Chapter 5

 

The Range Rover sped past dripping trees and dead-end streets, past mansions, sullen and dark behind the gilded gates and iron fences. Gas-fed street lamps too flitted by, no more than dim and dying stars in Sarah’s blurred vision. She tried to blink back the tears, but more and more she found them working their way down her cheek. She was losing control, and suddenly she was so tired. She tried unsuccessfully to swallow the thick knot that seemed to have lodged itself permanently in her throat.

Mansions gave way to a blur of shops, restaurants, a museum, a synagogue. They were winding through the remains of colonial Newport when a gas station came into her view, awkward and out of place.

“You should call your lawyer.”

His voice was muffled, and Sarah pushed herself against the heavy blanket that seemed to have descended over her. She pressed her head against the window. The glass lacked the ability to cool her fevered skin. She concentrated on his words.

“You do have someone to call, don’t you?”

The car stopped at a traffic light, and Sarah barely managed to focus enough to see him turn and stare into her face.

“Maybe the emergency room should be our first stop.”

She shook her head as adamantly as she could muster and tightened her hold on the leather bag in her lap. “I...I’m fine.”

She turned away as more tears slid down her face.

“Right there. That brick building just past the next light is the police station, if I’m not mistaken. And in a minute that’s where I’m dropping you off.”

Her head snapped around. “Please don’t! Not yet...I need a bit of time to think this through.”

“You’ll have plenty of it in the police station.”

“No.” her voice cracked. “They’re trying to kill me.”

“The police? That’s ridiculous.”

“I know.” Sarah nodded, burying her face in her hands. She tried to fight off the numbing chill, willing her body to stop the persistent shivering, to control the tears that kept coming.

“You seriously expect me to believe that the police are trying to kill you.”

Even in her frame of mind, she could hear the skepticism in his voice.

“They stopped me on my way back from the airport. One of them tried to choke me.” She touched her neck where she could still feel the bruising grip of the man’s hand. “When I tried to get away, they shot at my car. I was barely able to get on a dirt road and escape on foot. That’s where you found me.”

“So you’re a fugitive from the law.”

“How could I be? I’m already dead, remember?” She took a deep breath before continuing. “Look, Mr. Dean, I went away two weeks ago and came back to a nightmare. And since my plane landed, I don’t know how many hours ago, I’ve had two attempts made on my life. Two attempts!”

“But you don’t really think the police can be involved.”

“I do.” She stabbed at her wet face with a heel of her hand. “I can trust no one. They’ve put Judge Arnold in jail for murdering me. I think they’re trying to finish the job...destroy the loose ends. I think they mean to—”

“You’ve been watching too many movies, and we have a visitor.”

Sarah’s spine froze at the sight of the police car pulling up on their right. She turned quickly to him. “I need a...”

Owen shoved a tissue into her hand.

The policeman’s sharp nose angled in their direction. “Everything okay?”

“Yep.”

“It’s been green for a while.”

“Sorry, officer. Lost in conversation, here.”

“You all right, miss?”

“She’s fine!” Owen responded as Sarah nodded, keeping her nose in the tissue. “Just a little...uh, domestic discussion. You know how these things go.”

Sarah stopped breathing as silence linked the two cars. She didn’t dare look at the officer for fear of being recognized, so instead she turned toward Owen, speaking loud enough for the policeman to hear. “I...I feel much better now.”

“Well, have a good one, officer.”

Owen didn’t wait for a response as he closed the window and drove through the intersection. At the next light, he didn’t turn into the parking lot of the police station, instead continued along Broad Way.

“Thank you.”

“Don’t thank me yet. Our friend has decided you need a knight in shining armor.”

Sarah glanced in the side mirror and watched the police car follow them past the hospital. Cold dread again took hold of her body.

“They knew my car. They know where I work, where I live, when I was coming back. I can’t get away.” She couldn’t keep the tremor out of her voice. “And I don’t understand any of this, why all of a sudden…” She fought for her next breath. It was another long moment before Sarah again found her voice. “Please let me out...anywhere. I shouldn’t drag you into the middle of this.”

The words died on her lips as he signaled and pulled into the semi-brightness of a convenience store parking lot. Inside the plate-glass window of the store, a lone cashier sat with his back to the parking lot.

