“There’s a CB radio in Annie’s office,” Kellen said.
“Right. Good! CB radio first. Then restore communications.”
“Then—” she met his eyes “—my friend Birdie…”
“I know Birdie. She has driven for me.” Carson spoke too quickly. “What’s wrong with her?”
“She was hurt. Badly. I sent Sheri Jean to her, but…can you check…?”
“I’ll check. She’s too wonderful to lose.” As Carson made his exit, she wanted to clap in appreciation of his ability to show her her own face, her own feelings.
Max disappeared into the bathroom and returned with a roll of gauze. “Let’s see what we can do with this.” Gently, he wrapped her little finger to her ring finger to hold it in place.
“Better,” she whispered.
He fetched a cashmere throw off the couch, and as he wrapped it around her, he whispered, “Do you remember?”
As soon as he spoke, that sense of being in two places returned: the cool metal of the pistol, the man springing at her assailant, the blank nothingness of…of what?
She broke a sweat, a fine sheen all over her body.
“Kellen?” His tone changed to pleading. “Ceecee?” He tried to embrace her.
“No.” Panic swamped her. She wasn’t Ceecee. She wasn’t Cecilia. She could never be Cecilia again. Those flashes of moments past…they were not memories. They were merely impressions. She held him off with one hand. “Don’t. I’m in pain. That shot to the chest…”
“The sound of that shot brought me up here.” Abruptly, she could see into his tortured memories, to that moment when he had been too slow to save Ceecee from a bullet to the brain seven years before.
“I’m fine,” she said.
At once, he was practical Max. “Oh?”
“Well. Solid hit over my heart.” She touched her chest. “Hurts.”
“Let me see.” Max removed the leather shoulder holster and placed it off to the side. He unbuttoned her shirt, slid it off her shoulders, then off her wrists. He worked the vest’s fasteners free, then eased her out of its protective embrace. Reaching behind her, he unhooked her bra and pulled it away.
Great. She was naked from the waist up. She pulled the throw closer around her shoulders.
But he wasn’t drooling, and she found herself with mixed feelings about that. Why she cared, she didn’t know. Yet it seemed unfair to strip down and not have the guy notice. It made her half-remembered erotic dreams seem pitiful, the imaginings of a desperate woman.
He winced as the bullet site was revealed. “Oh, Ceecee…”
She corrected him. “Kellen.” She looked down at herself. A two-inch black bruise radiated from the center of her chest, and it was growing. If she hadn’t worn the vest, Mara would have shot her through the heart. She would be dead, lost to this world, and all her struggles to regain her dignity, her strength, herself would be for naught.
She looked at Mara, cuffed and slumped against the iron grill, and she considered turning on the gas fire and letting her roast.
“I thought the vest would stop injury,” Max said.
“It stops death. The force of the bullet has to be dissipated, and it was dissipated on my sternum.” She wet her dry lips. “Can you call for help yet?”
Max checked his phone. “Not yet. As soon as Carson gets the damper removed, we’ll take you to the hospital.”
She reached for her shirt. “You can’t leave with me.”
“I can.” He held her shirt while she put first one arm in, then the other.
Okay, now he was looking at her boobs. She had mixed feelings about that, too. She was one big mixed feeling poured over a very confused woman. “You’re in charge of the resort.”
He started to button the shirt, got it wrong, had to start over.
Good to know her boobs still functioned as a secret weapon.
He said, “I’m not in charge.”
“Who else? Now?” She gestured around her and winced at the pain the unrestrained motion caused her.
He stood, went to the bar, brought her a bottle of water and waited while she sipped.
When she’d wet her mouth enough to speak a little more clearly, she said, “Someone has to call the cops and wait for them to show up. Someone has to reassure the staff. Someone has to…fix everything. You’re the only one capable. You know that. Annie needs you.”
She might have only just acknowledged that she knew him, but she remembered that scowl when he didn’t get his way. She drove her point home. “If you insist on coming to the hospital with me, then I can’t go to the hospital. Annie left me in charge. Someone has to be in charge.”
