Читать книгу Fearless - ХеленКей Даймон, HelenKay Dimon - Страница 9

Less than ten minutes later, they slipped through the kitchen and out the back door. Lara watched as Davis caught the screen before it could slam shut. Always thinking and rarely unprepared. That was how she thought about him, and her mind wandered there often.

They hurried across the porch, the boards creaking under her sensible pumps. His sneakers didn’t make a noise. It was as if he placed each step with precision, including his run down the four steps to the muddy square of a backyard.

Her gaze focused on his butt. Not a bad focal point and certainly less scary than looking up into the eyes of another attacker. Two were enough for one day. Davis also made the staring easy. He had put on jeans and a T-shirt and carried a bag Lara wanted to believe was loaded down with clothes and essentials like shampoo but probably only contained weapons. He did love his big-boy toys, but at least he had clothes on now.

Through the haze of panic enveloping her and the sick ball of dread bouncing around in her belly, she smiled. It was not as if seeing Davis naked had ever been a hardship. He stood six foot one with long, lean muscles. If there was an ounce of fat on him, she defied anyone to find it. If anything, he was even more toned, more fit, than when she’d left all those months ago.

Looking at him now and holding his hand while they crept on boards balanced over the big puddles, she watched the muscles on his back tense and flex under his shirt. Nothing new there. The broad shoulders and military-short sandyblond hair hadn’t changed. Neither had the rough edge to his face, complete with a broken nose from years ago that had never healed quite right and a full, kissable mouth.

Put it all together and you got a man who was self-assured and strong, compelling and intriguing without being pretty. He walked by and women turned. He took a woman to bed and she didn’t want to leave again for days. Lara knew that last one from experience.

“You okay?” His question, delivered in a monotone voice, almost blended into the sounds of traffic blocks away.

“Except for the whole thing where people are trying to kill me? Yes.”

His fingers tightened around hers. “That’s the spirit.”

They walked to the six-foot fence running between his house and the next-door neighbor’s then followed it to the very back end. Unless he planned to chew his way through it, she didn’t see this as a viable way out. “Uh, what are we doing?”

“Escaping.” He trailed his hand over the wood planks.

“Did you develop the power to walk through walls?”

He shot her a sexy smile. “If only.”

Refusing to get sidetracked by the shine in his green eyes, she glanced around the yard. Nothing was out of the ordinary. You’d never know a dead man lay only a few feet away.

The strangeness of life going on, the sun shining and a lawn mower running nearby, struck her. When a person died, the world should stop, if only for a second. But nothing changed.

“Here we go.” There was a click and a panel of boards slipped open.

“A hidden door? Of course. Everyone has one.” She rolled her eyes, but his back was to her so he missed it. That was a shame because it really fit here.

Davis had a contingency for everything. Well, everything but her, which was part of the reason she’d handed back the ring and still cried over the loss.

“It’s my get-out-of-Dodge-fast plan.” After ducking his head inside and taking a look around, he held the door open and motioned for her to pass through. “After you.”

It was not as if she had a choice. Her life had careened out of control hours ago. Now she just held on and hoped not to throw up. Her knee throbbed and the drum-crashing thumps in her head promised a killer headache any second now.

They stepped inside a fenced-off square consisting of a small shed and what she guessed was a car under that slipcover. When they reached the shed, Davis flipped open a black box and typed in a code. The gate at the back end of the enclosed space opened. It spilled out into the alleyway that ran behind his house, the same house he’d moved into a week after their engagement had ended.

They were supposed to have bought it together, even put in the offer together, but when the relationship fell apart he went through on his own. Funny how the original sales listing forgot to mention a secret car compartment at the back of the neighbor’s property.

“Any chance you’re going to tell me what’s happening here? I feel like I walked into a movie a third of the way through.”

A door Lara hadn’t even seen on the house side of the enclosure opened and a tiny older woman walked out. “Is it time, Davis?”

Lara couldn’t help but stare. The lady wore a long royalblue robe buttoned up to her throat, dwarfing her under-five-foot frame. Her shocking white hair was long enough to tuck into her collar but thin enough for Lara to see the woman’s pale scalp underneath. Slippers and cheeks rubbed pink with bright blush rounded out the look.

