In Her Secret Fantasy (7 page)

“I need to ask you something,” he said expressionlessly.

She sat in the visitor’s chair, eyeing him with exaggerated attention. “Ask away.”

“Do you own a gun, Chrissy?”

It was so totally unexpected that her mouth fell open. She dragged it shut. “No.”

“Do you
possess
a gun?”

Her stomach twisted unpleasantly. “No. Why are you asking me this?”

“Have you ever held a gun?”

She licked her suddenly dry lips. “Maybe. Yes. Why?” Oh shit, they’d found it. Someone had found it…

“Because your fingerprints were found on a murder weapon.”

She stared at him. It almost struck her that he was joking before she let the half-formed idea die. His eyes were like flint. Right now, there didn’t seem much ex about this cop. She could imagine suspects coughing faster than they ever did on half-hour television dramas.

“No,” she said. “That isn’t possible.”

“I assure you it is. When did you last hold a gun?”

“Ages ago,” she whispered. “Three months. More. Who’s been murdered?”

“Whose gun were you holding?”

“I don’t know. Aidan, you’ve no right to question me.”

“Maybe not. But for everyone’s sake, you need to start talking to me. Why did you come here, Chrissy?”

She blinked at the change of tack. “To Ardknocken? Because Glenn asked me to help run things.”

“Does it pay well?”

She scowled. “Don’t be ridiculous.”

He uncrossed his legs and leaned forward, elbows on her desk. “Then why leave a respected, permanent job for this?”

Hurt and disappointment battered at her. “You know why.”

“Your attack? But you went back to work.”

She closed her eyes, unsure whether she was trying to blot out the memories or Aidan’s pitiless face. “Yes, I went back to work. And then Glenn came to see me and asked me to help get this place on its feet.”

“So you took a huge pay cut in order to work and live with a house full of ex-convicts?”

She opened her eyes with defiance. “Yes. That’s what I did. What, are you still imagining some scam? You think I did it for the proceeds of secret crime, which I’ve hidden under my bedroom floorboards? Not quite sure what crimes we could commit up here in the middle of nowhere, but I’m sure you’ve got that worked out too.”

She drew in a breath that shuddered with anger and bitterness. “You want chapter and verse,
ex
-cop? I went back to work at my old job because I wouldn’t let the bastard who raped me win. But the truth was, he’d already won. He and his lawyer did a great hatchet job on my reputation. He went down, but some of his mud stuck to me. I got the looks from my colleagues, the knowing sniggers and disrespectful, if not downright filthy, remarks from my clients. I put up with that day in, day out, for
months
. Until Glenn offered me a way out. Never once, by word or gesture, did he even mention what had happened to me, but he must have known. So yes, I grabbed it as a lifeline. I’d been offered a job. I didn’t have to admit I’d been driven to look for one, so it felt like my choice to go. Not his. Glenn promised me respect, and I got it. If I hadn’t, I’d have walked, because
that
would have been my choice too.”

Curiously, she thought his face had whitened, but she was far too churned up to care.

“So where were you when you ‘held’ this gun?” His voice wasn’t rough or aggressive, but Chrissy had had enough. She was shaking. All the warmth of their last encounter had vanished into hurt and fear.

“Glasgow,” she said desperately.

“You’re lying. Where did you go yesterday after I met you on the beach?”

His clear suspicion was like physical pain. And he was right. She
was
lying, and it didn’t matter. She’d talked so far to try to drive suspicion away from Ardknocken House, but the injustice of this, of Aidan, of all people, imagining he had the right to treat her like a criminal, had gone too far.

She sprang to her feet. “I don’t need to tell you my movements. I don’t need to tell you anything. Unless
you
’re going to tell
me
what’s going on, you can get the hell out. Now.”

“Does the name Henry Gowan mean anything to you?”

“Nothing,” she said with relief.

“Don’t you want to think about that?”

“No.”

“Do you want to change your answers about the gun?”

“No. I want to know by what authority you imagine you can interrogate me in my own office.”

“I’ve got a better idea,” Glenn’s most dangerous voice said from the doorway. “I want you to tell
me
.”

Chrissy closed her eyes. Now, surely, it was as bad as it could be.

