like such a noble organization, dedicated to bringing sanity and calm back to the strife-t
orn world of Northern Ireland. It hadn't been her job to check the bona fides. The very expensive investigative firm Robin Hood Associates hired was supposed to do that, and A Peace of Green had passed with flying colors. Patrick and Caitlin had covered their tracks well.
That was one more thing that had galled her while she lay in the sun on St. Anne. The fact that she'd raised all that money for a sham organization, money that had gone for guns and terrorism instead of peace initiatives. She knew perfectly well that she'd been suspected of collaborating with the Cadre. After all, she was very good at her job, and the money she'd raised had been considerable. She was also half-Irish herself, even though she didn't even remember the Byronic poet her mother had quickly married and just as quickly divorced. He'd drowned when she was three years old, and she'd never even seen a photograph of him. She'd tried to explain that to the investigators, but it had taken her cousin Daniel to convince them. At least, she'd hoped he had.
But there were still organizations in need, people who didn't know how to coax grants and donations from the various fat cats. And at least it was something she could do, something that kept her mind off herself. And her apartment had never felt so empty.
The tempo of the city began to take its toll» She threw herself into fund-raising—an auction for the AIDS Connection, a costume ball for the homeless. She hadn't been too thrilled with that particular idea. The thought of overdressed socialites swilling champagne to benefit the brutally poor bordered on the hypocritical, but she was overruled.
She even accepted her most recent client after some initial revulsion. There could be no connection between the Children of Eire, an organization dedicated to improving the quality of life for the children of Northern Ireland caught in the crossfire, and the murderous Cadre. She had the investigators check twice before she was finally satisfied.
But once she accepted Liam and Siobhan O'Malley, there was no stopping her. She worked nonstop, knowing perfectly well why she was doing it. As some sort of penance to the children and the people who were victims of the Cadre's fanaticism. She'd believed in what Patrick had wanted, she truly had. She was simply revolted by his means.
She fell into bed at night exhausted, too tired to think about Patrick, about St. Anne. About Michael Dowd. It was only when she slept that the dreams came. Some slow and hot and blatantly erotic, some fast and dark and dangerous. Sex and violence, intertwined. Both stemming from Michael Dowd.
In the daytime she could laugh at what little wisps she could remember, shaking off the lingering emotions. Michael Dowd was an English schoolteacher, a man of middle-class values and, when he chose to use it, world-class charm. A harmless, gentle man.
But that still didn't explain the three dead men on Baby Jerome.
She'd been back in New York for almost a month, but this hot July night was different. She came home alone, as always, but she stopped at the corner and bought herself a chilled split of French champagne. Ignoring the messages on her answering machine, ignoring her mail, she proceeded to drink every last drop, toasting her monumental decision. That very morning she'd gone through with what some people might call rash, ill-informed and downright stupid. She'd liquidated as much of her comfortable trust fund as she could and turned it over to the pathetically grateful representatives of the Children of Eire.
She still had more money than she knew what to do with, but for once in her life she felt free. Gloriously unencumbered by inherited money that she didn't deserve, by guilt that she might have deserved. She drank champagne, kicked off her shoes and danced around her apartment. And when she finally fell into bed, she dreamed once more of Michael Dowd.
Chapter 10
« ^ »
Francey looked up into his eyes. Eyes she knew well, warm, loving blue eyes, open and honest, gentle and caring. And yet they weren't the same eyes. The warm blue was icy now, with tiny pinpoints of rage in the dark center. There was no affable grin on his face. No crinkling smile, no tenderness. She was looking up into the face of a dangerous man. One with a hard mouth, shuttered eyes and a face that was narrow and still. This was no schoolteacher recuperating. This was someone as fully dangerous as Patrick Dugan had ever been.
He was lying stretched out on top of her, and yet she felt only the weight of his eyes staring into hers. And the weight of his mouth settling on hers, draining her soul, taking everything from her until she herself was weightless, floating, lost in some feathery dream world where nothing existed but the warmth of his flesh and hers, touching, heating, igniting, flaming into a flashpoint of brilliant light…
She awoke with a start, a scream of some lost emotion still rattling in her lungs. She was covered with sweat in her air-conditioned apartment, lying sideways across her double bed, and the pillows and covers were strewn around the room. Then she heard it again, the shrill ring of her telephone.
