Flirting With Disaster (22 page)

“Do you know where your father is?”

She laughed. “No.”

“Are you helping him?”

“I haven’t heard from him since I left Chicago. He doesn’t know where I am or what my name is. All right? Is that all you wanted?”

He sighed. “Can we sit down?”

“Sure. Maybe I can serve coffee and cake. We can pretend we’re fuck buddies again.”

“Just sit!”

Isabelle shrugged. She’d gotten her composure, finally, but her legs still trembled as she moved carefully to the living room. She took the chair so he couldn’t sit near her.

He collapsed onto the couch. “I didn’t know who you were the first time we... After your party... I didn’t know until the next day when I had a chance to look up your mom and her accident.”

Her heart twisted so hard it hurt. “You were spying on my personal conversations. And trying to get me to talk about myself... I thought you were actually interested in me. Jesus.”

“I
was
. I’d realized how much I liked you and, I swear to God, at that point I was trying to disprove my own suspicions so I could let it go and get to know you.”

She concentrated on the one mark she’d managed to leave on his face. The scratch was already fading. It wouldn’t hurt him for more than a few more minutes, if he’d even felt it at all. “We slept together,” she said, “and you kept checking into me.”

He looked away from her. “Yes.”

“And you thought that was okay?”

He met her gaze again and set his jaw. “I thought you might have needed help. And I was right.”

“How were you right? I didn’t need any help. I was fine until you called the FBI.”

“I didn’t call them. When I finally realized who you were, I checked the federal file on your dad. The account was flagged. Agent Gates called me a few minutes later. I denied having seen you or your father. Told him I was only conducting some routine research on federal fugitives. He didn’t believe it.”

“Agent Gates?” She frowned. That name sounded familiar.

“Do you know him?”

“I don’t know. Maybe. There were a lot of people involved in my father’s case. A lot of bad people. And you’ve led them to my door.”

“What happened?” he asked.

She shook her head. It was hopeless. There’d never been anything terrible enough to put a stop to any of it. There’d been late-night visits and veiled threats and anything she’d told a federal investigator had gotten to all of her father’s associates within hours.

Once her father had vanished, the visits had increased, the cops constantly asking if her father had left anything or asked her to hide anything or if she’d seen him leaving with a package. Some of them had been the good guys, maybe. Some of them hadn’t. And the only one her father had warned her about had been the one she’d refused to believe was involved. She’d needed him not to be.

“Why did you run, Isabelle?”

“Because I was afraid I’d end up dead if I didn’t.”

“Someone threatened you?”

She laughed again, an ugly sound. “No one out and out said they would kill me, but there was a lot of ‘If you don’t help us, there’s nothing we can do to protect you.’ And that was true. My own father didn’t protect me. He left. So did my fiancé. I ran because I was on my own, and I didn’t know any other way to save myself.”

“Why were they threatening you?”

“At first they wanted to know where my father was. Everyone wanted to know.”

“Were you helping him?”

She shrugged. “Barely. He was moving place to place, asking for money. I obliged a few times in those first weeks and then told him to fuck off. I have no idea where he went after that. Out of the country, I assume. You want to arrest me now for aiding and abetting?”

“No,” he said simply, and then he watched, waiting for her to continue.

“That’s all there is to it, Marshal. That’s the worst I did. When I wouldn’t give up my father, it was all about evidence. The FBI, the police department, the district attorneys. They all wanted to know if he’d left anything or taken anything. The house was ransacked one night. The threats started in earnest. I left.”

“And was there any evidence?”

She looked him dead in the eyes and lied like she had a hundred times before. He was one of them now. It made no difference. “No.”

Tom blew out a long breath and then pulled out his phone. “Gates gave me an hour,” he muttered as he typed a text. “Mary will have to take care of the team.”

“What? An hour for what?”

He sent the message and glanced up. “We’ve got an hour before he takes you in.”

