Читать книгу Shannon McKenna Bundle: Ultimate Weapon, Extreme Danger, Behind Closed Doors, Hot Night, & Return to Me - Shannon McKenna - Страница 18

The satellite phone in Val’s pocket vibrated. He counted the rings, twenty of them, but lay there, inert. Unable to coordinate his muscles. All he could do was twitch and fume and wait, furious with himself for letting her drop him. And with such humiliating ease, too. All it took was the short skirt, the long legs, the gleaming lips, the erect nipples.

He struggled until he managed to get his weak, trembling limbs to obey him, and hoisted himself up into a sitting position. He sat on the edge of the bed, hunched over. The phone rang again.

It took seven rings just to get his slack hand into his pocket and pull the thing out. The display informed him that it was Henry.

He answered promptly. “Sì? What have you got?”

Henry didn’t answer for a few moments. “Uh, Val? Is that you?”

“Who else would answer this phone?” he snarled.

“Your voice sounds strange.” Henry sounded suspicious. “What the fuck is wrong with you? Are you drunk?”

“She tased me,” he grimly admitted, “and ran.”

“Oh.”

Henry said nothing, but Val could see his friend in his mind’s eye, trying not to grin. The image did nothing to help his mood.

“So, ah, you lost her then, I take it?” Henry asked.

“No. I put an RF transmitter into her diaper bag,” he said. “They are going to a wedding now. I will follow them there. As soon as I can walk.”

“Want me to monitor it for you?” Henry’s voice was a little too solicitious. “I’ve got nothing happening this evening, and this chick sounds like a real live wire…so to speak.” He chortled at his own wit. “Give me the frequencies, and I’ll—”

“No,” Val said curtly. “Thank you, but I will handle it myself.”

“I don’t doubt it,” Henry said. “So, did you want to know what I’ve got on Zetrinja? Or is this, you know, a bad time?”

Excitement welled up, energizing him. “Tell me,” he said.

“August 24, 1992,” Henry said. “Colonel Drago Stengl of the JNA and his secret police squad rounded up the Muslim men and boys in Zetrinja and shot them. Thirty-seven dead. The women and girls were loaded into trucks and taken to the concentration camp at Sremska Mitrovica.”

It was a familiar enough story. Val had heard countless versions of it. “Did you check the—”

“Yes, of course. I made the calls to the city hall, I checked the census records,” Henry assured him. “There were five girls between the ages of ten and twenty who were related to the men and boys who died that day. One of them was the daughter of Petar Zadro, the goldsmith. She was fifteen years old. Her name was—get this—Tamar.”

A shiver went up his spine.

“Don’t get excited,” Henry warned. “I personally think it’s just a random coincidence. A woman like her is not likely to use her actual given name, after all the aliases she’s used so far. And unless I go there in person and start tracking down school photographs, I can’t verify—”

“It is her,” Val said. He was dead sure in his balls. He understood perfectly why Steele might risk taking back her own given name. After years of being a blank slate, sometimes a person felt the need to write something on that slate, however simple, and have it stand. And the daughter of a goldsmith might well be drawn to metalworking.

It was enough to convince him. “What happened to Tamar?”

“Her mother and sister died at the concentration camp in the end of September,” Henry said. “Your typical heart-tugging Balkans tragedy. No more data on little Tamar after that. She vanishes into thin air.”

Henry’s cool, cynical tone grated on him. “Who ordered the shooting?” he asked. “Drago Stengl, you said? I have heard the name.”

“That’s because he hired PSS personnel in the nineties,” Henry said. “We did some of his dirty work for him, like as not. Bastard’s in hiding now. Charged with a bunch of gruesome war crimes in Croatia. Word is he’s dying from some disgusting disease. Appropriate, huh?”

“Do you know where he is?”

“I know where his daughter is,” Henry offered. “Found the info in the PSS files on Stengl. Ana Santarini. She lives in Italy on the Amalfi Coast. She married Ignazio Santarini, a rich import-export merchant with ties to the Camorra. Don’t you have contacts down there? Weren’t you fucking some Camorra mafioso’s wife for PSS a few years back? Maybe you can just, ah, insert yourself into that slot again, wangle yourself an introduction to Ana? If it comes to that?”

