The Darkness Gathers (35 page)

“I’m sorry,” he whispered, though he wasn’t sure what he was sorry about. He just had the vague feeling in his heart that he had let her down. Tatiana was safe, but they had walked away, leaving countless others to their fates at the hands of demons. Lydia knew they were beaten, standing at the fireplace. There was a look of angry resignation on her face that he had never seen before. And he had grieved a little in that moment for her usual smart-ass defiance, her inability to accept defeat. But there was a clear choice to be made. They could get themselves killed, or live to fight another day. At least Sasa Fitore had gotten what he deserved. And the party wasn’t over yet. There were still Nathan Quinn and Jed McIntyre to deal with.

She hadn’t said anything really since she’d said good-bye to Tatiana. She’d walked away from Jacob without a word at the airport. But Jeffrey didn’t hate him as much as he knew Lydia would now. In his own way, Jeffrey believed, Jacob was still one of the good guys. He was fighting a battle that couldn’t be won, choosing lesser evils, making the most of hollow victories. Without his involvement, Jeffrey and Lydia would probably be dead right now. But of course, his and Jacob’s partnership would have to end. There were too many secrets, too much going on behind his back. Jeffrey needed to fight his battles on solid ground, needed to be able to distinguish between enemies and allies.

He pressed the button on the seat back and popped the air phone out. He slid his credit card in the slot and dialed.

“Go,” answered Dax Chicago.

“What’s the status of our situation?” he asked quietly.

“You were dead right, man. He was right where you thought he’d be. And now … we’re in a holding pattern,” he answered, his mouth full of something he was eating.

“As discussed.”

“That’s right. Piece of cake.”

“Don’t get relaxed. He’s not as stupid as he looks.”

“No worries, mate. You always did worry too much.”

“You don’t worry enough.”

“The situation is under control,” Dax said calmly. “I’ll be in touch.”

He hung up the phone with a sigh, wondering if he had acted too quickly, bringing Dax into an already volatile mix. But in a situation where the law didn’t apply, Jeffrey believed you had to ally yourself sometimes with lawless men. Dax certainly qualified. Besides, the game wasn’t nearly over. Dax would certainly be valuable when it came to that, no matter how they decided to proceed.

He looked over at Lydia, who was wide awake and staring at him with her big smoky gray eyes. “Jeffrey,” she said, suspicion knitting her brow and narrowing her eyes, “what’s going on?”

chapter thirty-six

S
he exploded as soon as the elevator door to their apartment closed behind them. He’d been waiting for it since he told her about Dax on the airplane. Her face had gone pale, her lips pulled into a tight line. He thought she was going to blow right there, but instead, she just crawled over him and went to the bathroom. She looked almost normal when she came back. She sat down next to him again and gave him a cold smile.

“Lydia …”

She lifted a hand. “Stop. I don’t want to discuss what you’ve done right now.”

Lydia was a brave, strong woman, but he knew that she was reaching the limits of what she could take. He could see it in the tension in her shoulders, in the taut muscles of her face, the dead expression in her eyes. He knew her so well, he could almost feel the tempest rolling within her. Depression setting in over her perceived failure in Albania, Nathan Quinn still to confront, the fear looming in the back of her mind with Jed McIntyre on the loose, now her grandparents being in jeopardy. For the duration of the flight, she sat ramrod-straight, eyes ahead, totally silent. Same deal on the cab ride home. His additional attempts at conversation were rebuffed with a withering stare.

“What the fuck did you think you were doing?” she yelled, blowing off steam as soon as they were safe at home.

“I don’t know why you’re so upset. You told me yourself to get a handle on him. I did that.”

“I didn’t tell you to use my grandparents as bait.”

“Fuck that,” he said, angry now, too, but refusing to raise his voice to her. “I didn’t use them as bait, and you bloody well know it. We anticipated his move and headed him off. There was no other way to track him. He’s not leaving a fucking trail of bread crumbs.”

“And now what? You’ve got him caged up somewhere with Dax. For what? Why didn’t Dax just turn him over to the police for breaking and entering? What are you intending to do with him?”

