Dark Waters (2013) (18 page)

He turned the lock as the woman called, “You were quick. What did you forget?”

She came out of the bedroom all smiles and rosy pink cheeks. He raised the gun. It was useless, but she didn’t know that. She stopped dead and lost all color. Her eyes darted to the window.

“He’s not going to be able to help you.”

Her eyes widened and then flashed with anger. “What did you do to him?” She took a step toward him and raised her hand as if to strike him.

He slapped her hard and she hit the ground. He liked the sight of her down there, a lot. Anger morphed into something else. Something primal and ruthless. Ancient and animalistic. He dropped to his haunches, lowered his voice. The imprint of his hand was stark red on her milk-white flesh. “Where are your car keys?”

Her eyes flashed to the key rack. “Over there. Just take it and get out.”

Little bitch
. He grabbed her by the hair and twisted her around so she was bent up in an uncomfortable arch and had to grab onto his wet shirt for balance. He could feel the revulsion in her touch even as she defied him, but he knew how to break her.

“Where’s the bedroom?”

She started punching him and he slapped her so hard her head bounced off the linoleum.

“We can do this the hard way or the easy way,” he told her, because he
was
doing this even though he didn’t have much time, just to ease the pressure in his balls and siphon off the fury that pounded his blood. “If we do it the easy way, your old man need never even know.” He held her gaze, and understanding filtered through the confusion and fear.

First, her husband wasn’t already dead. Second, she wasn’t getting a choice in this and fighting would just make it worse. The emotion leaching from her gaze was fascinating to watch, but Rand didn’t have time for any long-term observations. She nodded slowly and climbed jerkily to her feet. He gripped her wrist as she led the way to the bedroom, although she panicked at the doorway with the bed just feet away.

He subdued her easily and dropped her to the floor. He started peeling off his wet clothes, thankful to be out of them. Taking an extra five minutes wouldn’t harm his escape plans and right now his dick was so hard it felt like a lead weight between his legs. He pulled her up, pushed her on the bed, and dragged her jeans down to her ankles. She thrashed and he smacked her again, dazing her with the impact. “Keep still.”

Finally, she lay unmoving and he did what he needed to do. When he was finished, he pulled on her husband’s dry clothes that were too short for him in the arms and legs, but at least were dry. He made her get dressed and forced her into the car at gunpoint. “You and I are going for a drive. If the cops stop you, I’m your brother visiting from Victoria and you’re driving me home. If you do anything to raise their suspicions, I will kill them, and then I will strip you naked and make what just happened look like a fucking romantic comedy. Understand?”

Her eyes were bleak as she nodded at him. She started the car and turned onto the main road.

Yep, he sure as hell knew how to break them, but he was pissed this was just some redheaded stranger rather than the brunette he was chasing. He didn’t like anyone jerking his chain and he really didn’t like people shooting his buddies.

Sitting in the passenger seat of Brent’s truck, Anna had her knees drawn up to her chin, the neat denim skirt pulled tight over her legs. He liked the girly clothes she wore, not that it was any of his damned business.

“How do you know Holly won’t stop us getting on a plane?” She bit her bottom lip and he had to drag his eyes back to the road.

“She might go to the airport, but she won’t risk anything that might put me back inside because that would not go down well with her fiancée. Not that she wouldn’t bust my ass if she found out I broke the law,” he added. He’d made a few calls when they’d been getting Anna’s “other” passport. “But that won’t matter, because we aren’t leaving through the usual channels.” And he was pretty sure Finn would know that. He’d hurt his brother by rejecting his plans to help, but he’d spent a lifetime not trusting others and wasn’t about to change now, even though part of him wanted to. But he couldn’t do it. Not even for a brother whose unfailing loyalty he’d done nothing to earn and didn’t deserve.

In darkness, the inner harbor was lit up like a Christmas tree. They’d taken a quick detour to Brent’s agent’s Victoria offices to
collect his travel documentation, and although the guy hadn’t been there, his secretary had been ecstatic to help him with all the paperwork he’d needed done on short notice. Brent drove to the wharf and saw Anna’s surprise when he pulled into a parking space and cut the engine. He hoisted the bag of goodies she’d picked up that morning out of the backseat.