Val grunted, noncommital. “Maybe. Could you go to Italy—”

“Already there,” Henry said. “I’m in Salerno. I thought you might want me to follow Ana Santarini around, so I took the liberty.”

He was speechless. “Thank you,” he said. “Please carry on.”

“Hey, no problem,” Henry said. “I have nothing better to do right now, and Italian girls are hot. I got here this morning. Followed Ms. Ana all day. She’s got a nice ass. She went to a private clinic for a couple of hours this afternoon. My guess is Stengl’s languishing there. But in any case, you better move your ass before Ms. Live Wire gives you the slip for good. Are you mobile yet?”

“I think so. Later.” Val pocketed the phone, glanced in the mirror. He looked like shit, but he had no time for a shower or shave. He dragged on the black tee, buckled on the holster, shrugged on his gray Armani jacket. He had thought about ordering a suit from the department store, but he didn’t know how formal the event was. He could not draw attention to himself by being overdressed. In America, it was better to err on the side of overcasual. At least the jeans were black. He was lucky he had not pissed himself when she zapped him.

He packed everything into his SUV, pulled up the frequencies of the beacon he had slipped into Steele’s bag, and located them heading south on I-5.

It wasn’t difficult to overtake her cab. She had only a twenty-minute head start on him, and he drove fast. An hour on the road found him outside Tacoma, driving through an evergreen forest on a road that led to a resort hotel. Signs identified it as the Huxley Resort and Spa. The icon that indicated her position had stopped there minutes before he arrived. He pulled over at the entrance and waited until he saw a yellow cab pull out before he proceeded into the parking lot. The timing of his entrance was critical. She had to be seated in the hall, exit choked with the wedding party, the ceremony already well begun before she caught sight of him. No chance to protest his intrusion without disrupting the wedding and agitating the child.

He caught sight of Rachel first, dressed as she was in hot red and black; tights, dress, shoes, coat, the crimson hair ribbon in her dark curls. She glowed like a holly berry against the dull grays and browns of the wintry forest, perched on Steele’s hip as they walked toward the hotel. Rachel was fussing, arching back, mouth open. He could imagine the rich alto tones of Steele’s voice as she wheedled and cajoled.

He kept her in sight, falling casually in with other groups of guests making for the hotel, but he did not let himself stare at her or even think about her. Creatures who were accustomed to being hunted could sense a predator. He kept her in his peripheral vision and emitted a blank white noise screen in his head as he watched the matrix turn.

The gray man. A classic technique for a covert operative, silently projecting, I am not here. You did not see me. I do not matter. He was good at it. In fact, it could be overdone. That silent chant could become actually noticeable to those who were trained in such things, like Steele. She would hear him if he chanted too loudly. Even in his mind.

Steele and the child disappeared inside. Val the gray man blended into the crush of people near the entrance and loitered. A glance inside located Steele in the back in a chair far to the side, the child on her lap. Not surprising. He’d overheard enough sessions with the child psychologist to understand Rachel’s fear of strangers, particularly men. Steele was creating a safety zone, to limit pre-wedding socializing and have a possible escape route in case of tantrums.

He caught sight of the blond man who had acted as Steele’s bodyguard at Shibumi near the front of the hall. Davy McCloud looked mildly harrassed, and held a chubby, squirming infant with wild red ringlets in a carrying pouch. Val glanced around for the other bodyguard, Nick Ward, but did not see him, until a clot of tuxedoed men in the front of the hall resolved themselves into a semicircle, facing the center aisle.

One of them was Nick. His central position, and the nervous, strangled way that he was tugging at his bow tie indicated that he was the groom. Which meant that his attention was fixed at the back of the hall where his bride would appear.

Gray man, gray man. Val slunk deeper into the shadows behind the door and cursed being so tall, not for the first time. He spotted a chair, snagged it, and sat, putting himself effectively beneath Nick’s line of sight. There she was at last. The bride. A rustling murmur arose from the crowd. Heads swiveled. He caught a glimpse of her as she passed through the vestibule. Pretty, a cloud of curly dark hair that reached her shoulders, big green eyes all misty with love and bridal nerves. A lace-covered sheath showed off a memorable figure. She was followed by two very pretty dark-haired girls in rust-colored silk, one of them her younger sister, from the looks of her. The other girl was younger still, only fourteen or so, slender and ethereal.

