Afterglow Page 21

  THEY LEFT AS SOON as the manager of the airport showed up the next morning. He bore a fat loaf of crusty bread, cheese, and strong coffee in a thermos. Fortified, they paid cash for the rental, and took off.

  “For all he knows, we could be stealing this pretty plane,” Dakota pointed out as they taxied down the runway. It was a perfect flying day, the sun shining, the air clear and still.

  “He was reimbursed well,” Rand said, scanning the fields as they passed to check for anything out of the ordinary. They lifted off without incident, and he allowed himself to relax for the duration. “I’ll make sure he gets it back in one piece.”

  “Good.” She settled more comfortably in her seat, looking fresh and pretty. She’d covered the abrasions on her cheek with expertly applied makeup and wore large sunglasses to shade her bright eyes.

  She was dressed in fashionably wrinkled white cotton pants and an off-the-shoulder, long-sleeved black T-shirt that showed off her pale skin and two angry red scratches near her neck.

  Her glorious hair, fiery and so touchable it took everything in Rand not to reach out and run his fingers through it as he’d done the night before, was corralled into a low ponytail. Despite the lack of a hairbrush, she’d managed to tie back the thick wavy length with a black-and-white scarf. She looked like she’d just stepped out of the pages of a fashion magazine. She had never looked like a chemist.

  Dr. Dakota North was a resourceful woman.

  “I’d hate to cheat him,” she said, turning her head to give him a smile. “He brought us breakfast.”

  “He would’ve gotten an eyeful for his trouble if he’d shown up ten minutes earlier,” Rand said dryly.

  “True. This is nice, isn’t it? Peaceful, drama free.”

  “Yeah. It’s great.” He wondered how long the détente and the peace would last.

  An experienced pilot, Rand directed the rented Cessna toward Umbria’s capital, Perugia, where the prison was located. He enjoyed flying, especially when he had terrific weather and a tailwind. The sky was a crystal-clear pale blue with ten-mile visibility and just a little haze in the distance as they flew over the mountains. He pointed out Mont Blanc and other landmarks on the route. They talked about food, and wine, and Zak and Acadia. Whom, Rand realized, Dakota knew quite well. Better than he did, given that he lived in LA and his friend in the Pacific Northwest.

  “I don’t know how you live with this sustained cloak-and-dagger stuff day in and day out,” she said, peering down at what appeared to be a toy train cutting through brilliant green fields. “It’s exhausting.”

  He smiled. “Hardly. This isn’t how my jobs go normally. My team and I show up, we do our jobs without any drama or fanfare, and then we take a nice chunk of change home at the end of the day. In all the years since I started the security business, I’ve never once drawn my weapon. Never needed to.”

  “Good,” she said emphatically.

  “Just so you know, I’m determined to find whoever’s behind this. For a dozen reasons, not the least of which is this might very well be the person who burgled your house, put incriminating shit on your iPad, and tried to run us down yesterday. The list is fucking growing by leaps and bounds.”

  “We’re in this together.” Dakota swiveled her head to face him, her eyes masked by large dark glasses.

  “Yeah. We are.” But the truth of the matter was that yesterday’s high-speed chase had hit dangerously close to home. They could’ve been killed. She could’ve been killed.

  He hoped like hell his father could provide some answers.

  He rotated his shoulders to ease the tension, a product of anticipating seeing Paul again. His father wasn’t an easy man—an understatement. He was a sanctimonious asshole, and a bully. Rand preferred keeping their face-to-face contact to a minimum.

  Paul’s assets had been frozen by his wife’s Seattle lawyers until the charges against him were either dropped, or he was imprisoned.

  It was Rand who paid the astronomical prices for the team of defense lawyers. That, and being civil, was the best he could manage.

  Strapped in beside him, Dakota was holding the case that had contained the vials loosely on her lap, keeping track of where the second bad guy was. Currently, the GPS coordinates put the guy in northern Italy.

