In the Arms of the Wind (18 page)

“How many children do you want, Danny?” Jonee Crews asked from her hospital bed.

Danny looked over at her. “That’s a question no one has ever asked me before.”

“In other words, stop being nosy,” Drake, Jonee’s husband, said, no doubt sensing the reluctance on Danny’s part to answer.

“Well, I know Kaycee has always said she’d like four or five,” Jonee said, locking gazes with Danny. Her steady look said volumes for what she was thinking of her sister’s new beau.

Steeling himself not to flinch, Danny smiled lazily. “Why don’t you let us get married before we start thinking about having kids,” he said.

“But you do want children, don’t you?” Jonee pressed.

“Let it rest, Jay-Jay,” her husband said. “Mind your own business.”

“This is my business,” his wife snapped. “Kaycee has always wanted a family. I just want to know how Danny feels about giving her one.”

Kaycee looked up from the infant. She looked from Jonee’s angry face to Danny’s set one, and the truth of the situation struck her. Though it hurt, she walked over to the bed and placed Drake Hamilton Crews Junior in his mother’s arms.

“Kaycee, I’d think twice about…” Jonee began, but Kaycee shook her head.

“Let it rest,” Kaycee said.

“But…”

“You heard your sister,” Drake said in a firm voice. “This is none of your concern.”

Jonee’s lips thinned and she gave Danny a look of dislike, but her newborn took that moment to awaken with a mewl of rage that turned his already red face a deeper scarlet color.

“He’s hungry,” his mother snapped as she fumbled with the bodice of her nightgown.

“And that’s our clue to vamoose,” Kaycee said. She leaned down, kissed her sister on the forehead, gave her brother-in-law a hug then took Danny’s arm to lead him out of the room.

“Congratulations,” Danny told Drake again.

“Thanks,” Drake mumbled absently for he was staring avidly at his new son suckling.

“I’m sorry,” Kaycee said as she and Danny walked toward the elevator.

“For what?”

“Jay-Jay can be awfully bossy. Don’t pay any attention to her.”

“She’s only looking out for you as any big sister would,” he said. “She doesn’t approve of your choice in men.”

“It’s not up to her,” Kaycee said.

“Yeah, but she knows you want kids and I…” He let out a long breath. “Kaycee, I don’t want kids.”

“Okay,” she said.

“No, it’s not okay,” he said. “I’m a selfish bastard and it’s not fair to you…”

She bumped him with her hip as the elevator doors slid back. “Do you hear me complaining?”

“No, but…”

“Then shut up, Gallagher,” she said, walking into the elevator. She was fairly sure she understood why he didn’t want children and certainly wasn’t going to press him. In time he could change his mind. If he didn’t, she’d learn to live with it. He was becoming too important to her for her to allow anything to come between them so soon.

“Kaycee…”

The doors closed and she pushed him against the elevator wall, covering his complaining mouth with her hungry one, thrusting her tongue deep between his lips until she felt his reaction at the front of his slacks. She put her hand to the bulge and rubbed firmly. Danny groaned and clasped her to him, swiveling around so it was she who was pressed against the elevator wall with his knee planted securely between her legs. He returned the kiss with vigor then drew back a little.

“Don’t start something you can’t finish,” she warned in a playful voice, looking up at him coquettishly through her eyelashes.

“Horny little bitch,” he said, and half lifted her from the floor before removing his leg and stepping back—just in time for the elevator to settle and the doors to open.

“Complaining, Gallagher?” she asked as he ushered her off the elevator.

“Just wait,” was all he said as he walked with her, his hand at the small of her back.

He spied the dark sedan out of the corner of his eye as soon as they came out of the hospital. The windows were encased in a heavy solar film, making it impossible to see the occupants, and that alone made him wary. He moved so he was between Kaycee and the sedan, gripping her hand firmly in his as they walked.

“So what are we going to do the rest of today?” Kaycee asked, seemingly unaware of the sudden tension that had knotted in her companion’s body.

“What would you like to do?” he countered, keeping watch on the sedan.

“I don’t care,” she said. “What do you usually do on Saturdays?”