Her digital clock said 3:47. People didn't call at 3:47 a.m. unless it was to announce a disaster. She lay very still, feeling her heart pound against her chest, letting the panic dance over her skin. She didn't want to hear bad news. Her answering machine was still on; it would pick up after the fourth ring. The question was, would the next ring be the fourth?
The phone rang again, and there was no answering click from her machine. Must have been ring number three. If she could just control herself, let it ring one more time, the machine would take care of the problem, and she wouldn't have to deal with it until she was ready.
The wait seemed endless. Francey was fully awake by now, sitting cross-legged on her mattress, her arms wrapped tightly around her chemise-clad body, rocking back and forth, and for a moment she was terrified that whoever had called her had given up, hung up, leaving her forever in limbo.
The apartment was filled with the noisy buzz of silence. She could hear her air conditioner laboring away in the living room, the busy hum of her refrigerator, the ever-present noise from the street below. And then the phone rang again.
She dived for it, knocking it off the nightstand onto the floor and the pillows beside the bed, following it down with a thud, cursing beneath her breath as she first brought the receiver to her face. "Hullo?" Her voice was hoarse, strained, a desperate whisper as she waited for the voice of doom.
"Francey." One word, one voice. It was all she needed.
She started to cry. Tears were pouring down her face, and the more she tried to speak, the faster they flowed, choking her.
From miles, oceans, away, Michael's voice came back to her. "Francey?" he said again, his voice alarmed. "Are you all right?"
By sheer force of will she pulled herself together, wiping the tears from her face as she huddled on the floor in the darkness. "Michael," she said, and her voice was only faintly tremulous. "I'm fine. I just didn't expect to hear from you."
"Lord, what time is it? I woke you up, didn't I? I didn't think. Let me call you back…"
"Don't hang up! Please, Michael…"
"I won't." He sounded so calm, so sure, so safe, on the other end of the line. She closed her eyes, wishing she could touch him.
She shuddered, so alone, and then sat up a little straighter, leaning against the side of the bed. "Tell me about your life," she said, back in control. "You must be out of the hospital—you couldn't sound so healthy otherwise."
"I was in and out in a matter of days. It was a simple matter for them to patch me up. Then I went up to Whipdale House for a stay with my mother and sisters, and I've been back at school for the summer session for the past three weeks. We just won our first soccer match. We were out celebrating at the local pub, and I suddenly needed to hear your voice."
"It sounds as if your life is back to normal."
There was a certain wryness in his words. "As normal as it ever gets, given my life-style. What about yours?"
She remembered the darkness of the night on Baby Jerome, how her bedtime story with its horrors differed from the middle-class English comfort of his, and she wished for a moment that she'd never told him. That
she'd kept up with the pretense that she was just a young woman at loose ends, spending time at her cousin's Caribbean estate, not someone running away from pain, from terror, from life.
But she couldn't take it back, and her past had almost killed an innocent man. A man who had come to matter far too much. "Actually, things are going quite well," she said, wondering if she should tell him what she'd done today, then dismissing the notion. "I've gone back to work. Things are hot and busy. I've been doing my best to put things behind me."
"Good for you. Looking back is a waste of time. There's nothing you can do about it at this point. Better to look forward." There was something he wasn't saying. Something in his voice, beneath the light, charming tone, that sent tendrils of alarm through her.
"Michael, are you certain you're all right?" she asked, suddenly anxious.
"Right as rain," he said firmly. "Listen, the boys are raising a fuss, and if I don't get back to them they'll probably spray ginger beer all over the waitress. I just needed to make certain you were all right."
"I'm fine," she said. "Better for hearing your voice. When am I going to see you again?"
The hesitation on the other end of the line answered her better than his evasion. "Sooner or later. It's a busy time for me, after having missed so much. And I don't think I'm in the mood for traveling. I've missed England too much."
"I could come over there."
"I don't think that would be a good idea."
It was said very gently. She hadn't realized pain could be delivered with such a soft touch. She absorbed the blow, shivering slightly.
"You're probably right," she said finally, her voice as artificially cool as the air-conditioned apartment. "It's part of everything that I need to put behind me. Get on with my life and all that. I'm glad to hear you're well, and I wish you the best of luck in the future, Michael. You're a very sweet, gentle man, and I'm sorry if I embarrassed you. I know you'll have a good life. I can't think of anyone who deserves it more, and—"
