Danger in a Red Dress

by Christina Dodd

  The slick, deceitful bastard.

  The elevator made a fast descent.

  He kissed the top of her head.

  She tried not to gag.

  He tried to turn her face up to kiss her mouth.

  She pulled away and whispered, “Not in front of Daniel!”

  The doors opened, and she bounded out. She glanced both ways, then back at the guys and asked, “Which way?”

  “To the left,” Daniel said.

  “Come on!” She walked with the excess of energy that only the pure flame of absolute rage could give her.

  The gym was marked with a discreet little sign, and Daniel used his pass card to let them in.

  She surveyed the field of battle. This was a great gym. It was a perfect gym. It was clean. Mirrors covered one wall and a huge window covered the other. A machine dispensed bottles of water and energy drinks. There were four treadmills, four elliptical machines, four exercise bikes. There was an area to lift weights and do ab work, and eight professional gym-weight, massive black heavy machines.

  Two women were on the treadmills, chatting, and they were sweaty and red-faced, so hopefully they’d be done soon.

  Life was good.

  “You guys go ahead. I’m going to change.” Hannah headed for the ladies’ room, and before the door shut behind her, she heard their low, worried buzz.

  She wasn’t quite pulling off the carefree act, but they weren’t alarmed. Yet.

  Going into one of the small dressing rooms, she placed the bag on the bench, careful to make no sound. She unzipped it and pulled out the workout clothes.

  Perfect. A pair of black capri pants, a black hoodie, and a pink patterned tank. Not too flashy, just right. The shoes were good, too. In fact, the shoes were . . . She sighed in delight. She hadn’t been able to afford shoes like this for almost a year. Cross-trainers, white and pink, with good support. She was in heaven.

  She didn’t waste time—didn’t want the guys to get nervous—but changed, cursing the bandage on her wrist as it caught on the sleeves coming off and going on. Her arm still hurt. But she’d had bigger challenges in her life, and this one wasn’t going to stop her now.

  She tossed the lounge pants and top in the garbage. She was either going to make it out of here, or she wasn’t, but no matter what, she would never wear those damn clothes again.

  They were tainted with memories.

  Folding the hoodie, she placed it in the bottom of the bag, arranged everything to her satisfaction, and zipped the bag most of the way closed. She walked out in time to see the two women getting ready to walk out. She watched carefully, and all they did was push, and the door opened right up.

  Great. No pass card needed.

  She looked at the guys. “We’re alone.”

  They grinned at her, grunted, and went on working the weights.

  She’d suggested the right thing. They were both blissed out, doing man stuff, showing off.

  Daniel stopped to strip off his T-shirt. The guy was a black-skinned god, his chest and arms corded with muscle and glistening with sweat, his legs shaped like an Olympic runner’s.

  Gabriel kept his tee on, but she knew what he looked like, and the memory of his body made her perspire without lifting an ounce.

  For a moment, her heart quailed. This was going to take timing and luck, and lately her luck had been nonexistent.

  She raised her chin.

  So it was time for her luck to change.

  She put her bag beside an exercise bike, sat down, and set the resistance to nothing. She might have told the guys she wanted to work out, but in truth, for what she had planned, she would need all her strength. She started pedaling, scrutinized the room, and finalized her strategy.

  In a chatty tone, she said, “So. When do you guys celebrate your birthdays?”

  “A man as old as the boss never celebrates his,” Daniel said, and ducked and laughed when Gabriel flung a towel at him.

  “I was abandoned, so I’m not sure when my birthday is.” Gabriel spoke matter-of-factly, without self-pity—a man simply stating the facts. “The Prescotts decided I was born on July Fourth, Independence Day, and my sisters always make sure there’s a cake along with the fireworks.”

  “Neat.” His sisters sounded nice. Too bad the niceness hadn’t rubbed off. Zeroing in on her real target, she asked, “How about you, Daniel? When’s your birthday?”

  “You going to buy me a present?” He grinned at her.

  “Yes, something to prop up your poor, shriveled ego,” she snapped.

