Double Trouble (15 page)

PJ didn’t expect rescue
 
—probably didn’t deserve rescue for her stupidity. It just felt good to remind herself not to give up.

Please, God, please . . . I’m sorry I jump into things without thinking and get in over my head. I promise to think
 
—please help me think!

The car had turned onto gravel, from the grinding under the tires. PJ felt around the trunk, her hand connecting on a bag at her feet. A gym bag? She rummaged inside and found nothing but dry, wadded clothing, not even a tennis ball.

She’d just have to use her hammer fists.

The car came to a stop.

PJ braced herself, ready to lash out the second the trunk opened.

Only, it didn’t. The driver got out, slammed the door. Footsteps crunched on gravel . . . and faded away.

No, no,
no
 
—he was
not
leaving her here. “Come
back
!”

Nothing.

She kicked the trunk lid. “Coward!”

Then she put her hands over her eyes, gritted her teeth, and let the tears flow.

“PJ can take care of herself.”

No, she couldn’t! She couldn’t! Apparently, however, God wasn’t taking care of her either.

A cramp seized her calf and she flexed, massaging it away, slowing her breathing. Everything hurt. Was the air starting to thicken? She gulped in deep, pained breaths. Could someone suffocate in a trunk?

That was it. Next time Jeremy offered her an assignment, she wouldn’t wish for guts or glory. Only a quiet surveillance assignment from a safe distance.

Maybe,
surely
she could kick out the seat.

She spent a half hour attempting just that, wounding her hands, her knees, and drenching herself in furious tears.

“God, I’m sorry for thinking You abandoned me. Help! Please, send someone
 
—Boone, Jeremy
 
—
anyone
.”

She lay back, hands wrapped around her waist, just trying to breathe.

“Wait a second, PJ! I’ll get you out!”

She froze. Held her breath. Great, now she’d gone completely over the edge, her own paranoia starting to speak back at her.

Then she heard scraping, the grind of metal on metal. As if someone was trying to wrench open the trunk?

“Jeremy!”

“Calm down, Sugar. I’ll have you out of there
 
—” The trunk popped open.

PJ launched herself from the recesses of her smelly catacomb straight at Jeremy’s dark outline.

He didn’t even flinch. In fact, he dropped whatever implement he’d used to free her and held her tight, his arms locked around her even as he staggered away from the car. His breath rushed out fast and uneven. “I got you. I got you.
I got you!
”

She was shaking, she knew that, but she couldn’t speak.

He held her, his face in her neck. “Oh, thank You, God. Thank You.”

PJ had no words, just clung to him
 
—that sturdy, muscled, powerful, safe, rescuing Jeremy who had read her mind and
 
— “How did you find me?”

He still hadn’t released her and now met her eyes, his dark and furious. “Lee. He had the house staked out. Good thing he put out a BOLO for you and the car, or you would have . . .” He closed his eyes and touched his forehead to hers.

He was shaking a little too.

“You scared me,” he said softly. “
Really
scared me this time.” Then he swallowed and slowly drew away. Her feet found the ground. But she didn’t let go, and neither did he, his hands tight on her arms, holding her up.

“Lee?” she asked, her voice coming out parched.

“The FBI agent
 
—Dally’s contact. He was parked just beyond the alley when he saw you get nabbed. He didn’t see the assailant, only you being shoved into the trunk. By the time he got out of the neighborhood to follow, he’d lost you. But he got the plates. And a camera at the entrance caught you
pulling into the park. Lee called me the minute they got the address. Like a miracle, I was only a few miles away.”

Like a miracle. And no, she didn’t care that he’d had her tailed, despite her protests. For once, she was thrilled at Jeremy’s lack of confidence in her.

She pulled in another shaky breath. “He didn’t see who did it?”

“Sorry.”

A breeze lifted her hair from her neck. For the first time she realized she was standing in the middle of a gravel lot, the wind hissing in the dark trees, the sound of a river spitting in the darkness. “Where am I?”

“Taylors Falls.” Behind his voice she heard the whine of sirens. Jeremy pulled her close again, his arms locked around her shoulders. “This was a bad idea. A really bad idea. I’m not sure I’ve ever prayed so hard. I maybe have even bargained a little.”

PJ let him hold her, let herself sink into his embrace. And for a second she thought she felt his lips brush her hair.

Jeremy had come for her.

Like he . . . cared.

Only
 
—“Where have you been?” She tried to sound more angry,
was
more angry, but it came out exhausted. She’d have to try again. “I’ve been calling and calling.” She pushed away from him.