She shook her head. “No. I’m not going with him. I’ll run.”

“Isabelle. I’m a US marshal. You’re not going anywhere.”

“You don’t understand. He’ll take me back to Chicago. I won’t be safe.”

“It’s been a long time. The people who were after you—”

“You think it’s safe now?” She stood and started for her bedroom. “He flew all the way out here after you told him I wasn’t here! Why is he so invested?”

Tom was right on her heels. “I don’t know. I was hoping you could tell me.”

“They’re all fucking crooked, that’s why.”

“Come on. That’s not reasonable.”

She rounded on him with a sneer. “It’s not? Do you really think that gang of crooked cops just all happened to be below the rank of lieutenant? They’d been shaking people down for fifteen years, and none of them were ever promoted higher than that? They couldn’t have survived that long without their bosses taking a cut of the action and covering their tracks. Yet the investigation stopped there at the DA’s office. It never rose higher in the ranks. And somebody in the FBI made sure the police knew exactly what was going on with every move.”

She crossed her arms tightly, holding on to herself before she realized how weak that gesture was and made her fingers let go. “Anytime I had a meeting scheduled with an investigator, there was someone knocking on my door the night before, talking about my dad and loyalty and how many good men could be hurt by all of this if it got out of control. How the hell did they know when I’d be talking to the FBI?”

“Shit, Isabelle,” he murmured.

She poked him hard in the chest, but he didn’t even raise a hand to stop her. “Why didn’t you turn me in as soon as you realized who I was?”

“It didn’t smell right,” he admitted.

“No. Because it’s not right. And I’m not going with Agent Gates. If you won’t let me run, then take me in yourself.” She grabbed her jeans from the floor and jerked them on. She’d already jumped in the shower and brushed her teeth before Tom had awoken. But she couldn’t think about him in her bed now. She couldn’t think about the way he’d reached for her in the night and made love to her in darkness, both of them half-asleep and murmuring sweet words of pleasure. It hadn’t been sweet, after all.

“You’re not a federal fugitive,” he said.

“Arrest me for contempt or something. I’m sure I missed a subpoena or two.”

“Isabelle—”

“I can’t go with him,” she growled.

“If you really feel you’re in danger, let me talk to my boss about the protection program.”

She burst into bitter laughter. “Are you kidding? They’re going to spend thousands of dollars to protect me from the
feeling
I’m in danger? I’m not even a witness in a trial. I’m just a stupid, naive girl who got caught in the middle.”

“Shit.” He rubbed a hand over his face.

“You did this! You lied to me. You fucked me. You led them to me!”

“Goddamn it, you were lying, too. You lied about everything, and that didn’t stop you from fucking me, did it?”

“No,” she said, hating the way tears filled her eyes. “I did it, too.”

“Jesus, just give me a minute, all right? I need to think about what to do.”

She wasn’t sure what she’d expected, but pacing helplessly around wasn’t his style, apparently. He got his laptop from its case and sat down in her living room. “Don’t sneak out the back door,” he said. “You’ll be easy to track in the snow.”

“Fuck you,” she tossed back, then went to pack a bag. She had cash. She always kept cash, just in case. If she couldn’t leave right now, she’d leave as soon as she could.

Bear jumped into her suitcase and stared at her as if she’d already done something wrong. God. She’d have to ask Jill to take him in. Bear wouldn’t like that at all. Then again, Jill would feed him table scraps. Maybe he’d be happier there with all he could eat and no more oil paint in his fur.

Isabelle started to cry, but she scrubbed furiously at the tears until they stopped. That was all she’d done for weeks in Chicago. Hidden in her house being scared and weepy. She didn’t even like to think about that girl; she definitely wasn’t going to
be
her again.

She picked Bear up out of her suitcase. “You can’t come with me,” she said sternly, and then she held him tightly to her, burying her face in his fur. But Bear wasn’t big on self-pity, either, and he stiffened up and yowled within a few seconds. When she let him go, he ran off to hide. They were just alike, she and Bear.