He had done as she’d asked. This was the end of the line. Sarah reached for the door. “I appreciate the...”

“Come here.”

His mouth stifled her questioning gasp as he grabbed her arm and drew her face to his. For an insane moment, the shock of his lips on hers immobilized her. Before she could articulate the sensation, she felt the heat of him penetrating the layers of chilling fear. Then reality kicked in, and she tore her mouth away.

“What are you doing?”

“Trying to convince your persistent hero that you’re okay.” His mouth continued to linger right above hers. His arm slipped around her. “Don’t turn around. But he’s parked right by the entrance to the lot.”

It was difficult not to turn and look.

“And he’s going to stay there until he knows everything he needs to know about me...and then some.”

“What do you mean?” she asked.

He reached over to wipe the wetness on her face. “I have a woman who is disheveled and clearly upset in my car. I used the wrong word. Domestic. He is going to hang around and make sure that I won’t beat you some more. He doesn’t want me dropping your body somewhere off the Cliff Walk before dawn.”

“Everybody else is trying to do just that.”

“Yeah, well, it doesn’t look to me like he’s in on your conspiracy theory.” He stole a look over her shoulder at the police car. “If you get out of this car, then you get to talk with him. Or you can stay with me—for a short time, anyway—and try to make some sense.”

“I’ll stay with you.”

He gave her a half smile. The same killer smile, she thought, that she’d been seeing in the tabloids for years.

“Then it’s show time, Sarah. We’ll have to send him the message that our domestic squabbling is over, and you just can’t wait to get me back home with you.”

She stared up into his handsome face. The dark hair was starting to gray at the temples, and the lines around the eyes were deepening, but the piercing blue eyes were as clear as ever, and she knew he was right.

“Look, I’m a professional,” he said. “All you have to do is...”

Letting go of the leather case, she raised herself and took Owen’s head in her hands, bringing his mouth to her lips and kissing him as she had long ago dreamed of doing—as if nothing that had happened this night truly existed and this was yet another part of a dream.

His eyes reflected his surprise when he pulled back.

“A Garbo kiss,” he murmured vaguely.

In a split second his mouth was crushing down on hers, and suddenly she was filled with the taste of him. His mouth was rough and hot, and for an instant her mind emptied of everything else but the need to take what he gave.

Though blinded momentarily by this unexpected burst of desire, Owen still knew that he was treading on extremely dangerous ground. This woman spelled trouble any way you looked at it. And yet, having her in his arms, her mouth so soft and willing, his concern for real life dissipated into thin air.

At that instant, only the two of them existed. No police. No cameras. Nothing beyond the heat of a man and a woman. He pushed aside the oversized raincoat and let his hand run over her breast through the wet fabric of her jacket. Her soft moan in the base of her throat was just one more step toward his undoing. He wanted her. It was as simple as that.

A pickup truck pulled into a space not far from the Range Rover, and Sarah practically leapt out of his arms, pressing her back against the passenger door with a look of shock on her face. He watched her struggle to catch her breath.

“Well...where did that come from, I wonder?” He glanced at the entrance of the lot before looking back at her.

She quickly looked away, but even in the light from the convenience store window, he could see the blush spreading across her face.

Beautiful, he thought. Too beautiful for comfort. Too soft and too vulnerable. And he was clearly too aroused to be thinking straight.

He lowered the driver’s window to let in some fresh air.

“I guess we put on enough of a show for our friend to send him on his way.”

She turned around and stared at the empty curb.

“Why did you call me?”

His gruff tone snapped her head around. “I...I’m sorry! I shouldn’t have.”

“I’m not asking you what you should or should not have done. I asked why you called me.”

Those incredible eyes were again tearing up, but Owen fought off the urge to pull her to him. She was messing with his head.

“There was no one else I could think of. No one that they wouldn’t know about.”

“They? Who are ‘they’ exactly?”

Two bruisers dressed in jeans and work boots came out of the store carrying coffees and got into the pickup truck. She watched them back out and threw another nervous glance at the empty street.

“I’ve told you. The police! And a heavyset man who tried to gas me in Judge Arnold’s house. They must be the ones who killed my friend the day I went away.”

“Killed what friend?”

