Читать книгу Warrior Without A Cause - Nancy Gideon - Страница 9

Stan Kovacs looked worried.

As he watched Tessa pull the zippers up on her suitcase, his expression had all the forlorn characteristics of a droopy-faced basset hound.

“Stan, it was your idea,” she reminded him as she set the case by the door of her apartment. She tried not to notice the significance of the chains and new dead bolt locks. “If you didn’t trust him, why did you insist I call him?”

“Oh, I do trust him. With my ex-wife, my money, my life. But not necessarily with my best friend’s daughter. Chaney can be…”

“Difficult,” she supplied. “Yes, I know. But we’re not dating, Stan. I don’t care if he’s difficult. Just as long as he’s as good as you say he is.”

Stan’s features didn’t alter at his mournful reply. “Oh, he is. No doubt about that.”

She fussed with the tags on her luggage, trying to think of how best to broach the subject. “I know in your business you’ve met all sorts of rather unsavory people.”

“The dregs in the cup, so to speak,” Stan agreed.

“How did you meet Jack Chaney?”

He smiled thinly. “Long story.”

“The Cliff’s Notes version. How did you get tight with a mercenary?”

That did manage to rearrange Kovacs’s dour look. “What? Where did you get the idea that Chaney was a merc?”

“You.”

“Oh.” He glanced away sheepishly. “Guess I was trying to impress you or maybe scare you off from taking this particular path. Jack’s a lot of things but he’s not an indiscriminate killer.”

“So he’s the discriminating kind.”

“He’s the military kind. The Black Ops covert, no-record-of-his-name, disavow-all-knowledge-if-caught-or-killed kind. He’s worked in a lot of places I’d never want to visit. His call sign was Lone Wolf. That’ll tell you all you need to know about Jack Chaney.”

“CIA?”

“I’m sure there are some initials involved but I don’t want to know what they are. He’s no angel but he’s not the devil I obviously let you think he was, either. Sorry.”

“For letting me think that or because he isn’t?”

They shared smiles and a long silence. Realizing Stan had never exactly answered her question, which meant he had no intention of doing so, Tessa sighed.

“No matter his initials, I need him. And, Stan, I need you to keep on top of things while I’m gone. I can’t let the trail to the real killers grow even colder.”

“I plan to. I’m not giving up on your dad. He didn’t give up on me when he had every reason to.”

She touched his arm, eager to defuse his umbrage. “I never thought you would, Stan. Not for a second. I just want you to be extra, extra careful.”

His face relaxed into a grin. “Yeah, like a fat, ex-alcoholic is going to put the fear of God into Martinez’s men.”

“I’m just a girl and I worried them plenty.”

They both sobered. Stan nodded.

“I’ll be quiet as a mouse. They won’t even hear me scratching around.”

She squeezed his beefy forearm through the truly ugly sport coat. “Good. Keep me posted. See if you can find out what Martinez had on Johnnie O’ that was so bad he took jail time just to set up my father.” That was the part of the case that had convinced the police to look hard at Robert D’Angelo. Johnnie O’Casey, three-time loser and small-time drug pusher, hadn’t tried very hard to barter his way out of prison. He’d accepted the sentence and still named the district attorney as his accomplice. If saving his own worthless hide hadn’t been the motive, something else had triggered his sudden desire to name names.

The wrong names.

But for what price and who had paid the bill?

“I’ll look in on your mom, too.”

“Oh. Thanks, Stan. I’m sure Dad would want you to.” Her lack of enthusiasm implied that it wasn’t her priority. Stan simply nodded. He never intruded on their family dynamics even though Tessa could tell by the pursing of his lips that he wanted to.

A knock at the door had Tessa taking a quick, involuntary breath as Stan reached for the knob. A silly reaction. Did she really expect one of Martinez’s hired hit men to knock?

“Hey, Jack,” Stan greeted jovially. “How’s your dad?”