Now that she’d had a moment alone, she realized she was being weak again, asking Tom for help. He was only the latest in a long line of supposedly honorable men who’d spent every moment lying to her.

She couldn’t trust him.

He was suddenly in the doorway of the bedroom, the lines around his eyes far deeper than they had been the night before. “Gates was one of the original guys assigned to the case. Fairly low down on the totem pole back then, but...”

She stared Tom dead in the eyes, trying not to gloat over such a sad victory.

“Maybe...” he ventured, “that’s why he’s still so dogged. It’s an important case to him.”

“You know that’s not it,” she said. “I’m leaving.”

“Wait. I have an idea. Do you think you could trust me?”

She laughed. “Why the hell would I do that?”

“Because you’re right. I made this happen, and I don’t trust Gates, and I’m going to take care of you.”

“Ha!” The bitter sound turned into honest laughter. She had to stop and catch her breath. “Are you kidding me? You’re not going to take care of me. Let me tell you exactly what you’re going to do. You’re going to make promises. You’re going to say pretty things. And then as soon as it gets rough, you’ll walk away, and I’ll be worse off than I was before.”

“That’s not how I work,” he growled.

“That’s how everyone works. My own father taught me that. The man who loved me from the moment I was born. My fucking hero. So no, Tom, I can’t trust you.”

“I’m going to bring you in,” he said as if she hadn’t just laughed in his face. “You have information about a federal fugitive, and I’m going to bring you in for questioning.”

“I don’t have any information, and you’re not taking me anywhere.”

“Isabelle,” he said darkly. Then he started toward her.

She backed away. “No. We still have thirty minutes. Just leave and give me a head start. You owe me that.”

“I’m bringing you in. It’ll at least buy us twenty-four hours.”

She meant to fight him. She had every intention of getting away. But he reached out and grabbed her wrist, and one quick flick later, she was on the bed with both her hands clasped in one of his. “No,” she said, trying to scream the word, but it came out as a whimper. “Please don’t.”

“This is for your own good,” he answered. “I’m not letting you run anymore. You deserve better.”

“No!” she said more loudly. “No, Tom, please!” But she heard the handcuffs click into place, and panic flooded her blood. “Let me go. I can take care of myself. I’ll disappear, and I’ll be out of your hair.
Please.
”

“Ms. Pozniak, you’re under arrest for aiding and abetting a federal fugitive.”

“Let me go!” she shrieked, struggling against him as he took her arms and pulled her to her feet. She broke free for a moment, falling back to the mattress, but he didn’t even stop talking as he grabbed her again.

“You have the right to an attorney. If you—”

“I fucking hate you, Tom Duncan,” she said as he swung her around. “You’re a lying bastard, and I wish I’d never touched you.”

He didn’t even flinch. He just kept on reading her her rights.

She really wished she hadn’t started to fall a little in love with him. She knew now that it was the very last time she’d let that happen.

CHAPTER TWENTY

H
E
DIDN
’
T
KNOW
what to do with her.

If he’d been in Cheyenne, it would have been fine. A locked interrogation room, a meeting with his boss, he would have had this under control. But Tom was in Jackson, and the federal courthouse didn’t have an interrogation room, and the holding cell was being used for the trial.

He damn sure wasn’t going to drop her off at the county jail and leave her there. In the end, he took her to the meeting room he’d been using as an office, handcuffed her to the table and stepped outside to call Mary.

He was met by a very angry Agent Gates, who’d seen them pass by on the road and must have scrambled to follow.

“What the hell do you think you’re doing, Duncan?” the man asked past clenched teeth.

“I brought her in for questioning. I thought that was what you wanted.”

“This is my fucking case,” Gates growled.

“Yeah, well, Pozniak is my fugitive, isn’t he? I mean, if you were up for finding him, you would have done it by now, right?”

