Goes down easy: Roped into romance (10 page)

“What?”

“What what?”

“You laughed.”

“It’s nothing. Just thinking about friends I had in high school. The ones I told you about last night. We played together in an ensemble. Now that was a band.” He shook his head. “God, I miss those guys.”

“A rock band? Like Diamond Jack.”

“No. It wasn’t that kind of band. It was about true blue school pride and winning competitions and trying to keep Heidi from killing Ben.”

“Did she?” Perry asked, simply because she had no idea what else to say, and his trip down memory lane intrigued her.

“She did whack him upside the jaw one time with a bicycle chain.”

“Ouch. What did he do to deserve that?”

“He offered to help her pay for college.”

“And these are people you call friends?”

“They’re the best.” He laughed, laced his hands over his flat belly, closed his eyes and smiled. “They’ve been married now about six years, I guess.”

She heard a tinge of envy in the affection with which he spoke. “Do you still see them?”

“When I can, sure. They live outside of Austin. My friend Quentin took all those blue ribbons we earned in competition and parlayed them into a nice career as a record producer. Randy’s the only one of the bunch I haven’t seen for a while.”

Perry sighed. Hearing Jack talk about his friends made her realize how few she really had. At least,
friends she would call close. She did have Claire as well as Chloe, Josie, Tally and Bree—all neighbors, and girlfriends she could count on for anything.

But she’d spent so much of her time for so many years running Sugar Blues for Della that she hadn’t even developed those relationships as fully as she would have liked.

Maybe with the year so new, the time was right to change all of that. To step outside the safe little world she’d built for herself with her aunt, and experience more of life.

“What’re you thinking about over there?”

She was not going to tell him…at least not right now. “Thinking that you were lucky in your friends.”

“You didn’t have any?”

“Not really.” And how pitiful was that? “I think I scared everyone, first with my parents dying, then living with Della. I guess they thought I could read their minds or something. Whatever, they kept their distance.”

“Well, you’ll have to meet my bunch if you ever get to Austin.”

She was saved having to digest what his offer meant by Book’s car coming toward them. She pulled on her gloves and opened the door, letting in a whoosh of brisk air.

U
SING
S
UGAR’S
gnarled walking stick, which Book retrieved from the attic after Perry’s call, Della made her way from his car to the warehouse. The place had not been occupied since Eckton Computing had moved, yet appeared less unkempt than its neighbors.

Whether or not the condition of the property held any significance, she couldn’t say. So far, she hadn’t picked up but a flash or two of color. No heat. No sound. Nothing.

Facing the front of the structure, the cold wind whipping the ends of her scarf, she stared at the windows set high overhead that ran the length of the wall.

They looked out over the river, and she knew without going inside that a catwalk sat beneath. She also knew that Jack wouldn’t find Dayton Eckhardt today.

He’d been here, though; she couldn’t tell how recently, and since this building had once housed his firm’s shipping, production and assembly departments, it wasn’t exactly news that she sensed remnants of his energy.

She would need to get closer, to go inside…

“Is there any reason we can’t go in?” she heard Jack ask of Book.

She glanced over, saw Book shrug. “As long as you don’t bust out a window or take down a door, go ahead.”

Della started toward the entrance on the far right, knowing when Jack reached it he’d find it unlocked. He did, turning the handle and pushing the door open, glancing in her direction with the air of a man holding an ace up his sleeve.

Della held back, not quite ready to enter, now that a sharp ice pick sensation had begun stabbing behind her right ear. “They’ve been here. They didn’t see any reason to secure the place when they left.”

“How long ago? Can you tell?” Book asked beside her as she slipped her hand into the crook of his elbow.

“I don’t think but a few hours.” She shook her head, narrowed her eyes. “I should be able to get a better sense once I’m inside.”

“Do you think you should go in?” Perry asked, coming close to brush strands of hair, that had escaped the scarf, from Della’s face. “You’re so pale. Is it your foot?”

“No, my foot’s fine. It’s just…” Her shoes scraped over loose gravel as she hobbled closer to the door. “I haven’t picked up spikes of anything for over forty-eight hours. I don’t know what’s different now unless—”

Black, everywhere black. A bolt of red, another of white. Lightning without thunder. Ripping through the sky. Water rushing madly
.

A flood. Yellow rain. Drowning. Gasps of breath in bright orange. Rust and mud. The earth bubbling and swirling. Nowhere to hold on.

She groaned, stumbled back. Book caught her, and then Perry was there. “Della, sweetie? Can you hear me?”

It hurt to move her head. She tucked her forehead into Book’s chest to hide from the knifelike pain. “Please. I need to go home. Take me home.”

Cursing harshly beneath his breath, Book scooped her up in his arms and headed for the car. She kept her eyes closed, her head buried in the folds of his jacket.

