Now You See Him (21 page)

"Unlimited. Take your time, and then Dr. Brady will bring your vitamin shot."

"No shots," she said flatly.

"But, Francey…"

"No shots. I need a decent meal, a hot shower and some answers."

Daniel's smile was uneasy. "I'll give you everything I can," he murmured.

She locked the door behind him, moving on unsteady feet across the thick carpeting. Leaning against the door, she stared at her quarters, at the first privacy she'd had in weeks.

She'd been in a different cabin the last time she'd been on the
True Blue
. This was one of the larger ones, reserved for movie stars and heads of state. Being locked in a Spanish prison had its advantages, she thought sourly, surveying the bed.

Such strange dreams, she thought. Would they haunt her from now on? Or would she put them behind her, along with Spain and her fruitless search for Michael?

Only when she knew the truth. And she wasn't going to stop asking, stop demanding, until she did. It didn't matter that her ceaseless quest had led to being imprisoned. She couldn't, wouldn't be a good little girl and go home. Even though she knew Daniel was going to do his best to convince her to do just that.

She walked slowly, carefully, across the room. Her feet hurt. Last night was a blur, but she had snatches of memory, of being dragged through the back alleys of Mariz by a dark, robed figure. She'd lost her shoes somewhere along the way and stumbled along barefoot. It was no wonder her feet hurt.

She moved to the side of the bed, looking down at the rumpled gray sheets, reaching out and touching them, her hands brushing the smooth cotton. She sank, stretching out on the bed, burying her face against the sheets, her fingers clutching the material. And she lay there and shook with longing, and the trace of a lost memory.

"She's asking too many questions," Daniel fretted.

Michael looked up at him, squinting into the direct sunlight. The hot shower had taken only one layer of the stain from his skin, his hair was still dark, and he felt reasonably secure in just keeping his distance from Francey. Maybe he'd been too sanguine about the situation. She'd seemed so exhausted, so apathetic, that he'd assumed she'd given up her quest.

"What kind of answers have you been giving her?"

"None, yet. But I don't know how long I can put her off. Cardiff told me I should keep her drugged until we get on the plane back to New York, but I…"

"No." He kept his voice flat and even, but Daniel flinched nervously. Michael was accustomed to having that effect on people, and for once he was glad of it. "No more drugs. She's been through enough. Tell her anything you damned well please, as long as it doesn't compromise the current operation."

"I don't even know what the current operation is," Daniel said fretfully.

"And why should you? All that matters is that she doesn't know where I am. Tell her I'm in Northern Ireland. I don't think you can make her believe I'm a schoolteacher, not if she ran into the real Michael Dowd. Use your imagination. Lie to her. You've been on the fringes of the intelligence community long enough to have learned how to do it."

"She's not too easy to lie to."

Michael closed his eyes for a moment, remembering. "No, she's not. But you'll have to rise to the occasion. Tell her I'm part of a witness relocation program. Tell her you don't know, but you think I'm somewhere in Russia. Tell her I'm dead."

"That might be for the best."

Michael considered his demise unemotionally. "Yes," he said. "It might. For everyone. What's she doing now?"

"She's having a shower, then coming up on deck. You'd better make yourself scarce. I can come up with something if I don't have to worry about her seeing you."

"She won't recognize me if she does. Michael Dowd was a tall, frail redhead. She didn't know me last night, and she won't know me today if she sees me from a distance."

"You were in robes last night, and she was under a lot of stress. I wouldn't count on her being that unobservant, particularly if you won't let me drug her. Maybe you want her to recognize you."

Michael considered that possibility, considered what would happen if she did. And he shook his head. "It would probably sign her death warrant. I'll keep out of her way. You keep her out of mine."

Daniel stared at him. "I don't like you, you know. I don't like what you've done to Francey. I don't like the kind of man you are. I just thought I should mention that."

Michael smiled then, and Daniel took an involuntary step backward. "When she was with me, old man, she was safe. You were the one who knew Ross Cardiff was pulling a fast one, and yet you did nothing to protect her. You sacrificed her for your vicarious thrill seeking, and you don't even have the excuse that you were working for the greater good. You're a voyeur, Travers, a ghoul who feasts on other men's violence. At least Cardiff has no illusions that he's one of the good guys." He rose, towering over the older man, and he could see real fear in his eyes. "Don't worry, old man. Your worthless hide's safe. Unless something else happens to Francey."

