Hell on the Heart (20 page)

While the other agents took blood samples and hunted for witnesses, John expanded the search into the surrounding fields, looking for any hint of his next move or a clue as to a new direction.

The deep green grass testified to meticulous landscapers, intensive watering and numerous chemicals. No doubt poisoning the water supply. His ancestors would have seen it as a crime against the environment.

At the top of a crest, he surveyed the scene, closed his eyes and captured the image in his mind. He rotated ninety degrees and repeated his action. He continued in that manner until he made three complete rotations.

The wind brushed his face. He closed his eyes and drew the earth through the soles of his feet until he was one with his surroundings. Smoky darkness swirled. Shapes formed, like a screen of pixels aligned themselves until Czigany’s face dominated by deep dimples, came into sharp focus.

He inhaled sharply, caught off guard by her appearance. The twist in his gut told him she and Cain were inexplicably linked. The situation was an itch under John’s skin - one that scratching wouldn’t abate.

But Cezi wasn’t the only visitor in his vision. Another woman held her hand. He shifted his focus to the second woman. His sister, Dyami’s features were blurred but recognizable. Frozen in time, she remained as she’d looked before her death.

Sorrow washed over him. He’d been too late to save his sister. Her presence now, did not bode well for Cezi. Was Dyami her guide to the after world?

The Shiekh did not control his. “American agents with their questions, questions, questions. Outside my house. Outside my business. Talking, talking, talking.”

“About?”

“The girls. American girls. Were they here? How did they arrive? Did they have papers?”

Adam’s temper reared, but he wrestled with his tone, eager not to antagonize one of his best buyers. His teeth and jaw ached from wanting to bellow. He wasn’t talking to a local peasant without power. How had this situation become his problem? “Make the local officials move them along.”

Another long torrent of words followed and Adam finally understood the real crux of the problem. It wasn’t the verbal harassment that had his client worried.

Oil field sabotage had shut down production, banking glitches threatened his cash supply and whispers of secret American dealings made him suspect in the local community.

If this continued, Adam’s foreign contacts would roll over on him. Some how he had to figure out a way to call off the ‘American jackals.’

Adam’s cell rang. Why would this call be any different from the two he’d already received? While warning bells sounded in his head, he spoke what he hoped were soothing words. What had happened to tip off the Feds? Chicago? Grant’s Pass? Armadillo Creek?

Change was in order. New faces, new plan. Time to clean house.

Adam paced the floor. In two days seven or eight fresh-faced American girls would arrive. Should he abort the mission? He stared through the window to the garden three stories below.

Finally, he picked up the phone and pressed a number. Manuel, his major domo answered with his usual efficiency. “Round up the staff. We have a job to do.”

Summer was a busy time on the lake. Motorboats, jet skies and the like roared up and down the water from early morning until dusk. It was such a familiar sound, that most of the gypsies tuned it out.

When the whop, whop, whop of helicopter blades cracked the air overhead, the hair on the back of Nicholae’s neck rose. He ran to the nearest door, skirting clusters of people packed into the crowded room. The military Blackhawk crossed the lake headed toward the compound at an alarming speed.

Rolf was going to pull through, but the family was a long way from out of danger. Nicholae’s eyes sought Luca’s over the crowded, silent room and gave the sign. Shallowtail Hollow was under siege.

Luca summoned his sons with a flick of his wrist. “Arm yourselves.” To his wife, he said, “Keep our women and children inside.”

Nicholae hunted the room for Cezi. A large cluster of women sat near the kitchen. “Where’s my daughter?”

Several pairs of eyes looked at Nadya, causing him to raise an eyebrow. Nadya’s black hair was coiled into a severe braid that circled the top of her head. Her cheeks flushed slightly, but she sent him a sultry smile. To deflect him? This wasn’t a coy game.

“I sent her away.” An edge of defiance crept into her tone as she waved her hand wildly to demonstrate Cezi’s back and forth actions. “She was making everybody crazy with her pacing.”

Nicholae refused her a smile of redemption, well aware of Nadya’s failure to mask her disdain of his daughter. “You take too much on yourself. Cezi is a grown woman and does not need you to parent her.”

Nadya tossed her head. “She is unmarried and as such is considered a child.”

Out of the corner of his eye, he caught a grim smirk on Lyuba’s face. Any comment made now would result in infighting among the women and he didn’t have time to argue, mediate or cajole. Cezi would maneuver to be in the midst of the action and he cared only about ensuring her safety.

Grabbing an Uzi from the previous night’s action, he headed toward the door. Before he darted outside, he tossed a warning over his shoulder at the group of women. “Remain inside.” Unlike his daughter others were prepared to follow his direction.

The Blackhawk circled ominously overhead, dipping precariously low at times, then turned toward the flat pasture. Nicholae broke into a run, cutting across lawns to reach the fenced area before the chopper descended. This was not public land. Outsiders were not welcome.

The armed men spread out, guns raised, sites focused as the bird slowly descended onto the prairie.

The side door slid open.

“Shit. This is an armed camp.” While John hadn’t been expecting a warm reception, he hadn’t considered he might be entering a war zone.