His warmth soothed her, as did his scent, but she couldn’t process any of what she’d seen. Not without the darkness of her room, her medication, and hours to sleep.

“I’ll ride with you,” Perry said, as Book settled Della into the front seat.

No. Her niece had to stay. That much she knew. Of that she was certain.

She reached out, grabbed Perry’s wrist and squeezed. “No, Perry. You stay with Jack. He needs you.”

“I’
M SORRY
. Really. That’s the last thing I wanted to happen,” Jack said, wondering if he could possibly feel worse.

Whatever he believed or didn’t believe about Della Brazille’s gift, he sure as hell would never have asked her to come here if he’d thought it would make her sick.

“I don’t think she expected it.” Perry rubbed at her
wrist, a frown on her face as she watched Book drive away. The detective hadn’t looked too happy with Jack—or with Perry, either.

After getting Della situated, Book had given his business card to Jack and taken him aside, ordering him to call if he found anything, and not to touch whatever he did.

Jack wasn’t stupid. He was, in fact, as much a professional as the other man. But he’d let the detective have his say and had kept his resentment to a simmer.

Figuring out the reason for Book’s barely veiled threat hadn’t required a PhD. Had Jack been in the other man’s shoes, he wasn’t sure he wouldn’t have punctuated his directive with a fist.

Then again, that was something he’d never know, seeing how his woman wasn’t the one hurting. He turned to Perry. She looked strange. Strained.

And he had to remind himself that she wasn’t his woman. “You could have gone with them. You didn’t have to stay.”

“Yes, I did,” was all she said before facing him, her cheeks apple red from the wind. “So? What are you waiting for?”

Nothing, he supposed. Except something about Della’s reaction had him wondering if he shouldn’t do this solo while Perry waited outside. If anything happened to her…

Cursing under his breath, he pulled a flashlight from his pocket and switched it on, making sure the one he’d given Perry worked as well. “You can wait in the truck if you want to. You don’t have to come with me.”

“Actually, I do.” She swiped at her hair with gloved hands. “I’m under strict orders.”

To do what? Babysit?
“Orders from who?”

“Della.”

He let that sink in, and decided he didn’t like it. He didn’t like it at all. Still, whatever she’d seen, she obviously wouldn’t have told Perry to stay if doing so would put her in danger.

“Okay, then. Let’s do it,” he said, and pushed through the door.

Perry followed. “I’m surprised Book didn’t want you to wait until he could get back.”

With Della ordering Perry to stay, Jack doubted Book would be budging from Della’s side until this crisis had passed. “I’m pretty sure he thinks this is a wild-goose chase.”

“Even with what Della has seen?”

“She hasn’t pinpointed a location. Hell, she hasn’t even seen any chickens. Her visions could be of Timbuktu, for all we know.”

They certainly weren’t of this place—not if they were flashes of colors and light like Perry had described. The warehouse was nothing but a cold, bleak cavern. Concrete floors and cinderblock walls in matching shades of gray.

Dust motes danced in the trace of dead light drifting down from the dirty windows. A staircase on the right rose to a catwalk built against all four walls, and a row of upstairs offices at the rear of the structure.

“I can see why Book didn’t stick around,” Perry said from Jack’s side.

But Jack hadn’t been interested in the detective. His own research had told him the warehouse was empty. What he’d wanted to find out was whether or not there was anything here that
couldn’t
be seen.

Since he was already tottering on a very shaky limb, he was going to take Della’s reaction to mean that there was. His only hope was that a search of the place might turn up a clue he could follow, or a hint of where to go from here.

“Is this where Taylor’s husband worked?” Perry asked, walking toward the center of the room.

Jack nodded, listening to the echo of her steps and her voice. “I don’t know how many shifts they worked here then, but he was lead boss for one of the production crews.”

“What does that mean?”

“You got me.”

She crossed her arms, rubbed them from her elbows to her shoulders. When she exhaled, her breath frosted. And Jack grew even colder.

“So what’s the plan?” she asked. “You want me to see what’s upstairs while you check out the first floor?”

He hadn’t thought much beyond getting inside. “It might be best if we stay together.”

“It might be faster, and warmer, if we don’t.”

It wasn’t that he didn’t trust her…

“Unless you don’t trust me?” she asked, backing toward the staircase with a dare in her eyes.

The risers looked sturdy enough—though her expression left him unbalanced—and he nodded, listening to the metallic ringing of her footsteps echo as she climbed.

Since there was nothing at the front of the bottom floor, the place having obviously been gutted and still waiting for a new tenant, he headed for the rear, where he found two empty restrooms.

The doors were ajar, the toilet tanks long empty, the water pipes clamped tight to the bottoms of the sinks and the walls. He shone his flashlight overhead in both rooms, and found identical bare bulbs with pull strings. The floor drains were dry and as clean as they got in a place like this.

