Harlequin Intrigue, Box Set 1 of 2 (31 page)

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

“Toss the pistol,” Quinn ordered.

Jake reluctantly pitched his gun into a group of palmetto bushes a few feet away. Faye started around him as if to run to Gillette. He grabbed her, forcing her behind him.

“Don't move,” he ordered.

“I have to do something,” she whispered. “He's going to kill Calvin.”

“Making yourself a target isn't the answer.” He looked over his shoulder at her, waiting until she gave him a reluctant nod before facing Quinn again. “What's this all about? You hired me to find these two. Job done. All we have to do now is go into town and work on that extradition order.”

Quinn laughed harshly. “Did you think I didn't hear Miss Decker tell you I was Kevin Rossi? You can drop the act. We all know I'm the one who killed Genovese. He and I had a professional disagreement that unfortunately couldn't be settled any other way.”

“Professional disagreement?” Jake asked, stalling for time as he tried to think of a way to end this without anyone getting killed. Unfortunately, nothing was coming to mind.

“Playing dumb isn't your forte, Mr. Young. Obviously I was playing both sides of the fence, undercover for the FBI supposedly trying to get the goods on Genovese, while at the same time forcing Genovese to sock away money in a special account for my retirement. It was working beautifully until my boss started demanding results. I had to end the arrangement and cover my tracks. Still, even then, everything would have been fine except that Miss Decker was in the wrong place at the wrong time, and she and Mr. Gillette stuck their noses where they didn't belong. Now I'm forced to remedy the situation.”

Stuck their noses where they didn't belong?
Obviously there was still more to the Genovese story that Faye hadn't told him. Which put him at a disadvantage. It was tough to bluff or negotiate his way out of the situation if he didn't know the facts. He curled his fists in frustration. “Why now? You got away clean.”

“Clean? Not exactly. These two took something that belonged to me the day they ran away. It's a ticking time bomb. I've been agonizing over it ever since, worrying it would surface some day and destroy me. Thanks to Mr. Gillette's stupidity, using an old credit card of his in Naples, I finally got a lead. But my boss is already suspicious of me, so I couldn't follow up on my own. Thanks to you, Mr. Young, I can be in and out of here and log just a couple of sick days back at the office. No one will be the wiser and I can finally retire without worrying.” He flicked the rope in his hand like a whip.

Calvin grimaced when the rope snapped against his back. He stumbled forward a few steps. “He wants the journal, Faye. You have to give it to him or he's going to kill me.”

Her fingers curled into the top of Jake's pants.

“What journal?” Jake asked. “What makes you think either of them have it?”

Quinn pointed his rifle at Jake again. “While I appreciate that you found these two for me, that's where your usefulness ends. Did you think it was a coincidence that I hired an investigator new to the area, with no family ties? If something happens to you, no one's going to be crying over it and pushing for an in-depth investigation. So if I were you, I'd
shut up
.” He swung his rifle back toward Calvin. “The journal, Miss Decker. Where is it?”

“It's not here. But I can get it for you,” she called out.

“Where,
exactly
, is it? In that little town of yours, Mystic something or other?”

“It's hidden in the swamp, a full day's hike from here,” she said.

“Step out where I can see you.” Quinn's voice was calm, cold. His gun hand was just as steady as his voice.

“No,” Jake said.

The rifle jerked back toward him. Jake swore and grabbed Faye, diving to cover her just as the rifle boomed through the clearing. The shot kicked up dirt just inches from where they'd been standing. He glared at Quinn.

“That wasn't necessary,” Jake growled.

“I disagree. Help her up and push her over here beside her cohort or I'll shoot again. And this time I won't miss.”

“Get ready to run,” Jake whispered to Faye. “When I stand up, run to the trees as fast as you can. I'll draw his fire.”

“No! He'll kill you. And I can't leave Calvin.”

He helped her to her feet. “Just do it. Trust me.”

But instead of running, she moved away from him just as Quinn had ordered, flashing Jake an apologetic look.

