Paige frowned, thinking hard. Were the killings linked after all to the mysterious business deal the billionaire targets had been approached with, or was it something else entirely?
She could see why Mimi Ando might want to kill Tom Rowe. He definitely had that effect on a girl. But why the others? Why Jeremy Smythe, and why Mimi’s own husband?
One thing was for certain. If Paige was interpreting what she’d heard correctly, the threat level to Tom was about to go sky-high. Instead of a single would-be killer, an entire team of them was about to go after him.
Think, Paige. Do the analysis the way you were taught. Okay. Mimi had just told someone to finish the job immediately and to hire as many people as needed to get it done. Where was someone on this isolated and super secure little island going to scrape up several assassins on short notice? And how would the hit squad lay their hands on weapons? At the moment, security on Beau Mer was ridiculous. The only way she’d gotten a sidearm onto the island was by someone at a much higher pay grade than hers—like White House level—okaying use of the American diplomatic pouch to smuggle one to her. The only people on the island with guns were conference security personnel and the police….
Her train of thought froze in its tracks.
Surely not. The police?
Why not? The conference security team had been compromised, and as soon as the local police got involved in Takashi Ando’s death, all sorts of rumors had started, which could only mean the police had a leak. A corrupt leak. Someone willing to trade information for cash, most likely. In her experience as a journalist, she’d found that where there was petty corruption, there was almost always major corruption.
Okay. So, assuming Mimi’s hit man would recruit help from within the island’s police force, that was going to be a pain in the rear for the Medusas to deal with. How were they supposed to tell apart the legitimate police who would protect Tom and the corrupt ones who would hide behind their uniforms while trying to kill him?
He had to leave the island. Leave the summit. Now. Before this new threat got organized and came after him.
She reached for the telephone beside the bed out of reflex, but then stopped. If some of the local police were corrupt, some of the hotel staff were likely corrupt, too. And they might very well be engaging in dodgy activities like phone tapping. She had to assume the phone lines on the island were not secure. Which meant she needed her cell phone back if she was to contact the Medusas and warn them of the looming threat.
She made a quick call down to the World News bureau and hung up frustrated. Where in the hell was Greer Carson? The other guys in the news bureau had no idea where he’d gone. Out for dinner somewhere on the island. Not helpful. She didn’t even know if he’d gone to a public place like a restaurant or whether he’d gone to a private dinner.
No help for it. She’d have to warn the Medusas in person…and see Tom again.
Cursing under her breath, she headed for the elevators and rode up to the top floor. She paused for a moment in front of Tom’s door, steeling her nerve. She could do this. Just go in, state her business and get out. Do her job, and nothing more. Heck, if she was lucky, he’d be in the bedroom and she wouldn’t have to see him at all before she delivered her warning and left.
She knocked upon the panel.
Gretchen opened the door. Paige frowned. That was weird. She’d have expected one of the Medusas on duty to have answered.
“Hi, Gretchen. I need to speak to my colleagues. May I come in?”
“You may come in, but they’re not here.”
Paige stepped inside quickly and closed the door behind her, alarm bells clanging wildly in her gut. She asked urgently, “Where are they?”
“I don’t know. Out somewhere trying to find you, I gather. Miss Aleesha tried to call you for hours, then Mr. Rowe said he knew where you were, and they all left.”
“How many of the others were with him?”
“All of them, Miss Ellis.”
Not good. Her teammates should be well into an established rotation of rest and bodyguard duty already. But if Mamba had the whole team around Tom, she obviously believed something was very wrong.
Paige asked Tom’s assistant, “Did they give you any indication where they might be going? Any hint? Did they say anything?”
“I’m sorry, ma’am. They just picked up their backpacks and charged out of here.”
That was good news at least. It meant her teammates had ample weapons and ammunition with them, in addition to a wide array of nifty tools of the trade. It also meant they must have left the hotel. Which meant—
Her cottage.
“Thanks, Gretchen. You’ve been a great help. If any of them happen to contact you in the next few minutes, tell them I’m where Tom and I took cover last night.”
“Where you…”
Paige raced out of the suite before Gretchen could finish her sentence and headed for her car. Aleesha was worried about something, and Paige trusted her colleague’s instincts completely. Heck, her own instincts were shouting that trouble was coming. Soon. Very soon.
Tom searched the cottage himself, even after the Medusas had finished sweeping the place. He’d been so sure she’d be here! Where was she, dammit? Worry pecked at the back of his eyeballs, too insistent to ignore. It was shocking to realize that no matter how mad he was at her stunt with the news report, he still cared about her. How could that be? She was a reporter for God’s sake. A mouthy, pushy female who in no way needed him. Although maybe, at the end of the day, that was the draw of her. She was more his equal than just about any woman he’d met in a very long time.
“Believe me now, boyo?” Aleesha asked as he emerged from Paige’s bedroom.
He shrugged. “Yeah, I guess so. But she was here not too long ago.”
Aleesha’s eyebrows sailed up. “How do you figure that?”
“Her bathroom smells like her. The scent would have faded if the last time she was in there was early this morning.”
One of the other women piped up, “And you know she was in there early this morning how?”
Aleesha intervened smoothly. “That’s a good point. Would you recognize if any of her clothes were missing?”
“Not hardly. About all I can tell you about her wardrobe is she wears far too many mannish, ugly slacks and shirts.”
Several of the Medusas looked back and forth between him and Aleesha, comprehension dawning on their faces. Nope, not slow on the uptake these snake ladies. They’d all figured out how he had personal knowledge of Paige’s morning activities.
