Jared zoomed through a light. With luck Shepherd would stop at his house to get some traveling money as well as the account numbers to his offshore bank accounts. Jared wasn’t a betting man, but it seemed like a sure thing that Shepherd would be preparing to leave the country.
Jared had already called for backup. His plan was to stall Shepherd any way he could until they arrived. If that meant boldly strolling onto Shepherd’s compound and asking to talk to the man himself, so be it. He was up to it on adrenaline alone.
As he drove, an idea came to him, making plausible the stalling tactic he wanted to implement. He could try to make Shepherd believe that he still had the disk, locked in a safe place and that he was willing to trade it for a cut of the business. He could lie convincingly enough to plant doubts in Shepherd’s head. At least long enough until help arrived.
Pulling up in front of the towering white gates in front of Warren Shepherd’s estate, Jared leaned out and pressed the buzzer located on the side of the brick post. He waited, but there was no response. Pressing it again, he realized that though he listened, he didn’t hear the buzzer make any noise.
Puzzled, he got out of the car and tried the gates. After tugging on them, they parted easily enough, as if no current flowed through them to prohibit any unwanted visits.
That itchy feeling at the back of his neck intensified. He didn’t like this.
Looking around, he expected to see anything from bodyguards to Ninja warriors descending on him. But nothing moved. Even the guard dogs that Shepherd was rumored to have didn’t put in an appearance.
Was he already gone?
Jared left his car where it was and went the rest of the way to the estate-like house on foot. Even from a distance, he could see that there were lights on in every window of the ground floor of the three-storied sprawling house. Had the rats left the sinking ship? Or was there some kind of trap waiting for him on the other side of the front door?
Or, had Rosetti gotten wind of what had gone down and decided, childhood friendship notwithstanding, to burn his bridges behind him, cut his losses and get rid of Shepherd?
The myth that there was honor among thieves was just that, a myth.
Like the gates at the edge of the grounds, the front door was unlocked.
Something is wrong here,
a voice echoed inside his head. Still, he’d come too far to turn back. Stealthily, Jared entered and immediately heard raised voices coming from somewhere inside the house. Listening, he made out Shepherd’s. There was a note of fear in it.
“You’re not going to get away with this, bitch.”
“I don’t want to get away with it. I just want to see you dead. But first I want to see you mangled and bleeding on the floor, just the way you left Joe.”
Oh, God, it was Maren. He’d recognized the voice the moment she’d said the first word. Adrenaline shot through him as he hurried toward the source of the voices.
As he made his way, he remained alert against one of Shepherd’s henchmen springing out at him from some corner of the house. But then it occurred to him that if there were any of his people around, they would have been trying to get the drop on Maren. It was obvious from what he was hearing that she had gotten the upper hand on Shepherd.
He tried not to think what that implied.
“I didn’t do anything to your old man,” Shepherd said, the tremor in his voice escalating.
Maren’s tone was steely, unshakable—and unlike anything he’d heard coming from her before, even when she was angry with him.
“Maybe not personally, but you watched. I know you watched, you sick son of a bitch. The only reason Papa Joe stayed at Rainbow’s End was because he was afraid of what you’d do to me if he tried to leave. But that’s your speed, isn’t it, Shepherd? Threatening women you think are defenseless.” Jared thought he heard the sound of a gun being cocked. “Well, I’m not defenseless now, am I?”
“Please, Maren, we can work something out.”
“I don’t think so.”
Jared walked into the room to see that Maren had Shepherd on his knees. The man’s hands were clasped behind his head as he stared up at her fearfully.
The gun in her hand was aimed at Shepherd’s chest.
Chapter 15
J
ared judged that she was in a very dangerous state of mind. He’d been in situations like this before, where perfectly law-abiding citizens had been pushed too far and reacted on impulse. But the confidence with which Maren held her gun told him that she hadn’t just borrowed someone’s weapon, she knew how to use it. No overripe anxiety caused her hands to shake. On the contrary, they were steadier than rocks on the ground.
He needed to keep her from making a fatal mistake. His eyes on both her and the gun she was pointing, he took a tentative step forward.
