The Ties That Bind (20 page)

The depressing train of thought came to an abrupt halt as Shannon shook herself free of it. She would not give up on this man. Not yet. Maybe not ever. She loved him too much to allow failure.

Somehow, some way, she would find a path that led to the inner sanctum of Garth's emotions. The man had potential, she told herself resolutely. And she was the persevering type. She would continue to pursue him until he fell in love with her. And once he had acknowledged that much, she was certain she could start to change his life. Because it would take no less than a major life-style change for Garth to become the kind of lover and husband Shannon wanted.

With a new feeling of calm determination, Shannon wheeled around and started back up the beach. She had gone only a few paces when she realized she was not alone. For a moment she could not identify the man who had just descended the cliff at the point where she had earlier. He was too far away for her to see his face. But something about the way he moved toward her was alarming. It was also familiar.

Shannon halted, seriously considering a scramble up the steeper portion of the cliff wall that was to her right. Frowning, she edged toward it. She had no real cause for panic, she told herself. It must have been the lingering effects of her experience last night. Her hand was braced on a jutting shoulder, and she was searching for a foothold when the approaching man called to her. She recognized the voice at the same moment she got a good look at his features.

"Wes! What on earth are you doing here?" Astonished at McIntyre's presence, Shannon came away from the cliff and waited. A sudden thought struck her. "Garth didn't send you to keep an eye on me, too, did he?" she asked wryly. "One bodyguard is enough."

"No, Shannon, I'm not here to protect you." Wes came to a halt a few feet away, his handsome face set in taut lines that changed his whole appearance. He suddenly didn't seem to look at all like the easygoing man Shannon had met in Garth's office. "I'm here to make a deal with you. You're clever. I'll admit that. In the beginning, I made the mistake of totally underestimating you. I know better now, and I'm willing to put this on a businesslike basis. We have to cooperate, you and I. There's no choice."

"A deal!" And then it hit her. Shannon's eyes narrowed as she absorbed the implications of what he had said. Too late she realized she ought to have made the dash up the cliff. "You're the one," she got out, her voice tight with anger. She was distantly grateful for the raw edge of fury that was lacing her words. It was far more bracing than the whimper of panic. "You tried to change your voice last night but I recognize it now. You're betraying Garth. You were the one who searched my place last night."

"I'm going to be damn lucky not to get an infection from that knife you used." Wes gingerly touched his arm with the opposite hand. He frowned bitterly. "I'd never have guessed you were the violent type and I'm usually damn good at analyzing people. No wonder you fooled Garth. You're a very talented actress. Shannon. The sweet, unworldly artist routine was the one kind of act he wouldn't have been expecting. I'd like to know how you set it up, though. Just out of curiosity, you understand. How did you know where and when he'd be taking that trip over here to the coast? Your sources must be good, Shannon. Very well placed."

"Don't be stupid, Wes. I'm not working with anyone. Your own mind must be very twisted to make you think everyone else is just as warped as you are."

He grimaced. "Don't tell me you're going to carry the act out to the end? It can't last, you know. Sooner or later, Sheridan will figure out who was behind the theft and when that time comes, the only safe place to be is out of his reach. Believe me, I know."

"Is that where you intended to be?" Shannon asked scornfully. "Out of reach after you'd completed the sale of that bid package?"

"Very much out of reach," he returned coolly. "Who's your client?"

"I haven't got a client, you idiot."

He shrugged. "All right, you don't have to tell me. I just thought the information might be interesting."

"Who's yours?"

"Kenyon."

Shannon sighed. "That figures. You were supposed to make the transfer at the party that night, I assume?"

"It seemed the best time. You don't know Sheridan. When he slaps a security blanket on
Sherilectronics
, the way he did while this bid package was being worked out, he's very, very thorough. It would have been risky for me to meet Kenyon at any time during the past couple of weeks. There was too great a possibility that Garth had assigned private investigators to keep tabs on all his top people. He's done it before when he's been nervous about security."

