Cross Roads (8 page)

“Yes, Nikki, I hear you, and I promise. I'm thinking this is kind of like those pumpkins from way back. I hate all things pumpkin.”

In spite of herself, Nikki laughed. “Can't you speed it up, Jack?”

“And break an axle and have to hoof the last mile? I-don't-think-so. I can see the airport. We're almost there. No luggage might pose a problem.”

“I don't see why,” Nikki said. “Well, I do see why, but I'm sure we can talk our way through it. After all, you're Global's top dog here in this hellhole. All you have to do is throw your weight around. You can do that, can't you, Jack?”

Jack correctly interpreted the anxiety level in his wife's voice and just nodded. The truth was, he had no idea what to expect when he got to the airport. He knew for a fact there was a contingent of Global's field agents on duty because he had personally deployed them. All of the agents worked under him. But as everyone in the Global Securities network knew, there was only one real boss, and that was Hank Jellicoe, who had all the power centers of this country under lock and key. He nodded again, more to reassure himself than Nikki.

“You know what, I'm just going to leave the car out front and have one of the guys take it back to the house. That way I won't have to worry about the keys.”

“Sounds good. We're here, Jack.”

“Yeah, we're here! We have thirty-three minutes till the flight boards. Let's just hope we can get out of
here
.”

I
sabelle Flanders bolted upright, her body flushing, her head pounding. Her eyes were wild as she looked around the room she had been sleeping in for the past year and a half. It was ostentatious, but she hadn't decorated it, and it wasn't to her taste. Too much furniture—costly furniture—too many statues and knickknacks. The architect in her liked clean, straight lines, no clutter. It was obvious to her trained eye that whoever had decorated the entire house did not have a budget, and money had been no object. At least that's what Stu had told her. The bottom line was that she hated the place and everything in it.

Her head continued to pound as Isabelle swung her legs over the side of the bed and made her way to the shower. Maybe, just maybe, she could head off what she knew was coming. It had been years since she'd had one of what she called her
spells.
Back when her life had been turned upside down by an employee who'd blamed her for a deadly car accident and went on to steal her business, her fiancé, her money, and her life. She'd lost her architect's license and been one step away from killing herself when Nikki Quinn came into her life and somehow, with her help and that of the other vigilantes, she became whole again, and the awful spells or
visions,
as the others called them, stopped. And now the visions were with her again, and there was nothing she could do to stop them. Stress, one doctor had said. Another said it was a gift and to enjoy the experience. There were more doctors who said the same thing, only using different words. She knew they thought she was crazy, and sometimes she thought she was, too. Until something happened that proved she really did see what she saw in her visions.

Isabelle looked into the vanity mirror and wondered who the person staring at her was. Panic rivered through her. She stepped back and turned on the shower. If she didn't turn on the exhaust fan, the mirror would steam up, and she wouldn't
see
anything.

She knew she was in the shower because she could feel the water from the thirty-seven jets pummeling her head and body, but she was somewhere else, fully clothed, watching Jack Emery looking at a stack of papers on his desk. Sand was blowing from all directions, almost blinding her. She desperately wanted to talk to Jack, but there was sand in her mouth. Ted, Harry, and Joe Espinosa's names were on the papers. She blinked and blinked again because she was now in Harry's
dojo.
No, that was wrong, she was outside Harry's
dojo
and everyone was talking at once—Myra, Maggie, and Annie—but she couldn't hear what they were saying because it was raining, and the rain was getting inside her ears. Yoko, sweet Yoko, was holding out rice cakes no one wanted, and she had tears in her eyes. She looked down at the newspaper on the picnic table. It was the
Post,
Maggie's paper, the very paper Annie owned. She squinted and saw the date. Today's date. She tried to make her tongue work, but no words came out. She flapped her arms and hands, but no one seemed to notice. She tried screaming. At the top of her lungs. She heard no sound.

Isabelle sucked in her breath when she saw herself seated on an airplane. She was safe; she was going home. The picture in her mind raced forward as she watched Jack and Nikki clutch at one another. Nikki was crying, and Jack was trying to comfort her. All she could hear were the words
we're going home
over and over again. Home.

Isabelle moved then because the water had turned cool. She reached up to adjust the hot water faucet, then sat down on the marble bench inside the massive shower, which could hold a dozen people. The terrible, pounding headache was gone, but she was shaking and shivering, the warm water cascading over her naked body, doing nothing to warm her. She was cold to the bone.

