Читать книгу Beneath The Surface - Meredith Fletcher - Страница 11

Drago moved his hand up from Shannon’s neck and grabbed her chin. He turned her face up to his. She felt his breath hot against her cheeks. He stared into her eyes. Once again she was reminded how lizardlike his green eyes were. They were cold and incredibly clear, like the eyes in a taxidermist’s shop.

“You don’t have a clue who you sent me after, do you?” Drago asked.

Shannon didn’t answer. She hated to admit ignorance. The only reason people with secrets kept talking to her was because they wondered how much she knew of what they were hiding.

“It was somebody big,” Drago said. “And they’re buried deep within an infrastructure I couldn’t even begin to get through. And I’ll tell you right now that they don’t build firewalls I can’t get through. Not until this one.”

Excitement escalated within Shannon. Over the last few years her mysterious benefactor had supplied tips regarding political cover-ups, insider trading, blackmail and other problems involving political and economic leaders. Truthfully Shannon owed a big part of her career to whoever that person had been.

Had.

Shannon didn’t know why she kept thinking of the person in the past tense. There was nothing to indicate anything had happened to that person except for a months-long silence.

Until June, the contacts had been sporadic, but they’d been there. After weeks of wondering about it, and starved for a juicy story, Shannon had left New York City and taken a meeting with Vincent Drago. She’d hired him to investigate the traffic going on over her ISP. Shannon had covered stories about Internet tracking and the information that could be out there if someone knew how to look.

Vincent Drago was supposedly the best. The downside was his paranoia and violence. Scuttlebutt had it that he’d killed people.

He wasn’t the kind of man Shannon would have ordinarily wanted to deal with, but he’d seemed the best for what she’d needed done. Now she found out he hadn’t been able to track the messages either.

However, it was interesting that someone from the United States government—if Drago was correct—was involved. Her investigation was getting more fascinating all the time. She could almost see the consumer viewing points piling up. The story was going to be a good one.

If you live long enough to finish it, she told herself.

Drago’s eyes raked hers. “You didn’t know anything about any of this, did you?”

Shannon decided to go with the truth. “No. What branch of the federal government did you bump into?”

Drago laughed. “You don’t know that either? Damn, you’re not as intelligent as I thought you were, blondie. And I wasn’t thinking you were overly gifted in the intelligence department to begin with.”

Thanks for that. Shannon’s anger nudged at her fear. She hated being taken for granted, ignored and downplayed because of her hair color. She was smart.

“Look,” Shannon said calmly, “you don’t have anything to worry about where I’m concerned. I’m not here trying to trap you. I wanted to know where those e-mail messages came from. That’s all.”

“Why did you come to me?”

“They told me you were the best.”

Drago grinned, but again there was no mirth. “I’m flattered to hear that.”

“It’s not flattery.” Shannon knew her throat was going to be bruised for days to come. “I needed the best. I was willing to pay. I did pay.”

“You don’t have any idea who wrote you those e-mails?”

“No.”

Drago shook his head. “There’s a lot of juicy information contained in them.”

“I know.”

“Most of them tie to stories you cracked on the news channel.”

Shannon knew that, too. “I wasn’t able to prove everything.”

“Did any of the people you took down know about these e-mails?”

“No.”

“Did you ever stop to wonder where they came from?”

“Yes. All the time. I couldn’t get any information.”

“But you just kept using the leads.”

Shannon shrugged. “They were good. Why shouldn’t I? Those people I went after? They needed to be exposed.”

“But why?”

“Because the public deserves to know.”

Drago snorted derisively. “Save it for the sound byte on the autobiography, blondie. It doesn’t wash with me. Those people you took down, they could have paid blackmail for the information you were given. As a matter of fact, I’d be willing to bet my eyeteeth they were.”

Shannon had guessed that, too. She really wasn’t stupid.

Drago traced a forefinger along Shannon’s chin. “Do you know why a blackmailer would give up a cash cow? And most of these people were cash cows.”

“Because they stopped paying?”

“Very good, blondie. And to make an example for other people that are being blackmailed.” Drago smiled. “But there’s one other reason.”

Like a good captive audience, Shannon waited. Maybe you can ooh and aah and gush over how smart he is and he’ll let you go. She was prepared to do that if she had to. As to the other reason, she’d already thought of that, too.

“A blackmailer would burn a victim if it somehow netted him more,” Drago said. “Did you ever think about looking into what these people had in common?”

Shannon had. She’d looked. There were so many and they were so disparate that she hadn’t been able to get a handle on a theory.

“I thought you could just find whoever was giving me the information,” she said. “That seemed to be the easiest way.” That way had also seemed the most dangerous. That was why she’d exhausted every avenue open to her before she’d gone to a major creep like Drago.

“If the Feds hadn’t wanted in on the play, it probably would have been,” Drago agreed. “Whoever you’re after is good at computers, but I’m better. I would have beaten that firewall.”

“I can pay you more,” Shannon offered. Greed was always good leverage.