Even in the padding of darkness, she recognized his frown. “I haven’t gotten one call. I’ve had my phone with me the entire time. In fact, I was getting worried that I hadn’t heard from you.”

Worried that he . . . ?
She blinked at him. Held out her hand. “Lemme see it.”

He dug his cell phone out of his front pocket and slapped it into her hand. She opened it and scrolled to the recent calls. Two from L Simmons, and then, nothing.

Not one of her frantic calls.

She closed the phone. “218-555-1989?”

He took the phone from her. “218-555-8919.”

She took a breath, then cleared her throat. “Maybe I’ll write that down.”

Jeremy gave a short nod and pocketed the phone.

“Someone is after Dally,” she said after a moment.

A police cruiser came screaming into the lot. Headlights flashed across the car, illuminating the green paint, the battered exterior of a Chevy Impala.

“And,” PJ said, looking at the car, “I think I know who.”

PJ stood in Dally’s kitchen, her shoes crunching through a pile of sugar now attracting a brigade of ants, and stared at the destruction of Dally’s house. Sofa cushions upturned, pictures knocked over, books opened on the floor, pages crumpled . . . and, as she stepped over the piles and picked her way to Dally’s room, even her closet torn apart. The debris from her dresser was scattered across the floor
 
—picture frames, jewelry, with undergarments spilling from the open drawers.

Jeremy stood behind her, one hand on her shoulder
 
—it seemed impossible for him to not have a hand on her arm or her elbow, as if he might lose her or she might dematerialize into the night. She would admit to liking it, although she’d attribute that to her quickly fraying composure. His touch seemed to somehow hold her together.

Dropping her bag
 
—retrieved from the alley
 
—onto the
bedroom floor, she picked up a black leather skirt. “Dally’s going to kill me.”

“She won’t know.”

PJ snorted. “Look at this mess. Someone wanted me
 
—or Dally
 
—out of the way so they could toss the house. And what were they looking for? Did they find it? Don’t you think this deserves a serious, under-the-hot-lights interrogation? C’mon, Jeremy
 
—she’s not telling us everything. I know you and Lee didn’t believe her, but you have to now. Someone
is
after her, and I’m not sure it’s Billy Finch, no matter what Dally claims.” She narrowed her eyes at him. “The thing is, if we don’t find them, they won’t get Dally
 
—they’ll get me.”

He pursed his lips, something simmering in his eyes. “I won’t let anyone get you.”

She stared at him. “Uh, I don’t see how you’re supposed to protect me, hiding Dally wherever. Besides, this isn’t the first time someone’s broken in, Jeremy. The other night
 
—”

But the horror on his face cut her off. “Someone broke in the other night? Why didn’t you call me?”

She gave him a look of profound incredulity. “Seriously?”

“I’m calling Lee. We’re calling this entire thing off.”

PJ grabbed his wrist even as he dug into his pocket. Behind him, the morning sunlight had just begun to gild the wood floor of the living room, and in the shadow against it, Jeremy looked tired, lines forming around his mouth, his brown eyes weary, whiskers darkening his face.

“No. Don’t do that. I’ll stay at Connie’s until we change the locks and clean this place up. You can ask your buddy Lee to hang around outside. I’ll be extra careful.”

“But maybe your cover is already blown. This might be unnecessary
 
—”

“Or not. But if we give up now, we’ll never know who is after Dally, and maybe she
will
be frightened enough not to testify.”

Jeremy stared at his phone. Weighed it in his hand. “Billy Finch tied up the family of a drug dealer who crossed him and then lit their house on fire and let them burn alive. One of the victims was a five-year-old boy.”

PJ said nothing.

When he looked up at her, his eyes were reddened. Tired. “Dally told me that. And some other things. Finch needs to stay in jail.”

“And Dally needs to testify.”

He pocketed the cell phone, wrapped a hand around the back of his neck, and turned away from her. “But not at the expense of you getting hurt.”

She watched his shoulders, tense under his black shirt, rise and fall with his breathing, his worry.

“Talk to her, then. Get a list of who might want to hurt her. Besides Billy, that is.”

She expected a quick nod, an easy agreement. Instead, he sighed, long and hard. Which made her wonder exactly what made her request so difficult. Did he believe Dally over PJ? Or . . .

“How are you two getting along?”

She said it so quietly, it might have been just a thought, but he turned, a strange expression on his face. “Fine.”

“Any . . . excitement?” She wasn’t exactly sure what she meant by that, but she had to add, “Are you
distracting
her?”

A smile edged up his face. “It’s been . . . uneventful.”

