Kitabı oku: «Secret Agent Heiress», sayfa 2

The quick shift from one topic to the next left Vincent with a need to pause to catch up. “What did you want to talk about?”

She looked up at her grandfather, seeking a reprieve on having to answer that question. Then she turned and climbed to the second rail of the fence, putting herself at eye level with Vincent. “It’s my fault Whitney’s gone. He couldn’t catch me, so he took her, instead.”

Vincent’s heart went out to the girl. She seemed to be carrying an awful heavy weight on those slim shoulders. He stated the truth, hoping to reassure her. “His intention was probably to kill you, and take Ms. MacNair, anyway. There was nothing you could have done.”

Patrick McMurty cleared his throat. A high sign. Vincent stepped back and tried to think of a better explanation. But he’d already missed his chance. Jewel’s eyes flooded with new tears. She jumped down from the fence and returned her attention to Silver’s bony hip.

Vincent took note of the way the horse balanced his weight on three legs, with the left back hoof barely touching the ground. From his inexperienced perspective, it looked as if Silver was standing on tiptoe.

“What’s wrong with your horse?” he asked.

“He’s old, almost thirty.” Jewel punctuated her words with a sniffle. “Oh, you mean his leg? He got hit on a farm road a few years ago. He has arthritis real bad. Gramps says I’m going to lose him soon.” Her shoulders lifted with another drawn-out sniffle. And then she buried her face in the horse’s side to hide her tears. “I don’t want to lose Whitney, too.”

She turned and wiped her tears away with her dusty fingers, leaving an endearing streak across one cheek. “You’ll bring her home, won’t you?”

Vincent looked over the back of the horse to her grandfather. Patrick’s grim expression challenged Vincent to hurt the girl any further. Vincent reached through the fence and stroked the horse’s nose, in lieu of touching the girl.

He’d do his job for his country, and for the twenty-six-year-old hostage he’d never even met. But most of all, he’d complete the mission for this tearstained girl who cared so much for her missing friend.

His promise was simple.

“I will.”

“I’M NOT DEAD.”

The observation squeaked through the parched ache in Whitney’s throat as she woke up. She tried to reach up to massage the bruised tissue at her neck, but a rough reminder pinched the skin at her wrist.

She breathed in stale, undisturbed air and opened her eyes to the dim morning light before remembering the source of the pain. Several layers of wide gray duct tape bound her wrists to the arms of a warped hardwood chair.

But knowledge didn’t necessarily bring comfort. Like a condemned woman strapped in for a primitive electrocution, her wrists and ankles had been taped to the arms and legs of the chair. She had no fear of being electrocuted, though. The ramshackle, one-room cabin where she’d spent the night hadn’t seen electricity or running water for years—if ever.

She breathed in deeply and winced at the burning in her chest. Combined with the rapid pounding inside her head, her achy body felt as though she’d been hit by a Mack truck…or thrown from her horse…or…

“Good morning, Miss MacNair.”

Whitney’s senses snapped to full alert at the crisply articulated greeting. The man in black.

Dimitri Chilton.

He lounged across the room from her in a battered recliner upholstered with ratty, mildewed plaid, with one leg draped carelessly over the arm of the chair. The front of his wool coat gaped open, revealing the steel gray butt of an oversize handgun sticking out of a holster beneath his left arm.

She’d attacked a man carrying that kind of firepower? Even the Department of Public Safety agents who worked at Montana Confidential didn’t walk around wearing weapons that looked like some sort of handheld mini cannon. The pockets of her jeans held nothing more dangerous than a tube of lip balm and a tissue.

Her pulse rate kicked up a notch. He could have killed her on the spot with that thing. He could have brought down Jewel McMurty and both horses, too. God, she was an idiot. No wonder her parents and brothers, and the men she worked with, thought she couldn’t look after herself.

With very little effort, she’d made a mess of things again.

A flash of white teeth in the shadows, and the bemused laugh that accompanied the smile, brought her back to the present. Whitney forced herself to breathe calmly, in and out through her nose.

Second-guessing herself now wouldn’t help. She had to keep a clear head. She dredged up the stiff-lipped pride that had seen her through tough times before. She refused to bend her spirit to her captor, even though he clearly had the upper hand.

