To the Limit (33 page)

He ignored the soft whimpers coming from the other room, told himself she didn't know what she was saying. Right. Reno wanted to kill her. Paranoid. He let out a deep breath. Came with the territory. The only one who could possibly get killed around here was him if he let her out of that room.

He rose on a deep breath, walked back to the bedroom, and picked up the chair so he could wedge it back under the doorknob.

Chapter 21

It took longer than they'd thought to
finesse Tiffany's room number out of the desk clerk. And it was a team effort that had finally done it. McClain distracted the reservation clerk long enough for Eve to follow her fingers when she punched Tiffany's room number on the phone.

"We make a good team," Mac said as he and Eve rode the elevator to the penthouse level. It was a little past seven.

"I'll cop to teamwork when we find Tiffany and get her but of this mess. Until then, don't count your chickens. We haven't accomplished anything yet."

The elevator doors slid open and Eve stepped out into the hall.

"Wait," McClain said when they reached the door that contained the room number for what they'd determined was Tiffany's suite. "The door's ajar."

Eve immediately tensed. In her experience, open doors didn't always lead to opportunities. More often, they led to trouble.

"Wait right here," McClain said as he eased the door farther open and took a cautious step inside the room.

"I don't suppose you've got a gun on you?" she whispered, disregarding his order and following close on his heels.

"Right. Like I could smuggle a piece through airport security?"

"Just wishful thinking."

Wishful thinking dived deep and stayed submerged when they saw a large pair of feet sticking out at an odd angle behind a sofa.

"Oh God."

McClain swore softly when they rounded the sofa and saw the body. "It's Reno."

Eve's heart pounded like crazy, wild on an adrenaline rush, as McClain knelt by Reno's shoulders. Reno was on his stomach; a pool of blood stained the white carpet around his head.

McClain touched his fingers to Reno's neck.

"Dead," he said, his face grim. He rose, his gaze sweeping the room and stopping on a door that Eve assumed led to a bedroom.

"Stay here," he ordered again as he headed that direction. "And this time listen to me."

This time she did. She studied the body. Best guess was that one bullet, dead center in the back of Reno's head, execution style, had killed him. She made herself touch his face. Still warm. The blood was still seeping.

McClain's face was sober and hard when he emerged from the bedroom.

"Tiffany?" Eve asked, her heart in her throat.

He shook his head. "No sign of her. But Gorman's dead, too. Bought it the same way. And not long ago from the looks of things."

"What's going on?" she asked, at a total loss. "This doesn't make any sense."

"What about this?" His eyes were hard. "Does this make any sense?"

He held out a folded sheet of paper. Blood stained the edges.

She knew. Before she reached out with a trembling hand, she knew.

You're still dead, Eve. Hurry, hurry. Or Tiffany will be dead, too.

"Oh God."

"Come on." McClain grabbed her arm. "You're going to explain this later. Right now we've got to get out of here."

She shook herself out of her shock. "But what about Reno—"

"We can't do anything for them. And as soon as the bodies are found, the desk staff is going to remember the man and woman asking questions about Tiffany. We'll be the first ones they tag for questioning. And the first ones they'll suspect of killing them."

"We can't just leave them here."

"Oh yeah, we can." He hustled her toward the door. "Did you touch anything?"

She thought, then shook her head.

"Then we're out of here. I'll call nine-one-one from a house phone in the casino across the street and tell them about the bodies."

When they reached the elevator, he punched the down arrow, then wiped it clean of any possible prints with his shirt-tail. He did the same with the floor buttons inside. When they hit the ground floor, he ushered her straight through the casino and out the door. After he'd called 911 from the neighboring casino, they headed directly for their rental SUV.

"The third guy," Eve said once they were on the road. "The other band member. The one we never got a read on. What happened to him?"

"I'm more concerned about what's happening with you."

She let out a deep breath. And told him. About the attack in the rain off Blue Heron that preceded the Club Asylum explosion. About the note on her car in Key West after they were almost ran down. About the subway incident and the message on her home voice mail.

"Fuck," he said quietly. "You couldn't have clued me in a little earlier?"

He was angry. She didn't blame him. "I didn't think it was necessary."

"Not necessary?"

"Was telling you going to make any difference in your search for Tiffany? No. Except to distract you. You'd have been worried about me instead."

"Ya
think!
God, woman."

"I don't need you to look out for me. And I wasn't one hundred percent certain Tiffany's disappearance was tied to my attacks until now. It's the first time he's mentioned anyone by name."

"Pull in up there." Disgusted, McClain motioned to a small hotel and casino well off the main section of the Strip. "We'll get a room. Crash for a few hours and regroup. And you will tell me everything."

She wished she knew everything. Something was still missing. There
had
to be something she was missing.

There was.

They both missed noticing the beige four-door that had pulled out two cars behind them and followed them into the hotel parking lot.

MESQUITE,
 
NEVADA-ARIZONA BORDER

Between buying the bus tickets from Vegas to Mesquite and paying for the motel room, Billie was pretty much tapped out. He was also dead beat—and it was only eight thirty in the morning.

He pulled the drapes over the window of the room that overlooked the interstate and Mesquite's miniversion of the Vegas Strip.