Closer, Glenn said, “Izzy was looking for you.”

“I’ll bear it in mind,” Chrissy snapped, opening her eyes to see Aidan’s gaze flitting from her to Glenn and back. “This is nothing to do with you, Glenn. Go away.”

She turned to glare at him, but over her head, he seemed to have locked his gaze to Aidan’s. Some annoying, male communication must have passed silently between them because Aidan uncrossed his legs and stood up.

“All right,” Aidan said. “Lead on.” And before her eyes, they both walked out of the room.

She stared after them. “What the…?”

Glenn Brody led him straight out the front door. Aidan almost expected the ex-con to jump him, and curled his fists ready to defend himself. In truth, he wanted to hit someone—mostly himself—because of what he’d done to Chrissy. But Brody just kept walking, striding out over the mud towards the hill.

Aidan kept pace with him. And went with instinctive honesty. “Is the gun yours?”

Brody shook his head.

“But she’s covering for you, isn’t she?”

Brody nodded. “Yes.”

“Why?”

“Because firearms on the premises will get us shut down. Might even land some of us back inside. Where did you find it?”

“The gun? On a beach beside the murdered body of one Glasgow gangster. Henry Gowan by name. Know it?”

Brody shook his head. “I’m out of the loop. I don’t know the new neds in town.”

It might have been a lie. Brody had been lying to the police since childhood. He was probably extremely good at it.

Brody turned his head and met Aidan’s gaze. “She didn’t kill him. She isn’t capable of it.”

“You don’t know that. No one ever knows that. Where was she yesterday?”

“Here. Mostly.”

“Did you see her yesterday evening?”

“No, but everyone else will have. They all had dinner together in the dining room.”

Alibi.
Aidan let his breath out in a rush.

Brody said, “You’re still a cop, aren’t you?”

Aidan’s lips twisted. It didn’t feel like a smile, broken or otherwise. “Not for much longer. I suppose it’s too much to ask you to keep it to yourself.”

“You mean I’m not your prime suspect?”

“You’re not stupid enough to leave a gun implicating Chrissy.” Aidan glanced at him. “I need to know about the gun.”

“She got rid of it.”

“Why?”

“Because she realized the dangers.”

“Then you knew about it?”

Brody hesitated, then nodded. “I found out. We had a…situation. About three months ago, Izzy’s ex turned up.” Brody groaned. “Fuck, do you know who Izzy’s ex is?”

Aidan blinked. “No.”

“Raymond Kemp.”

Aidan couldn’t help it. He laughed. Raymond Kemp, respected financier recently revealed as one of Britain’s biggest bosses of organized crime. As if the situation wasn’t bad enough.

“He wasn’t interested in the project, or any of us. He just wanted to get control back over Izzy who knew too much. But he threatened Chrissy, who pulled her gun on him. Considering what she’d been through, wouldn’t you? But there were no shootings, no deaths. And Chrissy agreed to get rid of the gun.”

“How did she do that?”

“I don’t know,” Brody said, with so much frustration that Aidan believed him.

“I need to know where all your guys were yesterday afternoon and evening.”

“Oh shite, don’t ask me that,” Brody said. “None of them are killers. I wouldn’t have them here if I didn’t trust them not to get us shut down.”

“Good citizens help the police.”

“You’re not the police, remember?”

“Then no one’ll mind you helping me out.”

A breath of something like laughter issued from Brody. “What’s it to do with? Why did this guy die?”

“Drugs,” Aidan said. “Contaminated drugs. Three people have died in Glasgow, two in Dundee, and we’ve no idea how the stuff’s coming in or who’s behind it. Gowan was our only suspect, and he was a small fish.”

“And you thought he was connected with us.”

Aidan didn’t deny it. There was no point. Whether or not Brody was involved in this—and increasingly Aidan thought not—he’d have worked this much out for himself before long.

Brody strode along beside him, swiped at a low-hanging tree branch. “I wish you’d come to me rather than Chrissy.”

Aidan looked up at the sky. It was beginning to get dark again. “They’re her fingerprints, not yours. I wanted to talk to her first.”

Glenn’s head snapped round. “You were
warning
her…”

“There are always excuses,” Aidan said vaguely, “for what people do.”

