Twist of Fate (33 page)

Hannah knew that whoever had tried to kill her was returning to make certain that he had succeeded.

G
IDEON DIDN'T BELIEVE
in premonitions but he had a great deal of faith in his instincts. He'd depended on them too many times on the street and later in business. When the dark gray sedan that was parked by the edge of the road loomed up out of the rain he knew there was trouble. The car was too close to the Nord cottage, the night was too wild with the storm that had swept in right after his plane had landed, and Gideon was too certain that accidents were becoming too frequent in Hannah's life.

The only thing that gave him hope as he pulled his rented car over to the side of the road was that there was no sign of a silly pink jeep. Ignoring the warm, pounding rain he climbed out of the compact and slowly approached the dark sedan. There was no sign of anyone around, but the knowledge didn't do much to untwist the knot in his stomach. There was a feeling of wrongness here and he'd long since learned to respect that sensation. After a glance into the car which told him absolutely nothing, Gideon walked around it. He spotted the scraped and dented rear fender immediately.

Then he glanced over the cliff and saw the pink-fringed jeep on the rocks below. For a sickening instant Gideon simply stared down at it, wanting to deny the evidence, willing to trade everything he'd ever had to change reality and knowing all the while that you can't make deals with the universe.

The sickness in him turned into a cold chill that at least allowed him to function. He stripped off his jacket and started down the jumble of rocks that led to the beach. He had to know the worst, had to see for himself if his soft, sweet Hannah was lying broken inside the jeep. Then he would destroy whoever had been in the dark sedan. There was no doubt in Gideon's mind that the other car had forced the jeep over the edge. For the second time in his life the violent desire for revenge swept through Gideon. He would do whatever had to be done to make the people in the car pay.

Scrambling on the rain-slick rocks, Gideon reached the jeep. The closer he got the more he tried to prepare himself for the sight of Hannah crumpled on the rocks or trapped inside the jeep which was lying on its side. Nothing he did could unfreeze the coldness in his guts, but he found no sign of her at the bottom of the short, tumbled cliff. It took all his willpower to look into the front seat. The seat belt clasped nothing. It was lying undone. Hannah always wore a seat belt. It had saved her life during the first accident.

For the first time since he'd looked down from the road above and seen the jeep Gideon allowed himself a small measure of hope. He tried to kill it almost at once because it left him feeling jittery. It was, however, just barely possible that she'd survived the crash and managed to crawl out of the jeep. She'd survived a car accident once before, he reminded himself.

He was turning away to scan the cliff face when he spotted the rakish leather-trimmed photojournalist bag, the one with all the buckles and pockets. It had been thrown out of the jeep and lay on the sand near the water's edge. The skewed lights of the jeep illuminated it. With a final glance up at the dark sedan, Gideon turned to walk through the rain toward the bag.

He picked it up and went through it. Hannah's wallet was still inside. Whoever had driven the sedan hadn't been the type to indulge in casual looting. Gideon dropped the bag down onto the sand. Someone who passed up a wallet in circumstances such as this might have been intent on offering assistance. Or he might have had other things on his mind.

Gideon looked back at the jeep and tried to imagine which way Hannah might have gone if she'd unbuckled herself after the accident and crawled out. She would have been shaken and badly bruised at the very least, probably far more severely injured. The rocks would have seemed much too formidable to climb in that condition. She would have headed toward the beach, perhaps with some idea of walking to a point where she could more easily scale the cliff to the main road. The beach stretched invitingly to the left but twisted into a jumbled maze of rocks and slippery sand to the right. Someone trying to walk away from a serious accident would probably have turned to the left.

That analysis left unanswered the question of what the person or persons in the dark sedan had done. If they had come down the cliff and found the jeep empty they would probably have reasoned much as Gideon had. They certainly had not driven off in search of assistance. That left Gideon with the conclusion that whoever had been driving the sedan had gone in search of Hannah.