Drago shook his head. “Sorry, blondie. But this looks like the end of a beautiful relationship.” His eyes dropped to her cleavage. “Having you around to tie me to this thing isn’t my idea of fun.”

Shannon’s fear crystallized inside her in that moment.

“I’ve got to tell you,” Drago said, “I think it’s a damn waste.”

A million questions popped into Shannon’s head. She’d always experienced that when new situations and people had come her way. That tendency was one of the qualities that had propelled her television career. She wasn’t one of those reporters that simply regurgitated scripted questions and punch lines.

How can you just kill me? What makes you think you’re going to get away with it? Is it that easy for you to kill someone? How many people have you killed? How did you kill them? Why hasn’t someone caught you? How are you planning on killing me? What are you going to do with my body?

When she got to the last two questions, Shannon knew she was thinking way too much. She needed to be moving.

“Bye-bye, blondie.” Drago smiled and his finger tightened on the trigger.

When Rafe entered the bar, he got the immediate sense that he’d invaded a private party. Every eye in the place turned toward him.

The bartender stood behind the scarred bar on the other side of the room. He had one bar towel slung over a shoulder and used another to dry beer mugs. He was a big, wide guy, an athlete that had gone to seed. The football pictures above the liquor bottles on the wall behind him offered a clue as to which sport he’d played.

“We’re closed, mac,” the bartender said.

Rafe looked at the other occupants of the room. There were three of them. They were all in their late twenties and early thirties. Their attire wasn’t far removed from his. One of them wore a Hispanic kerchief wrapped around his head.

All of them gazed at him with predatory interest.

Shannon Connor was nowhere in sight.

“Door’s open,” Rafe responded. He pointed to the window. “Sign’s still on.” He spread his hands. “Look I only want a beer. I just climbed out of one of the warehouses down on the river. My boss nominated me to repack a few shipments going out in the morning. I’m hot. I’m tired. And I’m dry.”

“Sorry, mac,” the bartender said. “Like I told you, we’re—”

“Hey, Tommy,” the oldest of the men sitting at the small tables called out. “Man just wants a beer. Ain’t nothing. Don’t be a chump.”

Grudgingly the bartender looked at Rafe. “What kinda beer do you want?”

“Bottle. Domestic. As long as it’s cold, I don’t care.”

The bartender reached below the bar and brought up a longneck. He placed it on the bar without a word.

Rafe looked at the man at the table. “Can I get you something?”

“Thanks. I’m good.”

Rafe dug in his pocket and brought out a thin roll of cash. “How much?”

“Four bucks.”

“Pretty steep for a working-class neighborhood, ain’t it?” Rafe peeled off a five and dropped it on the bar. “Keep the change.”

The bartender made the five disappear without a smile. Evidently he wasn’t big on repeat business.

“So,” the guy at the table said, “you working down at the docks?”

“Yeah.” Rafe twisted the top off the bottle and tossed it into a plastic bowl on the bar. He turned his back to the bartender because he could track the man in the reflection of neon-washed glass overlooking the street.

“That’s hard work,” the man said.

Rafe shrugged and took a long pull on his beer. “I’ve had worse. Had better pay, too.” He grinned.

The man grinned back at him. One of the other guys laughed.

“You from the neighborhood?”

Rafe shook his head. He tried to figure where Shannon Connor was and whether she was in any kind of trouble.

“Hanging with a friend for a couple months. Just till I get some cash up. The last girlfriend I had cleaned me out. Packed up my stuff, emptied the bank accounts and took off with my best friend.”

“Ouch, dude,” one of the other guys said. “Not exactly a happy camper.”

“I’ve had better days,” Rafe said. The story was actually true, but it had happened three years ago. He’d learned his lesson. Women and a job that meant long out-of-the-country trips really didn’t work out.

He hadn’t tried for anything steady since, but he hadn’t been completely put off toward women. It wasn’t their fault. The job was hard, and he wasn’t extremely skilled at relationships.

In the window reflection, the bartender glanced at the clock over the bar. “Maybe you could take that beer for a walk.”

Rafe grinned and shook his head at the guy at the table. “Man, I don’t understand why Tommy here doesn’t play to a full house every night.”

The guy at the table laughed. “You’re right. But so is he. It’d be better if you finish up that beer.”

“Hospitality’s about to run dry, I guess.” Rafe wondered what was going on.

“Okay,” Allison said in his ear, “now I’m definitely getting antsy.”

Rafe was, too.

“Don’t mean to push you out the door,” the man at the table said. “You come around here another night, I’ll buy you a beer myself.”

“I’ll hold you to that.” Rafe upended the bottle and drained it. He placed it on the counter as he turned to face the bartender.

“Got a men’s room around here, Tommy?”

“Got the alley out back,” the bartender said. “Just look out you don’t hit any bums. They come up swinging sometimes.”

“You’re a funny guy,” Rafe said.

A piercing scream rang out from the back room.

Rafe glanced toward the back of the bar.

“Sure wish you hadn’t stuck around long enough to hear that,” the guy at the table said. He reached under his jacket and Rafe knew he was going for a pistol.