“Let’s go.”

The place was still bustling with tourist frenzy. Too many people. Too much noise. He blocked it out. Concentrated on Anna. Her scent. Her smile. Keeping her safe.

She followed him, somewhat hesitantly.

He didn’t blame her. The situation was fucked up. Cop-killing bad guys had tracked them down after he’d assured her they couldn’t, and he’d just ditched the one offer of protection she’d had. Maybe it wasn’t such a great idea, going back to the scene of the crime, but it was the last place anyone would expect them to turn up. And hell, he needed to figure out where Davis had mailed this evidence, needed to talk to Jack Panetti if and when he woke up. Jack must have been pushing someone’s buttons. He needed to figure out whose.

When Holly connected the dead cop in Chicago to Davis—which she would sooner or later—there was no way she’d let him or Anna out of her sight. He’d be eating, sleeping, and dreaming Mounties. And no one was locking him up—not even for his own good.

They strode along the wharf, past the million-dollar boats in their prime berths, toward the jetties where the floatplanes bobbed incongruously on the water. They passed a city cop patrolling the wharf, and Brent tugged Anna closer and rested his arm across her shoulders. He shortened his stride so she wasn’t forced to rush to keep up. Her muscles felt rigid as tempered steel.

“Relax,” he breathed into her hair. A strand caught on his lips and he had to force himself to move his head away and not just stand there inhaling her scent like a fool.

Brent led her to where a bright red seaplane was tied to the end of a short pier. The pilot stood at the end of a gangplank, his eyes licking at Anna like candy. Brent’s fingers tightened on her shoulder and then he let go. She wasn’t his. But she was his best friend’s daughter in one hell of a mess, and deserved to be treated with respect.

He nodded to the other man. It had been a few years.

“Never thought I’d see the day you left the island, Carver.” There was a lingering touch of Australian in his accent.

“You sure this piece of shit flies?”

The pilot aimed a grin at Anna, though anger shimmered in his eyes. “Charming as ever, I see.” He held out his hand to shake Anna’s. “And who might you be?”

Brent laid a cautionary hand on Anna’s lower back as she shook the pilot’s hand. “Nice to meet you,” was all she said. He tried to figure out when he and Anna had learned this silent form of communication. The fact he couldn’t keep his hands off her even in the most innocent of situations told him he was in trouble, but thankfully she was sensible enough for both of them.

The pilot gripped her small pale hand for an extra second. “You’re here because you want to be here, right? This guy isn’t abducting you?” His eyes were worried.

Brent took his hands off Anna and turned his back on them both.
Sonofabitch
.

“I wouldn’t say I want to be here, but Brent’s helping me,” Anna said softly.

He whirled back to face them. “Ready now, or you want me to pass a lie detector test before you let me on board?”

“Hey, I’m just trying to do the right thing, mate.”

Brent rolled his eyes. He didn’t want small talk or questions or reminders of the sort of man he’d once been. Although he’d never once gone after the little guy. Nor had he ever touched a woman in anger. But you didn’t spout your weaknesses to people who might use them against you.

“Just need to finish the preflight inspection and we’re good to go.”

They climbed aboard, stowed what luggage they had, and sat in the bright red leather seats. Brent secured his harness, leaned back his head, and stared up at the ceiling of the small tin box they were about to take to the skies in. Every muscle in his body tensed and his hands gripped the end of the armrests so tight it hurt.

“Is this the first time you’ve flown?” Anna asked quietly.

He jolted at the sound of her voice, wishing the taste in his mouth wasn’t fear. “Never went anywhere as a kid and didn’t want to explore once I got out.” Or maybe he was just too chickenshit to face the world. He sat up straighter. He didn’t like that option.

“Do you trust him?” Anna leaned past him and tried to catch sight of the pilot outside.

Brent shrugged the stiffness out of his shoulders. “I’m paying him good money and he’d think twice before he crossed me. That’s as much as I trust anyone.”