“Where are we? What time is it?” She squinted through the shadows, trying to bring his face into focus. “Have you called my father yet? I know who you are.”

“I know you as well.” His crisp Mediterranean accent bespoke a man of education and culture. But the bruises on her body gave testament to his penchant for violence. “Your father will be contacted when the time is right. He paid good money to silence your embarrassing little scandal, no? You were whisked away from an important job in Washington to become a ranch hand in Montana. And you had such a promising career ahead of you.”

Whitney withered at the false sympathy lacing his voice. So much for pride. Even a terrorist from the other side of the world had heard of the pampered rich girl’s shame. “So you read the newspapers, too.”

“I wouldn’t be doing my job very well if I wasn’t informed, now, would I. I must make sure your father wants you back before I ask for ransom money.”

Chilton had hit her at her most vulnerable spot. For the moment, she conceded victory to him.

“Then what do you want with me?”

He slowly unhooked his leg from the chair and leaned forward into the dusty shaft of sunlight streaming in through a lone, cracked windowpane. Dark, intelligent eyes studied her with superior indifference. She relished a brief satisfaction at seeing the dark purple blotches beneath both those eyes. She’d broken the bastard’s nose with one of those kicks yesterday.

But satisfaction was brief. Something about his unblinking stare made her suddenly conscious of how vulnerable she was.

“You are my ticket to freedom and…revenge.”

“What?” For a few breathless seconds, she pitied whoever had been foolish enough to cross him. He spoke so matter-of-factly, as if he had already planned his enemy’s death a thousand times, in a thousand different ways.

And then she began to wonder just who his target for revenge might be. Montana Confidential? Her family?

Whitney sank back into the chair, unable to ward off the chill that assailed her. Every bruise and scrape on her back and arms cried out, each wound a tiny little voice reminding her of who she was and what she was supposed to be. Gerald MacNair’s little girl. She was simply a pawn in this madman’s game. Not Whitney. Not a woman. Not even a human being.

A pawn.

The first sting of tears pooled in her eyes. She turned her chin into her shoulder, not wanting to give Chilton the satisfaction of seeing her succumb to his taunts.

But he held all the cards. She could hide nothing from him. When she heard his footsteps on the dry, warped floor, she quickly blinked and tried to erase any signs of crying.

With the tip of his finger he touched the point of her chin and traced a line around the curve of her jaw. She cringed at the provocative touch. Violence encased in butter-soft leather was still violence. Her chest rose and fell in quick, panicked breaths. She felt the skin at the top of her breasts burn beneath his knowing gaze. “Is something not to your liking?” he asked.

Standing this close, she could smell the smoke and pine on him. She even detected a hint of musk and sweat. He’d been living outdoors for a few days, away from anything resembling soap and a shower. She gritted her teeth against the smell, and tried not to squirm beneath his scrutiny.

Whitney searched for an appropriate comeback, one that would make him remove his hand and gaze and smell without triggering his anger. Since she couldn’t very well ask for her freedom, why not try the next best thing? Escape. But she had no chance unless she could get herself free from this chair. The full discomfort in her bladder suddenly felt like a blessing.

Her heart still pounded, but now a surge of hope instead of fear spurred it on. “I need to go to the bathroom.”

He took his hand from her face and gestured around the cabin. “Do you see any facilities here?”

“I’m not too proud. I can go behind a bush outside.”

“Not too proud?” He laughed, a mocking, derisive sound completely at her expense. “I never thought I would hear that from an American. Very well. I will take you.”

He pulled a long, slender knife from inside his boot and slipped it between the bottom of her right wrist and the chair. With just the slightest shift in position, he could slit her veins wide open. Whitney sobered a moment. She wasn’t free yet.

But in a swoosh of gentlemanly style, he flicked the blade neatly through the tape, releasing her arm. As she flexed her fingers to bring circulation back into her hand, he snatched the loose end of tape stuck to the top of her arm and ripped it off, taking hair and skin with it.

“Ow!” she screamed, instinctively dragging her arm into her chest to protect herself from further pain. Purplish red welts immediately popped up on the top of her wrist.

“I’m sorry,” he mocked. “Did I hurt you?”

“You bastard,” she seethed.

But his dark eyes danced in gleeful retribution above the marks of pain she had inflicted on him. “I have been called worse. You may call me worse before our time together is done.”