Brody said, “You’re the oddest polis I ever met.”

Aidan turned back towards the house. “I’m the worst polis you ever met.”

Chapter Six She put music on in the office so that she wouldn’t listen for Aidan coming back. She hoped Glenn wouldn’t hit him… But then, he looked pretty capable of looking after himself. She refused to think beyond that, but staring at Thierry’s costings for new computer equipment just didn’t hold her attention. Words and letters danced in front of her eyes.

Then, abruptly, Glenn appeared in the chair opposite, and reluctantly, she took off her earphones.

“He’s not after us for illegal firearms. He’ll let it go. But you need to tell him what you did with it, because some bastard used it to kill a bam he
was
after.”

Chrissy searched his eyes, glanced at his hands, which weren’t bloody or bruised. She nodded. What the hell did it matter? She still hated Aidan.

Glenn stood up to go. He seemed to hesitate, then, “He’s keeping the cops off our backs, Chrissy.”

“I think he
is
a cop. Still.” Her voice sounded hoarse, and she cleared her throat. “He’s been lying to us.”

Glenn nodded as if that was perfectly understandable. “Aye, but you’re not his agenda.”

“Are you?”

“Only if this Gowan leads him back to me.”

“Will he?”

Glenn shook his head. She shouldn’t have asked. Aidan’s betrayal had churned everything up.

“I may be wrong,” Glenn said. “But I think he was looking out for you the only way he could.”

Chrissy let out a bitter laugh. “Then there’s something far wrong with him.”

“Probably,” Glenn said vaguely, and walked away.

Chrissy snapped her earphones back on and returned to the dancing numbers. It was only moments before she sensed Aidan’s presence. When she looked up, he stood in the doorway, one shoulder against the white wooden frame. He looked nothing like a policeman. He looked more like some enterprising young criminal, intelligent, ruthless and slightly dangerous.

She stared at him without removing the earphones. He straightened and walked into the room, kicking the door shut behind him. Her heart lurched once.

This time, he didn’t even sit. He said, “You got hold of a gun to feel safe.”

“Ironic, isn’t it?” She pulled off the earphones, switched off the music. “It was more about control than safety, but I suppose it amounts to the same thing.”

“What did you do with it? After you threatened Izzy’s ex with it?”

“I buried it.”

“How?”

“I
really
buried it. I dug a hole in the ground, dropped it in and shovelled earth over it.”

Aidan blinked. “Here at Ardknocken? Will you show me?”

“Okay.” She rose and walked round the desk, grabbing her coat from the old sofa on the way past.

In silence, she walked across the hall and outside, leading the way across the yard and across the open ground in the direction of the woods. Although the light was fading, she remembered the way exactly.

Beside her, Aidan strode with equal purpose, although his head was constantly turning, searching, observing.

“We can be seen from the house quite easily,” she said. “Should do your cover story more good. Although I have to tell you, Len seems to’ve been unhelpfully discreet. No one seems to imagine we’re having an affair.”

She felt his gaze on her face. “You really think that’s why I’m pursuing you?” he asked.

She laughed. It wasn’t a nice sound. “Pursuing me?” she said grimly. “You’re not.”

“That sounds like an order.”

She didn’t grace that with a reply. In truth, her mouth had gone dry, and she’d no idea what response she should make. So she just led him straight to the big tree whose markings had made her imagine the face of an old man who resembled her grandfather, and crouched down among its roots.

It was definitely dusk now. Unexpectedly, a beam of light shone around the ground at her feet. Aidan’s flashlight showed the grass lumpy and recently churned up.

“Someone dug it up,” she said blankly. “I thought you’d made a mistake about the fingerprints. But someone dug it up.”

“Who else knew it was here?” he asked, crouching beside her and pushing his fingers into the dirt.

“No one. I buried it alone, and I never told anyone. No one asked.”

“You bury it at night?”

She shook her head. “No, I did it in daylight while everyone was busy.”

“But in theory, anyone could have seen you do it?”

“But no one comes up here. The locals leave us alone.”

He glanced up at her, then back at the earth.

From the house, anyone could have seen her enter the woods. But they wouldn’t have seen what she did there…unless they’d followed her.