“Are most people scared of you?” Anna’s eyes were wide, but he couldn’t read them.

In prison, he’d specialized in keeping out of trouble by being a hard-ass. It had kept him alive. “Sixteen-year-olds who kill their fathers are given a wide berth even in prison.” The words had their usual bitter aftertaste.

Bright green eyes bored into him. “You loved him, didn’t you?”

He felt like she’d shot him in the stomach.
Christ
. “Yeah,” he admitted grudgingly, “I loved him.”

“So why did you kill him? What did he do to you?”

He shrugged.

Her expression turned hurt before it turned angry. He grabbed her hands to hold them still and blew out a big breath, giving up the battle to keep it all a secret. Who gave a shit anyway? It didn’t change anything, and if anyone deserved the truth it was Anna.

“It wasn’t me. Not that night,” he spat it out as if it were a curse.

“Your brother then,” Anna guessed.

Blood chilled in his veins from the memories. The idea of striking a child was shocking to most, but it had been commonplace when he’d been growing up. Even now it hurt to think about what his brother had endured. “When I was little, things were OK, but then Dad lost his job driving logging trucks and started drinking heavily. He started hitting Mom and I couldn’t stop him.”

“But she left you there with him…?” She sounded incredulous.

“He didn’t hit Finn or me until after she ran away. I don’t think she’d have left us if she’d known what was gonna happen.” Maybe that’s just what he liked to think, and he hadn’t realized he was still that naive. “She did what she had to, to survive. It’s what we all did.”

“No one ever tried to help?”

“People weren’t so up on issues of child abuse or domestic violence back then. Plus, people liked my dad. Me and Finn were both a bit wild.” He had tried to ask for help once and got told to stop telling tales. That miserable bitch still ran the post office.

“So the night you killed your father, he was assaulting Finn?” She searched his face. She had the kindest, greenest eyes. The softest looking mouth he’d ever seen.
Christ. Don’t think about her mouth
.

Cold sweat broke out over his back. He started talking. “After Mom left, the sonofabitch transferred all the hate to Finn, and if I got in the way, he’d dish me up some fun times too. I’ll never forget the first time he punched me—felt like I’d run smack-bang into a Douglas fir.” His voice dropped. Hell, he didn’t want to drag all these memories back to the surface, but maybe it would be enough to take his mind off the thought of flying and be enough to let her trust him. They were going to have to trust each other now to get out of this situation alive.

“Usually we got out of the cabin Friday and Saturday nights because that’s when he drank. We’d sneak home after he’d collapsed somewhere unconscious. For years we had it down to a fine art, but then I started dating Gina and wasn’t watching out
for Finn the way I should have been.” He gave a bitter laugh. “Discovering sex short-circuited my brain.”
Christ
. If only he’d known. “Finn must have fallen asleep watching TV and Dad caught him. I walked in just as Finn told him to go fuck himself.” Thirteen years old and the kid had already been broken and bleeding. “You wouldn’t know it from looking at Finn now but back then, he was a hundred-pound weakling. Our daddy was more your brick shithouse variety.” Brent had inherited his height. He shook his head remembering the screams, and the even more shocking silence. “I thought Dad had killed him for sure that time, so I picked up a bottle—I was big for my age, and a hell of a baseball player—and hit him over the head to make him stop. Just once, but it was enough.” The carnage from that night was forever imprinted on his senses.

Anna sat frozen, but he didn’t look at her. “I knew I’d hurt him, but he didn’t want me to leave him. Made me hold his hand until…” He flexed his fingers and she took his hand in hers.

Saliva pooled in his mouth. His insides were already wobbly at the thought of flying—now he felt like he was about to throw up. “Finn was too beat up to go for help, so I just held Dad until he stopped breathing, and then I carried Finn to the Coast Guard station and waited for the cops to arrive.” He let go of her hand and jammed his fingers into his hair. “I was drenched in his blood. Looked like something out of a slaughterhouse. Finn was airlifted to the hospital and I was hauled off to jail.”