„What the hell are you talking about?“ The violence in Vaughn was very close to the surface.
„My uncle has his own unique way of doing things. You know that. He made sure I’d have the information I needed but he hid it in an unique manner. I don’t know how he gave Adrian his information, but I think I know where my copy is.“ Her fingernails dug into her palms. She wondered if Vaughn realized just how scared she was.
„Sara, let’s not play any games. You’ll lose, believe me. Where’s the map?“
„If s not a map. I’m trying to explain. It’s a sort of…of code.“
Vaughn stared at her. „A code? You told me you and your uncle didn’t go in for codes.“
„I said we didn’t have any prearranged greeting signals.“
„Then what are you saying?“
„I’ll show you.“ Moving cautiously so as not to alarm him, Sara turned and started down the hall toward the study. This business of trying to think two steps ahead of a man with a gun was tricky. The ferry that might or might not be bringing Adrian to the rescue had left Seattle by now. Her fate was in the hands of the Washington state ferry system. They claimed to have an excellent safety record.
Vaughn was close behind her as she stepped into the study. The crystal apple gleamed on Adrian’s desk, still pinning her note. Beyond it the manuscript of Phantom waited.
„There,“ she whispered, indicating the pile of typed pages. „Everything you want to know about that gold is in that manuscript. My uncle has jotted down little doodles and notes all over the margins, you see.“
Vaughn stared first at the stack of papers and then gestured viciously at her with the nose of the gun. „You little bitch. What kind of game do you think you’re playing?“
She hugged herself, trying to master the faint trembling that threatened to weaken her limbs. Her head bent forward and a sweep of her hair hid her expression. „It’s there. I promise you. And I know how to get at the information you want. It’s in code and my uncle once taught me the code. It will take a while, but I can do it.“
„Why you little fool!“ he snarled. „Stalling isn’t going to get you anywhere. There’s no one around to come to your rescue. If there was any likelihood of that, I’d never have agreed to let you drag me here.“
„No.“ She shook her head and lifted her chin defiantly. „I’m not trying to stall. I’m… I’m trying to make a deal. You said you were going to be hiring professional help to assist you in getting the gold out of Southeast Asia. Well, I want you to consider me as hired help, too. I can decode Uncle Lowell’s doodles on that manuscript. I can do it here and now, in fact, and prove that what I’m saying is true. In return, I want you to cut me in for a piece of the action.“
He studied her derisively. „You’ve got your uncle’s nerve, little Sara, I’ll say that for you. Decode the manuscript. What a crock of – “
„It’s true,“ she insisted. „You know Uncle Lowell. It would be just like him to hide the information so I would be sitting right on top of it all the time. That manuscript was waiting for me at his cabin the other day. It was right out in the open. You’d overlooked it, naturally. He says people always overlook the obvious. But I recognized the doodles on the margins. It’s the code he taught me when I was a little girl. It was a game we used to play together. Give me half an hour and I’ll have the information you need to find that gold.“
Vaughn was clearly and dangerously undecided. His eyes slid from the manuscript to her face and back again. „Half an hour?“
She nodded quickly. „Is it a deal?“
„I can afford half an hour’s wait. I was prepared to wait for much longer than that for Kincaid to return. And your boyfriend is no doubt getting ready to land in Mexico City so there’s plenty of time on that end. All right, my greedy little Sara. You’ve got yourself a deal.“
„You’ll cut me in for a slice of the profit?“ She had to make it sound real, Sara told herself. She tried to inject just the right note of hopeful greed.
„Sure. Why not?“ He threw himself down into a chair in the corner. „Half an hour. And if it turns out that you’re lying, little Sara – “
„I’m not lying.“ She sat down slowly behind the desk. From there she was looking through the study door and into the hall beyond. Brady Vaughn would be able to see anyone who came through the door but from his seat in the corner he could not see into the hall as she could. Sara figured she would have a couple of seconds’ advance notice if and when Adrian arrived. Nervously she reached out and pulled the manuscript toward her.
