Now You See Him (17 page)

Francey simply stared at the man. He had thinning blond hair combed back over a sunburned scalp, a petulant expression in his slightly protuberant eyes, and bad teeth. She couldn't blame him for his obvious irritation, she thought numbly. She must seem like a madwoman.

She shook her head slightly, hoping the scrambled picture would come into focus. But the wrong man was still in front of her, glaring at her, and the stately environs of Willingborough loomed menacingly behind him.

"I don't suppose you have a mother, three sisters and two brothers, and live in Yorkshire," she said, already knowing the answer.

"One brother, parents both dead, and I come from the Midlands. Someone's played a nasty trick on you, miss. Particularly if you've come all the way from the States to meet this liar."

Francey was feeling no emotion whatsoever. The combination of jet lag and a long drive across England, only to be faced with the semi-irate stranger, was too much for her. Her emotions, even her brain, simply shut down. "I needed a vacation anyway," she said vaguely. "I'm sorry that I bothered you." She began to turn away, but the real Michael Dowd appeared suddenly contrite.

"You look all done in. Why don't you come in for a cup of tea or something? My wife could fix you something to eat."

"No, thank you. I'd better get moving."

"But where are you going?"

If it was an odd question from a stranger she didn't realize that until later. She answered without thinking. "Back to London. To ask some questions, see what I can find out."

"Don't you think you'd be better off just leaving things be? It's none of my business, of course, but I imagine the man who gave you a phony name doesn't want to be found."

She looked back at him, resolution forming in her heart. "Perhaps he doesn't. But I don't like being lied to. I'm going to keep looking until I find him. And when I do, I'm going to want some answers."

Michael Dowd looked as if he wanted to argue with her further; then he shut his mouth. "I'd advise against it," he said. "But it's your funeral. Best of luck, then."

She nodded absently, heading back to the car she'd barely mastered. "My funeral," she echoed. "It just might be." She drove out along the spacious drive of Willingborough, with its century-old oaks and chestnuts, its stately grandeur, but her eyes could barely see the road. She drove mindlessly, heading back toward London. Until suddenly everything was awash, and she could barely see. She pulled over, wrestling with the unaccustomed right-hand steering wheel, and put the car into Park. And realized it wasn't raining after all. She was crying.

She wiped her face, but the tears kept coming, an unstoppable flow, and finally she couldn't fight them anymore. Leaning forward, she put her head on the steering wheel, clutching it with her hands, and wept.

The real Michael Dowd lumbered down the empty halls of Willingborough. The little swine were off reading their girlie magazines, blasting rock and roll through their adolescent eardrums. There was no one around to overhear.

He dialed the number quickly and efficiently. "Cardiff," he said when a familiar voice answered. "You were right. She showed up."

"Unfortunate," Ross Cardiff said at the other end. "But I knew she would, I just knew it. What did she say when you told her who you were?"

"She didn't believe me, of course. But I managed to convince her. She looked as if she'd been hit by a bomb. Just sort of mumbled something and said she was heading back to London."

"Do you think she'll have the sense to drop it?" Cardiff's voice was its usual nasal whine.

"I doubt it. You know Americans. And she had that 'hell hath no fury like a woman scorned' expression on her face. You know the effect he usually has on women. She'll probably walk barefoot over coals till she tracks him down. She said she was going to ask a lot of questions when she got back to London. She could make a great deal of trouble."

"Curse him," Ross fumed. "And curse her, too. He swore he hadn't boffed her. I should have known better. Even on his death bed he couldn't keep his pants on. He probably went through half the nursing staff while he was in a coma."

The real Michael Dowd grimaced on the other end, knowing full well the real cause of Ross Cardiff's fury. "I couldn't say, sir. All I know is she looked shocked, angry and determined. She said she didn't like being lied to."

"I suppose there's no need to overreact. After all, how much trouble can she cause? It's not as if she has anything to go on."

"She has a photograph, sir."

"Impossible! He couldn't have gotten that soft!" Cardiff exploded. "How did it happen?"