"But the party was neutral ground," Shannon interposed grimly.

"Exactly. The party was the safest opportunity I was going to get and I knew it. I took the one copy of the bid package I had managed to make."

Shannon eyed him. "How did you make that one copy? I thought Garth kept track of every piece of paper relating to that bid that came out of
Bonnie's
typewriter."

"There are limits to what any man can do in the way of security measures." Wes smiled. "And I had some inside help."

"Bonnie." Shannon took a deep breath and expelled it slowly.

"Bonnie thinks she's in love with me. Women in love will do strange things."

"It's incredible. Everyone around Garth was plotting against him."

"Including you," Wes snapped.

Shannon ignored that. "All right, you managed to make one copy of the document. Why didn't you make two or three copies?"

"Are you kidding? And risk having some investigator find it in my possession?" Wes shook his head at her dumb question. "Even having one copy on me for a few hours made me very nervous. I hadn't realized how tense this sort of thing makes a man. Besides, I didn't get the copy until the last minute. Bonnie was willing but not terribly clever. She finally got it made for me the day of the party. Right around lunchtime."

Shannon's eyes widened. "Oh, my God."

"That's right. If it hadn't been for your little diversion that day, Bonnie might not have had a free moment to take the bid down to a copying machine and run it. But when you showed up, Garth seemed to forget all about his normal paranoia. He was concentrating on you so much, he didn't bother to pick up the bid papers and put them in his briefcase before he took you to lunch. He just locked his office door. Bonnie has a key to that. She and I just waited until you left the building and then we went back inside, hoping Sheridan had been careless. Sure enough, all the papers were lying there on the desk, just as we'd left them. She grabbed the bid and ran it off while I kept an eye out for Garth's return. I don't mind telling you, I was getting a little nervous. I had wanted to transfer it that night and time was running out."

"The night of the party," Shannon began slowly, "how did the bid document get into my tote? Did you mistake it for
Bonnie's
?"

Wes's mouth twisted savagely. "I had the bid inside my jacket when I arrived. I had a hunch Bonnie would draw the line at being the agent I needed. She was too scared. She'd been reluctant to go as far as she had and I wasn't sure how much farther I could push her. So I told her I would take care of the final transfer to Kenyon. After I'd been at the party a while I told Kenyon he could pick up the bid inside the tote bag with the crazy design on the side. Then I wandered down the hall to the bedroom and slipped the thing inside the only tote that was on the bed."

"But there were two totes," Shannon argued. "Mine and
Bonnie's
."

"Not when I slipped into the bedroom," Wes gritted savagely. "I found out later that Bonnie had taken hers into the powder room for a few minutes. They both looked alike to me when I saw them earlier in the office. Since Bonnie had made a point of leaving hers in the bedroom, I assumed the one that was on the bed was hers. At any rate, I put the bid package in the one tote bag I found and left."

"Kenyon was supposed to wander in later and retrieve it. But Kenyon made the mistake of making a pass at me en route."

Wes nodded. "Garth saw him and went into his hands off my woman' routine. After which he apparently sent you into the bedroom to grab your purse because he was dragging you home early."

"So that's how I wound up with the document in my tote," Shannon muttered.

"After which, you were smart enough to take advantage of a real windfall, weren't you?" Wes looked thoroughly disgusted. "Hell, I made it easy for you, didn't I? I don't know what your original plan was, but when you found the bid in your tote, you could afford to abandon whatever complicated plan you originally had in mind when you seduced Sheridan. Life had suddenly gotten much simpler. But I'll tell you something, Shannon. You've made a serious mistake by continuing the affair with Sheridan. If you had any sense, you'd have transferred the bid to your client and gotten safely out of Garth's way. When he finds out what you've done, you won't stand a chance. He won't let another woman get away with betraying him. Believe me."

"Garth knows I didn't steal that bid package."