The storm was letting up a little already. A weak moon offered some visibility as the clouds began to disperse. Rain still fell in wind-driven sheets here and there. There was no point searching in the glove compartment of the jeep for anything so useful as a flashlight. Rental agencies weren't that thoughtful. In any event there was a chance that a light might be more dangerous than useful. It would advertise his position for several yards. Gideon wasn't sure he wanted his position advertised. Not until he'd figured out who had been in the dark sedan.

A fierce urgency drove him as he started along the beach in the only direction in which Hannah would have gone if she'd managed to escape the jeep. The waves that broke along the sand glistened with an iridescent whiteness less than a yard from his shoes. Gideon broke into a ground-covering jog. The storm-ruffled sea created enough noise to shield the sound of his footsteps.

Every inch of the way Gideon kept his eyes moving, scanning the open expanse of sandy beach for a dark, huddled form. Surely she couldn't have gone far. She would be suffering from shock at the very least. In the chancy moonlight and the intermittent rain there were no clues to tell if someone had come this way ahead of him. He could only follow the logical route and hope.

The beach began to narrow. The cliff walls grew closer as Gideon moved along the water's edge. He was going to run out of sand fairly soon. It looked as if the beach ended in a formidable tumble of rocks at this end just as it had at the other end. If someone else had followed Hannah, he couldn't be far ahead. Gideon slowed and moved into the deep shadows of the cliff.

He thought again about the photojournalist's bag lying on the sand. There was another possibility that he didn't want to contemplate. Once before someone had attempted to drown Hannah. If whoever had followed her down the cliff had found her unconscious or injured in the jeep, it would have been a simple matter to pull her free and drag her into the water to finish the job.

Savagely Gideon shoved that thought aside. If someone had found Hannah and killed her, he would have already made good his escape in the dark sedan. No. If there was anyone else here on the beach, he was still around. And that meant Hannah might still be alive.

Sinking into the darkness near the cliffs, Gideon kept moving. The protection offered by the rock wall wasn't all that different from the kind afforded by a dark alley. It had been a long time since he'd used the shadows for concealment. These days he was accustomed to camouflaging his movements behind corporate sleight-of-hand. But some things you never forgot, he discovered wryly. It was sort of like riding a bicycle.

From the shadows he could watch the stretch of beach between him and the water. Anyone moving across it would be a dark figure silhouetted against the lighter sand. He was almost to the wall of stone at the far end of the beach when he saw a shadow of movement. Gideon went utterly still, waiting.

The figure detached itself from the rocks at the closed end of the beach and started slowly back toward the wrecked jeep. It wasn't Hannah, Gideon knew at once. The shape and movement were that of a man. He moved cautiously, obviously still searching for someone. Gideon watched him for a few tense seconds and then carefully began to parallel the other man's movements back up the beach.

Sticking close to the cliff, Gideon kept moving, narrowing the gap between himself and the man. Whoever he was, he didn't appear to be armed. His hands moved freely, unencumbered by the bulk of a gun. Maybe he was simply a concerned motorist who was trying to find the other victim of the accident, Gideon told himself. Then the man swung around to survey the beach behind him. The pale moonlight fell on Drake Armitage's face.

That took care of the concerned motorist theory. Gideon waited impatiently as Armitage scanned the beach once again and then resumed his walk back to the jeep. When Armitage's actions made it clear that he had stopped searching and was intent on getting back to the vehicle, Gideon slipped out of the shadows and began closing the distance between them rapidly.

As if warned by some instinct, Drake whirled at the last second, his mouth half open on an unvoiced protest. But it was too late to dodge. Gideon's momentum carried him straight into Armitage and sent them both thudding down onto the sand.

“You bastard!” Armitage's choked off cry wasn't followed by any further conversation. He heaved upward, intent on using the strength in his upper body to dislodge his attacker.