Somehow, she managed to get out of the shower into the fog of steam that had engulfed the bathroom. She reached for where she thought the bath sheet was, found it, and wrapped it around her. Then she ran out the French doors to the terrace, where the sun was scorching hot. She took a deep breath before she curled up on a gaily colored chaise. More deep breaths. Still more deep breaths. And then she was okay. She felt the blazing heat but didn't move. She needed to think. Think
hard.
If only she had someone to talk to, to confide in. If only.

God, how she missed the others. She'd give anything, anything, to be back on the mountain with Annie, Myra, and the others. She wished now that President Connor had never pardoned any of them. At least she'd been happy back then. It wasn't that she was exactly unhappy here in Paraguay. She still couldn't believe she was here, living under Hank Jellicoe's roof and obeying his rules. She'd been a fool to follow Stu. But it had seemed like the thing to do at the time. How wrong she'd been. At least she had the good sense not to get married. That alone left her a free agent. But she wasn't really free, and she knew it full well. The eyes and ears of Hank Jellicoe's people were all around her. When she complained about the spying, the reports on everything she said or did, Stu just said, “That's the way it is. Accept it because it's for your own safety.”

Stu had been away more these last months than he was home. In truth, she was always relieved when she saw him packing for a trip to God only knew where. In the beginning she had cried when Stu said she couldn't leave to go home to visit. Then she'd started to scheme and plot behind the scenes. Once she got the lay of the land and learned how the household worked, she'd gone to work behind closed doors. She was an architect, for God's sake. How hard could it be to doctor up a passport? It had taken her three months to fine-tune everything. She was good to go if she had the guts to attempt the move. If she wanted any confirmation, today's vision was all she needed to spur her on. With Stu on the move, all she had to contend with were her handlers and the household help. The truth was, her handlers of late had become rather lax in their watchfulness, something she hoped would work to her advantage. Why she needed handlers or watchers was something she still hadn't figured out after all this time. Stu telling her it was for her own safety was a crock, and he knew she knew it. She didn't believe for a minute when she hounded him unmercifully saying
they
were just being careful since she was in a foreign country and was an American citizen.

Yeah, well, this place and Stu, too, came with an expiration date and, as far as she was concerned, that date had arrived. The thought left her light-headed.

Isabelle got up and left the terrace. Inside, she drew the sheer curtains covering the French doors and headed to a walk-in closet that was as big as a two-bedroom apartment in the Watergate. She walked among the racks of clothing she rarely wore and finally selected a white dress that would show off her tan, high-heeled sandals, and a perky little hat with a brim of the kind all the ladies in town wore as they shopped. Today, she would be the lady in white. When she boarded the flight to wherever it was going, she would be a lady in lime green, an outfit she'd never worn. She quickly ripped off the tags, ran to the bathroom, and flushed them. She folded the clothing neatly and tightly to fit into the white straw bag that she always carried. A small green-and-white clutch on a slender chain and no bigger than an oversize wallet went into the bottom of the straw bag, along with matching sandals. A strawberry blond wig followed. She was glad now that she'd had her hair cut short just a week ago; less hair to stuff under the wig, which was long and straight. She was sure Alexis would approve.

Back in her bathroom, Isabelle opened an ornate container of body powder and ran her fingers through it until she found the small package of latex she'd hidden there months earlier. Just enough of it to her nose, chin, and cheeks, and she would no longer look like Isabelle Flanders. The new name on her passport said she was Consuela Cardoza from Brazil. She was so glad now that she had paid attention to Alexis when she disguised them back on the mountain. She remembered Alexis's words, “Less is more, so be careful or it will look obvious. You just want a subtle change.”

Back inside the walk-in closet, Isabelle dropped the latex into the straw bag.

She ran back and forth, adding, taking out, making sure the straw bag didn't appear heavier than normal. She took one last jittery look at the passport that she had labored over for months. If there was a flaw anywhere, she couldn't see it. She carefully folded enough local currency, the equivalent of a thousand American dollars, and slipped the passport back into the clutch along with enough cash for bribes and to get her Stateside. She stuffed another wad in her bra.

According to the locals, cash was king in this country, enough to make the recipient look the other way. She felt like a spy and decided she rather liked the feeling. If only the Sisters could see her now. She felt her eyes starting to fill up. Soon.