“No,” she said. “I buried it in October. There were only the eight originals, plus me. Even Izzy didn’t live here then.”

He pounced immediately. “You don’t trust the new guys?”

“It’s not that I don’t trust them,” she said hastily. “I just don’t know them so well. I’d vouch for all the others—and I’m pretty sure Glenn would vouch for Frog—Thierry. But it can’t be the new guys either, can it? None of them were here in October, and I haven’t touched this area since.”

Aidan sat back on his heels. “Someone knew where to look. The rest of the ground here is hard and he made an effort—a recent effort, last couple of day, I’d say—to dig up just this area. Unless you built a cairn over it or added a signpost, they
knew
.”

Chrissy dragged her hand through her hair. “I hate this,” she said intensely. “I trust these men.”

“You want to trust them.”

She scowled. “I’m not an idiot. I’m a pretty good judge of character.” She broke off as a harsh laugh escaped. “Was.”

“Maybe one of the old guard saw you, dug up the gun and passed it to someone else? They could have been pressured by old loyalties, or straightforward threat.”

“I think they’d have gone to Glenn in a case like that. He’s still pretty scary when he wants to be. And…”

“And what?”

“You might think I’m kidding myself,” she muttered. “Maybe I am. But I think they’re loyal to me. We all look out for each other.”

“You don’t get into Barlinnie Prison by sticking to Boy Scout oaths.”

“I know that. They’re just people, though, underneath. People make mistakes. Some don’t care. Some do.”

His gaze lifted to hers and fell again. For the first time, she realized how close he was, almost touching her. The silvery stream of his breath mingled intimately with hers. He said, “They’re not your saviours, Chrissy. You save yourself.”

“You’re wonderful, strong and amazing…”

For some reason, anger surged back with a vengeance. And yet it felt different because he crouched here with her in the dark. She could feel the heat from his thigh, and he wasn’t even touching her. In spite of everything he’d said and done, desire prickled on her skin, slid insidiously down her belly and between her legs.

“You think that’s what I do? Latch on to strong men to save me from what another strong man once did to me? Trust me, I’m
self-
reliant.”

He looked at her, an unreadable smile curving his lips. The ignored beam from the flashlight cast shadows over one side of face, adding somehow to the forbidden attraction of the man.

“You don’t believe me,” she said. “You think I ran to you, held you, to
rely
on you?”

“For a moment,” he said steadily.

“Moron. I’m just a woman like any other. I just fancied you.” She swayed against him before he could respond, reached up and pressed her parted lips to his. It was a fierce kiss, from anger and bitterness at a betrayal he wouldn’t even comprehend existed. But it was lustful too, and she wanted him to know that, to understand what he’d lost by lying and interrogating and mistrusting her.

But, heaven help her, she liked the feel of his stunned lips. He tasted like…sex. Strong, male. Sheer desire. And she was done with him.

She was.

Only his lips quivered, and surprise—or perhaps a simple need to prolong the pleasure—kept her there. And then his mouth moved. No simple pressing and tasting of lips, but opening and taking. Her stomach flipped and dived. His arm closed around her; he stumbled back against the tree trunk, and she fell across him, gasping as he kissed her.

And, God, he could kiss. Strength and sensuality mingled in every caress of his lips, every touch of his tongue sweeping inside her mouth and stroking hers. And everything in her, every long dormant desire, every instinct, leapt to meet him. She caught his nape in her hand, holding him, kissing him, and it went on and on, growing deeper and deeper.

She sprawled against his chest, her coat open, so it seemed quite natural for his hand to settle over her breast. Heat surged through her; delicious lust pooled between her thighs, arching her hips in search of comfort as his mouth devastated her and his hand moved, caressing her breast, the aching peak of her nipple poking stiffly against the fabric of her sweater.

His mouth opened wide, drawing in a ragged breath before it kissed some more. She welcomed it eagerly, touching his rough, stubbly cheek with wonder as she kissed and kissed. She never wanted it to end. She wanted his caressing hand on her naked skin, on the throbbing juncture of her thighs. She wanted— He released her mouth with a breathless groan. “Don’t fancy me, Chrissy. I want you far too much, and I’m a total, total bastard.”

