The Heart Heist (10 page)

"No, no, I'll be fine," he murmured, finally letting her kick him out.

Kerrin switched off the lights and immediately that male thing came at her again. It was as unconscious on his part, no doubt, as aroma was from a flower.

"And now, sweetheart..." Gary's dark voice cut through the heavy night. "You're going to drive me back to my hotel."

"I am?" Kerrin's voice came out as an unfortunate squeak.

"You are," Gary confirmed, his tone hardening. "That's where I left my car, which I am going to need in order to follow you home."

Her errant heartbeat fluttered down to a level within the range of medical acceptability. "Oh, Gary, you don't have to do that." She thought of all the reading he was going to attempt and how little time he had in which to do it. "Really, I'll be fine getting home."

He took her arm in a grip like steel. "Nevertheless," he said in a voice much the same, "I'm going to follow you."

"I don't understand," Kerrin complained, awed by the solid strength of his grip as he propelled her down the arcade toward her car. Oddly, this steady, confident touch stilled her jumping nerves. "It's five easy miles. I drive it all the time -- sometimes late at night. What's the big deal?"

"I guess," Gary told her softly, "it's a matter of respect."

~~~

Twenty-five minutes later, Gary watched from the windshield of his plain white car -- standard FBI issue, he guessed -- as Kerrin waved to him from the front door of a rambling wood ranch house perched on a foothill a few miles outside of town.

Even in the dark he could see the exasperated expression on her face. Yeah, he supposed it was kind of ridiculous to expect a man doing twenty-five to life to provide much in the way of a security escort. Well, that was just too bad. He had to do something to return her favor. The house door closed after her and Gary shoved the gear shift into reverse.

How did you treat a woman who'd pretty much just saved your life?

With respect, he'd said.

Executing an economical little turn in the Horton drive, Gary got his car pointed down the hill again.

Unfortunately, respect was not the nature of his thoughts toward that woman. More like craving, inappropriate lust, unsuitable desire. He wondered if she knew just how tempting she'd been, walking up to him along the arcade in the dark, with a provocative hint of uncertainty. Like a woman approaching her lover for the first time.

And he was an ungrateful wretch, Gary scolded himself as he cruised down the winding road of the hill. That same woman had just stopped him from slipping back into his old habits.

What instinct had made her do it? Somehow he'd tipped her off, over the phone wires. She'd figured out how dangerous it would have been for him to break into her office. She'd been right, it wouldn't have been the same as trying to find a way into the DWP. Once started, Gary would have rationalized his right to insinuate himself into any number of taboo places. That filing cabinet of hers, the library, the home of anyone who happened to catch his curiosity.

And it wouldn't have stopped there.

Gary braked his car at the T-intersection between the Horton private road and the main highway leading back to town. There wasn't another car in sight but he stopped there, resting his wrists over the top of the steering wheel. It was at an AA meeting, something Gary had wandered into out of boredom one long prison afternoon, where the light had first dawned. Stealing was, for him, like alcohol was for the people in the meeting. Just one drop would be poison. Kerrin had stopped him from sipping that first drop.

With a deliberate, slow movement, Gary pushed the gear stick into first. He accelerated gradually onto the highway. Kerrin wasn't always going to be there to stop him. The next time temptation knocked on his door, he just might have to handle it himself.

The new fear roiled through his stomach, the one that had been with him to a greater or lesser degree ever since he'd bid Marty farewell in Bishop. He had no idea what was going to happen the next time. All he knew was that he wanted to be free. He didn't want these destructive impulses ruling his actions. He wanted to be like anybody else.

Gary caught a vision of himself in the reflection off the side glass of the car; the hard, con eyes, the face trained over years in prison to mask all expression from the screws. Just like anybody else. Yeah, right.

In fact, he could still remember what had been said at his last jail cell interview with Rogers. The FBI agent had explained that Gary had been selected by an exhaustive computer search as the man with the talents, intelligence, and basic psychological profile most similar to some lunatic bomber they were trying to catch.

Gee, thanks.