“You’re so fucked,” Gates said, that infuriating smile in place again. “You won’t have a damn pension when I’m done with you, much less a job.”

“Do your worst. Just get out of my fucking courthouse before I have one of these fine officers assist you.”

Gates glanced back and seemed surprised to find a couple of uniforms standing right behind him. “Christ, Duncan. I hope that pussy was worth it.”

“Get the hell out,” Tom growled.

Gates left, pulling his cell phone from his pocket in a deliberate movement as he headed for the front doors of the courthouse, making clear he was going to follow through on his threat to get Tom in trouble.

Tom had notified Mary just before he’d cuffed Isabelle, and while they’d waited for a ride, Tom had called his chief to ask for a little leeway on a case. “She’s a witness in a federal fugitive case, and the FBI agent in charge of the case isn’t going to like this, but I don’t like him.” His chief had seemed unconcerned. Tom had a damn near perfect record, and he and his superior had shared more than a few late-night beers together. But once the wheels of the FBI started rolling over them, Tom wasn’t sure just how much leeway he would get.

Gates was right about one thing. Tom’s job was on the line, but he wasn’t walking away from Isabelle no matter what she thought.

Mary frowned as she approached across the lobby. “How’s your savior complex coming?”

“You’re funny.”

“You do have a tendency to date women who are a...bit of a mess.”

“That was a long time ago, and Isabelle isn’t a mess,” he said. “She needs help.”

“Semantics.”

He stiffened. “You don’t have to be involved in this if you don’t want to be.”

“That’s not what I said. Has she told you anything?”

“She’s not speaking to me.”

Mary raised one eyebrow. “What exactly is this going to accomplish, then?”

“It keeps Gates away from her for another day.”

“And then?”

“Then I help her get away,” he said.

“Jesus, Tom,” she breathed. “Have you considered that she might just be delusional?”

“The whole damn case is about dirty cops, and along comes Agent Gates, asshole extraordinaire. You really think he’s the one good guy in the scenario?”

“Well, shit. When you put it that way...”

Tom rolled his tense shoulders, but they felt only tighter after. “The judge is settled?”

“Everything is under control,” Mary said. “Proceedings begin in forty-five.”

“Do you have a minute to take a look at the Pozniak file? I’d love your take.”

“I’m on it,” she said, already moving away.

Tom stepped back into the meeting room, half expecting to find the heavy conference table overturned and the window open, but no. Isabelle was there, staring straight ahead, hands flat on the table.

“I’ll take the cuffs off if you promise not to run.”

“Do whatever you want,” she said, refusing to look at him.

“I’m trying to help you, Isabelle.”

She shrugged.

He reached for the cuffs, cringing when her hands jerked away from him, but when she stilled, he held one wrist in his hand and unlocked the cuff. It felt strange to touch her, as though he was violating her even though they’d touched so intimately only a few hours before. He unlocked the other cuff and watched as she rubbed her wrists.

“He’s going to ask for a search warrant,” Tom said.

Her eyes flew up to meet his, finally. They went wide with fear.

“Is he going to find something?”

“I have money,” she said. “Cash. I need it.”

“Is it yours?”

“Of course it’s mine! Who do you think I am?”

Tom sat down across from her. “I’m not sure. You’ve never actually told me.”

She bared her teeth in a smile. “I lied about my name. You lied about everything else.”

“Not everything,” he said, but moved on quickly. “They obviously want something from you. Maybe it’s something you don’t even know you know. Something your dad said once. Or maybe he gave you something that seemed meaningless at the time. A piece of jewelry. A picture.”

“There’s nothing,” she said, the words clipped.

“Then why are they so sure of it?”

“They’re not sure. They’re desperate. My dad obviously knew something important.”

“Like what?”

She shrugged, but she was more nervous now. Her fingers plucked at the sleeves of her shirt. The same shirt he’d taken off her the night before. “He told me not to trust anyone.”