“My friend who was house-sitting for me. They must have killed her by mistake, trying to murder me to frame the judge.”

Owen looked at her doubtfully.

“Well, I can’t think of anything else. Judge Arnold has always been after the Newport Police for different things…excessive use of force…failure to follow established procedures.” She shrugged and shook her head. “That’s all I can think of. This must have been a setup.”

“But I found you in Wickford. That’s a different township.”

“I know, but they could have been Newport police. Between the night and the rain and their flashlights, I couldn’t tell the difference.”

He shook his head. “Think about it for a minute. Even if it were some group of rogue cops setting all this up, do you really believe they could…or would…hire a thug to gas you at that mansion within an hour of trying to bump you off on the road? A bit of a stretch, don’t you think?”

She leaned back against the head rest and looked at him with weariness in her eyes. “I know none of this makes sense. But I didn’t imagine those attacks. Someone is trying to kill me. You saw it in the papers. But they killed an innocent woman in my apartment and…and got rid of her body.” She closed her eyes and he saw another tear trail out of the corners. “She was my friend.”

She was a mess. A beautiful, rumpled mess. And she was upset. But Sarah Rand didn’t look like someone out of her mind. Neurotics, psychotics...he’d run into a lot of them in his business. But she wasn’t one of them, from what he could tell.

He picked up the passport she’d shoved in his hand before. Turning on the overhead light, he leafed through the pages, glancing from the picture of a sophisticated professional woman to the real woman across from him. The one made of flesh and blood. The one with the soft mouth and the heat just beneath the surface. There was no mistaking that they were one and the same.

Owen leafed through the passport some more, checking the stamped departure and arrival dates. The ticket stubs matched the dates on the passport.

“Tell me everything.”

“My friend Tori arrived from California the morning of August 2nd. That same evening I left for Ireland.” She rubbed her forehead. “No one knew I was going away. The whole thing was a last minute family emergency. But I also hadn’t told anyone that Tori was coming to visit me, either.”

A slew of questions ran through Owen’s mind, but he decided to wait.

“When I arrived at the airport, I tried to call her. She’d left a message for me. I know why, now. She’d left her wallet in my car. There was no answer. No answering machine, either, which was strange. I tried to call her again from Shannon when I got to Ireland. Same thing yesterday, from JFK. No answer.”

“Didn’t that worry you a little?”

“Not really. I’ve known her for too many years.”

She clutched the briefcase tighter to her chest. “But last night, after I read what had happened in the papers, the blood in my apartment…the matching traces of it on the judge’s boat…I tried to call her again.” She stabbed at another tear. “That was when I realized that she must have been killed, instead of me.”

He closed the passport. “What do you think you’re going to accomplish by not going to the police?”

“I will go to them. Not local police, or the state police. Someone at the federal level. But first, before I do that, I have to sort out a few things.” Her eyes met his. In the light of the car he could see them now. They were dark green, almost the color of jade. “I have to figure why these people want me dead. Also, I have to figure what the connection is between all of these attempts on my life and the framing of Judge Arnold.”

“And you think you’ll be able to figure all that out in a few hours on your own?”

“I’m so tired now, I don’t know if I can think clearly at all. But I have to try, Mr. Dean. I can’t just go to the FBI and tell them, ‘Here I am! I’m alive.’”

“Why not? That would free your Judge Arnold.”

“True. But it doesn’t get us any closer to the reason behind the attacks. They’re still out there. We don’t know who they are. What’s going to stop them from making another attempt on my life, or hurting somebody else?”

“Police protection.”

She shook her head. “I would have been killed if I had trusted those two officers earlier.”

“If your friend really was killed, then you’re withholding evidence and obstructing an ongoing police investigation.”

“And what if the FBI doesn’t believe me? What if they turn me over to the very men who tried to kill me while they check out my story?” She shook her head again. “No, I can’t risk that.”

“‘I can’t risk’? You use that word pretty loosely, it seems to me.”

She pulled the belt of the raincoat around her and knotted it, reaching for the door handle. “I apologize again for dragging you into this. As far as I’m concerned, we’ve never met.”

His hand shot out and took hold of her elbow. “And where are you planning on going right now?”