“Wondering when you’re going to stop over for a little five-card.” Jack Chaney stood in the hall looking dark and sleek and dangerous. Just the man she needed to see. Tessa released her breath in a relieved gust. She hadn’t been sure he’d go through with it. Take nothing for granted, her father had always told her.

Stan laughed. “I haven’t recovered from the last fleecing he gave me.”

“It’s your face, Stan. Your secrets are written all over it.”

Pleasantries exchanged, Chaney looked down at Tessa’s three-piece set of matched Gucci luggage without a blink. But he frowned at the sight of the cat carrier and the pair of glittering yellow eyes glaring out at him through the mesh door. Noting his disapproval, Tessa hoisted up the carrier, giving a defiant lift of one brow.

“Tinker goes with me. Love me, love my cat.”

A dark brow arched. “An interesting but unlikely suggestion.”

Wondering which part he found the most distasteful, Tessa stated, “I’m ready, Mr. Chaney.” She picked up the medium-size suitcase. “Can you get the other two?”

“Yes, ma’am. Your chariot is out front. It’s the Dodge Ram. Just toss your stuff in the back.”

Frowning to think he meant Tinker, as well, she was distracted by Stan’s quick hug and peck on her cheek.

“Behave,” he warned in a whisper.

“I will if he will.”

After Tessa started toward the stairwell, Stan confronted the younger man candidly.

“She’s tougher than she looks.”

“I hope so, for her sake.”

“You behave, too.”

Jack offered a lopsided smile. “Don’t I always.”

Stan rolled his eyes. Then the merriment was gone. “Watch over her, Jack. Keep her under wraps until I can find out if there’s any truth to what she’s saying.”

Jack gave a snort. “Or to what she wants to believe.”

“Somebody beat the hell out of her. I’m not willing to take any chances that it wasn’t just a coincidence.”

“You think her father is innocent, Stan?”

The P.I. frowned a minute then answered. “Right now, I don’t care. Rob D’Angelo is beyond their reach, but she isn’t. I don’t want anything else to hurt her, Jack.”

“What about the truth?”

“By the time I find it, she’ll be ready to hear it. Like I said, she’s tougher than she looks.”

Jack shrugged noncommittally. “If you say so.”

“What shall I tell anyone who asks about her?”

“Tell them she’s going to camp.”

“Saying your goodbyes to the old homestead?”

Tessa, who’d been staring up at the curtain-covered windows of her apartment, gave a start then a rueful smile. Saying goodbye to the sleepless nights, to the insidious terror that had her checking behind doors and under the bed in a manic cycle of fear? Good riddance was more like it. Whatever she was heading toward had to be better than that.

She suddenly realized that she didn’t want to return to the rooms with the upscale address she’d so proudly decorated with trendy furnishings that toted her independence. She now saw the shadowed corners of the second-floor rooms as a prison when they’d once represented her freedom. She couldn’t open the front door without seeing the glass glittering on the floor, without hearing the sinister whisper of her attacker’s voice.

No, she would never put her belongings back in that place where she no longer belonged.

For now, she was making her home with Jack Chaney. And after that…Well, she’d just have to improvise.

“Let’s go, Mr. Chaney.”

“Before you change your mind?”

She met his smug assertion with a cool glance. “Or you change yours.”

He opened the door for her to climb up into the four-wheel-drive vehicle, then scowled at the sight of the cat carrier on the floor of the passenger side.

“Not an animal lover, I take it.”

“Sure. I love them with gravy and potatoes on the side.” He shut her inside the truck before she could manage a curt reply.

Sticking her fingers through the wire grid, Tessa murmured, “Don’t mind him, Tinker. He’s just being…difficult.” A wet nose touched her fingertips in seeming agreement.

Chaney dropped behind the wheel and started the vehicle, provoking the engine into a series of coughs and grumbles. The smell of something scorching filled the cab.

“We could have taken my car,” she posed diplomatically.

“Your car is easily traced to you. Just swallow your pride and enjoy the ride.” He shifted and the beater shuddered away from the curb with a roar. “From now on, you’re officially undercover.”