She found herself staring down at the sketch of the wolf. For an instant it almost paralyzed her. Then, with excessive care, she turned over the first page of Phantom and picked up a pencil.
Time ticked past with a slowness that made Sara think she was waiting for eternity to end. She would have no way of knowing until the last moment whether or not Adrian would arrive. He would have the warning about the invasion of his house shortly after he drove off the ferry. He would probably leave the car down the road and walk the final few yards, she decided. Neither she nor Vaughn would have the sound of a vehicle to alert them.
Carefully she went through the manuscript, occasionally stopping to jot down a meaningless number or word on the notepad beside her. It would be particularly ironic if there really was a code imbedded in her uncle’s margin doodles, Sara decided at one point. A real joke on her. As far as she knew she was looking at nothing more than meaningless notes and drawings.
Time crept past. Outside the window the mist turned to rain. Sara turned on the desk lamp. Vaughn’s eyes never left her as she went page by page through the manuscript. His patience was as amazing to her as Adrian’s had been. Where did they learn that kind of skill? Perhaps some people were just born with it. It was a cinch she wasn’t one of those lucky souls. She shuddered and turned over another page. She would force herself not to sneak another glance at the clock or her watch for at least ten minutes, Sara decided resolutely at one point. The last thing she wanted to do was give Vaughn the idea that she was waiting for someone. She kept her head bent over the manuscript for what she estimated must surely be at least ten minutes if not mote and then, unable to resist, she slid her gaze upward to the clock on the wall near the door.
She almost didn’t see Adrian standing in the shadows of the hall. When she did, she thought her breath had stopped permanently. He was simply waiting there, watching her in absolute silence. It was as if a ghost had materialized out of thin air and in her odd, light-headed state of mind she might have believed just that if it hadn’t been for the rain-dampened Windbreaker he wore. It took her another instant to see the gun in his hand.
„Something wrong, Sara?“ Vaughn asked conversationally from the corner. He lifted his gun in an easy threat. „You seem a little tense.“
Sara swallowed and dropped her eyes from Adrian’s still, shadowed figure to the crystal apple in front of her. „I’ve just realized that I made a mistake.“
„Did you?“ Vaughn seemed only politely interested. „Just what kind of mistake would that be, little Sara?“
She picked up the apple and held it so that it caught the light from the desk lamp. „The information you want isn’t in the manuscript.“
„Then you have a problem, don’t you, Sara,“ he said with brutal emphasis.
She shook her head. „No. I don’t think so. Not anymore.“ She tossed the apple up in the air and caught it again. „Here’s what you want, Mr. Vaughn.“ She tossed the crystal object once more and caught it easily. Beyond the door Adrian did not move. He was as still as midnight waiting to descend. She couldn’t see his eyes but she knew they would be quite colorless.
„I think,“ Vaughn said abruptly, „that I’ve had enough of your games, bitch.“
„Ah, but I’m so good at them,“ she protested gently. „What you want is right out here in front of your very eyes, Mr. Vaughn. As clear as crystal. Just the sort of trick my uncle would pull, don’t
you think?“ With sudden decision she hurled the apple toward the window.
„What the hell… I’ve had it with you, lady. I’m going to kill you for this!“ Without warning, Vaughn’s patience snapped. He surged out of the chair, his gun trained on Sara but his eyes following the apple as it crashed against the tempered glass.
The sound of the crystal striking the window and falling to the floor was lost beneath Brady Vaughn’s scream of pain and rage as Adrian floated through the doorway and brought the base of the gun down in the direction of the other man’s skull. In the split second before the butt of the gun would have made contact with his head, however, some instinct must have warned Vaughn. He threw himself to one side, tumbling across the desk. Adrian’s gun struck him violently on the shoulder but it didn’t stun him. The weapon Vaughn had been holding, however, fell to the floor and skidded along the hardwood surface until it struck the edge of a rug.
On the other side of the desk, Sara screamed. She was trapped against the wall as the momentum of Vaughn’s panicked, sliding rush across the desk threw him toward her. An instant later he seized her even as he stumbled wildly to his feet. Sharp steel blossomed in his hand. He held the knife to Sara’s throat, his arm locking her against his body.
