Then You Hide (21 page)

“But you got on the same ship a month later.”

She dropped her head against the window and let out a sigh. “He’s never lied to me before.”

“Desperation changes people, Vanessa,” he said quietly. “I’ve seen it firsthand.”

“I guess I’m about to, because I’m starting to feel very desperate. Can you go any faster?”

“And not go flying off a cliff or roll over one of the huge branches I’ve been swerving around? No.” But he did kick it up a little. There was no road across the middle of Nevis, so they had to drive half the perimeter of the island to get from east to west. The rain had slowed to a steady sprinkle, and traffic was light except in the tiny towns that popped up and disappeared just as quickly. And of course, there was the occasional goat.

They arrived at the road that led to Mango Plantation in less than half an hour. Just before he turned the corner to the orchards, she reached over and put her hand on his arm.

“I owe you big, Billy Wade.”

He slid her a look. “You don’t owe me anything but a trip to South Carolina.”

“I know. I know what we agreed on, and—”

“You’re going to reneg.”

Her heart swelled at the tone of resignation and expectation. “No, I’m not,” she said, meaning it with every fiber of her being. “I’ll go. I just meant I owe you on…a personal level.”

He winked at her. “I’ll collect. Don’t worry.”

He pulled into a grassy area at the edge of the property, next to the Mercedes that had been parked there when they left the night before.

Relief shot through her.

“Thank God,” she said, throwing the door open and getting out. “Vex is—”

The wind gusted so hard she almost tumbled back as a sudden rhythmic pulsing shook the air. A helicopter lifted from the sand, hovering as high as the house, then soaring up, the rotors drowning out Vanessa’s shout.

“Was that the one you saw before?” Wade hollered, pulling her toward the boardwalk that led to the house. “Was it a Bell?”

“I have no idea,” she said, squinting up at the mighty bird. “It was a mile away, and I don’t know one helicopter from another. This looks bigger, but I just don’t know.”

Disappointment and frustration kicked her as hard as the wind from the rotor blades. Had she just missed Clive again?

“Come on,” Wade said, jogging down the wooden path to the house.

He slowed his step as they got deeper onto the property, holding her back while he pulled out his gun.

She knew better than to question that. At least two people had been murdered, and the owner of this house was armed. She let him lead the way as the last wallop of the helicopter disappeared, leaving only the soft rush of rain.

“Mr. Vex!” he called as they neared the side of the house. “Nicholas Vex!”

“Nicholas!” Vanessa yelled. “It’s Vanessa Porter.”

They made their way to the front of the house, where all of the shuttered doors were wide open, pools of water forming where the rain had blown into the house. The main room was empty, and Vanessa waited while Wade checked the bedroom and the bathroom.

“No one’s here,” he called to her.

“But his car’s up there.”

“He’s definitely not in this house.”

“Is my phone in the bathroom?”

He stepped out of the bedroom, reholstering the gun. “I didn’t see it.”

“Damn,” she murmured, turning around to check the counters and tabletops for her phone. “Where the hell is he? His car is here, and he wouldn’t go off on a helicopter ride and leave the house wide open in the pouring rain, would he?” She reached out her hand. “Can I borrow your phone? I’m going to call mine and see if I hear it ring.”

He handed her the phone, and she dialed, praying for the digital jingle she’d so rarely heard since she got to the Caribbean. The ring sang in her ear, but the house was silent. She went out to the patio, listening for it. Maybe he’d thrown it out last night with the rest of their belongings, and it had landed on the grass. Of course, it would be drowned by now.

She stepped off the boardwalk, looking on the ground as she heard the click of her phone going into voice mail. Swearing softly, she touched the three button, just to hear the number of irate messages from clients she had.

Wade passed her, his eyes locked on the misty beach as he walked toward the steps.

You have twenty-six messages
.

Oh, great.

Out of habit and some perverse need to hear bad news, she pressed number one, watching Wade disappear down the first steps of the beach stairs.

“Vanessa, please call me, please.” She instantly recognized Clive’s mother’s thick Long Island accent. “It’s an emergency. The police were just here. The phone won’t stop ringing. They want Clive.” She sobbed, out of control. “Please call me. Tell me if you found him. Please.” Her voice cracked. “They think he killed that girl from your company.”

She dropped her hand, and the phone hit her thigh with a thud as she stared straight ahead, stunned.