“Maren, I didn’t expect to find you here.” Jared kept his tone calm, friendly.
She knew he was going to get here sooner or later. If he was any kind of a cop, conclusions would have brought him here. By the sound of it, he was alone. She refused to take her eyes off the trembling coward in front of her. “Life’s full of little surprises.”
Jared nodded, taking his time, wanting nothing to set her off. “That’s a fact.”
Only Shepherd gave way to hysteria. His eyes were like two brown marbles as they looked from the weapon to Jared and then back again. “What the hell is this, some kind of freakin’ sitcom? Take the gun away from her. The crazy idiot is going to shoot me.”
Jared took a breath along with another step. He stopped when she cast a warning glance in his direction before looking back at Shepherd.
“Are you?” Jared asked.
She never flinched. The temptation of payback was tremendous. If she began to think about the way Joe had looked when she’d walked into the house… “I’m seriously considering it.”
“You don’t want to do that, Maren.”
The calm, authoritative note in his voice got under her skin. Just who the hell did Jared think he was? “And just how would you know what I would or wouldn’t want to do?”
The tightrope beneath his feet was taut. He trod across it very cautiously, not a hundred percent sure what would set her off. “Haven’t a clue, Maren, just talking cause and effect here. You kill him, we wind up losing a possible witness against Rosetti.”
Shaking, Shepherd stared at him in disbelief. “You think I’m crazy?” he cried, his face paling. “Rosetti’ll have me killed.”
He took another half step in Maren’s direction, pretending to think over Shepherd’s protest. “I don’t really see much difference in your situation, Shepherd. She squeezes that trigger, you’re dead now. If the D.A. thinks you have something to offer, maybe he’ll put you in the witness security program. You won’t live the lavish lifestyle you’ve been living, but you’d live.” Rather than move toward Maren, he surprised them both by going toward Shepherd instead. If worse came to worst, he figured he could shield the man with his own body. Shepherd was an integral factor in the case. “How about it, Shepherd, what’ll it be? The lady or the D.A.?”
“Aren’t you forgetting something?” When he turned to look at her, Maren’s eyes indicated the gun she was holding.
“No, I’m not forgetting something,” Jared responded as calm as Shepherd was agitated. “But I’m banking on the fact that you wouldn’t be able to kill a man in cold blood.”
Maybe he did get points for knowing her, she thought. But she didn’t want Shepherd to doubt that she was a threat. Trying to negate any confidence that might be budding, she gestured at Shepherd with her gun barrel and had the pleasure of watching him quake. “How about you? Are you willing to bank on it?”
The man’s terror quickly overrode any false bravado he might have had at his disposal. He turned toward Jared. “Okay, okay, I’ll talk to the D.A. Just get this lunatic away from me.”
“Talk to the D.A. about what?” Maren persisted.
“That I had your old man beaten because he made copies of the records.”
“And Joe was never a willing accomplice, was he?” she continued. When the other man didn’t answer quickly enough, she raised the gun barrel to his head.
“No, no, he wasn’t,” Shepherd cried. “I made him help us by telling him I’d have you killed if he did. You satisfied now?” Shepherd railed, spitting as he asked the question.
Maren smiled as she reached into her pocket with her other hand. And took out a tape recorder. She shut it off. “I am now. I got what I came for.”
For the second time that evening, Jared heard the whine of distant sirens pierce the darkness. Backup was arriving, he thought. They’d be here within the next five minutes if not less.
“You weren’t going to kill him, were you?” Jared asked as he put out his hand for her gun.
After a moment she surrendered the weapon. “I couldn’t honestly tell you. It was touch-and-go for a while,” she admitted. “But I knew I had to get him to clear Papa Joe’s name.”
Jared kept his own weapon trained on Shepherd in case the man had any ideas about getting away. “That’s my girl.”
“No,” she said firmly, holding on to independence with both hands, “I’m not.” Maren sighed inwardly. It was over. Secretly she’d hoped that Shepherd would attempt to lunge at her while she’d held the gun on him, giving her an excellent excuse to shoot him. But the pompous man in the three-thousand-dollar suits had sank down to his knees almost instantly. Just a coward at heart.