“Fine.” Max set his jaw and never had he looked so much like an Italian thug. “I’ll get someone to drive you to the airstrip.”
“Birdie, too. And Nils.”
“Yes, Birdie, too. And…Nils.” He finished buttoning her shirt. “But when you wake, I’ll be at your bedside.”
She thought that was a vow he had made before. “Don’t worry. I’m okay.” She thought she’d said that to him before, too.
His phone rang.
Kellen sagged with relief.
He answered and gave her the thumbs-up. “Carson, good work. You did it.”
She checked for her knife; it was still safe at her belt. She reached for her shoulder holster and laboriously strapped it on. Because Mara was still here. This wasn’t over yet. All she needed now was her pistol.
She looked around, didn’t see it, leaned back and took a few laborious breaths.
Across the room, Nils sluggishly lifted his head. Blood from the wound on the back of his head had trickled onto his face. He seemed to be having trouble focusing, but eventually he zeroed in on her. “Kellen…” he whispered. “You shouldn’t have come.”
Kellen had to get herself on her feet. She had to. She couldn’t sit here and gasp like a beached fish or soon she’d be flat on her back, Max would be at her bedside and she’d be…she’d be panicked. She had to give herself a chance to remember…everything. She had to think about how she wanted to proceed in this situation with Max.
Things were complicated.
Understatement.
She crawled to the coffee table, and using it as a support, she got to her knees, then more slowly to her feet.
Max watched, poised on the balls of his feet, ready to catch her if she fell.
She smiled toothily at him. “There. That wasn’t so bad.” She lied. Her hand hurt. The bones in her chest felt as if they were moving, grinding.
“Here.” He presented her with her Glock 21 SF. “You dropped this.”
Using her left hand, she took it by the grip and found it fit not awkwardly, but like an old friend. She holstered it, looked up at him, and the magnitude of the recent events overwhelmed her. “Thank you. Thank you for saving my life.”
He reached for her, gripped her arms, and his hands had a fine tremor. “I prayed to God for a second chance, and for speed, and for you.”
He was so intense she wanted to look away. She couldn’t. In his amber eyes, she could see a man stripped to the bone by emotions she could only imagine.
Then Nils called, “Kellen, I need you.”
41
Nils’s voice caught her by surprise. Kellen looked toward the entry, then back at Max. “I, um, need to talk to him.”
“It’s not so easy,” Max said and released her.
She told herself she didn’t know what he meant. But she did. As she made her unsteady way to Nils’s side, Max took out his phone and made another call, and another, to emergency services and to the staff left in the resort, and all the while he watched Kellen.
Kellen meant to kneel beside Nils’s prostrate form; she got halfway down, collapsed onto her knees. That hurt; she’d have bruises tomorrow. But w
hat were a few more bruises? She leaned close to Nils’s bloody head. “After I got to Temo’s and saw what was happening with him and his sister—I thought you were the Librarian.”
“I know.”
“How did you know about Temo?”
“I investigated everyone, especially the people close to you. He was acting suspicious, so I kept an eye on him and, sure enough, realized he had his kid sister living with him.”
“Why did you lie to me? Why did you send me on a wild-goose chase?”
“I read the report from the Army. I know why they discharged you.”
Kellen sat up straight. She’d been afraid of that, that if he’d hacked into her military records to discover her fighting skills, he would also have read all the details of her hospital stay.
“I didn’t want you to be hurt even more,” he said. “I believed I could handle it.”
“Of course you believed you could handle it. Now you know better.” At least in the Army, her men knew she could fight, and would fight to the death. “I’m conscious. That’s good enough for now.” She looked at Mara, bruised and unconscious. Or maybe just bruised; Kellen thought she could see the glint of her eyes beneath those lids. “How dangerous is she?”
Nils slid his hand up until it reached his chin, then propped his chin up under his hand. “Judged against Hitler? Or simply judged against greedy, ruthless female serial killers who happen to be narcissist psychopaths?”