“Knowing what we know, do you really think it’s going to do us any good to turn him over to the police? If Nathan Quinn wants him out, he’s out. Don’t you see what we’re dealing with now? We can’t play by the rules here, Lydia. You are in danger. And I am going to do what it takes to protect you … whether you like it or not. Christ.”

“I’m not a little girl, Jeffrey. I don’t need you to protect me. I should have been a part of this decision,” she said, lowering her voice and looking at him. She sat down on the couch and put her head in her hands. “I need you on my team, but I need to be a part of the game,” she said into her palms.

He wasn’t going to argue with her and he had no intention of apologizing for doing what he felt was right and would do again. He sat down beside her.

“What do we do with him now?” she asked, still not looking at him.

“We make him go away.”

“What does that mean, Jeffrey?”

“Whatever you want it to mean.”

She raised her eyes to him and shook her head slowly. “What happened to your whole ‘People Have Rights’ speech?”

“Some people don’t deserve the rights they have.”

“And we’re supposed to be in a position to decide who those people are?”

No one would argue Jed McIntyre’s right to live in society, particularly not Lydia. He was an evil, twisted human being who had been unjustly released into the world by another arguably more evil and twisted human being, if such a comparison could be made, someone who had the money and the power to bend the rules of law to his will. Lydia recognized that if they played by the rules of morality that they had always followed, they would lose and lose ugly. But in the cosmic scheme of things, who was she to decide anyone’s fate? Even Jed McIntyre, who had brought nothing but horror and death to most people with whom he came in contact … maybe even his life had meaning, however elusive and incomprehensible that might seem. But how was she to know? Who was she to judge the value of a life? She placed a hand on her belly.

“Before we decide what to do about Jed McIntyre, Jeffrey, there’s something I want you to know.”

He looked at her, and in his eyes she saw all the things she loved about him. She saw his strength, his compassion, his honor, and his kindness glittering in the flecks of amber and green in his hazel eyes. She felt suddenly horrible for yelling at him, for making him account for loving her and wanting to keep her safe, for needing to take action to protect her. Because these were all the reasons she needed him in her life, and all the reasons why he was going to be a wonderful father.

chapter thirty-seven

“I
wanted you to know that you did the right thing, Detective,” Lydia said into the receiver as Jeffrey sat across the kitchen table from her, his brow creased with worry.

“I already knew that, Lydia. I did the only thing I could do,” said Manny on the other line, his voice serene. He sounded like he’d gotten some rest.

“But I wanted you to know that she’s all right.”

“Tatiana?”

“Yes, she’s safe. I can’t tell you any more than that. But she’s alive, and we’ve all been played.”

She heard him exhale on the other end of the phone in anger or relief or maybe both.

“You told me to go where the money took me, and it led me straight to her,” she went on, glancing at Jeffrey, who nodded.

“Well, she better hope that Nathan Quinn doesn’t do the same.”

“Who? What do you mean?”

“I mean that Jenna Quinn somehow managed to steal about a hundred million dollars from Quinn over the course of their brief marriage, siphoning money from Quinn Enterprises into a company she owned called American Equities. She has disappeared, and the money with her.”

“Really.”

“It’s funny in a way. A man like that … so powerful as to be untouchable. Taken by his own wife,” he said, and chuckled as though he was really enjoying it.

“Well, there’s even more to it than that. I’ll tell you the rest of it the next time I’m in Miami. Not over the phone, though,” she said, smiling.

He paused a second before answering. “It’s not over yet, right? That’s why you’re calling to tell me this.”

“You’re a smart man, Detective.”

“And you’re a smart woman. So be careful.”

“I will be. I understand the choice you made better today than I did, Manny.”

He gave a little laugh. “Then be even more careful.”

Lydia put down the phone, let her hand rest on the receiver for a second. She looked at Jeffrey, who was watching her with a kind of love combined with awe she hadn’t seen in his eyes before. He reached out a hand to touch her, as though she were made of glass.

“I’m not one hundred percent comfortable with this,” he said, pulling on his distressed-leather bomber jacket. “There are too many variables.”

“I know. But I think it’s the only way.”

“It’s not the only way.”

“It’s the only way I can live with.”