"Nothing's going to happen to her," Travers said stiffly.

"Old man," Michael said softly, "see that it doesn't."

She was seeing Michael everywhere. When she stepped out of the cabin, not bothering to wait for Daniel to come fetch her, she saw a shadow disappearing around the corner, a shadow that looked like Michael.

On the deck, in the distance, a tall dark man had the same grace, the same back. She shook her head and he was gone, and she felt a little frisson of unease run through her. Was she going to be tormented by ghosts for the rest of her life? How long would it take her to forget him?

"Have some more coffee, Miss Neeley." Daniel's private doctor, a jovial soul named Elmore Brady, pushed her cup toward her. "You've been through quite an experience. Caffeine's the drug of choice, don't you know?"

Francey managed a polite smile. She knew perfectly well why Daniel had invited Elmore to join them for breakfast. He thought she would be too discreet to ask the questions that were plaguing her, to demand the answers she deserved. He was wrong.

She took another sip of her too-sweet coffee, squinting into the bright sunlight. Daniel's yacht was making good time, plowing through the bright blue of the Mediterranean, heading toward Malta and eventually home. She had no intention of stepping on any airplane until she had a few answers.

"So tell me, Daniel," she said sweetly. "Who is the man you sent to stay with me on St. Anne?"

She didn't miss the look that passed between the doctor and Daniel, a look that hinted at more knowledge than anyone felt like giving her. For a moment a black rage swept over her, one that left her weak and shaking.

"You mean Michael Dowd? You know perfectly well who he was. A recuperating schoolteacher from Willingborough. Why should you assume any differently?" Daniel didn't meet her accusing gaze, concentrating instead on his fresh-squeezed orange juice.

"Because I met the real Michael Dowd. The man you sent me was a phony. And it was searching for him that got me locked up in that Spanish prison. So I think I have every right to know who and what he is. And
where
."

"I really don't know, Francey. The little man… Cardiff's his name, by the way. I know him through some of my volunteer work. He asked if I knew of a place for a friend of his. I had no idea that the friend was using an assumed name, or that he was putting you into any danger. I really thought—"

"Bull," she said flatly. "You may be shortsighted, but you're not a fool, Daniel. The man calling himself Michael Dowd came to St. Anne for a reason. I want to know what that reason was."

"Don't you think," Dr. Elmore Brady suggested gently, "that you might be better off not knowing?"

The sun was too damned bright. It was giving her a blinding headache, making her joints ache, her heart thud, her eyes feel leaden, swollen. "How dare you?" she tried to say, but her tongue was thick. For a moment her eyes widened, to look at the two men watching her with such concern. "You… bastards…" she said. "You've drugged…" Her mouth no longer worked.

She heard Daniel's voice. "I'm sorry, Francey, but it's for your own good. I had to—" And then his voice stopped in a strangled, pained squeak.

"I should kill you," Michael's voice came from nowhere, from the blinding brightness of the sun. But Michael wasn't there, and why should he want to kill her? It was all too confusing, and for now she couldn't fight to make sense of it. She needed to use all her energy to fight the insidious effect of whatever filthy drug they'd given her, fight to open her eyes, fight to stay awake, fight…fight…

Michael was getting too damned used to this chair. He hadn't left her since he'd carried her back to the cabin. He watched, eagle-eyed, as that quack Elmore checked her vital signs. He watched, unmoving, when the housekeeper came and put her back into that chaste white nightgown, ignoring any claim to modesty Francey might have. He remained all through the long hours of the day, as a storm front moved over the Mediterranean, sending the
True Blue
skidding along the tops of the waves. He remained through the long hours of the evening, when rain lashed against the portholes and wind howled along the decks. Not for a minute did he worry about the
True Blue
sinking. It would be a mercy for all if it did. Francey would never know what happened to her. And he wouldn't have to deal with the Cadre, with the deceit of everyone who surrounded him. With his own deceit.