As she dressed, Isabelle wondered whom she would draw today to follow her. She hoped it would be Marta, the small dumpy woman with the bad feet who tended to sleep standing up while Isabelle shopped. More often than not, Isabelle had to wake Marta from her siesta to tell her she was ready to go home. She pulled the cord beside the bed, and, within seconds, a young girl of sixteen or so poked her head in the door. “I'm going shopping. Have someone fetch the car and bring it to the front. Who is going with me today?”

“Marta is the only one here today. She said you went shopping yesterday, and today is to rest. That is why no one else is here but me, and I cannot leave the house unattended. She said today is to rest,” she repeated stubbornly.

“I changed my mind,” Isabelle snapped. “Tell her to get in the car or stay home. I really don't care. Tell cook I would like roast chicken for dinner and to serve at eight o'clock. I plan to shop until I drop. I will bring you something pretty for being so helpful.”

The girl's eyes sparkled. “Yes, ma'am. Thank you for being so kind to me.”

The last thing Isabelle did, before leaving the bedroom she hoped she would never have to see again, was to take two bottles of ice-cold water out of the minibar. She cracked one open and dropped in two twenty-milligram Valium tablets. By the time they reached the shopping district, Marta would have consumed the entire bottle of water and hopefully would sleep for six or seven hours in the backseat while Isabelle made her getaway.

Isabelle, her insides quaking, strode through the house like the mistress she was. Outside, a gleaming silver Mercedes sat in the hot sun, the engine running, Marta in the backseat. In the beginning, when she had first arrived, she'd been assigned a chauffeur. That lasted all of two days before she put her foot down and said she would drive herself. In the end, she had to agree to bring Marta or someone like her. Following that incident, it had only taken her one week to realize she was being watched 24/7.

She'd had a rousing fight with Stu, and things went steadily downhill after that. But she'd stayed on because she couldn't see any other available options. It wasn't until months later, after a horrible fight when she threatened to leave, that Stu told her she was there for the length of the contract. She'd cried for hours, days, weeks. When she couldn't cry anymore, she spent endless hours wondering what the other Sisters would do in her place. The scenarios ran from the sublime to the ridiculous. That was when she finally, finally, realized she was going to have to go it alone and figure out a way to get back to the States. Life was a bitch sometimes.

Behind the wheel, Isabelle found herself watching the rearview mirror every few seconds to see if anyone was following her, and listening to Marta grumble and whine. There were times, and this was one of those times, when she wondered if Marta was as stupid as she seemed. “I told you I saw a dress I liked in a magazine, and I want to see if I can find it. I don't care if it takes me all day, and it probably will, to find it. I plan on going to every single store in the shopping district. You can walk along with me, or you can stay in the car and eat ice cream from the vendors. I'll be sure to park in the shade. You did say you like talking to all of the sidewalk vendors. I'll leave the keys with you so you can keep the air-conditioning on. That means stop whining right now, or I will stop this car and push you out. Well?”

“Today was to rest,” the dumpy woman said stubbornly.

Isabelle clenched her teeth. The water bottle was half-full. Marta should be getting drowsy by now. “Yes, for you, not me. You need to get more exercise. I see you are putting on too much weight. That is why your feet hurt you all the time. Is there anything you would like me to buy you today? Some chocolates, some sticky cakes? Or maybe some of my perfume that you like to
borrow
from time to time.”

“Hmmm,” Marta said as she struggled to keep her eyes open. “Yes, some chocolates would be nice.”

Ten minutes later, Isabelle brought the high-powered Mercedes to a stop on a shady, tree-lined street in the elegant shopping district. All she wanted to do was get out of the car and gallop to the nearest store. But she had to play the game and observe a certain protocol in case Marta wasn't the only one watching her.

Isabelle got out of the car, her bag secure on her shoulder. She opened the back door to poke at Marta. “We're here, Marta. Do you want to come with me or are you going to stay in the car? Here are the keys.”

Marta roused herself enough to mumble that she would stay in the car for a little while. Isabelle handed over the second bottle of water.

Isabelle looked around. Everything looked the way it did when she shopped on other days. To her left was the ice-cream vendor, a friend of sorts to Marta. She walked over to him and motioned to the car and Marta in the backseat. She handed over some local currency and said, “Watch over her. I am going to be late. If she gets hungry, buy her some food.” The vendor nodded and pocketed the money.