“He didn’t give you names?”

“No. He just said ‘Don’t trust anyone. Not the police. Not the FBI. Not even family.’”

Tom leaned forward. “Family?”

“Yes, but we didn’t have any family left.”

That couldn’t be right. And she was frowning hard at her hands. “He must have meant something, Isabelle.”

“I was engaged. My fiancé worked in the DA’s office, but he’d only been there a year.”

“But it had to have been him. There weren’t any cousins or uncles?”

She cleared her throat. He’d never seen her nervous before. Hostile, yes. Pissed. Even scared. But not this. “My fiancé’s father,” she started, then swallowed hard. “It was how I met him. Patrick, I mean. His father was my dad’s captain.”

Tom sat back, the air leaving his lungs. “It was him.”

“I don’t know,” she said, but he could see she didn’t mean it. “I thought he was trying to help at first. He came around a lot after my dad left. To take care of me, he said. They were the only family I had left. I actually tried to talk my fiancé into eloping in the middle of all of it, just because I needed them to be my family.

“But I noticed Patrick’s father kept telling me not to report things, or that I was only imagining the danger. I made the mistake of telling my fiancé that I was feeling nervous about it. It was stupid, and I was scared. But I asked if his dad might be involved. That was the end of the help.”

“What do you mean?”

“My fiancé broke it off. They cut me off entirely. Defense attorneys started bad-mouthing me to the press. Saying I’d helped my father escape.”

“They didn’t want you credible anymore.”

“Yes. They wanted to destroy me just in case I asked that question of someone else.”

“But they didn’t destroy you.”

Her hands stilled, and her gaze focused on him. “No. They didn’t.”

* * *

H
ER
HANDS
SHOOK
when she didn’t keep them pressed to the table. She finally gave up and put them in her lap.

Tom had excused himself after she’d given him Captain Kerrigan’s name, but a uniformed member of his team had been standing next to the door before it closed. Funny that he’d excused himself as if she were his guest instead of his collar.

That had been unexpectedly humiliating. Tom had made sure her coat had covered her cuffs, but it hadn’t mattered.
She’d
known. She’d known that the man she’d just had sex with had forced her into handcuffs and walked her into a waiting US marshal vehicle.

And he wanted her to trust him.

She might have laughed, but she was afraid she’d start crying.

When the door opened, she hated that she jumped, but she was expecting Agent Gates to burst in at any moment, an armed team at his back. Not that he’d need one. She was humiliatingly easy to overcome.

But it wasn’t Agent Gates; it was Mary, her face set in yet another glower. Isabelle glared back. Mary was the one who’d driven her here, after all.

“I read your file,” Mary said.

“Was it a cliff-hanger?” Isabelle snapped.

“I understand that you’re angry.” Her voice was a calm contrast to her tight face. “But you can trust us.”

“If you’d paid attention to my file, you wouldn’t say something that ridiculous to me. I met you a week ago. You’re yet another cop. That’s all I know about you.”

“But that’s not all you know about Tom.”

She clenched her hands into fists. “Isn’t it?”

Mary’s hand sounded like a shot when it hit the table. “No, it’s not. He’s going to let you leave. Did you know that? He’s going to help you leave, and if he does that, he’ll be fired. Over nineteen years as a marshal down the drain. For some woman he met a week ago.”

For one quick beat, Isabelle’s heart softened toward him. But Mary could say anything; that didn’t make it true.

“I’m not even sure that part matters,” Mary said. “He’s already in big trouble. He kept you a secret, and he got personally involved with you, a woman who’s neck deep in a murder investigation.” She leaned forward until she was halfway across the table, her eyes blazing now. “So when I say you can trust us, I mean that Tom Duncan, a good man and my very good friend, will probably lose his lifelong career because he wanted to help you. Do you hear what I’m saying?”

She leaned back and took a seat in one of the chairs, but her eyes never left Isabelle.

