In Too Deep (31 page)

Tally gave him a wide-eyed look. "What detonator?"

"The small silver 'box' you picked up on the beach."

"Ahh. That was a
detonator
? I put it somewhere safe. I didn't know what it was. I guessed it was valuable. But a detonator? Wow. What does it detonate?"

"Kill her and get this over with. When her boyfriend comes to, he'll tell us," Leli'a said coldly.

"My
boyfriend
won't tell you a damn thing," Tally told them coldly.
Wake up, Michael
!

"Did your lover tell you why
he's
here?" Arnaud asked.

"Because your goons knocked him over the head?" Tally asked sweetly. "What's the matter? Afraid to face him man to man?"

"Don't pussyfoot around, Arnaud," Leli'a said with distinct glee. "Tell her."

"Tell me what?"

"That Lieutenant Wright has been to Paradise before."

Lieutenant
? Michael was a cop? Since when? And no, he hadn't mentioned he'd been here before. In fact, he'd said otherwise. Tally remained silent.

"He and his Navy SEAL partner came here last year to destroy your father. Are you aware of that?"

Tally's mouth got drier. "No, but what has that got to do with anything?"
Michael was a Navy SEAL
? Little bits and pieces clicked into place like dominoes.
Oh. My. God
.

"I would imagine your lieutenant has returned to the scene of the crime, as it were. I do believe he's come back to kill Trevor."

Tally laughed. It wasn't exactly filled with wild mirth, but the idea was pretty damn far-fetched. "Michael is a sail bum. He would've told me if he'd been here before."
Not
, a little voice said,
if he planned to kill your father
.

"He used you," Leli'a said smugly, dark eyes flashing in triumph. "He fucked your brains out because he wanted to use you. Haven't you looked in the mirror lately? You're a skinny, flat-chested…
nothing
. Did you really believe for one second a virile man like
that
would spare a glance for someone who looks
like you
?" The girl laughed. "Give me a bloody break."

Tally's hand curled in her lap. How odd, her heart literally hurt. Ached. Silly, really. Of course she knew what she looked like. But she'd
forgotten
when she was with Michael.

He'd made her forget she was flat-chested, and plain.

She'd forgotten, because when he'd looked at her with hunger in his eye, she'd
felt
beautiful.

But she'd be damned if she'd give this little bitch the satisfaction of knowing her barb had hit home. "Gee, Leli'a, sounds like you're jealous to me." Tally flicked a glance at Arnaud. "What's wrong, Arnaud? Not enough for her, either?"

He flushed under his tan. The stem of his wineglass snapped between his fingers.

"For heaven's sake." Leli'a waved for a servant to remove the glass from Arnaud. She gave Tally a withering look. "Don't sit there all pale-faced and wounded. You're a big girl. I'm sure the sex was more than delicious. Consider yourself fortunate he fucked you,
whatever
the reason. Girls like you don't get the opportunity that often, I'm sure."

Leli'a crossed her legs and lit a cigarette. She inhaled, then blew the smoke at Tally. The breeze wafted the smoke over Leli'a's hair, and she fanned it away impatiently.

Tally gave her a cat-got-the-cream smile. "Eat your heart out, you silly little girl. The sex was delicious. Unfortunately for you, you'll never know firsthand. Arnaud is—what—twenty-five years older than you? Old enough to be your father, in fact. Skinny, flat-chested, pitiful me has had them both, and news flash: I got steak, and you got the toy in a Happy Meal. Guess big boobs and miles of hair don't count for as much as you thought they did, huh?"

Leli'a started out of her chair. Arnaud put a hand on her arm. She subsided, glowering like the teenager she was. "Now that we've got that out of the way, where is Arnaud's detonation device?"

Tally, still trying to assimilate Michael's betrayal, shrugged. If Arnaud shot her right now, she doubted she'd feel anything. She was numb.

"Don't be so damned impatient," Arnaud snapped to the girl. "They must both know where it is. We take no chances." He motioned for one of the men carrying a gun. "Bring him round. Dear Tally needs motivation to jog her memory."

Michael was alive.
Thank God
. Tally leaned back against the soft cushions as though she didn't have a care in the world. "I believe those earrings you're wearing are mine. Hand 'em over while we're waiting, toots," she told Leli'a, who was wearing a green cotton sundress, high-heeled sandals, and Tally's favorite silver-and-emerald earrings.

