“Really?” she said, studying him. Judd was tan, with a well-toned body. Not a workingman’s hard body, like Greg’s, but Judd had a physique. He probably had a personal trainer like Harry, the studmuffin. Judd reached out to lovingly touch one of the deadly orchid’s petals, and she saw the livid cut on his arm.
“What happened? How did you cut yourself?”
He looked at his arm as if he’d just noticed it, then smiled at her. Something in his expression made the fine hairs across the back of her neck stand at attention. How could she ever have been friends with this man?
“A cat scratched me. I’d befriended this stray who hung around the warehouse where Brad and I have our office.”
“What warehouse?” Brad had told her he had an office downtown, but he’d never mentioned a warehouse.
“One of the businesses in which we’re partners is orchid importing and exporting. When you came to Hawaii, you came to work for us right here in my home. Now we have our office downtown in a Chinatown warehouse. It’s easier.”
“I thought Brad was in designer beef.”
“We’ve invested in a number of companies. With America on a rampage against fat, designer beef is a real winner.”
There seemed to be a lot Brad hadn’t told her. But then, she was guilty of not telling him about herself. He’d given her space and time to adjust. No
doubt, he’d soon tell her all this himself.
“I interrupted you. What ab
out the cat who scratched you?”
He smiled that disturbing smile again, then said, “It accidentally wandered into the vault where I keep these blue orchids. I looked for it everywhere, then decided it had slipped out. Hours later, I opened the door to the vault. The poor thing was panic-stricken and it scratched me. After all that time with those poisonous fumes, it should have been dead, but it wasn’t. It really gouged me.”
“Is the cat all right?”
His eyes were fired by a strange inner light, and he waited half a beat too long before answering. “No. It’s very sad, but the poor little thing got only a few feet before it collapsed and died. I rushed it to the vet but—”
Anger and alarm rippled down her spine. That was
not
what had happened. Lucky didn’t know what exactly had tipped her, but she was positive Judd was lying. Why? She touched Rudy’s tooth.
Get out of here,
her brain screamed.
“I’ve got to find Brad.”
She rushed down the hall and took the stairs two at a time. Instead of returning to the dining room, she dashed out onto the lanai. Her heart was hammering against her breastbone, her breath coming in ragged spurts. Sweat gushed from her pores. What was wrong with her?
Lucky sucked in deep, calming breaths of the balmy tropical air. What had triggered such an intense reaction? She loved animals, true, but the death of a kitty she’d never even seen shouldn’t cause such an intense physical reaction. As her breathing returned to normal, she
recalled several things Dr. Sum
merville had told her.
Of the five senses, smell occupied the largest space in the brain. That’s why smells rekindled more memories, which were more vivid than the memories stored by the other senses. At the time these facts had seemed like meaningless trivia. But now she appreciated what she’d learned.
Dr. Summerville had insisted there was one more, very
important,
sense—the sixth sense. Intuition. Her intuition had
just kicked
in, Lucky decided. Something else the doctor had
told her came
to mind. Fear. Scientists had actually located the
spot in
the brain where fear was centered. That part of
her brain
was completely intact.
Was the fear center in her brain trying to warn her by triggering her sixth sense? Someone had tried to kill her, and she was instinctively afraid of Judd Fremont. Maybe the two weren’t connected, but her gut instinct said they were.
“Mrs. Wagner, there you are. Your housekeeper is on the phone.”
“Julie,” she cried, rushing after the maid.
“It’s probably nothing,” Malia said when Lucky came to the phone, “but Julie has an upset stomach.”
“Tell her that Mommy is coming home right now.”
T
he Orchid King turned out the light in his bedroom and gazed out at the private strip of beach known as the Gold Coast.
She was back. After
Missing!
hadn’t produced anyone who could identify her, they’d played the ace—Julie—and gotten Kelly away from Greg Braxton. It had taken him time to convince Brad, who’d insisted bringing Kelly back was only inviting trouble.
But she wasn’t Kelly anymore, flaunting her tight ass and big tits. Judd liked this new woman who was all eyes now, her hair short and sassy-looking. There was a certain shyness to her that he found immensely appealing.
“This time, she’s all mine,” he said out loud.
This new woman was into motherhood, a lady worthy of having
his
children. Gone was the smart-
mouthed, self-centered but
sexy-as-hell woman
he’d fallen in love with. She was still
drop-dead
smart, though. She’d picked up on something when
he’d
told her about the cat.