Uncertainty etched the features of her frowning face. “My own apartment is out of the question since these people know where I live. They probably know who my friends are, too. I can check into a Bed & Breakfast, I suppose, or a motel.”

“Ms. Rand, your face has been on the front page of every local newspaper for the past two weeks.”

“But for what I need to do, I have to be in Newport. There are files in our law offices downtown that I can check. The last few cases I worked on. Judge Arnold’s appointment files and books, if the police don’t have them.”

“Why is that important?”

“Now that I think of it, there was something the matter with him. I noticed it before I left. He wouldn’t explain, either. I can’t put my finger on it, but the answer must be here. Something, maybe a case that involved both of us. I have to stay in Newport.” She glanced down at the hand on her elbow. “But none of this needs to be your concern. Thank you for the ride.”

Damn, the woman knew how to reel him in. “How much time?”

“You shouldn’t involve yourself any more than you have. An innocent person is already dead.”

“How much time?”

The green eyes showed a flicker of hope. “One day. Just enough time to gather some information to take to the FBI.”

One day. He could do that. He stared ahead at the lights of the convenience store, knowing in his gut that he was lying to himself.

“Christ,” he said, starting the car.

 

~~~~

 

They had nothing on him. Absolutely nothing.

Frankie O’Neal felt the relief flood through his aching body. Trying to keep his hand from shaking, he stretched it out toward the pack of cigarettes still sitting on the table. He took one out and stuck it between his lips, and every remnant of nervousness drained away. As Archer reached over and held a match for him, he could see the gloat hovering in the cop’s washed-out eyes. The asshole would break out in a tap dance in a minute.

Frankie took a couple of deep drags and mulled the whole thing over. His head, where the bitch had bopped him, still hurt like a motherfucker. She’d pay for that. He was going to drag her out to that warehouse in Portsmouth and she was going to fucking pay...in spades. He closed his eyes and rolled his head to one side and then to the other, stretching his thick neck muscles.

But that was for another day. Right now, finding out this asshole had nothing on him was making Frankie feel better by the minute.

“You’re one smart man, Frankie. You should have applied to the Police Academy when you were younger. We sure could use stand-up guys like you. Stand-up guys with brains, I mean.”

The asshole was actually pretty funny, Frankie thought, taking another deep drag. Too bad it was so late. He had no patience left for dicking around. He blew smoke above Archer’s balding head and looked at the uniformed toad sitting at the other end of the table working the tape recorder.

Archer flicked ashes into his paper cup. “Why don’t you start from the beginning, buddy.”

Frankie took one last drag and looked his opponent straight in the eye. “I’ll make you a deal, Captain. I answer all the questions you asked, if you’ll let me call my lawyer right now. I want him here when we’re done talking.”

“Frankie, I don’t think you are in the position to make deals.”

He crushed the cigarette on the edge of steel table and threw the butt on the floor. “Then I guess I’ll just sit back and catch some shut-eye.”

Brushing some ash off the front of his fitted black shirt, Frankie sucked in his stomach at the sight of the buttons pulling across his middle. Jake was right. He should take better care of himself.

“Come on, Frankie. You aren’t going to pull this shit now? I thought we were ready to talk. Man to man.” Archer glanced at the tape recorder. “You said you didn’t want a lawyer. Listen, if you’re trying to pull a fast one on me...”

“I wouldn’t dream of it, Captain.” Frankie gave an innocent shake of his head, winced a little, and made a cross over his heart. “On the grave of my mother.”

The scrape of Archer’s chair almost brought a smile to Frankie’s lips. Archer reached back impatiently and banged the phone on the table in front of Frankie.

Otto Wessel was no stranger to getting calls from his clients at three twenty-five in the morning. Knowing Archer’s eagle eyes were glued to his mouth, Frankie spelled out the basics, told Otto to get down to the station, and hung up on him before the lawyer got too chatty.

Archer was back in his face as soon as the receiver hit the cradle. “From the beginning, Frankie.”

He touched the lump on the back of his scalp. “Refresh my memory.”

“Come on, quit screwing around. Start with that key you had in your possession.”