  Now Gabriel laughed.

  “She must be getting better,” Daniel spoke to no one in particular. “She’s grumpy.”

  “I am not. I just want to know. . . .” She took a breath and calmed herself. “Oh, well, if you don’t want to tell me, I can’t bake my special pie for you.”

  “I do love me a pie,” Daniel said. “What kind?”

  “Boston cream pie. A yellow cake filled with vanilla custard and topped with chocolate glaze.” She dangled her tastiest bait.

  Daniel frowned as if he thought she was pulling his leg. “Doesn’t sound like pie to me.”

  “I’ve had it. That custard is rich and the chocolate drizzles down the side and pools on the plate. . . .” Gabriel smacked his lips.

  “But, Daniel, if you don’t want it . . .” Come on, she thought. Come on, come on!

  “Okay! My birthday’s April twenty-second.”

  “What year?”

  “Nineteen eighty-eight.”

  With that, she had everything she needed.

  Daniel put down his weight and frowned at her. “But April’s a long ways away. How am I going to wait?”

  “When I go upstairs”—which if everything worked out as she intended, that would never happen—“you might be able to persuade me to do a little prebirthday baking.”

  “Do I get a Boston cream pie, too?” Gabriel asked.

  She smiled gaily, and joked, “You had better believe that you are both going to get your just deserts.”

  Except, of course, she wasn’t joking.

  After that, it was about a half hour—thirty long, agonizing minutes of waiting and watching—before she was able to say to Gabriel, “You need to stop.”

  “Why?” It was a knee-jerk, tough-guy reaction.

  “Because you got shot four days ago, and you look like you’re going to pass out.” It was a fact. He looked worn-out. Of course, she’d egged him on, but her first and greatest hope had been that he would stay in the penthouse and rest. After all, she didn’t really want the guy to die from overdoing it.

  Instead, she wanted to kill him.

  Daniel put down his weight and examined Gabriel. “She’s right. You look bad.”

  “I’m fine,” Gabriel said irritably.

  She chuckled. “That’s what I say when I feel like hell, too.”

  Gabriel was annoyed for one more minute. Then, with a sigh, he surrendered to the inevitable. “I suppose I am tired. One lousy gunshot wound, and I’m down for the count.”

  “We’d all better go up.” But Daniel glanced wistfully toward the treadmills. He was obviously into his training.

  “You stay here. I can make it upstairs on my own. I’m not that out of it.” Gabriel used a towel to wipe his sweaty face. “Are you coming, Grace?”

  Obviously, he was expecting her answer to be yes.

  As if.

  “Oh. I was hoping . . .” She put on her disappointed face. “Just a few minutes on the elliptical—twenty minutes, I swear—and I’ll be up.”

  “I’d be happy with another twenty minutes, too,” Daniel said. “Don’t worry. I won’t let her go up on her own. On account of her arm, you know.”

  “I do know,” she said.

  The guys stared at her.

  She must have sounded a little sarcastic, so she smiled with all her might.

  “All right. I’ll, um, see you up there.” Gabriel pulled his pass card out of his pocket. “We can s
hower together.”

  His voice got deep and warm and vibrant.

  My God. No wonder she thought he sounded familiar.

  He was Trent Sansoucy.

  He was Gabriel Prescott.

  He was the biggest liar in the world.

  “Yes, we can shower together.” Never as long as I live.

  She waved as he walked out the door, then hopped off the bike. “Daniel, do you have money on you? I’d like a water.”

  “Sure thing.” The guy was good natured for a jailer, and trusting, too, because he walked into the men’s dressing room, leaving her alone.

  Grabbing her bag, she carried it to the line of weight machines. She needed a tall one with a wide, heavy base and solid metal uprights. She needed one that looked complex. And she needed one close to the door. The second from the door looked ideal. She placed her bag on the seat, and opened it wide.

  “Hey!” she said when Daniel walked back out, carrying his wallet. “I don’t know if I can figure out how to use this thing, and even if I can, with this wrist, I can’t change the weight.”