Uneventful? “As in boring uneventful or peaceful uneventful?”

“Let’s just say that you add a little more life to any situation. And there are no donuts at the safe house. She’s a lot more distracted by what she thinks you might be doing to her clothing, her catcher’s position, and her chinchillas.”

“Who spit, by the way.”

He raised a dark eyebrow to match his smirk. “So, who is this Missy person? the one who owns the Impala?”

She’d named for Jeremy a sketchy list of suspects on the motorcycle ride back to Minneapolis, a ride that seemed to bathe her in comfort as she locked her arms around his solid waist. Occasionally he reached down and wrapped his hand around hers, squeezing. And once he’d touched his prickly cheek to hers, propped on his shoulder, whether by mistake or on purpose she didn’t know. At the time, she didn’t care.

Now, standing in the kitchen, seeing him radiate some sort of poorly disguised panic, yes, she wanted to know exactly what was behind his rather-tender gestures.

Or maybe that was too much information on an already-cluttered night. “Missy is a patron of Dally’s salon. Dally wrecked Missy’s hair a couple days before her wedding and Missy vowed revenge. And apparently she has an old Impala. Her husband, Rick, is some kind of bodybuilder.”

“Hence the smelly gym clothes.”

“You had to bring that up.” She rubbed her hands on her arms. “You know, now that I think about it, the guy who attacked me the other night smelled the same way
 
—a sort of menthol-ly ointment odor
 
—the same smell as the clothes in the bag.”

“You think it could be Rick?”

“Dally had a boyfriend she recently broke up with. Maybe it was Rick. You should ask her.”

“We also need to check Missy’s whereabouts. And if she still has her Impala.”

“While you’re at it, check out Karla, the Rockets’ pitcher. She has a record of some sort. There’s also Sammy Richland, Gabby’s grandson. He’s into something, but I don’t know what.”

“Any other neighbors
 
—perhaps the mailman?
 
—who strike you as suspicious?” His eyes had turned warm.

“Don’t mock my instincts. Remember what happened to the last mailman who underestimated me.”

“And your stellar roundhouse kick.” Now he’d broken into a full-out smile.

She held up her dukes as if to punch him.

He lifted his hands in surrender. “As you wish, Fast-Pitch. I’d forgotten how persuasive you are. Sort of like a pit bull.”

“Are you trying to say you might miss me a little?” She wasn’t sure why she’d said it. It just spilled from her tongue before she could catch it.

Before she wanted to.

Jeremy’s smile dimmed, leaving behind only a stillness in the air as he swallowed hard and stared at her with something in his eyes that looked almost hungry. “I should probably get back to Dally.”

Right. Dally.

If he wanted to spear her clear through to her backbone, he couldn’t have found sharper words. She’d obviously been inside a smelly Impala too long and had been reading into the
emotion of the moment. He was her boss, all this concern only professional.

PJ felt suddenly hungry and tired. “I should go talk to Gabby.”

“It’s too early. Call her after you’ve had some sleep.”

“You’re probably right. Can you take me home?” She picked up her bag, shoved the wig inside, and hoisted it over her shoulder.

Jeremy followed her out to his motorcycle. She climbed on the back, resisting a long moment before giving in to the need to put her hands around his waist. He started the engine and rode stiffly through the early morning, without talking, even at the stoplights.

A golden sun half-mooned over the dark waters of Lake Minnetonka, spilling out orange in a frothy layer over the horizon. The clear sky screamed of sand castles on the beach, a dive into the cool blue of the lake, perhaps even ice cream dripping down her chin as she shared a cone with Davy.

Jeremy motored through Kellogg, into the Chapel Hills neighborhood, and pulled up in front of Connie’s still house. PJ had the urge to wake up Davy, maybe head to church, and spend the morning thanking God for another miraculous rescue. She didn’t bother to ask Jeremy if he’d be there.

She climbed off the bike and started to walk up the flagstone steps.

“PJ.”

She turned, sighing, running a hand through her hair. “I need a nap.”

His eyes were on hers. He opened his mouth as if to say something. She looked away, at the sprinkler hiccuping on the
lawn across the street, the mist turning to a rainbow in the languid morning air.

When he said nothing, she glanced back at him. That hungry look again roamed his eyes, and she filled in for him. “Thanks for rescuing me.”

Then she turned and walked up the steps, listening, but not hearing his bike pull away. Not, at least, until she was safe inside her house, leaning against the door, wishing she knew how to stay out of trouble.

“Auntie PJ!”