Somewhere around two in the morning he decided he was going to start smoking again the moment he got off this boat. He didn't really know why he'd stopped, except that any addiction at all had the potential of betraying him to the enemy. He already had a powerful addiction, one to the woman lying on the bed. He was far more vulnerable through her than he was through cigarette smoke.

The sea calmed, the rain became a steady drone, and he slept, fitfully, knowing the door was locked against any intruders, knowing that for at least a few more hours he could keep her safe. When he opened his eyes again to the early-morning stillness, the bed was empty.

She was kneeling at his feet, staring up at him out of drugged eyes. Her hair was a tangled mass behind her pale face, and her hands were holding on to the seat of the chair, as if for support, as she watched him.

"Michael?" Her voice was no more than a whisper. She reached out to touch him, as if she couldn't believe he was real, he was there, he was solid flesh.

He was lost, and he knew it. In the murky shadows she wouldn't see the dark skin and hair, the added muscle. She knew him, would have known him with her eyes closed. On some level she'd probably known he was there from the beginning, no matter how drugged she was.

He could deny it, fight it. He could catch her slim white hand before it connected with his chest, put her back to bed alone and let the drug regain its control. He could leave her to the tender mercies of her cousin and his drug-pushing doctor, and she would probably be a lot better off.

But he wasn't going to. She was drugged, shocked, confused and vulnerable. And he was going to take her anyway.

Her hand was cool through the thin cotton of his open shirt, cool against his hot skin. He covered her hand with his larger one, pressing it against him, and he could feel white-hot desire leap through his veins.

That saintly, country-bred gentlewoman who ruled Whipdale Manor would have raised her son never to take advantage of a woman in Francey's condition. But then, he'd never known that mythical woman. He'd made his own ethics, his own sense of honor. Now he was about to betray it, and he didn't give a damn. He needed her more than honor.

He slid his other hand behind her, under the thick tangle of sun-streaked hair, and urged her closer. She moved willingly, kneeling between his wide-spread legs, and she tilted her head back, closing her eyes and parting her lips, waiting for him.

Such an invitation was too hard to resist, and he wasn't the man to try. He put his lips against hers, very gently, just brushing them for a moment.

She groaned, moving closer, wanting more, her hands sliding up his chest to dig into his shoulders, and he deepened the kiss, slanting his mouth across hers, dampening her drug-dry lips with his tongue before plunging it deep. She shuddered in his arms, moving closer still, her stomach pressed up against his groin, and he wanted to pull her astride him, onto his lap, opening his pants and taking her there and then.

It was a potent fantasy, but not as strong as the reality of her mouth. Whatever consciousness had surfaced beyond the drug's reach, it was being channeled into her mouth, her body. He slid his hands down, lifting her up effortlessly, and moved her over to the bed.

"Don't leave me," she whispered when he set her down, and she reached for him with something close to desperation.

"I won't," he said, knowing it was a lie, knowing he was going to leave her all too soon. He didn't bother with the row of tiny buttons this time; he simply yanked the white cotton nightgown over her head. She lay back against the pillows, her hair fanned out around her, watching him, completely unselfconscious.

Her tan had faded, she'd lost weight, and the bruises marked her body in the dim light. Stripping off his own clothes, he lay down next to her, drawing her unresisting body into his arms. "I don't even know what they did to you," he whispered against her skin, kissing the bruise on her shoulder. "I can see the marks where they hurt you, but I don't know how badly. I don't know if you're ready for this." He looked down at her, pushing her hair out of her face. "I only know I can't wait…"

She silenced him, reaching up with her mouth, catching his, kissing him, and then there was no more room for words. He touched her with his hard, dark hands and watched her body writhe with pleasure. He kissed her on her pale breasts, the bruises scattered across her peach-colored flesh; he kissed her between her legs until she arched off the bed with a strangled, inarticulate cry.

He didn't remember when he'd last had a woman. He didn't remember if he'd ever had a woman like Francey. A good woman, one who deserved far better. He knelt between her legs, looming over her in the darkness, and expected to see the shadow of fear darken her dazed face. Instead she reached for him, pulling him down to her, and he sank into her gloved tightness with a sense of coming home.