  “Wait a minute. I’ll help you. Don’t hurt yourself. The boss will kill me.” He stuck a bill in the dispenser, got her a bottle of water, got himself an energy drink, and came right over, ready to help the weak little woman.

  “Here, let me hold those.” She took the bottles and his wallet.

  “Thanks.” He leaned on the upright and bent over to change the weights.

  The machine didn’t even sway.

  Perfect.

  “The weight is way too heavy.” She put everything down near the door, and reached into her bag. “Whoever was working this must have been in fabulous shape.”

  “The weight’s not that much. Men’s muscle mass is a lot greater than women’s. That why when we work out—”

  She stumbled against him, knocking him to his knees. “Whoops. Sorry. I tripped on the—”

  “ ’S all right.” He tried to look up.

  She slammed his head against the pole. “I’m getting faint . . .” She fastened one end of the handcuffs to the upright.

  He shook his head to clear it.

  She grabbed his wrist and shoved it into the other cuff. “Darn, I guess I’m not as well as I thought—”

  She clicked the lock, grabbed her bag, and ran—just in time.

  Fast as a snake, he lunged for her.

  The metal handcuffs jerked him back. The machine rang like a bell.

  The astonishment on his face did her heart good.

  “Now, listen, Miss Grace, listen.” Blood trickled from a cut on his forehead. “You don’t want to do this.” He spoke softly, gently, but all the time, he was straining against the cuff.

  She grabbed the bottles and his wallet and dropped them in her bag. “I so want to do this.”

  “Mr. Prescott’s going to be angry with me. You’re a nice lady. You don’t want the boss to be angry with me.” Daniel twisted the cuff around and around, straining to get free, and he was still using that soft, kind, begging-for-understanding voice.

  “I don’t give a damn whether he’s angry with you.” She put one hand on the door. She needed to get out of here before someone else walked in, but she couldn’t resist one last shot. “Do you really think you’re going to break that handcuff? It’s a good one. I got it out of the bedside drawer on Mr. Prescott’s side.”

  Daniel stilled. “Oh, no.”

  Her voice swelled with fury. “What was he going to do? Arrest and cuff me when he’d finished screwing me?”

  “No, Miss Grace . . .” Daniel checked, then used her real name. “Miss Hannah, he believes in you. He really does, and if you’ll just—”

  “I don’t care whether he believes in me. I am done with Gabriel Prescott.” She walked out the door, down the stairs, and into the bustling Galleria mall.

  THIRTY-THREE

  They had been down in the gym too long.

  Gabriel sat on the couch in the living room, stared at the elevator door, and tried to decide if he was being paranoid or not.

  But Daniel and Hannah had been down in the gym for almost forty minutes. And they’d promised twenty.

  Probably they were chatting with someone who had come in, or Daniel was into his weights and Hannah was too polite to say she wanted to come up, or . . . or the workout had been too much for Hannah, and she was unconscious, or the guy who had shot Gabriel had made it past the building security and had killed them both.

  Gabriel got up and limped to the elevator, then limped back.

  If he went down there and nothing was wrong, Daniel would call him an old woman. And if danger threatened, there was nobody Gabriel wanted at his side more than Daniel. The man was fast, strong, and dangerous, a fourth-degree black belt in karate and a second-degree in kung-fu.

  If only Gabriel didn’t feel so uneasy. His gut was telling him something. Something to do with Hannah.

  She had started acting strangely . . . when?

  When he was in the shower.

  What had happened to give her a stiff smile and eyes that glittered as hard as sapphires?

  She’d heard something. She’d talked to somebody.

  He checked the phone, the outgoing and incoming history. Nothing there.

  She’d seen something.

  He looked around, but he’d left nothing incriminating lying around.

  She’d found something on the computer.

  He headed into the bedroom, to his desk. He opened the laptop. It came out of sleep.

  And there it was. An interview with Carrick and a photo of—“Shit!”

  Gabriel swung out of the chair. He headed for the door.