  He didn’t know what the guy was doing there, Rand thought, mildly annoyed, because he hadn’t had contact with his men since the day before. But that could be for many reasons. He didn’t want to believe they’d lost their quarry and weren’t responding because they had fuck-all to tell him.

  He regarded her thoughtfully. There was no sign of her being a white-knuckle flyer now. Stretched out as best she could manage in the confined space, Dakota looked as perfectly relaxed as a cat napping in the sunshine. As usual, she had her shoes kicked off. The shoes were sky-high black heels, which, like everything else they both wore, had been in her voluminous bag.

  They had a tacit agreement to keep the personal from seeping into the already explosive situation, and when she wasn’t making calculations on the handheld GPS, she spent the trip looking out the window or dozing.

  Which was fine. Talking to Dakota was a minefield, and for the duration he’d like to bask in the warmth of the postcoital glow, and leave it at that.

  Sex with her had been inevitable. The chemistry between them had never been an issue. That hadn’t changed. At least she couldn’t lie with her body; he knew that too well to be fooled by fake passion. Although he acknowledged to himself that a lot of men believed the same fucking thing. Still, he did know her body. Her mind was another matter altogether.

  He checked the coordinates and landmarks. They were a hundred miles from the airport.

  Umbria evoked the Middle Ages, with its mountains and hills, streams and valleys. The countryside was lush, the rolling green hills punctuated with the dusty gray of endless olive groves, emerald-green terraced vineyards, and orchards. The rustic landscape was dotted with historic hill towns of pinkish gray rock, set like semiprecious stones in nooks and crannies of vegetation.

  He checked his airspeed for the descent. “We’ll be landing in about ten minutes.”

  Dakota slipped her heels on. “How far is it to the prison?”

  “Only about seven miles out of town.”

  She checked around her seat to make sure she had everything stuffed back in her tote. “When were you here last?”

  “I had to come early to set up security for the wedding, and made a quick trip here first.” Paul hadn’t been that pleased to see him. It wasn’t like the old man had a social life—he was with the other inmates for an hour a day, with an hour outside, and had unlimited access to his legal team. One would think he’d be starved for any form of social interaction. Apparently not.

  “How’s your father doing?” Dakota shoved her sunglasses on top of her head, making the diamond studs in her ears sparkle in the sunlight streaming through the windows. “It must be hard for such an active man to be—”

  “He’s doing okay, all things considered.” It was damned hard to dredge up the old resentment, considering the night they’d just spent, and in the bright light of day it was harder still to maintain his stance. It was what it was. No matter who was to blame, the bottom line was Paul was in prison, and it didn’t look good for him being released anytime soon.

  “Check the bad guy’s location again before we land, would you? I’m surprised Ligg and Rebik haven’t called in to let us know their status.”

  He’d called his assistant, Cole. Voice mail. He’d called Creed. Voice mail. He’d called his office in Los Angeles. His receptionist, Kristin, had answered. She was just as worried now as Rand—she’d thought he was with the rest of the team. It seemed that nobody knew where the fuck half his team was. They’d disappeared off the map and he was left out here swinging in the wind without help or backup.

  Kristin asked if he wanted the men who’d just returned to head back to Europe, but after a moment, he said no. This wasn’t a situati
on that required that many people. With two of his men on the trail of the bad guy, he figured that was sufficient. For now. Instead, he instructed her to have them check into the disappearance of the men they’d left behind.

  This wasn’t adding up, no matter how he looked at it.

  It seemed a stretch—a big stretch—to think that the men were in cahoots with the bad guys. He’d known most of them from his stunt days. They were people, men and women, he trusted. But offer enough incentive, and a man could crumple as easily as a used tissue. He hoped to hell they weren’t part of this. Right now Dakota’s don’t trust anyone philosophy seemed like a sound plan.

  They’d lost one lead; he didn’t want to lose the second. Rand had a bad feeling. Ligg was experienced and exceptionally fast on his feet. Rand trusted him to keep their quarry in sight without engaging. Once he’d questioned Paul, he planned to rendezvous with them and assess the situation himself—but he had to see his father first.