Wes cocked one brow. "Just because you played innocent and called the cops last night? I wouldn't count on it. Sheridan's been acting a little strangely for the past few months but no one claims he's come down with a bad case of the
stupids
. That guard he had assigned to watch your cottage was probably meant as much to keep an eye on your activities as it was to protect you. Sheridan doesn't take chances."

"You're crazy."

"No, but I am getting anxious. Time is running out. You and I have to talk business. Have you handed the bid over to your client?"

"I haven't handed it over to anyone!"

"Good. I figured that if you had already made the transfer, you might have been dumb enough to keep a copy. I was willing to buy a second copy from you if that's all that's left. Kenyon doesn't need to know someone else has also paid for and gotten the information. But it's safer for both of us if you've still got the one I brought to the party. How much do you want for it, Shannon?"

"Not one thin dime, you fool. I'm not selling it to you," she snapped.

"I must have it, Shannon. You don't know Kenyon."

"What can he do to you that's any worse than what Garth will do when he finds out what's happened?" Shannon taunted.

"Kenyon's promised me a job running his new R & D branch in Tucson. He's going places and he's going to take me with him. It's become obvious to me during the past year that Sheridan isn't going to keep expanding. I think he's getting tired of the business. I don't want to hang around with a firm that's starting to go soft. But between the two of them, Sheridan and Kenyon can ruin me. I need Kenyon to protect me from Garth if and when he finds out what happened. I want to be safely on Kenyon's payroll and out of the state when the time comes.

"But if you don't deliver to Kenyon he'll turn his back on you. Then you'll be caught between a rock and a hard place, won't you? Garth will have his revenge and you won't have anyone to protect you from him. You'll be lucky to get another job in the field."

"You've got it. So now you must see why I'm willing to talk business. Name your price, Shannon. It'll be much safer for you to make the deal this way rather than trying to cut your own."

"No."

"Don't be a fool," Wes exploded. "You're nothing but a two-bit hustler who's trying to cash in on a lucky break. Don't think you can go up against me and get away with it. I want that bid. I'll take it the hard way if you won't sell it to me."

"You tried taking it the hard way last night," Shannon pointed out. "It didn't work."

Wes reached out and grabbed her arm. "Come on. We're going back to the cottage. I'm not leaving until I have that bid."

"I haven't got it," Shannon said with a calm she was far from feeling. "Garth took it with him this morning."

"The hell he did. How would he know you've got it? You sure wouldn't have told him. I'll bet when you called the cops last night you made up some line about a prowler without bothering to explain just what that prowler really wanted. Now move!"

Wes jerked her forward, causing her to stumble. Shannon started to struggle but this time her opponent was ready for her. She found her arm twisted painfully behind her back. Without another word, Wes shoved her toward the cliff.

Shannon began to climb reluctantly, her arm aching from the grip Wes had on it. She could only hope that Ted Walters had returned from lunch.

GARTH HAD BEEN on the road an hour when he decided to make the call to his office. He picked up the phone and spoke crisply to the mobile operator. His mind had been running in high gear ever since he had left Shannon, and he didn't like the various directions his thoughts kept taking. The need to get the situation under control was gnawing at him, and he became increasingly impatient with the long drive. Briefly he considered driving as far as Santa Rosa and chartering a plane back to San Jose. But common sense said that by the time he could make the arrangements and get from the airport to his office, he would have chewed up nearly as much time as the drive would.

He should have pushed that locksmith, Garth thought while he waited for his call to go through. He should have insisted Shannon's locks be installed several days ago. Maybe the intruder would never have gotten inside the cottage if there had been decent locks on the door.

But perhaps good security wouldn't have helped at all, he decided. The guy might have simply waited outside the cottage and grabbed Shannon when she opened her door.

The only thing that might have deterred the intruder would have been Garth's presence. And Garth had been two hundred miles away when Shannon had needed him. The memory made his fingers clamp more fiercely around the phone as Bonnie came on the line.

"Mr. Sheridan, I've been wondering where you were," Bonnie said in her smooth, professional voice. "I couldn't find any messages saying you'd be late in to work, and I was beginning to be concerned."