With that ominous promise to dull her temper, he repeated the sadistic release on her other arm. Her leather boots protected her ankles from a similar fate, so she was able to stand without much difficulty. Walking out the door ahead of him proved a greater challenge. With the knife slipped neatly into his boot, he pulled the gun from beneath his coat. Square-angled and lethal-looking, it fit the length of his forearm and tucked into his armpit. With its snub-nosed tip jabbing Whitney between the shoulder blades, she lurched to the door and stumbled down onto the gravel that passed for a front porch outside.

Regaining her balance, she followed the point of his gun to a nearby bush. Once outside, she could see that the dilapidated cabin had once been a pioneer’s homestead or a miner’s shack. An area around the house had been cleared of the towering lodgepole pines that surrounded them. Over the years, brush and smaller trees had grown into a wild garden of sorts, covering any path or road that might indicate the way off this small rise.

Whitney rubbed her hands up and down her arms, adjusting to the damp morning chill, and made an easy decision. Anyplace was better than here. When she got the chance, she would simply take off. It couldn’t be more than twenty yards to the woods. She could easily lose Chilton in there. Then, once she was beyond the range of his knife or fist or gun, she would worry about finding her way back to the Lonesome Pony Ranch.

“Do you mind?” she asked, turning her back to him and unhooking her belt. He had stopped her at a shoulder-high stand of scrub pine.

“Yes. I know what you’re thinking. I will not take my eyes from you.”

The blood rushed from her head down to her feet. Whitney wondered if her shock at the accuracy of his guess reflected on her face. So much for escape. Holding on to what little dignity he’d left her, she dropped her jeans and took care of business, feeling the blush of embarrassment flood heat into her cheeks.

But while she zipped her jeans and tucked in the hem of her jewel-necked sweater, a new opportunity presented itself. The pocket of his coat chirped with a telltale ring. A cell phone! And if it was ringing they weren’t as close to the middle of nowhere as she originally thought. They had to be near a cell tower for Chilton to be receiving a call. Whitney slowed her movements and took great care to snap her jeans and fasten her belt.

“Yes?” The other party seemed to be equally brief and to the point. “I have her.”

Whitney snuck a peek over her shoulder, as if seeing him on the phone would help her understand his conversation.

“You’ll make the arrangements, then?” What arrangements? she wondered. She watched his nostrils flare with an impatient breath. Sensing his growing distraction, Whitney quickly finished dressing. “Fine. No. I’ll call you.” With the next pause, she sized up the shortest route into the trees. “We have an agreement, you and I.” Chilton’s voice rose with tightly controlled anger. “Don’t cross me in this.”

The instant he turned his face into the phone to make his point, Whitney took off running. She dashed through the bushes and clambered up and over a pile of rock before she heard the rapid fire of bullets behind her. She dropped to her haunches and scooted off the other side. Either he was a lousy shot, or he hadn’t been aiming directly at her. She doubted the first was true.

“Stop her!”

Chilton’s command made no sense. But she’d hit the low brush now. She hurdled a shrub and lengthened her stride, closing in on the treeline. More shots jarred her eardrums. The bullets slapped the earth beside her feet. Whitney stumbled, touched her fingers to the dirt and righted herself.

She pulled up short as another man, taller and thinner than Chilton, emerged from the woods, holding the same type of boxy gun, pointed directly at her.

Whitney heard her own startled breath rasp in her lungs. She shifted direction, splitting the distance between the two men, and ran the way she had in high-school track. She pulled away from her pursuers, hearing the static of bullets, coming close but never hitting her, like shouts from the crowd, urging her on.

She could see the big trees now, rushing closer. She put her hands up in front of her face and shoved her way through a stand of baby pines.

And smacked into the unyielding chest of a third man. Short and stocky. Dressed in black and armed like the others.

Feeling the burn of muscle in her thighs now, she backed up into the pine branches, spun, and returned the way she’d come. Five strides. Ten.

Another man in black rounded a granite boulder and blocked her path.

Four men!

Her abductor was not alone in his abandoned hideout.

Tears of shock and unwilling surrender mixed with her panting gasps, making deep breathing impossible. She turned. The stocky man walked through the pines. She jerked another ninety degrees. The tall man. One more turn and she faced Dimitri Chilton.