Whoever she was, she knew Davis and wasn’t surprised to see him. She walked right up and put her hand on his forearm. Her eyes twinkled as she looked at him.

“Hi, Mrs. Winston.” He lifted her hand and kissed the back. “I need the car.”

“Go ahead.” She patted his arm then turned to Lara. “Well, who is this pretty young thing?”

“This is Lara, my…” He shot Lara a warning glance. “Fiancée.”

“Well, it’s about time, young man. Come here, dear.” Mrs. Winston gave him a squeeze and shuffled over to Lara.

It was her turn. Mrs. Winston hugged her, though her arms barely reached to Lara’s back.

“Uh, hello.” The older woman was so small and thin that Lara worried about crushing her by accident, so she kept the hold loose.

When the older woman pulled back, she took both of Lara’s hands in her curved ones and her smile faded fast. “Did that boy fail to give you a ring?”

Lara glanced at Davis. He stood behind Mrs. Winston with an unreadable expression. Clearly this woman viewed Davis in a grandson sort of way. Lara wasn’t about to unload about all their past problems. It didn’t hurt anything to let this woman think what she no doubt wanted to hear.

“Don’t worry. He gave me a beautiful ring.” And technically that wasn’t a lie. He had. A perfect solitaire with baguettes on a platinum band.

It had broken her heart, actually shredded it in two, to hand it back. Not because she loved jewelry—that sort of thing never mattered to her—but because of what it symbolized. The commitment she so desperately wanted from Davis.

Mrs. Winston reached out and absently patted Davis’s shoulder. “He’s a nice boy.”

He handed her a cell phone. “You remember what I told you, Mrs. W?”

“Stay inside, don’t talk to anyone including anyone in a uniform, put the alarm on, pretend I don’t know you and wait for you or Pax to come back.” She peeked around Davis’s muscled arm. “I guess I can add Lara to the list of people I can trust.”

He kissed her on the cheek. “Nicely done, Mrs. W.”

“My mind is just fine, you know.”

“All of you is.” He winked at her. “Now, back inside.”

Mrs. Winston padded away without asking for an explanation. The snide part of Lara figured that was why Davis liked the woman so much. She didn’t ask questions.

He closed the door, sealing them inside the odd parking space. When he turned back and walked to the front of the car, he whistled. The peppy tune continued as he ripped the slipcover off to uncover a pretty boring blue car.

Not Davis’s usual style. He didn’t go for flashy, but he usually chose trucks of some sort. This thing barely had a backseat.

With the driver’s-side door open, he reached under the dashboard and pulled out a set of keys. He smiled as he jingled them in front of her. “Ready?”

The man looked far too satisfied with this little scene. “What, no helicopter?”

“Not on such short notice.”

“Are you kidding me?”

He frowned. “Do you want to drive?”

“I’d prefer an explanation. You involved your neighbor in something dangerous. Since when do you do things like that?” That piece didn’t make any sense. If anything, Davis was overly careful.

He used to talk about contingency plans and had even run through a safety drill with her one time. The second time he’d tried she’d threatened to dump a pot of hot coffee over his head. Not that she would have, but coffee was sacred to Davis so he’d fallen for it.

He insisted civilians were the main problem in most difficult situations. Something about them taking away his options and messing up the fluidity of the operations. People without skills were fine as long as they listened. Mrs. Winston obviously listened. Looked as if she harbored a schoolgirl crush, too, but Lara wondered about her ability to follow directions.

“She thinks she’s my top secret assistant, but really she’s a nice old lady who never gets even a phone call from her deadbeat kids in Delaware. Her husband died more than a decade ago and she’s alone. I mow the back lawn, talk to her and, yes, play along with her active imagination, including installing a security system that rivals most high-tech office buildings.”

She listened but the questions remained. “I still don’t get it.”

Nothing in his explanation sounded like the Davis she knew. With his messed-up background he hadn’t learned much in the way of family coping skills. His bond with Pax was unbreakable, but coddling elderly women seemed outside of Davis’s skill set.