Gideon rolled to one side, trying not to give Armitage a target. Then he snapped a hand across Drake's throat, connecting solidly enough to make the other man gasp painfully. Armitage tried to throw himself onto Gideon, attempting to pin him onto the sand. But Gideon shifted again and brought his knee up into the other man's groin. The one rule about street fighting was that there aren't any rules.

The blow was a little off center but it was sufficiently brutal to send Armitage over backward. Gideon moved in and caught the full force of Armitage's foot on his thigh as the man kicked out savagely. Stupid, Gideon told himself as he struggled to reestablish his balance. In the old days he would never have made that kind of mistake. Maybe he'd spent too many years in corporate street fighting after all. Or maybe he was getting old. He had five or six years on Armitage, and in this kind of thing that counted.

But age brought some knowledge of treachery, and what good was knowledge if it wasn't put to use? Gideon let the kick take him farther out of reach than Armitage intended, falling onto his back and trying to present a reasonably tempting target.

Armitage didn't need any invitation. With a muttered shout of triumph he jerked to his feet and tried another kick, this time aiming at Gideon's head. The younger man apparently operated on the theory that if something worked once, you could use it again. But in street fighting predictability could get you killed. Gideon grabbed for Armitage's ankle and yanked his opponent off balance. Armitage yelped in rage.

Gideon was on top of Armitage before the other man had hit the sand. Two blunt, chopping blows made Drake's head snap first to one side and then the other. By the time Armitage had shaken himself free of the cobwebs Gideon had a pocketknife pressed against his throat. Drake's eyes opened very wide in the moonlight. It was hard to tell for certain because moonlight washed out their color, but Gideon was almost sure Armitage's eyes were blue. He tried to remember the day in the athletic club when he'd been introduced to the younger man.

“It's not the best knife I've ever used for this kind of work,” Gideon said as he dug the blade a little into Armitage's throat. “Just a pocketknife, I'm afraid. But it will do the job, believe me.”

“You're crazy.” Armitage didn't move.

“Possibly. Especially at the moment. Where's Hannah?”

“Jesus, I don't know. I was looking for her. Her car went off the cliff. I was trying to find her.”

“Her car went off the cliff because you used your car to push it off, just like you did a few months ago.”

“That's a lie, damn it. We were just trying to help. For Christ's sake, Cage, why would I want to hurt Hannah?”

Gideon ignored the question. “We? I assume that means Vicky's somewhere in the vicinity? Of course she would be. She wouldn't send you out alone on something this crucial. Where is she?”

“I don't know, I tell you. We split up looking for Hannah. We wanted to help her, Cage. She's probably hurt, maybe unconscious somewhere.”

“Thanks to you.” Gideon let the point of the pocketknife sink a little deeper.

“Listen to me,” Armitage pleaded, “we saw her Jeep get into trouble. We were right behind her on the road. When we went past Vicky said we should turn around and go back to see what had happened. By the time we got back the jeep was at the bottom of the cliff. I figured Hannah must have gone over with it so I came down here to have a look. But Vicky thought she might have crawled out up on the road. She's searching up there.”

Gideon didn't want to think about that possibility. He'd seen the expression in Victoria Armitage's eyes once when she'd looked at Hannah. If Hannah had escaped from the jeep before it went over the edge, she would probably be wounded and frantic. An easy target for an Amazon.

“Come on.” Gideon got to his feet, pulling Armitage up beside him.

“What are you going to do?” Apprehensively Drake eyed the knife that still hovered too near his neck.

“I'm going to find Hannah. And if she's dead I'm going to come back here and put this knife into your throat.”

“You
are
crazy. Will you listen to me? Vicky and I only want to help.”

But Drake's defense of his actions and those of his wife came to an abrupt halt as a gunshot echoed through the darkness.

“Shit. Vicky's got a gun.” The coldness in Gideon's belly turned to ice. “When this is all over, I really will kill you, Armitage, and I'll take my time about doing it.”