Reality hit her like a bucket of water. She’d begun this. So much for her quick, punishing demonstration of self-reliance and sophisticated desire. Another moment and she’d have spread her legs and invited him in.

A further jolt of inconvenient desire sliced through her. Would that really be so bad?

Yes, because whatever he wanted, he was rejecting her.

She wriggled out of his hold, and he immediately dropped his arms. She jumped to her feet with a breathless laugh.

“Don’t panic,” she said, ignoring the trembling of her legs. “I was only kidding you on.” And she strolled off through the trees, leaving him to follow or not as he chose.

Kidding me on,
he thought stupidly, gazing after her swaggering rear.
Fuck. Just fuck.

What the hell had he done? He could still taste her. Her light, sexy scent still filled his nostrils, and his cock was hard as the tree trunk that was about all that supported him.

Oh no, she hadn’t been kidding. She’d wanted him, and the knowledge fired his blood and deluged his brain with visions of all the things he could do to her if he followed her back to the house.

He rose and followed her back to the house. At least, he went far enough to see her go inside. Then he veered away to the drive where he’d parked his car. He’d been right to warn her off. Even with his blood on fire, he couldn’t do that to her. She needed time to build a relationship with a good man. He didn’t have time, and he wasn’t a good man. He didn’t know who or what he was anymore, and the last thing she needed in her life was another mess around her neck.

But it had been sweet to kiss her, he acknowledged as he drove down the winding path to the road, even sweeter to feel her passionate response. There was undoubtedly chemistry between them, hot and urgent, and he wanted nothing more than to explore that, to bury himself in her soft, welcoming depths all night. He’d only exist inside her, be what she wanted, what she needed, and he had the oddest feeling that then he’d be who he’d always been, who he must still be somewhere deep inside… More than that, her desire flattered him, told him he could help her. Sexual healing.

Fuck, yes.

Fuck, no!
He turned onto the road and drove down to the village, parking his car in the lock-up garage he still paid for, even though his dad didn’t have a car anymore. Neither did Louise. Even if she’d learned to drive, the B & B just didn’t do well enough to let her buy one.

But then, she couldn’t fill the place
and
look after their parents. She wouldn’t have the time or the energy. Vicious circle. And one he had to break before he left.

Several hours later, he pushed the rickety chair away from the desk in his old bedroom and rubbed the back of his neck. Neither he nor his colleagues could find any connection between Gowan and Chrissy, or anyone else at Ardknocken for that matter. The gun was almost certainly Chrissy’s, though—forensics had found traces of earth in it.

And he was sick of looking repeatedly over the profiles and biographies of the Ardknocken residents. He’d no time to get in among them and read the actual people. That was his speciality, but this was to have been a fast operation, which was why his actual life was his cover here.

He needed alibis for all of them. He even wanted to vindicate them for Chrissy’s sake, and yet if he did, if there was no connection, it left his investigation dead in the water. There was undoubtedly a connection—someone had shot Gowan with Chrissy’s gun. He just wished he could see what it was.

He glanced at his watch. A quarter past midnight. Impulsively, he stood, grabbed his jacket from the bed and left the quiet house. He saw no one as he walked through the village, past the harbour and down on to the beach. He walked fast, trying to release his frustrations—not just those of this impossible investigation, but the physical frustration inspired by Chrissy’s kisses. He still didn’t know how he’d managed to hold her in his arms and then let her go.

But the fresh air seemed to feed his lust. Her deep eyes, the softness of her breast, the passion of her kisses, all haunted him. And she wasn’t someone he could lay and leave. He didn’t want that either.

What the hell did he want? He needed to get away, leave this country and all its tangled mess of morals and ethics and loyalties far behind him. Soon. Less than two months now, and he’d be gone.

Why did even that seem bleak? Of course, he could die in Iraq. But he could have been murdered any time in the last five years.

Didn’t stop him wanting Chrissy Lennox.

Shit.

Staring out at the sea, he thought he saw the bobbing heads of seals. He wondered if she was watching them too. He walked on, waiting for calm to descend.

Close in to the cliff, something moved. Aidan paused, his body automatically going into defence mode. Even in Ardknocken.