The circle closed in on her. Whitney’s gaze darted from one man to the next. Helpless as a rabbit trapped in a snare, she could only wait for her inevitable demise.

With a wall of men surrounding her, Chilton snatched her under the jaw, lifting her up onto her toes. His hard fingers dug into her cheekbone on one side, while his thumb left its bruising imprint in the other side.

“I grow tired of your defiance.” The refined breeding she’d noticed in his voice earlier was eclipsed by the thick accent of his native tongue. “I am not always a patient man.”

He threw her to the ground. The wrench on her jaw and the impact of dry, hard dirt left her ears ringing.

“Tape her and gag her.”

Whitney gathered her senses long enough to realize what was happening to her. She was aware of every hard touch and unkind word. One man bound her wrists, another taped her at the ankles. The third shoved a handkerchief into her mouth, thrusting her tongue back and pinching her lips against her teeth. He rolled her face into the dirt and tied the handkerchief behind her head, catching a few strands of hair in the knot and plucking them from her scalp.

“Wait.” Chilton punched in a number on his cell phone and knelt beside her. He ripped the gag from her sore mouth and pressed the phone to her ear. “Say hello to your father.”

Fearing some kind of trick, but brutally aware of the four guns trained on her, she obeyed his command with a dutiful whisper. “Daddy?”

“Whitney? Is that you?”

Hope surged through her at the sound of her father’s voice. “Daddy!”

But hope was snatched from her as quickly as it was given. Chilton shot to his feet.

“Mr. MacNair. It’s so nice to finally meet an American powerbroker like yourself. I think I have a deal you will be interested in…”

With a succinct hand signal, Chilton walked away, carrying all thoughts of rescue with him. Before Whitney could make a plea, the gag was shoved back into her mouth.

Without the blessing of unconsciousness, she endured the gut-wrenching dizziness of being tossed over the stocky man’s shoulder and carried back to the cabin. Inside, he dropped her with an unceremonious plop onto a dusty mattress in the corner.

Moments later, Chilton filled the doorway, an ominous shadow blocking out the sunlight. He snapped shut his cell phone and smiled at her in a way that made her skin crawl. “Your father sends his best.”

Then he looked to his men. “Return to your post.” Chilton gave the word and they disappeared into the vast and varied camouflage of Beartooth Mountain.

More fearful than ever, too confused to do otherwise, Whitney didn’t move away when Chilton knelt on the floor beside her and spoke. She decided she preferred his anger over this deceitful guise of civility.

“Now, if you are very good, and do not defy me again, I will give you water at sundown and take you outside to relieve yourself.” She closed her eyes against the hateful caress of that soft glove on her cheek. “But, if you make a noise, if you move without permission…I will kill you.”

Whitney nodded her understanding. When he slammed the cabin door behind him, she turned onto her side and buried her nose in the moldy ticking. She curled up into a fetal position, and let her own silent tears keep her company.

Chapter Two

Though she hadn’t expected it, Chilton kept his word. As the sun faded and darkness claimed the cabin, he came to Whitney and helped her sit up. He loosened the gag and let it hang around her shoulders like a necklace. While she worked her jaw to restore feeling to the muscles in her mouth, he opened a canteen.

He held it up to her lips and let her drink her fill. A slop of excess water dribbled down her chin and pooled on the front of her sweater. But Whitney was too smart to mind. She’d had an entire day to do nothing but think. Chilton had to ransom her sometime. He had to trade her for his freedom or revenge or whatever purpose this kidnapping served. But she intended to keep her strength up. She intended to be ready and able to run again, in case he changed his mind about letting her live.

“Rashid will take you outside.” The short, stocky man she’d seen before materialized like a shadow in the creeping darkness. Chilton freed her feet, but left her wrists bound together. Before she left, he whispered one last warning. “Do not provoke him.”

Though she could speak, she chose a submissive nod to answer him. Rashid and his gun escorted her to the far side of a pile of ancient rocks. She made no effort to ask for privacy. She allowed him to undo her belt buckle and zipper, then turned her back to him and dropped her pants.

She heard a thunk and a shuffle of feet behind her. Either Rashid was impatiently shifting from foot to foot, or he was angling around to get a better look at her derriere. Though she could feel the heat creep into her face, she bit her tongue to stifle the crisp retort she had in mind for his blatant voyeurism.