“Vanessa.”

Wade’s voice floated up from the bottom of the stairs, but she didn’t move. Was this possible? Was this happening?

Could she be so wrong about a man she considered her close friend?

“Vanessa.” He was more insistent. “Come here.”

She moved like a zombie to the top of the stairs, pain and disbelief twisting her insides. “What?” she croaked.

“I found Vex.”

She looked past him to the bottom of the stairs, where Nicholas Vex’s dead body lay in a heap.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

FOR THE FIRST
time in the twenty years since Saul Feldstein had died and left her enough money to travel anywhere she wanted, Stella skipped breakfast on a cruise. Since that evil man had pushed her out of his way and run from her cabin the night before, she’d done nothing but curl in a ball on the bed and quiver.

A hundred times she had the phone in her hand, ready to call security to report the assault. And a hundred times the fine hairs on her neck rose in a warning not to do that. Saul had called it Stella’s Sixth Sense, and she never,
ever
ignored it.

So she did nothing until the sun rose over morning-blue water outside the cabin window, and the sounds of the crew preparing to dock at St. Barts filled the ship. Then she forced herself to get up and pack what she’d brought into Vanessa’s cabin, waiting until the last possible moment to go back to her original room. What if he was out there, ready to pounce again?

She opened the doors of the tiny closet and looked at the few pieces of clothing that Vanessa hadn’t taken with her. There was more in the drawers and some stuff in the bathroom. The cruise company would probably empty the room, but who knows what would happen to Vanessa’s belongings?

She found Vanessa’s suitcase, flipped it open on the bed, and started throwing things in. When she stuffed some underwear into the zipper compartment, she felt a magazine and pulled it out, curious about what Vanessa had been reading.

But it wasn’t a magazine. It was a glossy business brochure, the cover sleek and pale, shiny gold with black raised letters.
Razor Partners LLC. Alternative Asset Management.

Whatever the heck that financial babble meant. Saul had kept their money in the bank, and it did just fine, thank you very much. She flipped a few pages, skimming phrases like “mezzanine funds” and “restructuring advisory partners.” The last section was called “Your Partners,” with a picture of a silver-haired fox, the man the company was named after.

She flipped the page to see the other photos and bios, skimming to the P’s to find Vanessa.

There she was, with her long blond hair and her square black glasses. So pretty and sharp-boned, with her wide smile and fine nose. Stella had loved her instantly and sensed a kindred spirit of strength in the girl who couldn’t return a hug. As she started to close the book, her gaze fell on a photo on another page.

Clive Easterbrook?

It wasn’t possible. That was Jason! That was the man she’d danced with, who’d run away when she called him last night. The man someone wanted badly enough to threaten Stella with a gun.

Her instinct had been right last night: he
had
been looking for Vanessa. No wonder she’d bumped into him outside Vanessa’s cabin. But if he was looking for her…then Vanessa certainly hadn’t found
him
.

She had to be on the dock.
Had
to be. She’d promised. Stella yanked the last few items from hangers, dumped out the drawer, and swiped the items on the bathroom counter into the bag. She zipped it up, did a quick check of the room, grabbed both bags, and flung open the door.

The coast was clear.

Downstairs at her less expensive cabin, she finished packing her stuff, left another voice-mail message on Vanessa’s cell phone, stuffed her unwashed hair into her sun hat, and headed out to the tender embarkation deck. Every face looked familiar and friendly; she’d spent every waking moment making friends. But Jason—Clive—wasn’t there.

How had he gotten onboard? The crew would have to have known him. Of course, he’d been on this cruise before, and maybe they’d let him slip on at one of the ports.

She boarded the next tender boat, made small talk with the other passengers, and scrutinized the decks for his face.

After docking, she accepted help off the little boat, gathered her bags and Vanessa’s, and stood on the wide wooden planks at the mouth of Gustavia harbor, squinting into the sunshine bouncing off the quaint pink and peach buildings that sloped all the way to the top of a mountain.

She rolled the suitcases along the dock, scanning the crowds. With two big commercial cruise ships just emptying for an excursion, plus the arrival of the
Valhalla,
the town was jam-packed with tourists.

But no tall blonde with horn-rimmed glasses. And no skinny, thin-haired charmer.