“Goof off,” he muttered, easing her closer to the backs of the parked cars they were passing, prepared to shove her between them if the sedan came at them. “Work out in the gym at the condo, swim.”

Kaycee looked past him to the sedan. He thought he was being careful, that she wouldn’t notice he was keeping watch on the vehicle, but she was becoming attuned to his moods. She’d known the moment he had become suspicious of the dark car.

“We could go out to Dragon Cove,” she said. “They have a huge swap meet out there.”

Danny glanced down at her, a deep frown drawing down his handsome face. “Swap meet?”

“You ever been?”

He shook his head. “No.”

“It’s a lot of fun,” she said. “We could browse around the stalls, eat junk food, browse, eat more junk food, buy something, slurp down some lime freezies, buy something else and share a funnel cake.”

“You really wanna do that?” he asked, risking a look at the sedan and relieved to see it was pulling out and away from them.

“Yeah, I would.”

“All right,” he said. “Dragon Cove it is.”

* * * * *

In the dark sedan pulling out of the hospital parking lot, the man sitting in the backseat flicked a piece of lint from his trousers.

“Find out everything you can about the broad with him,” Tim Shannon—Terrence Malone’s hired gun—told the man beside him. “Gallagher was shielding her so she must be important to him.”

“Yes sir,” Neal Curran replied.

“And let’s get in touch with our informant. I would like to reach out to Danny Gallagher where he lives.”

“Yes sir. I’m on it,” Curran acknowledged, pulling out his cell phone.

* * * * *

“You can buy magazines or paperbacks if you want something to read,” Danny told Kaycee as he dressed for work Monday morning.  She had already discovered the little store on the condo’s ground floor where such things were available. “Or you can go swimming or hit the gym.” He tucked in his shirt. “I’ll be back for you at noon and we’ll have lunch.”

“Why don’t I just fix us something?” she asked. “Now that I’ve got groceries in the cupboard, I can make us a good lunch.”

He smiled. “I’d like that.”

“Then that’s what I’ll do,” she said. “After I get the laundry done.”

“That you don’t have to do,” he said.

“That I want to do,” she said. “Until I can find another job, I would prefer to keep busy.”

Danny scowled. “I don’t know about another job, Kace. Maybe you should hold off until we find Adams’ killer.”

“I want to work, Danny,” she said. “I would not make a good hausfrau.”

“I’m not asking you to be a hausfrau, baby,” he said, cupping her chin. “I just want to keep you out of harm’s way. That’s all.”

“We’ll talk about it at lunch,” she said, having no intention of giving in on the issue of her working. She enjoyed working and making her own way, having her own money.

“Just stay inside the compound,” he said.

Kaycee rolled her eyes. He’d said those same words at least four times already. “I will already!” she promised.

Not long after he had left and she’d put the first of three loads of wash in, made the bed, cleaned the shower and straightened the living room, Kaycee stood in the middle of the pristine kitchen and sighed.

It wasn’t that she was bored. She had plenty she could do. She was just restless and the four walls were beginning to close in on her. So she took the spare keycard Danny had given her, stuffed it in the back pocket of her jeans, grabbed her shoulder bag and left the apartment.

For half an hour, she strolled about the garden between the main lobby and the clubhouse where several elderly couples were playing canasta. No one paid her any attention as she looked about the clubhouse then sauntered outside to sit at the bubbling fountain in the midst of azaleas and dogwoods. The rain overnight had left the garden cool and the stone bench upon which she sat a bit damp still, but she didn’t mind. By the time she meandered into the little convenience shop off the lobby, she was ready to buy a paperback or magazine or two and head back upstairs.

“Kaycee?”

Turning at the sound of her name, Kaycee stiffened when she realized it was Kathleen Moriarity who had spoken.

“I thought that was you out in the garden!” Kathleen said, coming over to where Kaycee was standing by the rack of paperbacks. She hugged Kaycee then pushed her gently away. “I heard about Rosemary. What a terrible thing to have happened! I can’t begin to imagine how you must have felt.” Kathleen frowned. “What are you doing here, sweetie? Were you looking for me?”