The string quartet began to play, and everyone stood. Val sighed with relief as the collective point of focus shifted to follow all that dewy feminine beauty on up the aisle and away from him.

Then a buzzing hum in the back of his mind indicated that someone was staring at him. He had to look around twice before he identified the observer.

It was Rachel. Her arms were clamped around Steele’s neck, her face buried against the crumpled iridescent sheen of her mother’s scarf. Only her eyes were visible under the mop of dark curls and the floppy crimson bow. Huge, dark owl eyes, staring into his.

She raised her face. Her eyes looked solemn and wise.

He waved at her. Her face dove into the scarf, but in seconds, she peeped up again. This time he ventured a smile. The cycle repeated, but this time when she emerged from the scarf, her eyes were sparkling. The child was smiling at him. Dimpling. Flirting. Her head tilted.

The strangeness of it made him want to laugh. The minister droned on. The sound slid over his ears without penetrating.

Now, he decided. He grabbed his chair, strode over to Steele. He sat down beside her and grinned widely, right into her face. “Ciao.”

The child dove into the scarf again with a squeak. Steele gasped.

“What the fuck are you doing here?” she hissed in Italian.

He kept the smile nailed firmly on. “Keeping you company,” he murmured back in the same language. “Resign yourself. I am your date. You invited me.”

“Oh, no. No way are you my date, you—”

“Shhh!” A woman shushed them, frowning. Several others were looking over curiously.

Val leaned closer. “You could scream and yell and throw me out if you want to ruin your friend’s wedding,” he said softly. “And I’m sure your daughter would help to make the event memorable, too. You could even try to kill me with one of your hair ornaments. That would make a big impression, no? Or you could smile and accept reality. Those are your options. After what you did to me in the hotel room, I will not hesitate to embarrass you.”

“Vaffanculo,” she hissed. “Stronzo.”

“I’m a good dancer,” he offered.

“Maiale,” she hissed. “You are not welcome here. Va te ne, before I really do kill you.”

Rachel began to whimper. “Mamma?”

Tam shot him one last poisonous look and murmured something soothing to the child. Rachel was emboldened, and soon began to flirt again while her mother stared up at the wedding, mouth clamped. Furious, but neutralized—for now.

Ah, well. He winked at the child. He’d charmed the little one, at least. And the evening was young.

He would take it as progress.

Manipulative swine. He’d assessed the situation perfectly. If she got agitated, Rachel would freak. If they made a scene, Becca would never forgive her. Becca had doubts about Tam, even though Tam’s efforts on behalf of the children kidnapped by the organ pirates had forced her to grudgingly admit that maybe Tam might have some small redeeming qualities—the operative word being “small.” Becca was still pissed at the way Tam had kicked her man around during the organ pirate debacle. It wouldn’t do to underestimate Becca. After how she’d aquitted herself in that whole Zhoglo nightmare, she’d proved she was not to be fucked with, and Tam respected that.

But it was so silly of her to take it personally. That big galoot Nick had deserved every kick in the teeth that Tam had given him, and he was tough enough to take it. Nick himself had no hard feelings.

It didn’t matter. Becca was still convinced that Tam was a rude, raving, dangerous hellion. Which, of course, she was. No arguments there. But Nick insisted that they grit their teeth and feign friendliness.

So fuck it. Whatever.

The upshot of it all was if Tam wrecked Becca’s wedding, no matter how justified she might feel, being jerked around by this gigolo pimp asshole with his big, terrifying agenda, that fragile truce would be dissolved, and the bride would proceed to take Tam apart. Physically. Unpleasant for everyone. Not good for Rachel. To be avoided if at all possible.

Tam cuddled Rachel, glancing down at the little girl’s face to see how she was handling…holy crap! The kid was smiling at him! Giggling at that smirking pig dog! And he was smiling back, using that knock-you-dead sidelong grin, white teeth flashing, eyes crinkled. God, what a lethal smile. She wanted to backhand it right off his face.