He found no fresh graffiti, and no meaning in what he could read of that which was there. No wastebaskets, no toilet paper, air dryers that were empty of everything but air when he pried them from the walls.

He made a cursory trip around the cavernous room, flicking his light up and down the walls from the floor to the catwalk above. Nothing. Anything Della had sensed had made no lasting mark here.

Just as he started for the stairs, Perry called his name. He glanced overhead, saw her at the catwalk railing waving him up. He took the stairs two at a time, his feet pounding against the metal.

Something in her face told him to hurry. Something in his gut told him to run.

“What?” he asked, before he’d even reached the top. “What did you find?”

She shook her head, her eyes wide and glassy, her face a deathly pale. “It’s not good.”

He reached for her, wrapped his hand around her shoulder and squeezed. “Are you okay?”

“I will be,” she said, her voice as faint as her nod.

She took a step in reverse, then turned and made her way down the catwalk. His heart was pounding from both dread and adrenaline as he followed her to the third door in the long row of five.

He stepped through, shone his flashlight around the small office space. Unlike the floor below, this room hadn’t been emptied. Industrial gray file cabinets lined one wall, a matching desk backed up to another, but he saw nothing in the low-ceilinged space to explain Perry’s alarm.

“At the end of the row of file cabinets,” she said from his shoulder. “There’s a door. Into a closet.”

And that was when his own panic set in. He inhaled, exhaled, inhaled, exhaled, the short choppy breaths frosting in cloudbursts of white.

He reminded himself of where he was—New Orleans; of who he was with—Perry Brazille; of the reason he was here—Dayton Eckhardt—before he walked to the corner. He saw the spray-painted message first.

There will be no ransom demand. We have what we want.

And then he saw the chair, the ropes hanging from the legs and the arms. Yellow nylon, a water-skier’s ropes. Ropes used to bind cargo, to secure it on the deck of a ship.

To secure a man below in the hold, leaving him in the dark for days. For weeks. Until he lost count. Until he barely remembered his name.

“I’m guessing that’s his finger?”

At Perry’s question, Jack startled. The flashlight beam danced around the small room as he forced his breathing pattern to return to normal, forced his muscles to relax, hoping doing so would calm the near deadly beat of his heart.

What had she asked him? “Finger?”

“On the floor,” she said, and he looked down to where she pointed.

Yeah. It was a finger. He ground his jaw until he felt a joint pop, then he stepped into the small room, checking behind the door, shining his light into the corners.

It took only seconds to see what he needed to see. He stepped back out. “Did you touch anything in here?”

“I pushed the door open.” She held up both hands. “But I’m wearing gloves.”

He nodded, guided her back to the staircase with one hand on her arm. Once at the top of the stairs, he pocketed his flashlight, dug for Book’s card and pulled his cell from his waistband holster.

“It’s Jack. You need to get a crime scene unit to the warehouse as soon as you can.”

J
ACK SAT
on the running board of his SUV, the door open, the engine running, the heater blowing at full blast. He had his arms crossed, his hands tucked in his armpits, the hood of his sweatshirt pulled almost to his mouth.

Perry had bummed a Styrofoam cup from one of the
officers on the scene, and then bummed coffee from the thermos of another. She held it beneath his nose and waited.

It didn’t take long for him to look up and push back the hood. He took the cup from her gloved hand with a muttered “Thanks,” as he wrapped all ten of his fingers around it.

“You’re welcome. And you look like shit.” She hadn’t planned to blurt it out like that, but he did. If possible, he looked as if he’d aged ten years in the last ten minutes.

He sipped, grimaced. “Thanks for that, too.”

“Seriously, Jack. It’s more than a lack of sleep.” She’d hazard a guess that it was more than this case. “You look like a ghost. Or at least like you’ve seen one.”

“Nah. Just a finger,” he said, and sipped again.

Jack Montgomery, Private Eye, reduced to a shell of his former self by a severed finger? She wasn’t buying it.

But before she could say anything else, he asked, “They found the ring, right? Behind the door?”

She leaned against the vehicle’s closed back passenger door. “Believe it or not, yes.”

“They bagged the ropes? And took scrapings from the spray paint?”

“And confiscated the chair.”

“Did they spray it with luminol or fluorescein?”

“I don’t know,” she said, and turned, leaning her shoulder against the frame and staring down at the top of his head.

“Okay. Whatever.”

“You know, Jack. I’m a shop clerk. They’re not exactly giving me a blow-by-blow. I heard about the ring, the rope and the chair while I was hunting down coffee. If you want to know more, you’re going to have to put those investigative skills of yours to work.”

He studied the coffee in his cup for so long that she wondered if he’d been listening, or if he’d returned to wherever the scene upstairs had taken him. He’d said little about what they’d discovered. She’d expected so much more.