He smiled. “From the time I moved in she tried to wander into the house. More than once she set off my alarm by accident. Almost got shot another time when she snuck in the back while I was out front. It was a problem until she decided I was a spy.”

The word clunked in Lara’s brain. “Spy?”

“International James Bond type.”

They used to laugh about televisions shows and how they portrayed law-enforcement officials, especially those who worked undercover like he did. Expensive drinks and cars were so out of the realm of reality for Davis that he often swore his way through a program.

“You hate that term.”

He shrugged. “I tolerate the whole spy thing for Mrs. W because it makes her happy.”

The idea of Davis playing into that sort of nonsense to make an old lady happy made Lara’s stomach do a little dance. “That’s kind of adorable.”

“It was necessary. But, yeah, Pax also thought it was hysterical.”

The game came together in her head. “So, naturally, you told her Pax was a spy, too.”

Davis flashed her that sexy smile that had sent more than one woman into an eye-fluttering swoon. “I wasn’t about to go down alone. Point is, she loves it, and the wandering-around thing stopped. Now she watches the house for me and is much more careful because she’s helping me.”

“And she lets you keep a car here.” Lara ran her hand over the roof, marveling at how clean it looked for being held outside of a garage.

“I actually bought the spot. Money was tight for her and it worked well with the spy story. Also gave me a place to store the car that I prefer to keep for emergencies.”

The little dance turned into a full-fledged stomach jig. He presented this tough-guy tarnished image but underneath he was about helping people. Maybe it came from being abandoned by his mother that he never let anyone else get stuck out there all alone. Whatever the origin, it was one of those things that had made her fall in love with him in the first place.

“You rescued her,” Lara said.

“Uh, no. I came up with a way to neutralize her.” He walked around to the passenger’s-side door and opened it. “Get in.”

It was just like him to duck a compliment. He saw admitting to the existence of his bone-decent good side as some sort of weakness. She’d never been able to make him see that the size of his heart was much more impressive than the size of those biceps.

Rather than fight, because, really, there was nothing for her to win on this one, she slid into the seat. She waited until he’d climbed in before asking the obvious question. “Where are we going?”

“Pax’s boat.” Davis slid the key in and turned. The engine roared to life.

“Is being surrounded by water really the safest choice?” Then there was the problem that she got queasy if the boat rocked too much.

She’d never been on this one, but they’d gone boating with friends before. She’d tried that focus-on-a-spot-in-the-distance thing and ended up losing her lunch over the side of the boat. Not the best impression on his then–work friends.

“It’s not registered to Pax. Only a few people know about it and all of them have brutally high security clearances. Whoever is behind this shouldn’t have a clue.”

She waited until he’d pulled out of the spot and relocked the gate to talk about the point nagging at her. “I notice you didn’t ask if I had a boyfriend before you added me to your spy story.”

The car grew deadly quiet as she traced a pattern on the inside of the window. When the silence stretched, she glanced over. The rigid jaw and tick in his cheeks told her what she needed to know. This was not his favorite topic. Understandable, but she thought she knew his response, so she was prepared to wait all day. And she let him know that when she glanced over and lifted her eyebrows but didn’t say a word.

He exhaled in that women-are-so-annoying way men often did when they were cornered. “Do you?”

He didn’t even try to make it sound like an honest inquiry. “Oh, please. I know you know exactly what’s going on in my life. Or at least you think you do.”

A smile broke over his mouth. “Yeah, I’m single, too.”

CLIVE EBERSOLE BROUGHT his car to a slow crawl and stopped behind the designated warehouse on the southwest waterfront in Washington, D.C. He didn’t have to look at his watch to know he’d lost some time on this job. Took him longer to clean up Steve Wasserman’s row house than expected. Clive had wiped the place down, except, of course, for the evidence he needed the police to find.

Remembering the scene brought Lara Bart to the front of his mind for about the hundredth time in the past two hours. He hadn’t counted on her. That one proved to be a fighter and a significant complication.