Isabelle blinked, shocked into silence. Had he willingly put his career in danger? Or was this another ploy? Why would he take those kinds of chances? It made no sense. “I didn’t ask for help,” she finally said.

“Right. I know you didn’t. But doesn’t it mean something that you didn’t have to ask?”

The door opened again, and it was Tom. Isabelle felt a little numb watching him. A little removed. Her whole world was foggy and confused.

He collapsed into the chair next to Mary and started filling her in, but Isabelle didn’t hear much of what he said. He wasn’t looking at her now, so she could watch him. He didn’t look sincere or convincing or earnest. He didn’t look as if he was trying to talk anyone into anything, and God, she’d seen that look a hundred times on the faces of a hundred cops.

Tom looked tired. Worried. He looked like a man who was trying to solve a problem. The problem of her.

She hated him. She really did. But she’d trusted him from the start. Either her instincts were good or she was completely broken, in which case, what did any of this matter?

And she didn’t want to run anymore. She wanted this over. She wanted to be done with it for good. Maybe she could trust him. And if she couldn’t, there’d never be anyone to trust. Ever.

She licked her lips, but her mouth was so dry it didn’t work, so she swallowed hard and licked her lips one more time so she could speak. “He gave me a gun,” she said.

Tom stopped talking, and they both turned to her. “What did you say?” he asked.

Isabelle wasn’t sure she could speak the words again. She never thought she’d say them even once. But she looked into his green eyes, so new and so familiar, and she said it one more time. “My dad. He gave me a gun. He told me to get rid of it and never tell anyone. I hid it instead.”

“This was after the shooting?” Tom asked, his body straining closer, face intense.

“Yes. Just before he ran.”

“You still have it?” he asked.

“Yes. At first I thought it was his, but then I realized they already had the gun he’d used in the shooting. Why would this one be so important? Why was everyone looking for it?”

“Isabelle—” he started, but she couldn’t stop talking now.

“Who was I supposed to give it to?” she rushed on before Tom could interrupt. “Who could I trust? If I chose the wrong person and the gun disappeared, I’d be the last one who knew it had ever existed. I’d be a loose end.”

She gulped in a breath, embarrassed at the strained, high sound of it.

His hand curved around hers and squeezed. “Listen. Isabelle. If you give me the gun, you won’t be the only one who knows. I’ll know. Mary will know. My boss will know. My whole team. You can tell your friends, too, and you won’t be alone.”

She nodded, and when she spoke again, she couldn’t produce more than a whisper. “I think it’s the gun used to fire the first shot. I think it belongs to whoever wanted that cop dead in the first place.”

Tom nodded. He was squeezing her hand too hard, hurting her fingers, but when she looked down, she realized it was her hand wrapped around his. Her knuckles were white.

“We were the same age, you know. Me and that girl my father killed. It was one of her first big busts, and she was protective. That’s all. That’s why she noticed the drugs missing from holding. She was trying to do her job, and she didn’t know yet that she wasn’t supposed to.”

She let go of Tom’s hand and wrapped her own fingers together to hold tight. “He still treated me like his little girl, like I was still too precious and innocent to take on the world, and he shot that girl in the back while she was running for her life. My dad did that.”

“I’m so sorry,” Tom murmured.

She nodded. “I just want it over. I don’t care anymore. Just keep them away from me.”

“Is it at your cabin?” he asked.

“Yes.”

“Mary,” Tom said softly. “Can you handle things here while I drive Isabelle home?”

She heard them discussing something quietly, but Isabelle didn’t pay any attention. She couldn’t be bothered. Nothing mattered except getting this over with.

She’d known the gun was key to everything, but it had also been the thing keeping her alive. If she had the gun, or even if she only knew where her father was
with
the gun, then she was both dangerous and valuable. Without it, she was nothing. Just a possible link that would be safer to eliminate than ignore.