Kaycee cleared her throat. “Ah, no, I’m staying here with a…” She nearly choked on the word. “Friend.”

Kathleen’s pretty blonde eyebrow shot up. “Friend?” she repeated then smiled conspiratorially. “As in male friend?”

“Yes,” Kaycee said then took a deep breath. “You’ll find out sooner or later, Kathy. I’m living with Danny Gallagher.”

Kathleen’s eyes widened and her perfectly shaped lips parted. “Danny Gallagher?” she repeated. Shock shifted over her lovely features then those same features hardened. “You mean my ex-husband?”

“Yes,” Kaycee replied.

Cornflower blue eyes narrowed. “Is he investigating Rosemary’s death?” she asked.

“Yes, but we met before that,” Kaycee admitted. “About a week before.” The lie didn’t sit well on her soul but she felt it was necessary.

The perfectly shaped lips tightened and the soft voice turned brittle. “I see.” Kathleen’s manner changed completely. “And you just decided to up and move in with him.”

“Not exactly,” Kaycee said. “I didn’t move in until after Rosemary’s death. He thought it would be safer if…”

“Safer,” Kathleen said, cutting her off. “How convenient for Danny.”

Kaycee shifted uncomfortably beneath the withering stare aimed her way. “I’m sorry if my being with him upsets you, Kathy. I…”

“You and I need to have a little talk, sweetie,” Kathleen said, taking Kaycee’s arm. “Let’s go out to the garden. I’d rather not be overheard.”

“I don’t…” Kaycee began, but Kathleen was already tugging her along in her wake, her fingers like a steel band just above Kaycee’s elbow. She had no choice but to follow Kathleen or cause a scene, and the woman behind the counter was watching them.

Once in the garden, Kathleen released Kaycee’s arm and ordered her to sit in one of the Adirondack chairs under the canopy of a large dogwood. Kathleen wasted no time in coming to the point.

“I’m going to assume you know very little about my ex-husband’s outside activities,” the blonde woman said as she sat down beside Kaycee. “I seriously doubt he would have had the balls to tell you.”

“Tell me what?” Kaycee asked, not sure she wanted to hear what Kathleen had to say.

“God knows I had to learn about it the hard way,” Kathleen said as though she hadn’t heard.

“Learn what? What are you talking about?”

“You do know who his family is.”

“I know his brother is Johnny Gallagher, the restaurateur. His grandfather is Xavier Gallagher.”

“Oh yes. X, the Exterminator,” Kathleen said. “What a piece of work to have as your grandfather.”

Kaycee’s forehead creased. “What do you mean?”

“You should have done your homework on Danny’s family, sweetie,” Kathleen said. “Especially the old man.”

“Just tell me,” Kaycee said.

“Well, maybe you’re too young to have heard about the Donnelly murders back in the late seventies. I don’t suppose you know anything at all about the Dixie Mafia.”

“The what?”

“It’s not important. Let’s just say there was a turf war here between two major Irish gangs and several key members of the Malone gang were found hacked into pieces, what was left of them stuffed inside fifty-five-gallon oil drums and dropped down at Dragon Cove. The man they say was responsible for the dismemberments was labeled X, the Exterminator, though no one was ever able to pin anything on him.”

Kaycee thought back to the evening before when Danny had flinched at his grandfather’s words,
“She’s all in one piece, ain’t she?”
and felt a chill weave its way down her spine.

“Are you telling me that old man is…?”

“As cold-blooded a killer as you will ever meet,” Kathleen said. “Xavier Gallagher is the head of the Gallagher clan, the other half of that gang war equation. He ran the prostitution in Sigourney, the illegal gaming halls, the strip clubs, crews of home burglars and only God knows how many other illegal enterprises. The Malones were the drug czars until then. When the old man retired, Johnny took over as the head of the business—and I use that term lightly. The restaurants and supper clubs are covers for the moving of stolen property, drug trafficking and whatever else Johnny has going at the moment. But yeah, old man Gallagher is a vicious killer and his son, Danny’s father, was his enforcer. God only knows how many men that bastard killed before he died.”