And off the face of the known world, she mused, staring out the window as familiar scenery whizzed by. She let it go without regret.

“You never asked where we were headed,” her driver observed as he checked the crooked rearview before blending into freeway traffic.

“It doesn’t matter,” was her philosophical reply. Then, after a pause, she asked, “Where are we headed?”

“No place you could ever find on your own, even if a map existed. No man’s land.”

No woman’s land, she’d be willing to bet as she studied his profile. A nice profile. Clean, strong, good bones, firm chin. Handsome in a dark, effortless way. Like a pirate.

He was the kind of guy who would have had girls lining the street in front of his house when he was a teen. With his easy confidence and dark, melting eyes, he could have been anything from class president to class clown, star quarterback to under-the-bleachers bad boy. But studying him more closely, she figured him for the cool, sardonic loner who could have had anything he wanted and shunned all of it. She’d hated guys like that, the ones who never lived up to their potential. Had Jack Chaney grown up knowing he wanted to be a government hit man? Had he planned from an early age to skirt the fringe of acceptability with a wry, indifferent scorn?

She could see ex-military in him. In the way he carried himself, erect, alert, even when he seemed relaxed behind the wheel. She saw it in the crisp cut of his glossy black hair and squared-away look of his clothing. Efficient, without an extra inch or ounce on him. His dark eyes were always on the move, cutting between the mirrors in a precise circuit that allowed for no surprises.

And it disturbed her to find that he made her feel safe.

Suddenly uncomfortable with the turn of her thoughts, she tried distracting them with conversation.

“So how do you know Stan?”

“What did he tell you?”

“He did a lot of talking but never really answered my question.”

Jack nodded his approval and for a minute Tessa didn’t think he would answer. Then, with a casual shrug, he said, “He and my father were partners on the force a lot of years ago.”

“The police force?” Why did the notion of Jack coming from a law enforcement family surprise her so? Because usually law and order was passed on as a tradition. Apparently not in his family.

“You said you owed him.”

“I said too much,” he muttered, but he didn’t withhold the information. “About twenty years ago they got caught in a cross fire. My dad was hit. Bad. Stan could have left him and gotten to safety but he didn’t. He stayed at my dad’s side, keeping him from bleeding to death, keeping the scumbags off until reinforcements showed up. He rode with him to the hospital and later broke the news to us that Dad had been shot and would never walk again. Stan stayed with my dad through therapy and bankruptcy—with a whole lot more loyalty than my mom who figured the going wasn’t going to get any better so she got going and never looked back. They don’t come any better than Stan Kovacs in my book. That answer your question?”

And then some.

“Stan said your call sign was Lone Wolf. That sounds a little…”

“Unfriendly? Aboriginal?” he finished for her. His tone hadn’t changed but a certain tightness sharpened the edges of his swarthy features until she could see the hint of American Indian in the sculpted highs and lows. “On my mother’s side, way back. Just enough so I could run a casino if I wanted to. But that’s not where I got the moniker. Lone Wolf isn’t my Indian name, if that’s what you’re wondering.”

“Where did you get it?”

“From my enemies, because I prefer to hunt alone. And I prefer my own company to those who never seem to run out of nosy questions that are none of their business.”

Well, he didn’t need to put a finer point on it than that.

The rest of their drive passed in a taut silence.

In the lull, it was easy for Tessa to drift into a sleep-deprived REM state. She’d only meant to close her eyes for a moment but when she blinked them open, it was to find that man-made structures had given way to soaring examples of nature’s architecture. Spreading oaks ablaze with color, ramrod-straight pines standing at attention and ghostly poplars with their pale white trunks and flutter of graceful yellow leaves lined a two-lane highway upon which they were the only travelers. She’d fallen asleep in the inner city and had awakened to a deeply forested Oz.

Tessa leaned away from the window where her cheek had left a circular print and immediately checked for any trace of embarrassing drool. Chaney caught the movement and quirked a smile in her direction.

“You snore.”

Great. Just the kind of intimate details she wanted known from the maddeningly enigmatic man beside her.