Big fucking
deal. So he’d kicked the cat to death. The filthy
little beast deserved it. He would probably have
a scar on his
arm.
“Lucky,” he whispered in the darkness. “This time
you
belong to me. No one else but me.”
Judd reluctantly admitted he’d made a mistake. He’d met Lucky on the Internet. It had been love in cyberspace, and he’d invited her to come to Honolulu and work for him. When she arrived, Lucky proved to be even sexier and more interesting in person than she had on-line. But he held back, waiting for Kelly to understand that he was the man for her. Then Brad had stepped in.
“Stepped in? Fuck no! Kelly pounced on him—for his money.”
Judd had gone on a two-week orchid expedition. Nothing exciting—just your basic jungle stripping. When he returned, they were married. Next thing he knew, Kelly was pregnant.
He had told himself that he’d get over her. After all, she was married to his best friend. But time hadn’t changed anything.
“I want her as much now as I did then. Tonight I laid the groundwork. She thinks we had an affair. A lie, but that’ll make it easier to get close to her.”
He stared at the water for a moment, finalizing the plan he’d been thinking about for days.
“You know what you have to do now.”
It wasn’t going to be easy to lure Brad into the chamber. His partner knew how deadly the orchids were, but he’d think of something. Then he’d have to kill Greg Braxton, because with Brad gone, Lucky would run to that prick.
He’d been at the house watching through high-powered binoculars as Lucky took her usual early morning swim. Even now he could feel how painful his erection had been. Watching. Imagining her beneath him.
His hand slipped beneath the waistband of his pants, finding his swollen cock just the way he had that morning. This time, however, pleasure came with a few swift strokes.
This morning his cock had wilted like an orchid in the searing
sun the minute he’d spotted Braxton and that fucking dog strolling onto the sandy cove Judd had always thought of as his beach. He had trained the binoculars on Lucky and Braxton as they’d talked. Lucky thought she loved the bastard.
No doubt about it. He would have to kill two people. First Brad, then Greg Braxton. And make it look like an icing—an accident.
33
C
ody parked the Bronco in the Traylor car rental lot, thinking about Greg. He’d called last night from Claude Winston’s home in Honolulu. Greg had told Lucky about her past and said she was okay with it. Well, why not? A princess with a cute kid and a rich husband had a tough life, right?
He knew he wasn’t being fair to Lucky. She’d suffered more than anyone he’d ever met, but now his brother was going through hell, loving a woman he couldn’t have. At least they were close again. Maybe having a family around would help Greg, but Cody had his doubts.
Cody walked into Tony Traylor’s office reluctantly. The jerk had been calling him for several days, but Cody had avoided him. He’d been too involved in tracking down the warden and the prison shrink who had worked with Lucky. Knowing Traylor was involved in the Maui Wowie drug trafficking made Cody furious. He could hardly wait to arrest Traylor’s fat ass.
“Where the fuck have you been?” Traylor bellowed the second Cody came through the door.
“I’ve been busy doing my job,” Cody replied, a mean edge to his voice.
Traylor jerked his head toward the office door and one of the two
mokes
who always hung around him closed it. Uh-oh. Now what?
“I want one of those secret source agreements,” Traylor said. “I tell you something. Use it, but don’t tell anyone where you got your information.”
The fat weasel had gotten wind of Helmer’s investigation. This must have something to do with blaming his drug trafficking on someone else. The fact that this man was an elected politician, head of the joint council governing Maui, made Cody sick.
“I can’t cut any deals. Only the DA has the authority to do that.”
“If you don’t give me your word, I’m not telling you shit.”
The creep’s vocabulary was limited to four-letter words. Cody had given up swearing when the twins began parroting such words. Okay, okay. So once in a while he slipped. Cody reached for the doorknob. “Suit yourself.”
“I figured you’d want to help your brother.”
Cody spun around. “What are you talking about? Why would you care about helping Greg?”
“I hate the motherfucker, but I’ve got an image to protect. Your brother blabbing that I’m responsible for pollution destroying the reef is hurting my reputation. I’m gonna help him, then you persuade him to keep his mouth shut.”
There wasn’t a power on earth who could silence Greg when it came to environmental issues, but Cody merely nodded. Traylor had him curious.
Tony pulled out a copy of the
Tattler.
It was the latest issue, with a front-page picture of Lucky getting on the plane with her family. PELE’S GHOST DISAPPEARS. The banner headline and the close-up picture—courtesy of Fenton Bewley— captivated the islanders. Just like the legend, Lucky had disappeared as unexpectedly as she had appeared.