"Tell me what you did with my pearl necklace before we kill you," Leli'a snarled in response, her pretty face pink under expertly applied makeup. The island girl was gone completely, Tally suddenly realized. This self-possessed young woman was not only well-dressed, and perfectly groomed, she also spoke perfect English.

"Hmm. No more pidgin English, I see," Tally said absently.

Michael wasn't coming around. Arnaud got up from the table to hassle his men. Tally dragged her attention back to Leli'a. "What happened?" she asked. "Did you take elocution lessons this morning?"

Did Auntie know her niece was plucked-eyebrow-deep in Arnaud's business? God. Was
Auntie
involved in all this? And Henri?

Michael lay insensate on the deck, while Arnaud and two guards crouched over him, presumably trying to decide how to get him to wake up.

"I had a better education than you did," the girl told her coldly. "Twelve years at San Souci in London."

"They might've taught you to speak the Queen's English, but that didn't help with your klepto problem, did it?" Tally said. One of the men had thrown a pitcher of water over Michael. He wasn't moving. Oh, God. Perhaps he
was
dead.

Leli'a leaned over the table. "Let me explain something to you,
toots
. My great-grandfather brought those pearls up one at a time from the reefs of Bora-Bora more than seventy years ago. He had them strung in Paris for my great-grandmother. They've been passed from each generation of women in my family.
My
family, you bitch. Not yours. The pearls are mine, and always have been."

Tally frowned. "Are you saying my father stole them from your family, then gave them to me?"

"I'm saying
my
father stole them from me to give to you," Leli'a said flatly, her black eyes watching for Tally's reaction.

Tally glanced over as another pitcher of water was thrown on Michael. Damn it. Why didn't he wake up? She glanced back at Leli'a. "I'm sure my father has a bill of sale. He gave them to me years ago. You would have been only a child then. Perhaps your father sold the—"

"You not very bright, are you, sista?" Leli'a mocked in pidgin English, switching back to her faintly accented British as she said venomously, "My father is Trevor Church."

Tally heard her quite clearly, but she said, "What?" anyway.

"He was living with my mother when you and
your
mother were in Papeete looking for him ten years ago. I am more his daughter than you could ever hope to be."

Tally felt as though she'd been punched in the stomach.

She didn't doubt Leli'a's claim for a moment. She and Bev
had
come to Tahiti years ago looking for Trevor on a flimsy lead. Tally remembered the long, lonely days, and even longer, lonely nights. Her mother's desperation. Her own yearning. They'd both hoped. And in the end they had returned home under another crushing, bitter disappointment.

God, what irony. She'd always wanted a sister. If only she'd known… and if she had, then what?

She reached for the fruit drink on the table, not caring what was in it, and chugged it down. She didn't taste it. Had her father left Leli'a behind when he'd packed a bag and gone off on one of his "business trips"? Had he taken the little dark-haired girl with him? Had Trevor cared about Leli'a, and
her
mother, more than he'd ever cared about Tally and Bev? Had he called, and promised Leli'a the moon, then delivered nothing? Had he told her half-sister he loved her? And meant it?

God. This shouldn't hurt so badly. It wasn't as if she and her father had ever had anything close to a relationship. But Leli'a had been with him for all these years while Tally had just dreamed of
seeing
him for a few hours… for those same years.

A nasty, overwhelming, jumble of pain, jealousy, anger, and hurt tore through Tally. She ached with her father's betrayal. To herself. To her mother. Dry-eyed, she stared at Leli'a. She must look like her mother, although now that Tally knew, she thought perhaps the Tahitian girl had the same slightly crooked smile her fath—that Trevor—sported.
Oh, God
. She needed to go somewhere quiet to assimilate this. To come to grips with it all.

One look at the triumph in Leli'a's eyes dissuaded her.

"Why would he steal the pearls from you to give to me? It doesn't make any sense."

"Because they are perfectly matched and priceless. And I was wearing them the afternoon he went to meet you for your birthday. He was angry with me. And he took them and gave them to you for spite. I want them back."