"I couldn't say. Obviously he didn't know it was being taken. From the looks of it, it was done at some restaurant in the islands. But it looks like the Cougar, boss. Anyone who knows him would recognize him."

There was a dead silence on the other end, and he could just imagine the expression on Cardiff's weaselly little face. "Then I suppose we're just going to have to do something about this little problem, aren't we, Dowd?"

"Not me, sir. I've got twenty-seven young buggers here to keep me busy. I've done what I can."

"For now," Cardiff said, and his voice was chilling. "I'll get back to you later."

Michael Dowd hung up the phone, staring at it for a moment. Ross Cardiff was a bad man to cross, a petty, back-stabbing little bureaucrat who thought nothing of bending the rules to support his own shortsighted agenda. He paid extremely well and asked no questions, and the real Michael Dowd had always appreciated a little tax-free income. But he was glad he was out of the line of fire in this one.

The girl was going to be right sorry she'd ever come across Ross Cardiff. And she was going to regret even more the time she'd spent with the man who'd appropriated Michael Dowd's name.

Still and all, it wasn't his problem. And if an American tourist was found floating in the Thames in the next few days, he would skip over that bit in the newspaper and concentrate on the tits and bum in the centerfold.

Still and all, it was a hell of a life.

Of all his recent persona, the man sometimes known as Cougar thought, Charlie Bisselthwaite was one of the most annoying. He'd been somewhat envious of the Michael Dowd he'd created, with his basic decency, his solid background, his hopes for the future. Charlie Bisselthwaite was nothing more than an irritating fop.

He squinted up into the bright sunlight. He'd been on Malta for more than a week now, cultural attaché to Sir Henry Putnam, the blustery ambassador, a nothing kind of job that required no more than a decent social grace and appearances at various cocktail parties. Occasionally he might have to squire around someone's angular spinster daughter, but the rest of the time was his, as long as he was discreet about it.

The problem with discretion, of course, was that it was hard for information to find you. In the week he'd been in place he'd put out tentative feelers, showing up in out-of-the-way places, asking casual questions, and so far he'd come up with nothing. Far less than had been apparent during his cursory stop on Gibraltar.

Which had only convinced him further. The Cadre wouldn't leave an obvious trail. Ross was going to have his own troop of goons tromping all over Gibraltar, looking for terrorists, and they would most likely come up with nothing more dangerous than a few Barbary apes.

On his end, he'd just begun to come up with a few stray pieces of information. Enough to keep him going. Enough to keep him so busy that he couldn't even think about Francey Neeley.

At least he knew she was getting on with her life. He'd kept tabs on her before his rash, late-night phone call. She'd gone back to work, had even gone to a few parties. In another month or so she would forget about a man named Michael Dowd and settle down into the safe little life she'd been born to. As long as he kept away from her, away from the telephone, she would be fine.

He only hoped he had the self-control to keep his promise to himself. It was in the middle of the night that it hit him—the remembered scent of her skin, the way her eyes lit up, the softness of her mouth. And nothing could wipe it away; he just had to sweat it out and hope the next day he would forget again.

He had a message waiting for him when he let himself into the villa he was renting on the south end of the island. He made himself a drink first, not certain he wanted to talk to Scott. Scott was stationed in New York—he'd had him watch over Francey from a discreet distance, just to make certain she was all right.

On the one hand, she might be in trouble. On the other, Scott might just be checking in with the latest report. Maybe he would tell him that she was seeing someone. Sleeping with someone. Ready to get married.

He drained his whiskey and water in one gulp, glancing at his reflection in the mirror. The brown hair suited him, and so did the tan. He was getting used to the brown contact lenses—he'd used them often enough before, and he had finally begun to put the weight back on his gaunt body. The man Francey had known on the island no longer existed. He needed to remember that.

"Bad news about your little friend, chum," Scott said flatly when he finally reached him.

He was used to controlling his reactions. He ignored the sudden stab of panic. "Is she all right?" he managed in a calm drawl.