Damn it.
He knew she meant well, that she thought she was protecting both him and her brother. But she'd just made everything that much harder. Now Quinn had three clear targets instead of two.

“Thank you, Miss Decker,” Quinn said. “Your cooperation is noted and appreciated. I assume you have a cell phone, Mr. Young. Toss it to me.”

He pulled his phone out and pitched it squarely at Quinn's chest, hoping he'd lose his grip on the rifle trying to catch or deflect it. But the phone hit him and dropped to the ground. The rifle didn't move. His mouth twitched with amusement.

“Good try.” He stomped his heel on the phone, crushing the display.

“A day's walk to the journal. Is that correct, Miss Decker? Or are you making up stories?”

“I'm telling the truth. I hid it in a hunting cabin deep in the swamp.”

“Hmm. Not the most ideal of situations, considering I don't know this area. And I certainly don't want to trek through a filthy swamp to find the thing. But then again, that's why I have leverage.” He flicked the rope again. Calvin grimaced.

“I'll be generous. I'll give you twenty-four hours to retrieve it and meet us back here. If you aren't back by this time tomorrow night, with the journal, Calvin dies. If I see any signs of law enforcement poking around, or hear any chatter on the police channels—about me, the journal or anything remotely suspicious in the area—Calvin dies. If you do
anything
to alert anyone or try to get help, he dies. Understood?”

She nodded and held her hands up in a conciliatory gesture. “I understand. Please, don't hurt him. We'll get the journal.”

Quinn's brows quirked up. “We? You said
you
know where the journal is. Did anyone else help you hide it?”

“No, I buried it, months ago when I first got here.”

“Then you can
unbury
it by yourself.” The rifle boomed. The bullet slammed into Jake, sweeping him off his feet. White-hot pain flashed through his body. His lungs seized in his chest. He crashed to the ground, his head cracking against the hard earth. The last sound he heard was Faye screaming.

* * *

J
AKE
RESTED
ON
the floor in Eddie's main room. He didn't know which was worse—his throbbing headache, the sharp jabs of pain every time Faye pressed her wet cloth against the lump on the side of his head, or the weight and chill of an ice pack sitting on top of his bruised ribs.

“Quinn?” he asked.

“Gone.” She pressed the cloth against a particularly sensitive spot, making him wince.

“I'm okay. You can stop now.” He pulled her hand away from his head.

“Thank God you were wearing a bulletproof vest.” She feathered her hands over his bare skin as if still searching for a bullet hole between his ribs.

“Bullet-resistant. Not bulletproof. But it still packs a punch.”

“Do you think your ribs are cracked?”

“All I know is they hurt like hell.”

She repositioned the ice pack against his side. He sucked in a sharp breath.

“Sorry, sorry.” She dropped the ice pack to the floor and pressed the wet cloth against his head again, sending another sharp jab of pain shooting through his skull. “You've lost a lot of blood. Do you feel light-headed? Can you breathe okay? If you have a broken rib and it punctured a lung—”

He winced and grabbed her hands. “Stop worrying. I'm breathing fine and the bleeding has mostly stopped. I never would have given much credence to your woo-woo science before, but I have new respect for the pouch of medicine you carry on your necklace.”

She frowned at him. “Woo-woo science? Maybe I shouldn't have wasted my very scientific powder on you after all.” She tugged her hands away and plopped the cloth on the floor beside the ice pack.

He pulled her hand back to his mouth and pressed a quick kiss on it. “I didn't mean to criticize your woo-woo science. Thank you for helping me.”

She rolled her eyes. “You're welcome.”

“How did you manage to get me into the house?”

“Leverage and physics. I rolled you onto a blanket and used it to drag you inside. It wasn't that hard really, except for getting you over the threshold. I think I may have bumped your head a few extra times doing that. Sorry.” She bit her bottom lip in sympathy.

“I'm pretty sure the threshold isn't what's making my head throb right now. Remind me again what exactly happened.”

“We need to get you to a doctor. Your memory is pathetic.”