Whitney pulled up her panties when she was finished, but with her hands bound, her jeans proved to be more of a challenge. She could pull them up over one hip, but when she’d reach for the other side, the weight of her belt would make them slip. She tried twice, and ended up with the denim pooled around her knees.

Swallowing what bit of pride she had left, she turned back to Rashid. She blinked twice, and looked again.

Not Rashid.

Though this one, too, was dressed in black from head to foot, the man who stood guard over her now held a different gun. Something sleek and compact that fit into his fist. So Chilton had called in another thug. In the dawning light of the moon she could see his black eyes, the shadow of black stubble on his jaw, the short, shiny crop of inky-black hair that molded to his head.

The thing that frightened her most about this man was his size. He stood bigger and brawnier than any of the others. Well over six feet tall, the breadth of his shoulders strained against the leather jacket he wore. He fit the dimensions of the mountain itself. Even his legs, encased in black denim, looked as solid as the pine trunks that towered around the cabin clearing.

She definitely didn’t want to cross this one. Whitney raised her hands in surrender. “I’m not trying to escape this time, I promise. I just…” She didn’t want to say the wrong thing. She’d been warned not to speak at all. But necessity dictated taking this risk. “I need some help with my pants.”

“Ms. MacNair?”

His deep, raspy voice held no trace of the accent the other men shared. He buried his gun inside his jacket and closed the distance between them. She was too stunned by what she’d just heard to make any protest when he reached down and pulled up her jeans.

With swift, spare movements, he zipped and snapped, and buckled her belt. With him standing so close, she had nowhere else to look but at the controlled flex and give of his broad chest beneath the jacket and a wool turtleneck. He smelled different than the other men. Clean. Leathery. She tipped her chin and looked him in the eye. “Who are you?”

From somewhere behind him he pulled out a switchblade knife and punched it open. She recoiled from the razor-sharp point. But he grabbed both her hands within one of his and pulled her to him. He slipped the knife between her wrists and slit the tape. He’d freed her. Whitney’s confusion must have reflected in her face. He closed the knife right before her eyes so she could see he didn’t plan to slit her throat as well.

“Relax, ma’am. I’m here to rescue you.”

“RIGHT. And I’m the tooth fairy.” Vincent narrowed his gaze and watched the changing emotions play across Whitney MacNair’s upturned face. Her creamy skin reflected the moonlight, revealing fear, distrust, anger. But not once did the classic contours of her oval face soften into anything resembling joy or relief. “I’m tired of playing these games. Just take me back. I won’t run away. I promise.”

He knew an uncharacteristic moment of indecision when she walked around him and headed for the open ground of the clearing. Few things surprised him, yet her straight-backed refusal to accept his help did.

But he wasn’t a man to let anything rattle him for long. Before she reached the end of the rocks and the sight line from the cabin, he snatched her by the belt and pulled her up against his chest. He backed them both into the shadows. “Where are you going?”

“Back to the cabin.” The crown of her hair barely reached his chin, but she squiggled in his grasp as if she had a chance of escape.

His grip held firm. “You can’t.”

“I can and I will.” She reached back and swatted at his hand. “I won’t have your boss take away what privileges I have left. Now let me go.”

Vincent knew of hostages who became attached to their kidnappers, who became loyal to the keepers who terrorized them if they stayed together long enough. But Whitney MacNair had been held for fewer than forty-eight hours.

Maybe she hadn’t understood him. She might be injured or brainwashed or just too frightened to listen. He spun her around and clasped her by the shoulders. “I’m Agent Vincent Romeo. I’m here to take you home.” He scrunched down to her level and looked her straight in the eye. “Do you understand?”

In a shadowy trick of the moonlight her eyes appeared colorless. Gray, her file had said. But much paler than he’d imagined, as airy and light as quicksilver.

The expression in those eyes was unmistakable, though. Simmering anger. Pure rebellion.

Her wide mouth tilted into a sarcastic line. “Romeo, hmm? Romeo, ‘Romeo, wherefore art thou, Romeo?”’

Shakespeare? Like he’d never heard that joke before. All right. So he’d never heard it while he was in the middle of an incisive, undetected strike into enemy territory to retrieve a spoiled society dame who had fluff for brains.