“This here article says her husband didn’t know what happened to her. He hadn’t seen her in months. That’s a fuckin’ lie. We saw ’im right here, didn’t we, boys?”
Like mimes, the
mokes
nodded silently. For a second, Cody thought his heart had stopped beating. “No way. The FBI checked Brad Wagner’s story.”
“Fuck the FBI. About three months ago, we were up in the rain forest hunting wild pigs, weren’t we, boys?”
Again the
mokes
nodded but didn’t speak.
“I mean, we were way the hell back there. We came to a trail head and there was this car. We saw them but they never saw us, ’cause the jungle’s so thick around there. We saw two men and this woman—Pele’s ghost. She was sitting in the backseat starin’ out of the open window like she was on something. Right, boys?”
More silent nods from the “boys.” Cody’s heart was thumping now, and he was sweating as if he’d run a marathon. Two men. It had taken two men to dump the hiker’s body. The same with Lucky.
“You know, I kept thinkin’ I knew the bitch. Those eyes. They’re hard to forget. But I didn’t put it together until I saw the man’s picture. Brad Wagner was with Pele’s ghost. He and another guy were loading orchids into the trunk of a car.” Orchids. The key to the case. With the back of his hand, Cody swiped at the sweat coating his brow.
“I didn’t recognize Pele’s ghost because her hair was long and dark. Straighter than a stick. Next day she drives off some damn
pali
with bleached blonde hair all curly. Fuckin’ weird.”
“Yeah, fuckin’ weird,” said one of the
mokes.
“They had Tony’s stolen car but we didn’t know it.”
Traylor zapped the
moke
who dared t
o speak with a killer frown. “
I got hundreds of fuckin’ cars. I don’t have their license plates memorized. It had been missing a year. I didn’t even think about it bein’ my car.”
Cody didn’t say a word. He was out the door in a second. Oh, Christ, no. Brad seemed like such a nice guy. Even Sarah
liked him, and she usually had good instincts about people. But they’d been wrong. He was certain that they’d handed Lucky over to the man who’d tried to murder her.
It took two hours for him to locate Greg in Honolulu. Cody had first alerted Helmer, who was stunned by the news, but there wasn’t anything the authorities could do. They didn’t have any evidence of a crime other than Tony’s confidential story. There was no chance of getting Traylor to talk.
Tony would never admit to anyone that he’d been in the rain forest. Cody didn’t buy the pig hunt story. They were running Maui Wowie. That’s why Traylor wanted this kept quiet. After all, next year was an election year.
“Look, I know you’re pissed big time,” Cody told Greg over the phone. “The FBI’s working on it. Helmer called the Honolulu office. This is the break we needed. We can’t send in the police without some evidence.”
“I’m getting Lucky out of there.”
“Be careful. Brad Wagner has killed once—that we know of. There’s another man out there working with him. We don’t know who he is. Could be the chauffeur Brad mentioned. Could be anyone. They won’t hesitate to kill you if you get in their way.”
“I’m going over to her house right now.”
“Good idea,” Cody agreed. “Tell her in person, but be sure no one overhears you. That would put you both in danger. Right now Brad must be feeling secure. I can’t believe he had the nerve to come get Lucky. He could have just left her here.”
“No. Brad loves her too much. She must have seen or heard something she doesn’t remember. I can’t imagine any other reason he would try to kill her, then want her back.”
“You’re probably right,” Cody said, cold sweat running down his back. “I wish I was there to help you. Be careful.”
“Right. I owe you one.”
“
S
ebastian is on the telephone,” Malia whispered to Lucky. “He says it’s urgent.”
Lucky tiptoed out of Julie’s room. She’d spent the night beside her daughter’s bed. The doctor had been right. It was just an upset stomach, and once Julie went to sleep, the child hadn’t had another episode. But Lucky had kept her home from school and now Julie was napping.
“You’ve got to come down here,” Sebastian told her when she took his call.
“I can’t. Julie’s home—”
“You have to,” Sebastian insisted, sounding frantic. “I just looked in the shopping bag you gave me. I should have opened it right away. My stars, I’m such a twit. I’d come to you but I’m double booked as it is. Trust me, you’re going to want to
see this.”
“I could leave Julie with Malia, I suppose.”
Telling the maid she’d be right back, Lucky took her new blue Suburban to Cache. She couldn’t imagine what could be in the bag. Sebastian had said it was a small bag. It couldn’t be anything that terrible, could it?
She was still a little shaken about the panic attack she’d had at the party. Judd Fremont was trouble with a capital
T.