“You, two, head back to Ft. Worth. Come in tomorrow with the rest of the team. I’m going in now.” The situation might be better handled alone.

“If they shoot you, we’re revising this plan.” Lassiter yelled. John hoped he meant it as a joke. He scanned the crowd half-expecting to see Cezi. Her father and Uncle were there. Neither lowered their guns.

He leapt from the door, hit the ground hard, bent his body in half and rolled over the choppy earth, letting his transportation depart, too late to debate the wisdom of an unannounced visit.

Why the hell wasn’t Czigany answering her damn phone?

Armadillo Creek’s residents were not Cezi’s friends. Most hated her. Not exactly news. She’d known the facts since elementary school.

At ten she’d been sued for hexing Carl Brimmerton’s older brother and making him a bed-wetter. At the time she’d been mortified, now it struck her as funny. If she had that kind of power, no way would she have limited it to the Brimmerton family.

Her mother had insisted on public school, although gypsies were educated at home. The few that did attend were considered troublemakers. After her death, Nicholae withdrew. Often forgetting about her for several days at a time. No one had stepped up to help. Consequently, her wardrobe was neither fashionable nor well fitting. And if that hadn’t drawn attention, her asthmatic wheezing singled her out.

With her family’s blessing, she’d quit high school in the beginning of her junior year. Ten years had passed, but she avoided most public places and contact with the locals. To be truthful, they probably avoided her as well. Particularly if they thought she could turn them into bed-wetters.

So it was with jaundice eye that she opened the front door and read the posted notice. The townspeople wanted answers for the two murders. The mayor and the Sheriff’s office promised to provide them at four pm at the high school gym.

In her heart she knew Cain was responsible for both Lyndsay and Rolf. She thanked her lucky stars that she’d escaped with her life the first time. She also knew the Sheriff’s office would never believe her.

She wished she hadn’t sent John away. He’d know what to do. All the crime scene data she’d collected he could get to the right agency. More than that he’d make her feel protected and right now she doubted she ever feel safe again.

 If the local population knew what she did, would it prevent another useless death? All afternoon she’d loaded images and evidence into her computer, determined to do the right thing.

Which was all fine and good, but on the walk to the high school gym she came up with several excellent reasons to retrace her steps and return home.

Rolf was her support system. If he’d been here, she would have marched into the gym in defiance. Without him…. Cezi shook her head. She wouldn’t let herself think that way.

The decaying scent of stinky shoes, adolescent sweat and floor wax brought high school back in a rush. Ignoring the sea of pale faces with their eyes on her, she climbed to the top of the bleachers and found a seat between two older women.

A microphone surrounded by a half-dozen folding chairs circled the center-court floor marks. The air conditioner sputtered, attempting to cool an unused room now teaming with overheated patrons. The low hum of angry voices seethed.

Cezi forced herself to take deep breaths. Being here was a mistake. If push came to shove, she didn’t have to say anything. She scanned the crowd for a friendly expression and found none.

The far doors opened and the mayor, followed by the three-man city council entered, waving to the crowd like they were on a float in a parade. Carl and Bobby Joe brought up the caboose, both in matching brown uniforms, boots and side arms. No doubt for crowd control. As though those two bozos understood more about crowd control than they did criminal investigations.

The mayor spent five minutes welcoming the crowd and acting surprised and delighted the entire town had come out. Cezi shook her head. Did he not understand the seriousness of the situation? Grumbling from the audience ratcheted up the tension.

Finally, Mr. Henderson of Henderson Hardware stood up, interrupting the mayor’s meaningless drone. “We haven’t had a murder in Armadillo Creek in the sixty years I’ve lived here. Now, in the last month, we’ve had two.”

Heads bobbed in agreement. The mayor’s lips shifted into a magnificent vote-getting toothy smile. “We’ve had one murder, Bob, and our deputies apprehended the killers immediately.”

“What about Lyndsay Brooks?” A voice Cezi couldn’t see called out.

The mayor brushed lint from his jacket sleeve. “Ms. Brooks is officially a missing person. We have no reason to think she’s been murdered.”

Stunned by the stupidity of that statement, Cezi leaped to her feet. Before words could tumble from her mouth, Carl Brimmerton jumped out of his chair and pointed a long finger at her. “No one wants to hear your theories.”

Every head in the gym pivoted her direction. Irritation stiffened her spine and her father’s voice spoke in her ear. We do not allow ourselves to be ruled by displaying negative emotions, but we will get even.

This time the voice in her head was her mothers. This is your time. Make the most of it. Clutching her computer bag, she made her way down the bleacher steps.

“The deputies and mayor have told you that this is not the work of the same man, but I think it is. More importantly, I have photos.”

She’d never spoken in public. She stopped, looked around the crowded gymnasium at the people she’d known all her life, people she’d feared with good reason. But today the eyes staring back were not hostile. Instead they ran the gamut from curious and hopeful to outright admiration.

Cezi nodded and swallowed a couple of times, trying to quell the alarm rising in her throat. Giving her an encouraging wink and a pat on the shoulder, he disappeared inside a door to the left of the main door. Soon he returned with a table and an array of cords, which he quickly attached.