“Come with me now, or I will take you by force.”

Though he never raised his voice above a whisper, he snapped the directions with a clear-cut authority that was rarely challenged.

“I said I’d go back.” She twisted her slim shoulders within his grasp. “Just don’t touch me anymore.”

Giving her the benefit of the doubt, he released her. She stumbled back a step in her haste to get away from him. Her heel caught and she staggered backward. Her arms flew out like twin windmills, but her left foot hit on the same impediment and her balance was lost. She landed with a soft thump on her backside.

On top of the man he’d taken out two minutes ago.

Dazed by the proof of his mission, she touched her fingers to the dead man’s face. His skin would still be warm, but his lack of a response to the woman sitting on his chest should clue in even her stubborn brain to the truth.

Vincent checked his watch while she studied the man. He scanned the clearing for signs of the other guards when she looked up at him. He unholstered his gun when she looked back at the corpse and met her questioning gaze when she looked up at him again.

“Is he…?”

“Dead.”

She scrambled to her feet with reflexes rivaling his own. In an instant she was behind him, her fists gripping handfuls of his jacket.

He had her full attention now.

She poked her head around his shoulder. “Did you do that?”

“Yes.”

“How?”

“You don’t need to know.”

He could feel her chest expand and press into his back as she dealt with the shock. The pictures he’d seen of Whitney MacNair had given him the initial impression of a woman of above-average height who needed to put some meat on her bones.

His introduction to her tonight, though, had provided an unexpected glimpse of a nicely rounded bottom. And the stretch of her body against his back indicated an athleticism to her build that decried her klutzy maneuvers thus far.

“Let’s go,” he ordered, setting aside his awareness of her physical attributes. When he turned toward the high ground, he expected her to follow.

But what else had gone as he expected tonight?

Whitney moved in the opposite direction, back toward the terrorist’s body. “You jerk.” She kicked the body’s crumpled legs. “You hurt me.” She collapsed to her knees, grabbed the front of his jacket and shook him, as though his ears could still hear. She raised her voice to a level that would certainly catch the attention of any living ears. “And don’t think I didn’t see you look…”

“He’s dead.”

Vincent wrapped his arm around the waist and lifted her clear off the ground. He clapped his hand over her mouth to stifle her startled yelp and carried her back to the cover of the rocks. She beat at his arm with her fists and writhed within his grasp.

The gun he still held in his hand made it difficult to keep hold of her. Persistent as a fish on a hook, she nearly slipped free. He twisted around and pushed her back against the boulder, trapping her there with his body, absorbing the force of her blows until her energy was spent.

Until he felt the drop of hot moisture hit his hand where it covered her mouth. Oh no, he prayed. She wouldn’t do this now. She couldn’t.

Great. Maybe the reason MacNair had shuffled his daughter off to Montana was because she was crazy. An absolute dingbat without a single survival instinct in her bones.

But she had the most unusual eyes. Sad eyes, he thought. Wounded eyes that seemed to catch and reflect even the dimmest light without allowing anyone to see inside. Right now they brimmed with tears that spilled silently down her face. Vincent peered through the shadows and saw the bloodstain on her cheek. Acting on instinct, he shifted his hand to touch his thumb to the injured spot.

“Are you hurt?”

She shook her head, stirring her cheekbone beneath his touch. The blood came away on his thumb, revealing unblemished skin. She must have put up one hell of a fight to draw someone else’s blood.

Somewhere inside, his confusion shifted and was replaced by an old familiar calling. To protect. Crazy lady or not, Whitney had been taken by force, degraded, and possibly even abused. She had a right to cry. A right to pummel the corpse of a man who had terrorized her. She needed a kind of emotional help that wasn’t in his power to give. But he could keep her safe. He could get her home in one piece.

If she’d let him.

“If I take my hand away, will you be quiet?”

She took a deep, steadying breath and nodded. Slowly, watching for any sign of verbal protest, he removed his hand. He stepped back to put some physical distance between them, and thought through the next series of moves he had to make. The light brush of her hand on his chest diverted his attention.

“I thought…I’m sorry.” Her voice was little more than a husky whisper. “You look just like the others.” She pointed to the dead man. “The black outfit… Do you have some ID?”

Vincent allowed himself one choice succinct curse.