Bastard. How dare he use Rachel to back her into a corner.

She didn’t hear a word of the ceremony. Sveti looked great in her bridesmaid dress, alongside Becca’s sister Carrie, but Tam couldn’t help notice the sad looks she kept casting at Josh, Becca’s brother. Josh was twenty-two years old to Sveti’s fourteen. Guaranteed heartbreak. Sveti was already very pretty if a bit too serious, and prone to moping. But Nick and Tam both would beat up Joshie in a heartbeat if he even looked at Sveti cross-eyed, at least for the next four or five years or so. She was far too young, and she’d been through too much horrendous shit already, but still, there it was.

Josh had other fish to fry anyhow. He was dangling at least ten different girlfriends on a string.

She was going to have a talk with that girl. Poor little thing. She wished Sveti could have exactly what she wanted just once in a blue moon. She deserved it, after what she’d gone through with the organ pirates, as well as what she’d done for Rachel. Rachel had only lived through that ordeal because of Sveti’s love and care.

Tam would gladly chain up that panting dog of a Joshie in a monastery and keep him pure for Sveti by brute force until she grew up.

But life didn’t work that way. People could not be controlled, feelings could not be controlled. She hadn’t always believed that, but the last few months of life with Rachel had driven the point home.

People so seldom got what they deserved, for good or for evil, she reflected, casting a sour look at Janos. Rachel was participating enthusiastically in his efforts to undermine her. And everyone had begun to notice that she had company. Tall, dark, handsome company.

Davy recognized Janos and stared at them fixedly as he jiggled little Jeannie in his arms. He looked puzzled and alarmed.

His eyes asked her is this a problem?

She made an executive decision in that moment to handle it herself and rolled her eyes to indicate, no problem, just a pain in the ass. Hoping it was true. She didn’t want to spoil the party for Davy, either, or any of the rest of them. And oh, joy. Now Margot was gawking, too, her eyes like saucers. A little poking and gesticulating, and within seconds, everyone sitting in her orbit was rubbernecking. A wave of stares, grins, whispers followed from Seth, Raine, Liv, Sean.

Connor and Erin, too. Erin smirked knowingly over her son’s round blond head. Idiot. Thinking that wild, wonderful sex was finally being had by that snotty bitch in her mountain lair. No doubt reflecting smugly that getting properly nailed would magically render Tam a docile, satisfied pussycat who would be sweet and nice and obliging to everyone henceforth. Don’t hold your breath, babydoll, she told Erin silently.

Then again, who could blame them for thinking it, after what Davy and Nick witnessed at Shibumi? Everone in the room probably knew the details, the way that crowd gossiped among themselves.

It took a few minutes to identify the prickling heat in her face, it was so unfamiliar. Mother of God. She was blushing. She was shocked at herself. If she needed any further proof of her impending nervous breakdown, this was it. Maybe she was having a hot flash. Premature menopause would be easier to embrace than blushing.

Still. At thirty-one, menopause seemed a bit too much to hope. Flu maybe? A sudden fever? Except that she never got sick.

And since when did she give a shit what anyone thought of her?

She was so absorbed in her own thoughts, the explosion of hoots, howls, and applause made her jump. Nick grabbed his new wife and bent her over in a juicy, triumphant kiss. Tam nuzzled Rachel’s warm curls as the organ began to blare, bracing herself for the obligatory physical contact, the mandatory boring chitchat. Torture, every time.

Why did she go to these events, anyway? For Rachel’s sake, she supposed, but not entirely. She hated them, yes, but she was honest enough to acknowledge that a piece of her, for some reason, wished she was a person who did not hate them.

Part of her wished very badly that she didn’t have to hate everything so goddamn much.

That didn’t help her now, though. Not in the midst of being simultaneously bored, encroached upon, invaded, and annoyed by everyone. She muscled a big smile onto her face, clenched her teeth, and put Rachel on the floor as the deluge approached.

Erin was the first to bear down on her, flushed with triumphant delight. “Hey, Tam. You look great. Gorgeous dress, and Rachel is a doll in lipstick red. What a nice surprise to see you here, Mr. Janos!”