He nodded and held her by the shoulders. “Remember this … protect yourself for me. That’s your first priority tonight.”

She held him tightly around the waist, feeling the stiff Kevlar vest against her chest and the hardness of his gun on the inside of her arm, “Yours, too,” she said.

“We’ll meet you behind the museum in Van Cortlandt Park at midnight.”

They released each other reluctantly and Jeffrey stepped onto the elevator. “Don’t forget to put on your vest,” he said, tapping his chest as the door closed.

“Shit,” she whispered, a twister of anxiety spinning suddenly in her stomach as she wondered if her brilliant plan was so brilliant after all.

J
effrey jogged to the parking garage where they kept the black Mercedes Kompressor that Lydia used to drive in Santa Fe. Because of the heavy Kevlar and the unusually mild temperature, he was sweating heavily when he got behind the wheel. His mind was racing as the engine hummed to life. He pulled out onto Houston Street and headed for the West Side Highway. The sun was low in the sky, casting the city in a pink-orange glow as he crawled through the usual downtown congestion. The same construction project that had been taking place on the Henry Hudson for the past fifteen years showed no sign of nearing completion. Past Twenty-third Street, the traffic cleared and he sped up toward Dax Chicago’s place.

His head was spinning with a tornado of emotions, and he had to suppress the urge to run back to Lydia and tell her to bag the whole plan, say that he couldn’t stand the thought of risking her life and the life of the child that could be inside her right now. The thought of having a child with her filled him with a kind of helpless feeling of love and gratitude that he’d never experienced before. And it made him more afraid than he’d ever been in his life. It made him want to lock her in a cushioned room, so that not even the slightest mishap could befall her. But he recognized the impossibility of protecting Lydia: She was too much herself ever to yield to his control, no matter how loving and well-meaning he intended it to be. Their knowledge of each other, their acceptance of each other’s flaws and needs, was one of the things that made them so good for each other. And it was one of the things that had caused him the most amount of inner conflict: It was his nature to shelter and protect, and it was her nature to break free. There was no holding her unless she wanted to be held. He’d come to trust that she did. But a baby would add a whole new dimension to that struggle—his need to protect, her need to be independent. It would change everything for both of them. He gripped the wheel as he passed the high stone wall of the Cloisters, hoping they were doing the right thing.

Riverdale was one of the last nice neighborhoods in the Bronx. Past the train yards and up a winding road, Jeffrey entered an enclave of tree-lined streets sheltering mammoth, hugely expensive homes. Wealthy people who had children to raise but still wanted to be near the city lived in Riverdale, sending said children to one of the exclusive private schools in the neighborhood. He wondered how they’d feel if they knew Dax Chicago was one of their neighbors and whom he had as a houseguest.

Dax’s house was more isolated than the rest of the homes in the area, and as Jeffrey pulled up the long driveway, the garage door opened for him. He pulled the Kompressor in next to a Land Rover with heavily tinted windows. He got out and stood at the metal door, looking up into the camera. The door buzzed loudly and he pushed it open.

“Dax?”

“In here, mate.” But his voice sounded strangled, and Jeffrey drew his weapon, a Magnum Desert Eagle. He rounded the corner, to find Dax in the kitchen, eating a submarine sandwich that was bigger than his arm, which was pretty damn big.

“Jesus,” Dax said, glancing up at Jeffrey’s enormous gun. “You are fucking paranoid these days. What’s with you?”

Jeff breathed a sigh of relief and sat at the kitchen table, placing the gun down in front of him. “I’ve just got more on the table than I used to.”

“It’s messy, love and all that shit. It’s not for me, I’ll tell you.”

“Where is he?”

“In the dungeon,” Dax said, his green eyes glinting with mischief.

“Is he alive?”

“I dunno. He was yesterday,” he said, wiping mustard from his chin. He tapped the mouse on a laptop that sat next to the coffeemaker. A small image appeared in the corner of the screen, and Jeffrey could see Jed McIntyre in a windowless cell, bound onto the same type of table he had seen in execution chambers. The sound was off, but Jed’s mouth was open and his head was thrashing as if he was screaming.