Something was really wrong here. She would have discussed it with Brad, but he came in late from the party and went right to bed after checking on Julie, saying he had a breakfast meeting in the morning. Lucky hadn’t minded because she didn’t want to leave Julie’s side. Now, though, she wished she had talked to Brad.
Sebastian was in the middle of something he called a weave. Strands of the woman’s hair were wrapped in strips of tin foil, but he left his customer and hustled Lucky into his office.
“Here it is.” He grabbed a small shopping bag off a desk. “You said to keep this for you. I didn’t open it until last night. My stars, I saw the two envelopes, but I just thought they were pictures of dresses. You were always showing me outfits you wanted to buy.”
He pulled a white envelope from the bag and handed it to
her. Lucky recognized her own handwriting. The note inside puzzled her, though.
Sebastian, I’m hearing the night marchers. If anything happens to me, mail this immediately.
“The night marchers must have been the ones who tried to kill me. Who are they? Is Judd Fremont involved with them?”
Sebastian shook his head. “The night marchers are part of island lore. Superstitious people think that if you hear footsteps at night when you’re trying to sleep, it’s ghosts of Hawaiian warriors marching to sea the way they did in ancient times. It means that someone is going to die—usually the person who hears the night marchers.”
Lucky hesitated, astonished to discover this man must have been her closest friend. She trusted him, but not her husband.
“
I must have known I was in trouble. Did
I tell you anything about it?”
“No. I would have mailed this if I’d known.”
He pulled a small manila envelope ou
t of the bag. It was addressed t
o Ned Adams, Special Investigator at the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
“What would I have to send to the FBI?” Lucky ripped open the envelope and found a small plastic case. Inside were two computer disks.
Sebastian pointed to the computer on the desk.
“
You’d better see what’s on them.”
Lucky sat at the desk, suddenly realizing the office seemed eerily familiar, like Judd’s house. She knew there was a drawer with office supplies and the bottom drawer would have a bag of Hershey Kisses in it. “Have I been in here a lot?”
“You bet. You set up my inventory system. Now I know exactly how much of everything to order. I keep track of my operators’ salaries, write checks, and all because you said I was a dinosaur. And you were right. My life is so much easier.”
He gave her a quick pat on the shoulder. “Get to work. I’ve got to finish Mrs. Doram.”
Lucky logged onto the computer, the password HAIR popping into her mind immediately. The first disk tracked orchid shipments. Most of them came out of Singapore and went to places all over the country. Seemed harmless, but there must be some criminal activity involved or she wouldn’t have feared for her life and wanted this sent to the FBI.
Orchids meant Judd Fremont. And her own husband. She froze, fingers splayed across the keyboard, and stared at the screen. Surely the father of her child hadn’t tried to kill her.
Unquestionably, Brad loved Julie and was a good father. He seemed so kind, so understanding. But did that make him a good man—or a man adept at hiding his innermost feelings? Beware of what’s too good to be true, came a warning from some distant part of her brain.
With shaking fingers, she changed disks and scanned the next one. It was a series of numeric codes that made absolutely no sense to her. There wasn’t one single word on the disk, just an odd assortment of numbers.
Lucky put the two disks back in the plastic case and dropped it into her purse. Common sense told her that Brad and Judd knew exactly what these disks meant. The information was valuable enough for them to kill her over it. She picked up the telephone and called the FBI facility in Quantico, Virginia, where the package had been addressed.
It was late back there and no one was on duty who could help her. She insisted on getting Ned Adams’s home telephone number, but they refused to give it to her. They took her name and the shop number and said Ned Adams would call her.
“What was on the disks?” Sebastian came into the office as Lucky was hanging up.
“Nothing that made any sense to me. I called the FBI. They’re supposed to call me here.” She took a deep breath and gazed at the man she’d trusted to help her. “Be honest
with me. What was my relationship with Brad and Judd like? Did I tell you anything about them?”
Sebastian sat in the chair next to the desk. “We were very close friends, but you weren’t very open about your past or your private life.”
“Did I love Brad?”
“You said Brad was nice but a total bore, yet he was rich and gave you anything you wanted. You did say you originally wanted to marry Judd, but when you went to work for them, you liked Brad better. I think he was easier for you to manipulate.”
“I sound like such a bitch. How could anyone stand me?”
“You were—are—fun. You loved to tell jokes and stories. You always knew the latest, trendiest restaurant or boutique. You were smart and sexy. Men instantly liked you.”