According to Rogers, Gary would attack the problem of getting into the DWP facility in much the same way their Mr. Holiday would. From insinuating himself into the sparsely populated region to figuring out how to break through the numerous security systems, Gary and the lunatic would be thinking along much the same lines. At least, that's what the FBI was counting on. They thought that whatever way Gary found into the place would be the way Mr. Holiday would choose. Then they'd be ready for him.

As with Mr. Holiday's other 'projects,' the psycho had let the authorities know what he was planning. He'd even told them when: Columbus Day. It was damn embarrassing that even with all this information, the FBI couldn't manage to catch him.

So by now Gary figured the feds were as desperate as stags at the end of rutting season. But hell, what did he care? He'd get his ten years, whether or not that madman managed to blow up the aqueduct to Los Angeles -- and the town of Freedom along with it.

The few lights of Freedom came into view as he drove down the highway. An uneasy sensation curled inside Gary. What would the little girl mayor think of having her happy town blown up? She seemed pretty attached to the place. And the school, Gary remembered, with a deepening of unease, was no more than a couple hundred yards from the aqueduct facility.

Gary glanced to the side, toward the books Kerrin had lent him. He was damn well going to have to make this schoolteacher thing work out. He had to, if he was going to buy the time he needed to figure out what Mr. Holiday was going to do.

Gary Sullivan teaching high school. Right.

CHAPTER SIX

Janet Everly, the proprietor of the WawaNeemah Inn, was a woman Kerrin had formerly considered a friend. Janet now stood on the other side of the registration desk from Kerrin and smirked. Kerrin had been hearing the same smirk in the woman's voice every time Kerrin had called over the weekend asking to speak to Gary. Each time Janet had refused to put her through, acting on direct orders from her paying guest. Goodness, Kerrin had only wanted to know if the man needed help. But Janet acted as though Kerrin were, well, running after him.

"You're in luck," Janet now told Kerrin as they stood in the cozy and cluttered front lobby of the inn on Monday morning. "The butterfly has emerged from his cocoon." Pointing a hard-working finger toward the street, Janet elucidated. "He's at the Lone Trail, getting breakfast."

"Thanks," Kerrin replied.

Janet's smirk broadened into a more generous smile. Put in words, her expression said she thought some kind of romance was going on. Which was ridiculous. Just ridiculous.

Shifting her purse higher, Kerrin decided to explain the circumstances. "We have to talk before he starts teaching class this morning."

"Uh huh," Janet hummed, and turned aside to sort the hotel mail.

She didn't seem to believe Kerrin. Absurd. Hadn't she caught on yet? Kerrin didn't have romances. She was too stupidly nervous.

Besides, she was waiting for her white knight, and that sure wasn't Mr. Sullivan.

Kerrin stepped out to the sidewalk and squinted in the morning sun. No, Mr. Gary Sullivan was no white knight, yet she'd spent an inordinate amount of time over the past few days in useless speculation about him, wondering why he'd turned out the way he had. As if it mattered why he'd become a criminal.

Through the plate glass window of the coffee shop, Kerrin got an advance peek at said criminal, her newest teacher. He was sitting at the counter dressed in a plain white shirt and a pair of brown trousers. A tie. He was wearing a tie, she saw, as he moved his newspaper to take a sip of coffee.

At that moment Carolina, the day shift waitress, strolled by, glass coffeepot held high. Kerrin watched as she apparently asked Gary if he wanted more coffee. He nodded, put down his cup and shot her one of those heart-killing grins of his. Then he said something that made Carolina laugh lustily in reply.

Kerrin felt something turn under the center of her breastbone. But of course Gary was flirting with Carolina. Didn't all the men flirt with her? Built along voluptuous, generous lines, Carolina was the epitome of female. And as everyone well knew, the promise of that body was not kept locked in miserly chastity but was dispensed with a frank and joyous cheer. For a man in Gary's position, Carolina could have been made to order.

Kerrin looked down at her own girlish figure clad in a fringed denim skirt. There was no comparison. But now hadn't she known that all along? Hadn't she warned herself, the few times Gary had looked at her in that...hungry way, that he would have looked that way at any woman, any woman who'd happened to be around?

For about the millionth time, Kerrin shoved all of her wants and desires into the secure little cage she'd built for them. She had everything that was necessary in life: she was fulfilled. Please. Given the awkward way she acted around men, it was obvious she didn't even want one. With a cool and indifferent smile then, she pushed open the glass door of the coffee shop.