“Not usually.”

“You should never let your guard down so completely, even around those you think you can trust.”

His remark needled more than it instructed. Her reply was curt.

“I’ll keep one eye open from now on.”

“I always do.” Then he added ominously, “I would if I were in your position.”

All sense of security fell away at that cool observation. She wasn’t safe. Not even here with this man she’d hired to protect her and to teach her to protect herself.

He was right. She trusted too easily, in unfamiliar situations, with unknown strangers. She’d grown up to privilege, private schools, safe streets and a good job. The closest she ever came to the seamier side of life was in the courtroom. She’d never had reason to check her back seat before getting in or to glance into shadowed alleyways anticipating a threat.

Until now.

Sitting stiff and duly chastised, she looked around, observing her surroundings. She was Little Red Riding Hood to his huntsman and there was no grandmother’s house in sight.

“Are we—”

“There yet?” he finished for her. “Almost. It takes about fifteen minutes to the front door once we leave the highway.”

Fifteen minutes to reach what? Exactly where was he taking her? Her lack of preparatory knowledge came back to haunt her. She’d been in such a hurry to leave her fears behind, she’d forgotten to ask what she’d be walking into. Or driving into. And since she’d seen fit to naively snooze the better part of the drive away, she had no idea where “there” might be. North, he’d said. There was a lot of North in Michigan.

When Chaney finally left the highway for the fifteen-minute last leg of the journey, it wasn’t to pull onto a paved street. At first glance she hadn’t even seen a break in the trees to indicate there was a road. Two-track, she believed best described the spine-jarring roller coaster of dust and sudden dips. Stray branches scraped against the sides of the vehicle as they bounced along the twin ruts cut deeply into uneven ground. It wasn’t an obstacle course her Lexus would have appreciated.

Tessa clung to the door handle with one hand and braced her other palm against the dash as Tinker’s carrier slid back and forth between her firmly planted feet. She locked her ankles tight on either side of the case hoping the suspiciously silent tabby hadn’t already had the stuffings shaken out of him.

Then the Ram made a sudden turn and Chaney’s compound appeared as if hewn out of the forest. Her mouth dropped open in helpless awe.

North woods had conjured up the image of rustic in her mind’s eye. A log cabin, hopefully with indoor plumbing. But Jack Chaney’s retreat was a veritable fortress in the wilderness. Squares and turrets of stone and log collided with huge ultramodern walls of glass and steel in what should have been a jarring juxtaposition. It wasn’t. Pulled together under long sloping roofs of rough-hewn wood shingles, the massive structure seemed to blend with the rugged surroundings, easing the stark modernistic elements back to the basics of quarried rock and peeled timber. Only the high-tech satellite dish broke the harmony of new age and natural beauty. Tessa perked up. Not Club Med, perhaps, but certainly a far cry from the dour cabins she remembered from camp. Chaney’s dwelling was huge, impressive, and as Jack wheeled the vehicle to the left, obviously not her destination.

They jounced down another dirt-and-gravel track until they reached a footbridge that spanned a winding stream. On the other side squatted a single-story barracks of log and stone. No soaring vistas, no dish TV. Just the raw basics of survival.

Welcome back, Camp Minnetonka.

Prepared to grin and bear it, Tessa climbed out of the truck and took a minute to twist and stretch her back. There was a brief stab of discomfort where a rib was still healing. She made the movements easier, babying the hurt. As she glanced to the right, through a parting of the trees, she could just make out one of the massive stone porches running along the side of the main house. She blinked and began to frown in uncertainty of what she was seeing.

There on the porch, just on the edge of the shadows, stood a small, slender girl of about twelve years old. In the muting tones of near twilight, all she could make out was the fact that the girl was Hispanic. As Tessa stared in surprise at finding a child in Jack Chaney’s home, her astonishment doubled as a woman appeared to place her hands on the girl’s shoulders to steer her back inside.

Just as it had never occurred to Tessa that Jack might live in a forest paradise, she’d never once considered that he might not live alone.