Jared shoved the weapon she’d just given him into the back of his waistband. He looked around. The place was too empty, too eerie.
“Where is everyone?” he wanted to know.
“Gone,” she told him. She’d gotten the story from Shepherd at gunpoint. “Once they’d realized that they were all just walking liabilities, that the evidence would probably put them behind bars for a very long time and that Rosetti would more than likely get rid of Shepherd rather than risk having him talk, they deserted the kingpin here so fast you couldn’t see them for the dust.” Sarcasm and satisfaction dripped from her voice. If she couldn’t kill him, at least she could have the pleasure of watching his kingdom fall. “Joe not only detailed the monetary transactions, along with a fake set of books, he also kept a journal online of the people involved. That’s why Shepherd sent his men to get the disk from him.”
But all that presupposed a knowledge of Joe’s enlistment by the D.A. Only the three of them, plus Janelle and Davidson knew about that part. He hadn’t even told his superior about it. He refused to mentally accuse anyone of leaking the information. He looked at Maren. “How did they know?”
Maren shook her head. In the background, the squad cars had arrived. The sirens had ceased their threatening song. “I don’t know.”
But there was one man in the room who did. Jared cocked his weapon, pointing it straight at the kneeling man. “Shepherd?”
Shepherd scowled. “Max.”
Maren was stunned. Wasn’t anyone who they said they were? “Max is in on this, too?”
“That jerk?” Shepherd hooted contemptuously. “Hell, no.” He looked at Jared because he held the weapon. “He just let it slip that you were sniffing around Maren and that Joe was burning the midnight oil in the office. Since there was no reason for any extra input on that double-crosser’s part, I got suspicious.” He shook his head, obviously remembering what had gone down a few short hours ago. “Tough guy. Wouldn’t tell me what he was doing, but I knew. I knew he had to have copied the files. Footprints on the program gave him up. The last thing that old guy said to me was, ‘Go to hell.’”
Fury crowded her all over again. “You bastard!”
Shepherd’s raised hands went up higher. “I was strictly there as an observer,” he cried, panic entering his voice. He swung his head around to look at Jared. “I never touched the guy.”
Jared saw the look in Maren’s eyes and knew what she was thinking. She wished she had the gun back. But the house was filling up with detectives.
“Hell, is this thing all wrapped up already?”
Jared turned at the sound of the familiar, disappointed voice to see his younger brother Troy walk into the room, followed by a number of uniformed patrolman.
Troy jerked a thumb behind him toward the opened door. “Casey has the S.W.A.T. team all ready to go outside,” he said, referring to the sergeant in charge of the sharpshooters.
“Nothing to swat,” Jared responded dryly. He nodded at the man who was still on his knees. “You want to take over, Troy? I’m about done for the day.”
A grin played on Troy’s face. There was nothing he liked better than bringing in the bad guys.
“You always did take the easy way out, big brother.” He indicated the man about to be taken into custody. “This Shepherd?”
Jared nodded. “He says he has an earful for the D.A. And if he doesn’t feel like talking, we’ve got most of it on tape, thanks to Maren here.”
Producing handcuffs, Troy took Shepherd by the arm and jerked him up to his feet. “Ready to sing?” he asked the man. He spun Shepherd around so that he could handcuff his wrists behind him.
“Hold it.” Stepping forward, Jared took the handcuffs from his brother. He held them up in front of Maren. “You want to do the honors?”
Her surprise faded, to be replaced by pleasure. “I’d love to,” Maren replied with relish. She snapped the cuffs on one at a time. “Although it’s still won’t compare to shooting him and watching him bleed out.”
“In the long run, this’ll be worse.” Giving the cuffs a tug to make certain they were secure, he pushed Shepherd toward his brother. “And I won’t have to bake you a cake with a file in it. I’m not much at baking,” Jared confided.
“He isn’t,” Troy agreed, putting in his two cents. He beckoned one of the uniformed policeman over. “Take this scum down to the station.”
Jared suddenly felt tired and wired at the same time. He looked at Maren before telling Troy, “I’ll be in in the morning to do the paperwork.”