„Hold it right there, Saville. Come one step closer and I swear I’ll kill her.“
Sara couldn’t take her eyes off Adrian. The temperature in the study seemed to have suddenly dropped by about twenty degrees.
His face was utterly without emotion. It reminded her of the way he had watched the fish dying at his feet the other morning on the pier but it was a thousand times more remote. He didn’t look at Sara. His whole attention was on the heavily breathing man who was holding the knife to her throat.
„Let her go, Vaughn.“
„You think I’m crazy? She’s my ticket out of here. Drop the gun.“ He jerked his arm more tightly around Sara’s neck. „I said, drop it, damn you! Think I’m playing games?“
„No, I don’t think you re playing games.“ Moving slowly and deliberately, Adrian took a step forward and set his handgun down on the floor at his feet. The blue steel gleamed savagely in the light of the desk lamp.
„Come on, you bitch.“ Vaughn tugged Sara around the edge of the desk, clearly heading toward the spot where his own weapon had landed when it had been jolted from his hand. „Move, damn you!“
Sara tried to make her body as limp and heavy as possible but the feel of the steel at the base of her throat kept her from refusing to cooperate entirely. Vaughn would use that knife, she knew. Just as he would use the gun when he got his hands on it.
Across the room Adrian stood balanced a step away from his own weapon. If push came to shove, Sara didn’t doubt but that he’d make a grab for it. He watched Vaughn the way a wolf might watch a circling hyena.
„Your best bet is to make a run for it, Vaughn. Hanging on to Sara will only slow you down.“
Sara felt the tension in her captor’s body as he pulled her toward his gun. „I’ve come too far in search of that gold, Saville. I’m not leaving without getting what I want.“
„Sara doesn’t know where it is.“
„Maybe. Maybe not. I can’t quite figure sweet Sara. But Kincaid knows where it is, and when he finds out I’ve got his niece, he’ll bargain.“
„You think so? I’ve never known Kincaid to bargain for anything without coming out on top,“ Adrian said thoughtfully.
„You don’t know him as well as I do,“ Vaughn assured the other man. He stopped beside the gun on the floor and his fingers bit abruptly into Sara’s shoulder. „Bend down very slowly, Sara, and pick up the gun, muzzle first. And keep in mind that I’ll have this knife at the nape of your neck.“
Sara realized that it would be dangerously awkward for him to try scooping up the gun while still retaining a stranglehold on her. The action might give Adrian the opening for which he was clearly waiting. So Vaughn was going to make her pick up the lethal chunk of steel and hand it over politely to replace the knife.
Sara glanced down at the gun and then up at Adrian’s still, unreadable face. If she gave the gun to Vaughn, he would surely use it against the one thing that stood between him and the door: Adrian.
„Do as I say!“
Slowly Sara knelt, aware of the tip of the knife following her nape. Adrian didn’t move, his eyes never leaving Vaughn’s face. She went all the way down on her knees and reached out reluctantly for the muzzle of the gun.
„Hurry up,“ Vaughn snarled, forced to bend over slightly in order to keep the knife within striking distance of her neck. „Pick it up and give it to me!“
She wasn’t going to get a better opportunity, Sara realized. It was now or never. Handing the gun to Vaughn was the equivalent of signing Adrian’s death warrant. She took a deep breath.
Then she threw herself full-length on the floor and rolled to one side, straight into Vaughn’s legs. Her falling body covered the gun.
„Damn you!“
The knife flashed as Vaughn was forced to step backward in order to regain his balance. The blade arced downward, scoring Sara’s shoulder. She felt the icy sting of the steel even as she struck his left leg. The pain brought a startled cry to her lips.
„Sara!“
Her name was the only sound Adrian made. In the next instant he launched himself across the room in a deadly rush.
But Vaughn was already moving. He hurled the blade straight at Adrian, who must have guessed what was going to happen next. Sara opened her eyes in time to see Adrian throw himself to one side. The blade whipped harmlessly past and imbedded itself deep into the far wall. The rushing assault had served to draw the snake’s fangs.