  He couldn’t believe how quickly and thoroughly everything had gone wrong. The wedding fiasco, the dead waiter, the mass murder in Barcelona, Ham’s death … now an assassin on his ass. Hard to give chase when he was being chased himself. He hoped the lucrative deal he’d made with the guy from the flight school would prevent him from talking if anyone asked. Rand wasn’t going to hold his breath. Rand knew the authorities must have his name by now, and there was a strong possibility, if it wasn’t already done, that his photo would be next.

  “Anything?” he asked, starting their descent while she was still rummaging in that bottomless bag of hers.

  “Got it!” Dakota pulled the hard case and handheld GPS out of her bag again. “Hang on a sec.” She quickly tapped in the longitude and latitude she was seeing in her head. Her ability was extraordinary, and uncannily accurate. Rand took back everything he’d thought when first Stark and then Dakota claimed to have this amazing tracking ability. Without her, he would’ve been screwed.

  “He/she/it is now in a town called Berat, Albania.”

  “Damn it. I wish to hell I knew if Ligg and Rebik were close or looking for their asses with both hands, miles away.”

  “If they read their texts, they’re right there with the bad guy.”

  When they hadn’t responded to his voice mails, he’d texted both of them the GPS coordinates every hour for the last eight. There’d been zero fucking response. “Yeah. If.”

  “I can tell you exactly where they are.”

  “I knew you had a crystal ball in there.”

  “Something better and far more accurate.” She shot him a sassy smile despite the edge to his levity, a smile that did a number on his heartbeat. She dove back into her bag.

  As she searched for whatever, he powered back and leveled off, increasing the amount of pressure on the yoke, adjusting the aileron in the crosswind so the nose rose slightly. The wheels bit the tarmac with a screech, and he slowed and taxied across the runway’s centerline to the private terminal.

  “Hang on a sec—okay.” She held the small aluminum case and the GPS again, then turned her head to look at him. He saw his own reflection, not a happy camper, in her sunglasses.

  “Can you give me a minute, or do you want to wait until we’re in the terminal?”

  “Here.” He applied the brakes and taxied in. “How are you doing this magic?” If she said she knew where his men were, she knew.

  “I appropriated Ligg’s sunglasses and Rebik’s Swiss Army knife back in Paris.”

  “Devious.”

  The sunny smile disappeared as a cloud of hurt moved in. “Yeah. So I’ve been told.”

  THEY WENT TO RENT a car. “Let’s get a scooter,” Dakota suggested. “The wind in our hair, the sun on our backs?”

  “Not much to protect us if someone tries running us off the road again.”

  She grimaced. “Good point.”

  Rand pointed to a sports car with the roof folded down. The kind of car he would’ve rented if they’d indeed come to Europe for their honeymoon. “How about that little blue job over there?”

  Her face lit up. “Perfect.”

  It didn’t take long to do the paperwork, and they were on their way. “You know, your father isn’t going to want to see me,” Dakota pointed out, holding her hair back and lifting her face to the sun. The wind teased bright banners of molten copper out in a stream behind her.

  No fucking shit. Rand wouldn’t have wanted to chitchat with the woman responsible for putting him away in a foreign prison either.

  Flanking the road were vineyards as far as the eye could see. “Were you serious when you said you’d testify on his behalf?”

  She hesitated a beat too long, then said into the wind, “I’ll try, but I won’t perjure myself. Not for old time’s sake. And not even for you.”

  “I figured. And this is a meeting better done alone. I know a decent hotel in Perugia—you can shower and rest up while I go see him.” Rand wasn’t looking forward to the visit.

  He and his father had always had an adversarial relationship. His mother, whom Rand had adored, for all her faults, held the purse strings. Old oil money. His father hadn’t liked toeing the line; instead of taking it out on his golden goose, he’d made Rand his whipping boy. His parents had been two dogs with one bone, each using their only child to motivate and manipulate the other. They’d professed to love each other, and yeah, his father had been devastated when his wife died. But for Rand, growing up in a war zone, their abiding love had been fucking impossible to understand.