Gary turned to look at her and all of Kerrin's cool indifference shot up in a hiss of steam. She felt his eyes like they were a pair of heat-seeking missiles and she was a little bi-plane.

After taking her in, from shoulder epaulets to cowboy boots, he smiled, that audacious smile with the dimple in his left cheek. What was left of Kerrin's composure evaporated.

She took the stool to his side, gnashing her teeth. It wasn't fair he should have this effect on her -- especially when he was in the middle of pursuing Carolina. "Good morning, Mr. Sullivan. It's good -- finally -- to see you again."

He turned to face forward and picked up his coffee cup. "Nice to see you, too, Mayor Horton." His smile remained, as at some private joke.

Kerrin gave a hasty glance to either side. They were alone at the counter. "I, uh, thought you might like to go over your lesson plan with me this morning before you start class."

Gary took a sip of coffee. "Nope. Not necessary."

Kerrin gaped. "What do you mean, it's not necessary?" Kerrin was sure the man had never taught a class in his life, and he was going to be starting out with teenagers -- teenagers! They were bright, observant, critical. Didn't he realize he could get flayed alive?

Gary set his cup down with deliberate care and turned to face her. His smile disappeared. "Sweetheart, we need to get something straight. You gave me a job. I'm gonna do the job, but I work alone, see. That's how it is."

Kerrin wanted to retort that if he worked in such independent solitude, then why had he called her to jump out of bed in the middle of the night to help him? But she didn't say a word because that night made her think about unwanted, unallowable emotions. Her hand twisted the paper napkin on the counter in front of her.

"You understand now?" Gary sounded mockingly polite.

Kerrin nodded.

"And now." Gary leaned closer. His voice was a whisper gauged to reach her ears alone. "And now, if you could stop looking so scared maybe everyone in here might not get the impression I'm some kind of ax murderer."

Kerrin's eyes flicked up from their downcast position. "Don't be absurd -- " She stopped before she managed to blurt out the rest of it.
It's not that you're a criminal but because you're an attractive man. I always act like an idiot with one of you.
"I'm...known as a nervous person," Kerrin said instead. "Don't worry about it."

Gary sighed and stood from his counter stool. Taking a wallet out of his back pocket, he threw a few bills onto the counter beside his plate. "Honey, you're the one who looks worried. Me," he claimed with a shrug, "I haven't a care in the world."

A lie. And Gary wondered, looking down into those amber-and-jade eyes of hers, if she guessed as much. Probably not. She was too busy being scared of him to notice the way he had to keep his fingers from shaking on the dollar bills. He hadn't gotten much sleep this hellish weekend, between going through all those books, slipping out at night to ponder the fenced facility of the DWP, and simply worrying about all the responsibility that he now, suddenly, shouldered.

In prison, Gary realized, he hadn't had to worry about a thing. No one depended on him. His actions didn't affect anybody but himself. Here that was all turned around. Everyone was counting on him.

Including little miss lady mayor, although she didn't know it. Hell, she'd probably still think he was an ax murderer, even if she knew his real goal in the town. Gary wished, as he left her sitting there at the counter, that his parole officer, Marty, had taken the trouble to point out to her that in his long and eventful criminal career he had never, not even once, not even close, hurt another living being. Maybe then she wouldn't nearly collapse every time she got within touching distance of him.

Gary blithely dismissed the fact he'd deliberately set out to intimidate the woman, and that his motivation had been to keep her safely out of his lustful reach.

Gary crossed the street to get his jacket from the hotel. Perhaps he was overdoing the formality of the role of teacher but he didn't think so. The con men he'd met had always stressed the importance of good research in undertaking a scam. Second on the list was careful attention to one's appearance.

Gary had done his best at the first, the research, this weekend. Lying on the bed, the floor, curled up in that garage sale wood chair -- anywhere he could find some human comfort in that funky little room -- he'd devoured the books Kerrin had lent him. Gary had always felt comfortable around books. Libraries were places to which he'd often retreated, both in prison and out. Guys who wanted to beat you up generally didn't think to look in a library.