Near darkness settled over the room. Which wasn't a bad thing. Number 308 at the Do Drop Inn sure as the world wasn't the penthouse suite at the Topanga Bay, but it was all he could afford. Unlike Reno, who had access to Tiffany's bank account through her ATM card, Billie was down to his last forty bucks.

At least the room was clean and cheap and it had two beds, and that was all that mattered right now. That and the fact that they were at least an hour northeast of Las Vegas. Which meant they were an hour away from Lance Reno. He'd like to have been farther, but he'd hauled Tiffany onto the bus and hauled her back off again here for two reasons. One, they both needed some sleep. Two, this was as far as he thought he'd better take her until she was alert enough to make her own decisions.

He tossed his straw Stetson on the dresser, scratched his head, and yawned. Then he sat down on the bed. And stared at Tiffany.

She was sound asleep on the other bed—had been since she'd dropped there five minutes ago. He didn't know what she'd do when she came around and realized that he'd sprung her out of that locked bedroom and hustled her away from Lance and Abe. She might be ripping mad, no matter that she'd been blubbering that Lance was going to kill her.

Not that Billie believed her. She'd been stoned was all. But still. There'd been something ... something beyond pathetic about her. He didn't know. And there had been something compelling about her fear. It had finally gotten to him. He'd been about to wedge a chair under the door handle to the bedroom so she wouldn't be able to get out and bring the wrath of Reno down on his head when Billie realized what he was doing.

It wasn't right. Wasn't right at all, what had been done to her. And it had gone on long enough. Right then and there, feeling an urgency that was a little unnerving, he'd made a decision. He'd thrown his stuff in a duffel and tossed her things in a bag. Then he'd coaxed her to her feet, hustled her out of the room, and headed for the bus station.

He didn't know what Lance would do if he found them, and frankly, he didn't care. Hell, it was hard telling what Tiffany would do. For all he knew, she might cry rape. She might cry kidnap.

Fine. Let her. She could holler foul all she wanted. He'd just head on out the door. She could figure out her own way home—or wherever it was she wanted to go.
At least his conscience would be clear. He'd done what his mom and dad would want him to do.

With a weary yawn, he tugged off his beat-up boots, then flopped to his back on the bed. God, he was beat.

He glanced to the bed beside him. She was curled up on her side in a little ball, her knees tucked to her chin, her hands clutched together between them. That permanent tear marking her cheek. Even asleep, she looked lost.

He rolled over on his side away from her. He wasn't going to feel sorry for her. Or responsible. When she woke up, if she wanted to run back to Lance, fine. At least he'd tried.

He knew where he was going. He was going home, and right about now, home sounded pretty darn good. So did sleep.

A few minutes later, he let it take him under.

LAS VEGAS

"Why off Reno and Gorman? All indications are they were working for whoever's behind this. Do you suppose the boys were pulling a double cross?"

Mac considered Eve's speculation about why Reno and Gorman might have been murdered, all the while thinking about strangling her.

Gawd damm it! Someone wanted her dead. And she hadn't thought it was important enough to mention until she'd had—what?
Four
attempts on her life?

He sat with his back propped against the headboard on the motel bed, his legs stretched out in front of him, a paper plate with a half-eaten slice of breakfast pizza lying on the spread beside him. Trying to look casual when inside he was seething with concern and anger.

"Possibly." He tipped a plastic container of orange juice to his mouth. Took a deep pull, then picked up the pizza.

It was around 9:00 a.m. They hadn't slept. Not since New York. The plan was to finally catch a few z's, but there was the little matter of two dead bodies that kept them awake.

Like he could sleep knowing there was a death threat hanging over Eve's head.

He wasn't only frustrated with Eve. They couldn't reach Kat or Sven to tell them about Reno and Gorman so they could warn Tiffany if she called. It was not the kind of news you left on a voice mail. They'd decided to try calling them again later and eat now instead. And hash over reasons for Reno's and Gorman's killings. And reasons why someone wanted her and Tiffany dead.

Mac glanced at her. This business had shaken her. She hadn't said as much. Hell no. Not the bullets-bounce-off-of-her babe. But now that he knew what she was up against, he could see the toll it had taken. Could feel her tension even though she tried to hide it. Knowing she was with him and not out there searching for Tiffany on her own did more than the food to ease his own mind.

Still, he didn't like this turn of events. He didn't like it at all.

"If we'd shown up fifteen, maybe twenty minutes earlier, the LVPD might be bagging four bodies right now instead of two."

She shivered after he stated what they'd both been thinking.

He took another swig of juice, halfway wished it were beer. And suppressed a shiver of his own at the thought of anything happening to her.

"Kidnapping, drugs, and murder," he muttered aloud. "Things are getting dicey."

"Holy crime spree, Batman. What's gonna happen next?"

He sliced her a glance. As angry as he was, he couldn't help but grin. Humor was one way to cut the tension. Action was another. He didn't know what was going to happen next any more than she did, but he knew what
wasn't
going to happen. Eve wasn't going to get hurt. He didn't know when he'd developed this protective streak where she was concerned, but he was going to make damn sure she wasn't hurt.