Sighing, she pulled out her cell phone and punched in Vanessa’s number. In the midst of all the dock’s commotion, she heard the digital melody play “Some Enchanted Evening.”

Vanessa was here! Pressing the phone to her ear, Stella started to turn, looking for her. Vanessa had programmed that song into her phone as Stella’s private ring tone the night they’d met, because it was Stella’s favorite—

“Yes?”

Stella was startled at the man’s voice in her ear.

Without thinking, she slammed the phone shut. It must have been a mistake. She must have dialed wrong and imagined the song played.

Taking a deep breath, she dialed again…and heard the same notes. She spun toward the sound, squinting into the crowd, praying she’d see Vanessa answering her phone. But only a broad-shouldered man in a baseball cap happened to open a cell phone at that moment.

“Yes?”

The same voice.

Did that man have Vanessa’s phone? Stella peeked around people to get a better look at him, but his back was to her.

“Who is this?” he demanded.

Who was
this
? She kept her mouth closed and waited as he turned to the side. Was he looking for Vanessa, too? He snapped the phone shut, and Stella’s clicked with the sound of a dropped call.

She watched as the man turned, looking for someone.

Was he with Vanessa and maybe got separated from her?

She knew one thing: it wasn’t Clive. And it wasn’t that eleven who’d asked about Vanessa when they were docked in St. Kitts, the one with the Caribbean blue eyes and that Southern accent that could make a girl go
meshuga
. No, this guy had a thicker neck and meatier shoulders.

And more important, he had Vanessa’s phone.

For a big guy, he slithered pretty well through the crowd, making it hard for Stella to keep up with him, lugging her suitcases. But she did, moving like a magnet to his iron, determined to find out what was going on. Maybe he could lead her to Vanessa.

He stepped into a shaded area near some street vendors, slightly away from the crowd. Stella followed, sliding her hat off. She didn’t want him to notice her until she knew what the heck he was doing with Vanessa’s phone.

She tried to maneuver herself to see his face, but his cap was pulled low, and he wore sunglasses, and he was deep into the shade. He propped one foot on a wooden bench, pulled out a phone, and dialed.

It wasn’t Vanessa’s phone. His flipped open; her little phone didn’t.

Emboldened, Stella dragged her bags to the other side of the bench and sat down, earning a disinterested glance which she didn’t dare return. She fanned herself with her hat and acted like the overheated grandmother she was.

He turned away to speak, but she caught the first words. “She’s not here.”

So, he was looking for Vanessa, too! Stella forced herself not to react but slowly leaned a little to the left to listen.

“Look, we have to stop this cat-and-mouse game right now. She could blow everything for us. Make him an offer, a million for each of them. Test the bastard to see what makes him roll—love or money. My guess is, he’ll give up on love and take the offer; then he’ll bring them both to my doorstep. Until we have her, and him, we’re not in the clear.”

Her and him? Vanessa? It had to be. He had her phone, didn’t he?

Slyly, she slipped her phone from her pocket and carefully thumbed Vanessa’s number.

“Some Enchanted Evening” immediately beeped from the man two feet away. He yanked out Vanessa’s phone and shut it off. Then he walked to a trash can, dropped it in, and started toward the cab stand at the end of the dock.

Meddling was a bad habit, but Stella was too old to stop now. She ignored Saul’s loud voice in her head, ignored the hairs on the back of her neck, and followed him. On her way, she grabbed Vanessa’s phone out of the trash can and tucked it into her bag.

Vanessa sat across from Wade at a white-linen-covered table for two, so high above the water they had to take a tram up the side of a cliff to reach the restaurant. Soft music floated on a sea breeze, stars flickered in a black-velvet sky, a half-moon hung over the Caribbean Sea, and the most gorgeous, attentive man sat across from her, offering bites of lobster that melted in her mouth.

“Pretty romantic evening, considering the day we just had,” she said, passing on the next bite. “If I hadn’t spent ten hours being interrogated by the police, identifying a client’s body before it was whisked off to a morgue, and still trying to figure out where Clive is, I might think this was one heck of a nice date.”

“There was a compliment in that mile-long sentence.” Wade smiled.

“And not a dirty word in the whole thing.” She tilted her head. “See? I can clean up my act, Billy Wade. When’re you coming to New York next?”

“If I take the job with the Bullet Catchers, I’ll be there all the time. I could, for all intents and purposes, live there.”