“Oh, yeah. The key. I remember now. The thing that fucks your ‘breaking and entering’ charge. You were wondering how I had a key to the Van Horn mansion.” Noting with satisfaction the detective’s stony silence, Frankie continued. “The key was sent to me by Judge Arnold’s office. I’ve had it for over a month.”

Archer’s eyes were about as lively as a dead flounder’s. The rest of him didn’t look much healthier, either, sitting there. He’d suddenly developed a funny twitch in his fingers.

“Yeah, you see, Captain, I’m in the business these days...antiquing.”

“Antiquing?” Archer spat out.

“Just a little something to do with my free time. On the side, you know? With the judge’s wife dead, the furniture in the mansion had to be appraised.”

“You...Frankie O’Neal...an antique dealer?” The look of disgust on Archer’s face was truly comical.

Frankie shrugged. His head was really pounding, but he didn’t care. He was rolling now. “Don’t you think antiquing is a respectable job, Captain?”

“Okay, Mister Antique Dealer…appraiser…whatever the hell you are. So you decide to pay a house call at midnight?”

“What’s the difference? The place is empty all the time, now that the judge is locked up for snuffing that babe, the one the whole family was banging.” Frankie thought for a moment about the banging he was going to give her. He frowned. “How did I know some fucking teenager, or whoever it was, was going to clock me when I decided to make myself a cup of tea.”

“A cup of tea?”

“I’m trying to cut back on coffee.”

Archer came to his feet, and Frankie threw his weight on the back of the chair.

“They told me that antique dealers always drink tea.”

“Why all that cockamamie bullshit before?” the detective snapped back at him.

Frankie started to touch the lump on his head again, but decided against it. He folded his fingers over his belly. “You mean about the Cliff Walk? Well, I think I was still a tad hazy after the...after the severe blow to the head. That tape still running, toad boy?”

The young uniformed policeman looked up at him blankly, and then glanced at Archer.

“The truth is,” Frankie paused. “Well, you know all the talk about the old lady’s will. Now with the judge in stir and all that talk about him being guilty of God knows what, I didn’t wanna waltz in there in broad daylight. It’d make it look like...well, you know...I don’t want nobody tagging the guy with more stuff than he’s dealing with already.” He shrugged. “I was just looking after my client’s interests. That’s all.”

Archer didn’t look anywhere near convinced, but Frankie didn’t care. It was a good story, and he could make it work once he got in touch with his contact.

The detective rubbed his hands over his face and then poured himself yet another cup of coffee. Frankie watched him.

“And what fairy tale are you gonna hand me about the gun and the blood in the car?”

“Come on, Captain. You think I don’t know what guns I have permits for, and what guns I don’t?” He grinned. “Not that I have any guns that I don’t have permits for.”

“We’re running a ballistics check on that gun right now, Frankie. We’re going to get a match on the bullets we found in the Rand apartment. Then I’m going to run a DNA check on that blood, and after that I’m going to mount your fat head on my wall!”

Frankie looked up at a cobweb in the corner of the ceiling above the door. He dropped his gaze to the scratched metal tabletop. He let his eyes wander back up the pale green cinder block to the cobweb again. Then he turned his eyes on the detective’s ashen face.

“Fish.”

Archer’s eyes turned murderous. The cup of steaming coffee hung forgotten halfway to his lips.

Frankie rocked back on two legs of the chair. “Yeah, fish. Me and a buddy of mine were out in his boat off King’s Point and this big motherfucker of a fish tried jumping into that boat. I’m telling you, Archer, it was either a Great White shark or toad boy’s grandmother.”

He nodded at the policeman sitting at the far end. The cop’s knuckles were white on the edge of the table.

“Why, we had to shoot that sucker at least once or twice to discourage the son of a bitch. And good thing you told me about my trunk, Detective, because if there’s a drop of blood in there, then it probably came from that fucking bait bucket. I can’t believe I missed it when I was cleaning it last week.”

“And you think I’m going to swallow that shit?”

You can choke on it as far as I care, Frankie thought, leaning forward and straightening the creases in his pants as he rose to his feet.

“Swallow anything you want, Archer,” he said nonchalantly. “But I’ve answered your questions, and I’ll be waiting downstairs until my lawyer gets here.”

“Frankie...”

“Fish,” Frankie whispered, brushing past the detective and heading toward the door.

Once this lump on his head got better, he thought, maybe he’d really give the fucking sport a try.