Good thing she’d left her work case file when she’d run off. The documents inside helped him track her identity and find her apartment. She hadn’t run back there, so he couldn’t tie up that end, but the trip hadn’t been a total waste. Not after he borrowed a few items.

And it had only taken him a few minutes to find exactly what he needed to take back and plant in Wasserman’s bedroom. A few pieces of underwear and her address book, along with her laptop and a brush. With all of those pieces, one would hang her.

The move was off script but to his mind brilliant. And perfect in the execution. Not even the best lawyer would be able to dodge the reality of her property and DNA being all over the crime scene, as well as all over the house. She was supposed to have been there for a simple interview, but Clive had created something much bigger. A false past that tied her directly to the dead man.

It would only take a few fake emails to establish the rest of the secret life and a lover’s spat. One well-placed hair from the brush and she’d be spending the rest of her days in prison. That would teach her to take him on, to think that she could actually win.

Idiot woman. She may have escaped, but she’d left enough behind for him to implicate her in the naval officer’s murder.

His orders hadn’t mentioned her. She’d been an unwelcome surprise, but he’d improvised. Wiped his fingerprints and any evidence of his presence away. Instead of framing the murder as burglary-gone-bad as planned, he had a new answer—her.

The question was whether his employer would see it this way. When he’d confirmed the Wasserman termination at check-in everything was fine. Delivering the news about Lara Bart’s interference had caused a hiccup. Clive had been directed to appear at this destination at this time. That was rarely a good sign.

He heard the crunch of tires and glanced in his rearview mirror. A black sedan now idled behind him. He didn’t wait for the phone to ring on this command performance. Taking the offensive always worked for him, and the two guns tucked within easy reach would even the balance of power.

Exiting the car, he scanned the area for witnesses. He’d been tripped up by one already today and refused to have it happen a second time.

The passenger’s-side window rolled down and a thin file appeared in the space. No words, just a tap of a folder.

Pompous and dripping with an overactive ego, his employer continued to act as if he could separate the things he did from who he was. A typical smarmy blowhard dressed in a too-expensive suit. From the sunglasses to the shiny watch to the annoying way he held his head an inch too high, the man’s overblown sense of self begged for Clive to put him down.

His usual business philosophy faltered with this guy. Usually, as long as he was paid Clive ignored the overdose of attitude. The second an employer failed to transfer the payment on time and in the right amount, Clive would cut him down—literally. It had happened only twice, but his reputation remained intact. Both of those disloyal men were dead and Clive promised the same to anyone who tried to screw him.

He leaned down but didn’t grab the papers. “What’s this?”

His employer continued to stare out the front window. Didn’t even bother to turn down the news on the radio or give eye contact. “Your one chance to fix your mess.”

Clive decided he could do without the overwrought drama, but that was what this guy did best. “I already did.”

“You left a witness. Worse, you opened the door to more trouble than you can imagine.”

Clive kept his one hand behind his back, next to his weapon, and grabbed the file with the other. “Meaning?”

The employer finally faced Clive, but the dark glasses hid any reaction. “Your backup failed to tie up loose ends, so I am reluctantly trusting you to do it.”

The words made the nerve in the back of Clive’s neck twitch. “What backup?”

“I always have insurance.”

“So do I. That’s why Ms. Bart will now take the fall for the murder. Problem solved.”

“She is the least of your worries now.” His employer turned the radio volume up and looked forward again as if to ignore Clive’s very existence on the Earth. “The man referenced in that file is your main concern. Neutralize him immediately.”

The car took off before Clive could move away. Only luck and quick reflexes prevented him from becoming a victim of a hit-and-run or losing a foot.

But he would remember. When this was over, his employer might need a lesson. One at the end of a knife, and Clive did so enjoy his knife work.

There would be time for that later. Now he needed to focus. He flipped open the file and read the name at the top and the job history.

Davis Weeks.

Looked as though Ms. Bart had a built-in protector. That was fine with Clive. This Weeks guy would bleed out like any other man…slowly and with as much pain as possible.

Then Clive would pay his employer a much-needed late-night visit.