  Paul’s imprisonment for the last two years was frustrating and depressing for his father, not to mention expensive and frustrating for Rand. Instead of assisting the legal team, Paul was constantly coming up with ways they could do their job better, which delayed proceedings while they tried to sort out his paper trail.

  Rand tried to be understanding. Paul desperately missed his wife. He maintained his innocence to anyone who’d listen. Even if he was found not guilty of the premeditated murder charge, he’d certainly be imprisoned for involuntary manslaughter.

  He’d been in Capanne prison for twenty-five months already, and he was understandably stir-crazy, as the Italian justice system moved slowly. Of course, he took no responsibility for his own delaying tactics and their effects.

  Rand and Dakota checked into the small hotel. “Go ahead and go to the room,” he said. “I’ll probably be an hour or so. Then we can go and grab something to eat.”

  She shook her head. “I’m going with you.”

  “I don’t think that’s a good idea. He doesn’t like anyone seeing him like that.”

  “Like what?” Dakota asked dryly, tucking her hand in his arm, steering him back outside. “In prison? Probably not. But we worked together for years, and he respected, if not me, then my work. There are questions I can ask him, or he may say something that you’d miss—–I don’t know, but if there’s a chance he knows something, I want to be there. Four ears are better than two.”

  Rand agreed. He still wanted to give her an out. “He might not want to see you.”

  She shrugged, looking very French as she did so. “Let’s deal with that if and when it happens.”

  He opened the passenger door. “Your chariot awaits.”

  “Barring people trying to shoot us or run us off the road, we can enjoy the short trip, right?”

  He smiled back, unable to resist tucking a long strand of coppery hair behind her ear. “Right.” He got in and started the car.

  He had to gird himself for the upcoming confrontation—because a confrontation was always what their meetings were. He just wanted this one over with.

  It was almost a relief to see the sign: Casa Circondariale di Perugia. Capanne prison. They had to show identification to the guard at the gate, a big fucking problem if they were followed, but there was no choice. They were allowed to pass through to the parking lot. More ID checks along the way. As they turned into the designated parking place, Dakota reached and laid her hand on his arm. “I k
now you’ve heard your father’s point of view for the last two years, but I’m asking that you please keep an open mind right now. I swear to you, I didn’t give Paul the drugs he administered to your mother. I swear on everything we shared. He lied to save his skin. I understand that need.”

  “Yeah. So do I. There’s a lot of shit that doesn’t add up. Let’s go in and see what Paul has to say when you confront him face-to-face.”

  She bit her lip, her eyes shining as she said thickly, “Thank you.”

  “Don’t thank me yet.”

  Dakota left her bag locked in the trunk, and they went through the process of being searched and checked in before being escorted to the visitors’ room by two officers. Rand figured if he didn’t ask if Paul would see Dakota, he wouldn’t have the chance to say no.

  His father was wearing regular clothes. Jeans and a sweatshirt over a blue dress shirt, and waited at a table, having been told he had visitors while they were filling in the required paperwork. Other than him, the large, sunlight-filled room was empty, but two guards were stationed outside. Paul had been a model prisoner and wasn’t considered a risk. Clearly, the prison officials hadn’t been sliced by his acerbic tongue.

  They crossed the cement floor, their footsteps unmistakable on the hard surface. His father didn’t look up.

  Paul’s style of dress and meticulous grooming hadn’t changed despite his incarceration. A fit and healthy-looking sixty-seven, he had salt-and-pepper hair, buzz-cut close to his scalp to disguise the fact that it was almost nonexistent on top.

  Rand knew his father was aware of their presence long before they arrived at the table in the far back corner. Paul liked to keep his back to the wall. The chairs scraped as Rand pulled two away from the table.

  “Hello, Paul.” Dakota curled her fingers around the back of a chair.

  Paul lowered his glasses to glance up from the book he was reading. He ignored Dakota. “I saw you last week when you and Seth came. What’s this visit in aid of?”