“I’ll be sure to have the confetti for the ticker tape parade ready,” Troy quipped before he got down to the business of securing the area.
Crossing to Maren, Jared second-guessed where she would go from here. It wasn’t hard. “Can I take you back to the hospital?”
She didn’t know if she was ready to be with this man. She was still nursing her anger. It might take a while to work her way through that. Besides, there was the problem of logistics to address. “I drove my own car, remember?”
Apparently he’d already taken that fact into account before making his offer. “I can have one of the uniforms drive it over to your place.”
She shook her head. The man was still smooth, even under life-and-death circumstances. Smooth with a dark center. Like black velvet. “Like I said before, you’ve got an answer for everything, don’t you?”
“Not everything,” he allowed. “I don’t have an answer for how long it’s going to take you to forgive me.”
Even as he said it, she knew that she was more than half leaning his way. Still, she couldn’t make it too easy for him. “What makes you think I’ll forgive you?”
There were too many people around. He wanted to be alone with her. Taking her by the arm, Jared guided her outside the house.
That she let him gave him hope.
The night was crisp, clear. He should have stopped for her jacket, but he was too intent on clearing this up. Maybe if she was cold, she’d see things his way faster. “Because I’m an optimist at heart.”
So had she been. Once. But that was before all her illusions had been shattered. “There’s optimist, and then there’s fool. Believe me—” a touch of cynicism entered her voice “—I know all about that.”
“You’re not a fool, Maren.”
“Aren’t I?” She raised her chin. The fight was still in her eyes. “I fell in love with someone who didn’t even exist.”
“The name didn’t exist. At least, not the last name. But the man did.” Unable to stop himself, he lightly touched her cheek. Wanting to caress it. For now, he held himself in check. “The man does.”
She glanced toward the open door and saw Troy pass by inside. The detective had called him “big brother.” “You really have two brothers and a sister?” she asked.
His lips quirked in a grin. “Got the scars to prove it.” Pushing up his sleeve, he showed her the faintest discoloration along the inside of his forearm. “That’s where Janelle bit me when she couldn’t get out of a wrestling hold I had on her when we were kids.” He rolled his sleeve back down. “I’ve also got a ton of cousins if you’re interested in those,” he offered. “They can be yours for the asking.”
She raised an eyebrow. “You’re selling them?”
“Actually,” he corrected, “I’m offering them. In exchange.”
“In exchange for what?”
This time he did caress her cheek. He wanted this to be behind them. But she deserved to work this out of her system at her own pace.
“You.”
Was he asking her to forget what happened? To start fresh? “I don’t understand.”
To have a better foundation for his argument, he backtracked. “You just said you fell in love with me.”
“With Jared Stevens,” she clarified. Besides, it wasn’t really love she’d left, just loneliness, Maren silently insisted. Loneliness made you do strange things. “And I got confused.”
“I didn’t.” He traced the outline of her lips with his thumb. She didn’t pull away immediately, and he grew more hopeful. “Maybe for the first time in my life, everything’s really clear to me.”
She couldn’t trust her emotions. They only served to mix her up and to muddy the water. “Well, it isn’t clear to me. I don’t know who or what you are. And don’t give me any of that garbage about ‘what you see is what you get.’ It isn’t.”
But he had a different opinion. A part of him was in every character he became. And never more so than this last time. If only because, at first, he tried to keep his facts straight. And then, because every lie he’d told her had hurt.
“It is when you come right down to it. No matter who I play, I’m still me. I’m still the guy who wasn’t looking to fall in love, who thought that love was a nice fringe benefit to life but that it only complicated things.” He raised her chin with his finger, forcing her to look at him when she looked away. “I was right about that, you know. It does complicate things. Because now all I can do is think about you.”
“They teach you those lines at the police academy?”
“Nobody taught me what I’m saying now. I had to learn that for myself. And they come from the bottom of my heart.” He took her hands in his, willing her to believe him. “Like I was saying, I wasn’t looking to fall in love, but I did. Hard. With you,” he added in case she was going to be flippant and ask to know who the object of his affections was. “And until just a few minutes ago, I didn’t know what I was going to do about it.”