He chilled her with his detached evaluation. She gestured Max over. “Did you call Sheriff Kwinault?”
“She’s on her way.” Max loomed, unmoving.
Nils ignored him. “A local sheriff will probably be outmatched. Mara will attempt to escape without a care to who or what she hurts.” He didn’t sound ominous. He sounded matter-of-fact, and that made it all the more chilling. “She is the Librarian.”
“She’s illiterate,” Max added.
Both Nils and Kellen started and stared.
Nils grunted. “That could explain a lot.”
Max radiated a solid satisfaction.
But all this information sent chills up Kellen’s neck. Annie had left her in charge of the resort, and Kellen had visions of explosions and flames. Urgently, she said, “We’ve got to get Mara out of here. You said it yourself. She’s a serial killer. That makes her the responsibility of the FBI. Get her out of here.” Kellen sounded excessively pleasant, and she put her hand on her knife. “Get her out of here or I’ll neutralize her myself.”
Mara was definitely conscious, for at Kellen’s threat she flinched a little.
Good. She was smart enough to fear Kellen.
“Get me a phone,” Nils said. “I’ll make some calls.”
Someone rang the suite’s doorbell.
“I called for a first aid kit,” Max told them and looked through the peephole. “I thought Nils would like to stop bleeding on the carpet.”
Kellen felt foolish for thinking Max needed to be defended, for reacting like a Victorian maiden to Max’s embrace and, most of all, for caring whether Nils noticed she had a thing for Max. Nils had kissed her a couple of times. He’d gone out and gotten into a fight because he was horny. So what? What happened between her and Max was nobody’s business but theirs, and furthermore, what had happened in the past was…
She slid down the wall. Everything in her future hinged on the past. Maybe that was always true, but at least now she knew. Didn’t she?
Max answered the door. Frances stood there, wide-eyed. She looked at the guns, looked at the knife, looked at the blood, handed Max the first aid kit, and in a slow, graceful slither, she fainted. Max caught her in one arm, handed Nils the kit and lowered her to the floor.
Kellen got up—rising was easier this time—and walked over to Mara.
MARA PHILIPPI:
FEMALE, WHITE, TANNED. HEALTHY, 5’6”, 130 LBS. EMPLOYED 8 YRS. SPA MANAGER. AGGRESSIVELY PHYSICALLY FIT. EAST COAST STREAKED-BLONDE PREPPIE. BLUE EYES. DORIAN GRAY PERFECTION OF SKIN TONE. BATTERED, BRUISED. UNCLEAR ON DIFFERENCE BETWEEN WAR ZONE AND GYMNASIUM. SMUGGLER. SERIAL KILLER. LIAR. ACTRESS. MASSIVE EGO. DO NOT LIKE. NO GOOD REASON. EVERY REASON.
Kellen should have trusted her instincts.
She knelt beside her, close enough to speak quietly, close enough to get in Mara’s face. “Your nose is broken.”
Mara pretended to be unconscious.
“That’s going to ruin your chances for the International Ninja Challenge.”
As Kellen had known she would, Mara opened her eyes. They snapped and sparked with fury. “You think I’m done? I’ll never be done.”
“You gave Lloyd Magnuson that heroin.”
Mara’s lips curled in a smile, and her lashes fluttered. “The poor dear man simply needed a bit of seduction and a push in the right direction. He was an addict through and through.”
Kellen had never seen the truth behind the mask Mara wore, because Mara believed she was justified in every cruelty, in every murder. “How did you find Priscilla’s body? Where did you take it?”
Mara’s smile disappeared. “We didn’t find it. I’m not so sloppy. I put a tracker on Lloyd. Mitch followed the signal and retrieved Priscilla’s body. I didn’t need any surprises popping out of her other shoe.” Mara’s eyes narrowed. “Who knew that bitch could be so devious?”