In the small space of time he had bought for himself, Vaughn glanced down and seemed to realize he didn’t stand a chance if he took another moment to push Sara off his gun. He raced for the door even as Adrian dived for his own gun.
Sara gasped in pain, her fingers going to the wound on her shoulder just as Adrian leaped for the door. Her cry of anguish stopped him as effectively as a steel cable. He whirled and came back to her even as the sound of Vaughn’s running footsteps disappeared down the hall.
„My God, Sara.“ Adrian went down on his knees beside her. „How bad is it? Let me see.“ Carefully he guided her to a sitting position, pulling her face into his shoulder as he pushed aside her shirt.
„I… I don’t think it’s all that bad,“ she managed, inhaling sharply as she leaned into him. She was trembling. „It just hurts.“
„I know, Sara,“ he soothed in a soft growl as he examined the shoulder. „I know. But you’re right. It isn’t very deep. Do you think you can handle it yourself?“
„Myself?“ She lifted her head in astonishment and then realized what he meant. „Adrian, you’re not going after him!“
„I’ve got to, Sara. You know that.“
„No, I do not know that,“ she retorted. „Let the police worry about him. It’s not your job – “
„Sara, it is my job.“ Adrian’s face was a cold mask, his light eyes frozen, crystal pools. „After what he’s done to you, I don’t have any choice.“
„No, damn it!“ she raged, grabbing at him as he rose to his feet „You’ll never catch him, anyway. He’ll take my car. He’s got the keys.“ But even as she argued she realized there was no sound of a car leaving the drive.
„I took care of the car before I came into the house. A precaution.“ Adrian moved away from her, scooping up the gun and started for the door. „He’ll be on foot and unarmed. This is easy hunting, Sara. Don’t worry about it.“
„I don’t want you going hunting! Please, Adrian, wait….“
But she was calling to no one. Adrian had already disappeared down the hall after his quarry.
Easy hunting. Sara’s eyes filled with tears. She didn’t want Adrian going hunting. In that moment she would have given her soul to keep him from pursuing Vaughn.
Once again she remembered the way Adrian
had watched the fish dying on the pier.
Outside the house Adrian paused briefly on the porch, listening. He shoved the gun back into the leather holster he wore at the base of his spine. The rain was coming down heavily now, obscuring visibility. Sara’s car stood silently in the drive, unable to function since he’d clipped two strategic wires.
He’d really made a mess of this, Adrian told himself grimly as he started down the porch steps at a long, loping run. Everything was coming apart in his hands, and to top it all off, he’d nearly gotten Sara killed. The fury and fear he had felt when he’d realized what was happening inside the study were unlike anything he’d ever experienced in his life. The combination of the two had risen up to choke him, causing him to mishandle the situation badly.
But Sara was safe now. The knife had drawn blood but it hadn’t gone deep. She had been too close to the floor, depriving Vaughn of an easy target.
Vaughn. Adrian shook his head as his sense of logic returned. There were only two ways off the island, the ferry from Winslow and the bridge at the far end of Bainbridge. Vaughn would head for the highway and try to commandeer a car to go for the bridge. The ferry was already pulling out of its slip on the return run to Seattle. There would be no chance for Vaughn to catch it.
His hunting instincts told Adrian that Vaughn would stick as much as possible to the wooded terrain until he spotted a car that could be hailed. And he would want to keep moving in the general direction of his goal, the bridge. Panicked quarry didn’t think to backtrack or race off along a route that would seem to be in the opposite direction. When you were trying to escape, the sense of urgency effectively destroyed a good portion of natural logic.
With grave certainty, Adrian started toward the woods that bounded the road. He moved silently on the wet ground, oblivious to the rain that was soaking his hair and clothing. He knew he was heading in the right direction when he found the scrap of cloth Vaughn had apparently lost when he’d blundered into a thick cluster of blackberry bushes. After that, the trail became increasingly easy to follow.