Tally had felt so grown up when he'd handed her the pearls over dinner. Damn it. She'd pretended he actually gave a damn about her. "I'll give you the pearls when we get back to the island," Tally told the girl.

She covered the horrible, burning pain in her chest with her hand. Her throat worked, her eyes stung. She blinked back the tears and forced the numbing pain somewhere manageable. She'd be damned if she'd cry in front of Leli'a.

"Tell me where they are," the girl said. "You won't be going back."

"Oh, for God's sake," Tally said, throwing up her hands. "Are you threatening me, too? What is it with you and Arnaud? Haven't you ever heard of discussing a problem without killing the person because they disagree with you?" Tally glanced over at Michael. His head and shirt, and the deck around him, were soaking wet. But he still hadn't moved.

Of the multitude of emotions rushing at her, Tally allowed anger to win out. "Whatever you two are up to, I just don't, care. Got it? I don't
give
a damn. My—Trevor is expecting to see me this afternoon. If I'm not there, he'll want to know why. When I've seen him, I'll leave. Until then you're S.O.L."

She sensed someone behind her just as Arnaud's attention flicked over her shoulder. She tried to turn, half-rising out of the softly padded chair. She was unceremoniously shoved down by two rough hands on her shoulders.

"What the hell do you hope to achieve with this, Arnaud? Trevor is going to have your guts for garters when I tell him what you've done to me."

Arnaud laughed mirthlessly. "
Non
. I do not believe your father will care one way or the other."

Unfortunately, that was probably, and sadly, true. One of the men grabbed her arms and held her hands together as the other guy wound a thin, hairy rope about her wrists. "Ow, damn it. That hurts!"

"Tie her tightly," Leli'a instructed, sipping at a glass of wine. "Tighter," she snapped.

"You won't get away with this," Tally said furiously, hoping, praying Michael would wake up and save the day. This was not looking good. There was no point straining against her bindings, Leli'a had them tied so tightly, Tally couldn't feel her fingers.

"Auntie and Henri know I was here. People will talk. Trevor will kill you for this."

"He is
my
father. You think he has given you a moment's thought in the last twenty years? No, he has not. I am his daughter. I am the one he cares about, not you."

Direct hit. And it
hurt
, damn it. "I'm the one he gave the pearls to."

Leli'a hissed in a breath. "Where are they?"

"I forget."

"You stupid, bloody bitch. My father won't care when you die. He's never cared about you."

"Whether he cares or not, when he finds out I've been here, and then suddenly disappeared, he'll start asking questions. It'll be suspicious that we're all gone at the same time."

"Yes," Arnaud said pleasantly. "The staff is taking you and your lover to Bora-Bora to catch a plane back home. A romantic cruise to end a pleasant vacation. Nothing more. A favor for the boss's daughter. They will return, tell him they dropped off the lovers in Bora-Bora, and you won't be heard of again."

"And you don't think he'll be slightly put out I came all this way to see him and then didn't bother waiting for him to show up?"

Arnaud laughed. "I have worked these many years to impress upon your father how American you are—thoughtless. Selfish. Inconsiderate. No, he will think nothing of this quite normal and inconsiderate behavior." Arnaud pulled a red grape off the bunch on his plate and brought it to his mouth. "Here are your choices, Tallulah. One, you tell us where the control is hidden. Two, you don't—"

"Good. I choose door number two."

Arnaud continued uninterrupted. "And we torture your friend here until you spill your guts." He nodded at one of the soldiers. The man drew back his booted foot and kicked Michael hard in the ribs. "Once more. No," he snapped. "Not forceful enough. Again." Satisfied, he turned to Tally. "Which is it to be?"

"Wow. Hard choices," she said, her brain going a mile a minute, and bile climbing her throat at Arnaud's casual brutality. If she told Arnaud and Leli'a she didn't know where the device was, they'd kill her and torture the information out of Michael. If she told them she was the only one who knew where it was, they'd kill Michael in a heartbeat. "Michael took it apart."

"Christ." Arnaud went pale. "Well, where the fuck is it?"

"I only know where my half is. Sorry."

"She's lying!"

Tally looked from one to the other. "If you think so, might as well kill me now. I'm not telling you. Isn't it funny how thieves and liars always expect the same thing from other people?"