“You just confessed to killing her.” Mara wasn’t stupid; did she consider herself above the law? Or, more likely, that she would never go to trial?
“There’s no corpse to be found,” Mara said. “Not this time.”
“Let me unlock your handcuffs.” Kellen smiled invitingly. “You run really well. Let’s see you run now.”
“Run so you could find the nerve to shoot me? You can’t shoot me in cold blood? I chose you as my opponent because I thought we were alike, that you were worthy. But you’re weak.” Mara raised her head. “Yes, go ahead and free me. I’ll kill you all and I won’t run—I’ll walk away with your hands in my pocket.”
Her vitriol wiped the smile from Kellen’s face. “Then I’ll leave you bound. Because, by my count, you’ve now lost two shipments of Central American tomb art.” She waited a beat to see if Mara corrected her, if Mara said she had recovered the second shipment. But she didn’t, so she hadn’t, and that meant it was still somewhere on the property stored in an ATV. Kellen continued, “At best, you’re done as a smuggler. At worst, your twice-disappointed buyer is going to kill you.”
“I have allies in powerful places. Tell your Nils Brooks that one of those allies killed his MFAA bitch. He’s still out there, and he knows who to hunt.”
“Your cruelty makes you a target to be destroyed. Your position leaves you weak. Allies abandon the weak.” Kellen turned the taunt back on her. “You’re weak.” The trouble was, Kellen didn’t completely believe what she said. Something about Mara lured and attracted, and she feared Mara’s allies would try to save her.
As Kellen returned to the entry, Mara muttered, “Snakes and phantom faces, indeed.” A small frisson slithered down Kellen’s spine.
When and how had Mara found out about her husband, about Gregory Lykke? That face outside the window had been his, and Mara had been so convincing in her indignation about the snake in the fruit bowl, the snake that had been native to Maine…
Nils was holding an ice bag to the back of his neck. She looked into his eyes and said, “Listen to me. You find that stone tablet with the hieroglyphic curse and you take it, and all the Mayan carvings, out of the resort. Get the curse out. This resort needs to be curse-free now. Today. Do you understand me?”
As if he was surprised at her forcefulness, he leaned away from her. “A curse-free resort. Right. I’ve got it.”
She glanced at Mara.
Mara’s smile was all barbed wire lips and bared white teeth.
Kellen said, “And I don’t care what it tak
es, you put that bitch behind bars.”
42
With that, Kellen’s flush of energy faded. She began to breathe laboriously again, and she leaned her head against the wall.
At once, Max walked over and slid his arm around her waist. “I’ve got a town car waiting.” He lifted her to her feet. “You need an experienced trauma center. I talked to Sheri Jean—Birdie’s alive, but she needs trauma care, too. A helicopter is on its way to take you to Seattle.”
Kellen nodded.
“After law enforcement gets here, I’ll send Nils to the emergency room, too.”
Kellen nodded again.
“No argument?” He assisted her as she walked slowly to the elevator. “That’s worrisome.”
The trip down the elevator wore her out; she couldn’t breathe deeply and wasn’t getting the oxygen she needed. Russell held the resort’s exterior door; she touched him lightly on the shoulder and he burst into tears. Outside, under the portico, the town car waited.
Max opened the back door and assisted Kellen into the seat, helped her lie down, covered her with the cashmere throw and turned on the seat heater. He said to the driver, “Pick up Birdie at the maintenance garage. Take the women to the airstrip. Wait for the helicopter, get them on board and come back. I might need you.”
“Of course, sir, I’ll do whatever you bid.”
Kellen frowned. She didn’t recognize the driver’s voice, but she certainly recognized her attitude. This woman was sarcastic and amused, and something about her set Kellen’s teeth on edge.
Before she could puzzle out that unpleasantness, Max rested his hands on her shoulders. Kellen opened her eyes. He was upside down, looking at her in exasperation and joy. “Listen to me. I see you. I know you. You know more than you want to admit. So in reply to your unspoken thoughts, let me say this.” Leaning over, he kissed her.