“Are her running shoes here?” he asked.
Aleesha gestured to one of the women to check it out.
In a moment the tall blond one came back. “No running shoes,” she announced.
“Which direction would she run from here?” Aleesha asked.
He shrugged. “Either way from here, there are a couple of miles of hard-packed sand. It’s a little more isolated to the north, and that direction would be my guess. She strikes me as the type to prefer solitude for her runs.”
Aleesha looked at the others. “Would you agree with that?”
Nods all around from Paige’s teammates.
“Go have a look down the beach, Casey.”
The woman nodded briskly at Aleesha’s order and left via the kitchen door. Tom resisted an urge to pace and instead sat down on the sofa and commenced trying to relax the tension across the back of his neck and shoulders. The exercise was a complete failure.
Casey couldn’t have been outside more than three minutes before Tom jumped at the shadow suddenly standing in the living room doorway. The former FBI agent murmured, “No sign of Paige. But we have a bigger problem. Someone’s hiding in the jungle on the south side of the cottage.”
Everyone’s gazes snapped to the windows, but nobody made any other sudden move. Good self-discipline these women had. Dusk was falling outside, which meant they’d be brightly lit in here to anyone looking in. Fish in a barrel.
“Casey, slide into the kitchen and turn out the light. Alex, give it a few minutes after that and then turn out the lamp beside you. Cho, a few seconds after that, kill the bedroom lights. It’s too early for anyone to believe the occupant of this place is going to bed for the night, but let’s not make it blindingly obvious that we’ve spotted whoever’s out there by slamming off all the lights at once, eh?”
Logical. Without Aleesha having to tell him, Tom slid off the sofa to sit on the floor in front of it. Any sniper who wanted to see him now would have to climb a tree right next to the house and look down into the room. And even then it would be a tricky shot.
The cottage gradually went dark around him.
Aleesha gave quiet instructions deploying the Medusas to cover each of the doors and windows, and shadows glided past him, ghostlike, as the women moved into position.
“What can I do?” he asked in a low voice.
“Lie down and take a nap,” Aleesha replied, distracted.
“I’m serious,” he insisted. “There has to be something I can do to help.”
Her featureless face turned his way. “There is. Stay out of our way and do what we tell you to without questions.”
“Thanks, but I know the drill,” he muttered.
“Yeah, but not from the protectee’s end of things, you don’t,” Aleesha retorted. “Don’t you go all commando on me and try to be a hero, got it? You’re the important guy we’re here to keep alive. You keep your head down and don’t pull any cute stunts.”
He huffed, not at all pleased with this state of affairs. But what choice did he have? Aleesha was right. He was little better than a sack of potatoes to them. An object. Something to be kept safe from all harm. Nevermind he happened to be a living, breathing sack of potatoes.
“I’ve got movement,” Casey murmured from the front window. “I count at least three targets, arrayed at fifty-foot intervals. They’re either cops or killers working as a team.”
Great. Just what he needed. A whole team of assassins come to get him.
“My experience with the local police hasn’t been stellar,” he murmured. “My money’s on those guys out there being hostiles.”
“Duly noted,” Aleesha replied. “But let the record show we’ll be treating everyone and everything that moves out there as hostile until proven otherwise.”
“Ooh-rah,” one of the women murmured from the bedroom.
Aleesha added wryly, “No shooting until I green-light you, Monica.”
That was the tall blonde. Bloodthirsty type, was she? Who’d have guessed? Beautiful and lethal—these Medusas were something else.
And then Cho murmured from the window beside the front door, “I’ve got one guy well back in the trees, and he’s pointing a weapon at the house.”
Well, then. That answered the question of friendlies or hostiles.
“Look sharp, ladies,” Aleesha bit out. “I want the best head count you can give me.”
Cho added grimly, “Another guy just moved. He’s carrying a high-powered rifle. Telescopic sight. Doesn’t look infrared.”
That was good news, at least. It meant the sniper probably couldn’t see—and shoot—their heat images right through the cottage’s walls.
“Don’t assume everyone’s identically armed,” Aleesha warned.
He winced. Great. Maybe someone else could see through the walls and pick him off like a bug on the sidewalk. Aleesha scooted over to sit close beside him. “Nothing personal,” she murmured. “Just want to confuse the signatures if they’re peeking through the walls.”
He nodded grimly. “I sure as hell hope Paige doesn’t decide to come home right now.”
Paige glanced at her front door, then looked back at the sniper fixated on the closed portal. At least all the lights were out. If she was lucky, Tom and the Medusas had come and gone already in their hunt for her. But her gut said she hadn’t been that fortunate. The sniper was on full alert, his attention riveted on the house. He certainly was convinced someone was in there. And she was inclined to believe him.
At a snail’s pace, she crawled on her belly to her left toward the south side of the cottage. The underbrush came closest to the building on that side and offered the best close-in cover for anyone wanting to approach the place unseen.
Moving this slow was a trial to her taut nerves, but she corralled them as she’d been taught and eased through the shadows at one with the night. As her eyes continued to adjust to the darkness, she made out more details around her…and spotted another shooter. And another. And then she saw something that made her blood run cold. A fourth shooter wearing a police uniform. Her heart dropped to her feet. She’d been right. And if the Medusas called for any local help, they’d be completely unable to tell the good cops from the bad cops.
Mimi’s hit man had successfully augmented his hit squad and isolated the Medusas.
Which meant Tom and the Medusas were out of options and trapped squarely in the center of the kill zone.