“A delight for me, too.” He bowed over Erin’s hand and gave Tam a sidelong wink before he kissed it, à la Count Dracula.

He would die for that wink, Tam silently vowed. She met Connor’s eyes, grimly amused to note that Connor was as unimpressed as she at Janos’s slick, Transylvanian gallantry. Erin seemed to be enjoying it, though, and baby Kev as well. Babies liked the guy. Go figure.

It made no sense, but she had no time to wonder about it. Everyone was crowding around to see the latest sideshow—Tam with a date, whoo-hoo—and she was trapped in a dance of embracing arms and social kisses and loud exclamations.

Rachel grabbed her thigh, protesting at being lost in a forest of legs, but before she could extricate herself, the child was swept up and almost out of her field of vision, skinny red legs waving wildly.

She spun around with a gasp. Janos was putting Rachel on his shoulders. She shrieked with delight, eyes wide, cheeks rosy.

“Put her down,” she spat at him. “Figlio di puttana.”

He blinked innocently. Rachel chortled, wrapping an arm around his forehead. “But why? She loves it.”

Tam reached up to grab her. Rachel began to wind up into her ambulance shriek. Tam sighed and let her arms drop.

“She’s not completely potty trained, you know,” she said. “She often loses it in moments of great excitement. But we’re living dangerously today. Taking big risks. No pull-up pants. Just big girl panties. Made out of thin cotton knit.”

Janos gazed back, apparently unintimidated. “Your point is?”

She shrugged. “I have fresh underwear and tights in my bag for Rachel if she pees or poops herself, but I have no spare Armani jacket for you when the inevitable happens,” she said. “Nor will I have the least sympathy for you. On the contrary. It will make my day.”

Janos’s white teeth flashed. “You are less likely to stab with a poisoned blade or tase me with a necklace while I have Rachel on my shoulders,” he said. “I am safer like this. I will risk it.”

“Be it on your head, then. Or your shoulders, and running down your back, as the case may be.” Tam noticed the fascinated audience clustered around them. “Oh, for Christ’s sake,” she snapped. “Don’t you folks all have people to kiss? Go on, fuss over the bride before she gets annoyed at me for drawing too much attention to myself! Go!”

The crowd dispersed, smirking at each other. Janos followed her as she hoisted the diaper bag over her shoulder and made her way to the ballroom where the reception was being held. He suffered Rachel’s sticky, clutching hands grabbing his ears, his nose, yanking his hair, all with calm good humor.

She spotted a table to the side that was flanked by a long bench, where bulging diaper bags already sat. She recognized them as Margot and Erin’s. High chairs were interspersed with the place settings.

She headed for it and found her name. Janos sat down on the other side of Rachel’s high chair, lifting her onto his lap and bouncing her. The kid giggled madly, delighted. So dangerous, to let oneself be charmed by so little, she thought darkly. “That’s Erin’s chair,” she informed him.

“There’s room for another person,” Janos said. “She was happy to see me with you. She’ll make space for me.”

“Her husband won’t be thrilled to have an uninvited stranger with no security clearance plant his arrogant ass right next to his wife and son,” Tam said.

“You’re my security clearance,” he said.

She passed a roll from the breadbasket to Rachel. “Do you want to live to see the dawn? You do understand the futility of following me around, don’t you, Janos? I will never do what you have asked. Never. Is that absolutely clear?”

“As crystal,” he said.

She watched sourly as Janos was a good sport about having the roll crumbled and smeared all over his Armani. God, how her jaw ached. Social events in general made her tense, and the day’s bizarre events and assorted shocking revelations had ratcheted the tension up higher, nudging her toward homicidal on her own scale. Tam had no talent for parties at the best of times. But Becca wouldn’t like an impromptu amputation with a steak knife or someone losing an eye to an escargot fork at her nuptial bash. Behave. Down, girl. Breathe.

She reached for the cabernet that sat breathing in the middle of the table and sloshed some into her glass. People were already drifting toward her table like gawkers toward a car wreck. She closed her eyes against the pulse of a stress headache.

It was going to get worse before it got better.