  The phone rang. He grabbed it as he walked past, didn’t recognize the number, almost threw it aside. But it only took a second to push TALK.

  At once Daniel was yelling in his ear. “She’s gone! She escaped! For God’s sake, boss, send the hounds out. We’ve got to find her!”

  In the penthouse master bedroom, Gabriel packed a clean shirt and a clean pair of jeans into his carry-on, and listened as Daniel gave his report.

  “Me and the guys, we’ve reviewed every tape.” Daniel was hoarse from all the shouting he’d done in the gym yesterday, trying to get someone’s attention so he could get free of the cuffs. “First thing she did was put on her jacket and pull up the hood. Good move. We had her when she exited the stairway into the Galleria. Then she hit the elevators, and we lost her. Next time we found her, it was ten minutes later. She goes to an ATM on the first level, accesses her money card, and gets a thousand dollars.”

  “Her money card.” Gabriel wished to hell he’d taken it when he found it. “She must have grabbed that while we were changing into our workout clothes.”

  “She’s pretty crafty for an amateur.” Daniel realized he sounded admiring, and straightened up. “Next thing, she’s using my money card to take a thousand dollars out of my checking account.”

  “How did she get your PIN number?”

  “I don’t know.”

  Observing Daniel’s pout, and remembering her pointed questions, Gabriel asked, “For God’s sake, Daniel, you don’t use your birthday backward, do you?”

  “No.”

  “Daniel.” Gabriel bent a stern gaze at him.

  Daniel threw up his hands. “All right! I do! But no one knows my birthday except—”

  “Except for a pretty woman who offers to make you a Boston cream pie.”

  “Yeah.” Daniel was as chagrined as any guy who had been suckered. “Only crooks know that backward birthday trick.”

  “Security people know, too.” Gabriel remembered his phone conversation a year ago, the night before the fateful Halloween party. “I told her about it.”

  “Boss, how could you?”

  “I never foresaw her stealing your wallet,” Gabriel said tartly. “So she took you for a little walking-around money.”

  “Yeah. Great.” Daniel held an ice pack to his bandaged forehead.

&nb
sp; If Gabriel were in a laughing mood, he’d be chuckling, because Daniel was notoriously tight with the dollar. “She can go wherever she wants with two thousand dollars.” He went into the bathroom.

  “Where she wanted to go was the Saks day spa.”

  Gabriel came back out, holding his partially packed shaving kit, wondering if he’d heard right. “The day spa?”

  “That was where we lost her for a long, long time.” Daniel looked lousy, as if he’d been up all night. Which he had. “We were talking to the cab companies. We mobilized people on the streets, who fanned out in all directions. We talked to the cops. We didn’t think to check the massage tables.”

  “She got a massage?” Gabriel couldn’t help feeling a little proud. The spa was pure genius.

  “She got a massage. She got her toes done and her fingers done. She got a facial. Somewhere in there, they brought her lunch.” Daniel consulted his list. “A chicken salad sandwich with grapes and pecans on a bed of fresh salad greens, a whole-wheat roll, and a glass of champagne.”

  “What the hell?”

  “I said that, too, only I used a different word.” Daniel passed him a photo, taken from above, of a blonde with a spiky short haircut, dressed in dark jeans, a white silk button-up shirt, and a black duster, walking out of the spa. “Last but not least, she had makeup applied and her hair colored and cut.”

  “Ah.” That put a whole different complexion on the spa experience. Gabriel studied the photo. “Are you sure this is her?”

  “That’s her. The ID software nailed her, and when we interviewed the beautician, she ID’d her, too. She must have done the clothes shopping the first time we lost her.”

  “She looks great.” Gabriel tucked the photo in his jacket and went back to filling his shaving kit. “What next?”

  Daniel came to the door. “A cab picked her up at the Nordstrom entrance and took her to the Wal-Mart where she worked.”

  “Now that’s interesting.” Gabriel headed back into the bedroom.

  Daniel moved aside.

  Flinging his shaving kit into the suitcase, Gabriel asked, “What did she do at Wal-Mart?”