She tried to squash the little thrill that zinged through her. If he joined the company that had the unappealing name of the Bullet Catchers, he’d still be a man who carried a gun. But at least his job would be protecting people, not the opposite.

“Think you’ll take that job?”

“I don’t know yet. The contract is binding. You don’t just walk away from being a Bullet Catcher.”

“Why not?”

“Because it’s like a family. And Lucy treats her family well. No one wants to leave, so they don’t unless they’re fired…or die.”

She made a face at the last word. “Razor is like that. Marcus makes it so lucrative and comfortable no one ever wants to leave.”

“Unless they’re fired or die.”

She closed her eyes, and took a sizable sip of Grey Goose.

“You know,” she said after a moment, “it’s a minor miracle we weren’t detained longer or put in jail ourselves, considering we found a man shot in the head, and you had a gun on you.”

“Not such a miracle. That detective was smart, and he knew he was lucky to have us on the investigation. And if we hadn’t seen that helicopter, I’d be inclined to agree with the police’s initial take that Vex killed himself. Ballistics will probably confirm that the Glock next to him fired the shot, and the man
did
just lose more than a billion dollars in two days.”

“Not to mention that his company is manufacturing a product linked to cancer,” she added. “His reputation was about to go into the toilet, and the class-action lawsuits alone will shut down Vexell Industries.”

“All pretty strong motivators for suicide.”

“Except that Clive’s prescription and my cell phone weren’t in the house. And we saw the helicopter.”

“There’s no proof that the person in the helicopter killed Vex,” Wade replied. “Heck, Vex could have taken the Zoloft before he shot himself and thrown the bottle into the sea. And your phone could be anywhere. Those guys were competent, even though they probably don’t handle many cases like this. We gave them a lot of information and helped our own cause by being perfectly frank about Clive and the house we’d been to in the rain forest and giving them the note. They probably have Gideon Bones in custody over in St. Kitts right now.”

“Then where did Clive go? Where could he go to ‘make things worse’?”

Wade shrugged. “Maybe to kill Nicholas Vex. He could have been in that helicopter, Vanessa.”

She pushed her plate away, totally disinterested in the food. “Then who was trying to set him up as the murderer of Russell Winslow, and why? We heard that guy on the phone. They may have set Clive up to take the blame for Charlie’s death, too, and that’s why evidence is only coming out now. It’s all planted.”

He looked dubious. “I told you what Lucy said, and her connections deep inside the NYPD are excellent. Clive had an argument with Charlie French the day she died. Someone saw him running in the neighborhood, about sixty blocks from his home.”

She straightened her spine. “Not hard evidence of a crime.”

“And yet people…” His voice was rich with implication. “…have spent thirty years in jail on little more evidence than that.”

She lifted her glass. “Message received.”

“The plane’s in Nevis, Vanessa. We can leave tonight, or…” He put his hand on hers. “We can wait one more night and fly out to South Carolina tomorrow.”

She gave him a look that was no doubt as miserable as she felt. “You know, you didn’t meet your end of the bargain.” He opened his mouth to respond, and she held up a conciliatory hand. “But you did try your damnedest. Besides, if we
had
found Clive holed up somewhere, it’s not like he’d be sitting here drinking gimlets with us. He’d be under arrest and being extradited to New York.”

He curled his fingers into hers. “I’ve met Miranda Lang.”

“Have you.” Her voice was flat, belying the little tingle in her tummy.

“She’s a terrific lady,” he continued, as if she’d asked for more details. “Very smart. And she hadn’t even known she was adopted. Apparently, Adrien Fletcher had a time of it, trying to find her tattoo without telling her.”

Vanessa leaned forward. “What happened?”

“A little bit of everything, to hear Fletch tell the story. But you can ask her yourself tomorrow. She’ll be in South Carolina to meet you, and so will Fletch. They’re inseparable now.”

She said nothing, and Wade squeezed her hand. “Vanessa, I won’t force you or hold you to any bargain or make you do anything at all you don’t want to do. I care too much for you to do that.”

“Thanks.” She winked at him. “There was a compliment buried in there, too.”

“At least one. I’m on your side now. If you don’t want to go, for whatever reason—”

She held up her hand, stopping him. “There is a reason. Not ‘whatever’ reason, but it’s mine.”