“My memory is bound to be fuzzy since I was knocked unconscious.” He tried to sit up. Faye braced her shoulder beneath his and helped him scoot his back against the wall with his knees drawn up in front of him.

“Thanks.” He winced. “You said that Quinn had left. Are you sure he's gone?”

“I heard his car going down the road back toward the highway. And he didn't stop me when I was pulling you in here. So, yeah, I'm sure.”

“The last I remember,” he said, “Quinn was asking about a journal. What was he talking about?”

“Can we discuss this later, after we get you to a hospital? We'll take Eddie's car. And...” She swallowed hard. “Then we'll go to the police and report Eddie's murder, and tell them about Quinn and Calvin.”

“I may not remember everything, but I'm pretty sure Quinn would have said something about
not
going to the police. I doubt he's going to make exceptions for hospitals, too. We can't risk your brother's life by outright defiance against his instructions.”

She sat back on her heels. “You're right. He said no cops or he'd kill Calvin. He gave us twenty-four hours to get the journal and bring it back here.”

“Then we need to get the journal.
After
you tell me what it is.”

She cocked her head, studying him. “I don't understand. Why would you, a cop, even consider
not
calling the police in this situation? I would have expected that to be the first thing you'd want to do.”

His mouth thinned. “I know what it's like to lose a sibling. And I also remember the cold, dead look in Quinn's eyes. He's not bluffing when he says he'll kill your brother if we don't follow his instructions. Faye?”

“Yes?”

“The journal?”

She sighed. “It's stupid. I told you earlier that Genovese paid our wages in cash from a safe in his study. Well, Calvin apparently paid a little more attention than I did to the lock combination Genovese used when he opened the safe in front of us.”

“I think I know where this is heading. After the shooting, Calvin took something out of the safe before the police got there.”

“A leather-bound journal.”

“Stealing from a mobster isn't the smartest thing he could have done. Even a dead mobster. No telling who else might be interested in whatever's in that journal.”

“I know, I know. It's been a constant source of arguments between Calvin and me ever since. I didn't discover what he'd done until we were on the run. By then it was too late to return it without associating our name with the journal. I was afraid that whoever is listed in it would come after us.”

“What exactly does it contain?”

“Initials, dollar amounts, dates, account numbers, descriptions of agreements and deals. Pages and pages full of things like that. At the back there's some kind of index written in code. I'm pretty sure it's the key to figuring out the names that go with the initials.”

He whistled. “Sounds to me like you've got a gold mine the FBI would love to get its hands on. Did you make any copies?”

“No. I just wanted it gone. And I was afraid Calvin would try to use it to blackmail some of the people in the journal, which would have made everything worse. So I stole it from him and hid it. I wanted to destroy it, but honestly, it seemed too important to destroy. I worried something might happen later on and we'd need it. Thank God I kept it.”

“It would have been better if you'd turned it over to the police in the first place.”

“Easy to say now. Obviously I didn't think so at the time.”

“Sorry. I'm not trying to place blame. Let's just get it and figure out our next steps.”

“Are you sure we shouldn't go to the police?”

“If we do, and Calvin pays the price, I don't want to bear that burden the rest of my life. Let's at least start out doing what Quinn said, to buy some time until we can figure out a plan. Okay?”

She leaned in and pressed a soft kiss against his lips. “Okay.”

He motioned to his shirt and vest lying a few feet away. “Put the vest on and I'll fasten the straps.”

“Uh, no. Not happening. That's
yours
. You're the one who's going to wear it.”

“Faye, with Quinn out there somewhere, I'm not about to wear a Kevlar vest while you have nothing to protect you. That's not even negotiable. And we're wasting time we don't have arguing about it.”

She shot him an exasperated look and tossed him his shirt while she grabbed the vest. A few minutes later, he was trying to hold back his laughter as she glared at him.

“It's too big. I can hardly move in this thing.” The vest extended several inches past her shoulders, practically swallowing her. It hung almost to her knees. “There's no way I can hike through the marsh like this. It's more of a hazard than protection. I can't wear it.”