The voice made her look up, and sure enough, Davy scampered down the stairs, dressed in his Spider-Man pajamas, his hair in a wild nest. He stopped at the edge of the stairs, poised to launch himself at her. “Do you play baseball?”

Then he jumped.

She caught him and nearly went down with him in a heap.

Baseball?
Oh yeah, she still wore Dally’s outfit. Minus the wig, of course. Good thing, too. She didn’t want to scare the child.

“Yep, I’ve been playing baseball,” PJ said as she nestled his little body close. He smelled of sleep and fresh-laundry innocence.

She breathed it in, eyes closed.

“Peezhay?” Sergei came down the stairs in a T-shirt and a pair of lounge pants. He rubbed his eyes, his hair as wild as Davy’s.

Davy slid out of her embrace and ran to the kitchen, climbing on a stool. From the guest quarters on the other side of the kitchen, Vera emerged wearing her short orange bathrobe, her hair in a net. She raised a hand in greeting as she tousled Davy’s hair.

How PJ had missed this. Missed the friendly simplicity of Connie’s home. No chinchillas screaming at her, no bumps or smells in the night.

No one throwing her into the back end of a car.

No one confusing her with strange, hungry looks.

Footsteps thumped behind her on the porch; then the door opened . . . and in walked Boris. He wore his predictable dark suit and turned his back to her as he shut the door.

“
Prevyet
, Boris,” she said, switching to Russian, one hand on the banister. “How’s the new job?”

He said nothing, just turned back to her. All activity in the room stilled. Vera dropped the frying pan onto Connie’s high-end stove.

Boris sported a rather angry-looking black eye, swollen as large as a plum, along with a wicked scrape along his chin.

“Cool,” Davy said.

“Shto sloocheellas!”
Vera gasped, nearly running from the kitchen.

PJ’s Russian had improved greatly over the past month of living with the Russians, but even she didn’t need to speak the language to understand Vera’s panicked
“What happened?”

“Nichevo,”
Boris muttered, catching his wife’s hands and pushing her away.

Nothing? Nothing happened? PJ wasn’t buying that. She’d seen nothing and this wasn’t it.

Sergei had retrieved a bag of frozen peas from the freezer and handed it to his father. Boris slapped it over his eye and let Vera lead him to a chair. Davy beheld him as if his grandfather had morphed into a Marvel character. Super Boris.

PJ slumped down on the stairs, head in her hands, listening
to their conversation, comprehending little. Something about work and a misunderstanding.

Great. As Boris’s handler, she should probably be expecting a call from Rusty any moment.

As if on cue, or by some cosmic power, her cell phone rang. She pulled her bag toward her and dug out the phone on the second ring.

But no, not Rusty. Boone.

And he sounded just as frazzled as she felt.

“Am I reading this wrong, or was there a BOLO put out on someone matching your description, stating you’d been . . .
kidnapped
?”

* * *

PJ slept like a slug. Hard. Sprawled out in the center of the bed on top of the white chenille bedspread, with the eyelet curtains free from their sash and blowing summer into her room. She’d changed out of the softball uniform and collapsed on the bed, promising herself she’d get up and ready for church as soon as she . . . got . . . some . . . shut . . .

“Peezhay!” The pounding at the door drilled through her head
 
—
bang, bang
.

Go away and come again another . . .

“Peezhay, you have a ghest!”

Her eyelids weighed an elephant each, and her body refused to respond to the alarm in her brain. Someone had glued her to the bed or tied her hands and feet and . . .

“PJ? It’s Connie. Are you okay? Sergei said you didn’t answer. Someone is downstairs for you.”

Yes, she knew. Boone had come to wrest her out of a sound and needed sleep, to harangue her about her unfortunate and terrifying late-night trip to the border of Wisconsin. Okay, it couldn’t have helped that she’d said a short “Yep,” followed by a sleepy “but I’m okay,” right before she ended his call with “I’ll tell you later.”

Later apparently wasn’t soon enough.

“I’m . . . here . . . Con . . .” She still hadn’t managed to open her eyes.

“Okay, that’s it; I’m coming in.”

She heard a key in the lock and pried her eyes open
 
—way, way open
 
—before Connie barged in. “You’re still sleeping? It’s noon, PJ! You missed church!” She moved into the room, picking up the soiled and smelly softball uniform, holding it with two fingers, and dropping it into a hamper near the wide chest of drawers. “What in the world . . . ?”

“I was . . . up late.” PJ managed to push herself up. Scrubbing a hand down her face, she caught a glimpse of the destruction in the mirror across from the bed and grimaced.