"She left for London more than a week ago, and on Saturday she went missing. There are a couple of possibilities."

"I'm waiting."

"One, that she went looking for you. Someone fitting her description was seen outside Willingborough, but Michael Dowd said he hadn't seen her."

"What's the other possibility?" His voice was terse, strained.

"Before she left she liquidated a large portion of her personal fortune. I don't think you're going to want to know what she did with it."

"Don't make me ask."

"The Children of Eire. She signed it all over to them, after working on fund-raising during the bulk of last month. And you know as well as I do what the COE is a front for."

"The Cadre." He wouldn't believe it. Despite strong cause for doubt, he'd believed her, trusted her. He couldn't believe she was part of that nest of vipers. Not after all this time. It just didn't add up.

"It would fit in with her disappearance. She could have gone over to join them."

"Then why was she near Willingborough? And why did Dowd lie about it?"

"You know who you'll have to ask about that, old man. Cardiff himself. I can't do any more for you."

"You've done enough, Scott. I owe you."

There was a momentary hesitation on the other end. "You think she's okay, Cougar? I got sort of fond of her while I was watching her. Seemed like a nice girl."

"I don't know. I damned well mean to find out, if I have to beat it out of Cardiff."

"And if she's gone to join the Cadre?"

It was a possibility too bleak to even consider. "Then I'll find her when I find the others." And God have mercy on her soul.

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The cell was tiny, foul and terrifying. Francey sat on the edge of the narrow pallet, making herself very small. The voices were all around her, speaking in languages she couldn't understand, Spanish, Arabic, German. And she was frightened.

So very, very frightened. How had it happened? Somehow she'd been thrust into a maze of contradictions and lies that had brought her to this place of horrors. Just days before she'd walked into a sunny Spanish bar. And ended up here.

"I'm looking for a man," she had said, trying to cover the faint quaver of uneasiness in her voice.

The man behind the bar ignored her. She tried again, her voice a little louder, a little shakier. "I'm looking for a man,
señor
," she said.

The bartender stared at her out of black, expressionless eyes. She knew he spoke English as well as Spanish—the sign on the bar informed her of as much. In the two days she'd been wandering around Spain, she'd discovered that most people were multilingual, and if they didn't understand English, she could just manage to communicate in her schoolgirl French. The tiny port of Mariz was her third Spanish city in two days, the smallest, after Malaga and Sevilla, and the least hopeful.

The bartender spread a meaty hand over the crowded bar. "Take your pick," he said, turning away.

She had the nerve to reach out and catch his arm. "No, I'm looking for a particular man. My cousin. He has a big boat…"

"Lots of big boats," the bartender said, nodding toward the shining blue of the Mediterranean beyond the grimy, fly-specked window.

"His name is Daniel Travers. He's my cousin…"

A man standing too close beside her sniggered. "That's what they all say. If you can't find this 'cousin' of yours, I can get you plenty of work. There are lots of very rich cousins out there, and I won't expect too much of a cut."

She glared at the man, giving him her best patrician stare. The man simply shrugged. "Or you can make do with one of us." He ran a filthy hand down her bare arm, and she shivered. "A tourist would know better than to come into a place like this. Why should a man with a boat be here? The rich ones go to better places than this."

She yanked her arm away, stumbling backward into a table, knocking over several bottles of beer on disgruntled customers. It happened quickly, too quickly. Someone grabbed her purse, another swung a punch, and somewhere a woman screamed. Francey dived for her purse, landing on her knees on the dusty floor, her purse clutched in her hands. Landed in front of two pairs of uniformed legs.

She looked up, way up, into the shuttered expressions of two members of the local police. They didn't move, merely stared down at her as she struggled to her feet.

"That one," the bartender was suddenly more voluble. "She came in here, causing trouble with my customers. Said she was looking for a rich boat owner."

Francey glared at him in frustration. "Not
a
rich boat owner," she corrected him. "I'm looking for my cousin. I was told he was somewhere off the Costa Blanca, and I thought…"