Twisted Shadows (9 page)

What struck her, though, was the intensity of his vivid green eyes and the energy radiating from his body as he spoke into the phone. His foot tapped; his hand moved as he talked. His eyes, she thought, didn't seem to miss anything, and now they seemed fastened on her.

She turned back to see her companion charging ahead without her, evidently finally getting the message.

She relaxed, realizing only then that her body had become stiff with tension. It wasn't exactly fear she felt but something more like wariness. Caution.

Was this how her mother had lived—never allowing herself an unguarded moment, always having to watch and suspect everything? Would she feel that way every time she encountered a stranger? She turned back to the concourse, her pace quickening as she passed closed stores and a bar with one lonely-looking patron.

But as fast as she walked, others were keeping pace. Most people at this time of night were on automatic pilot, going their own way. She followed the signs leading to the baggage area and transportation. She would grab a cab there.

As she reached the luggage area and saw all the people waiting in front of empty conveyors, she was grateful she had managed to get everything into her carry-on. She didn't plan to stay long. She had a life to return to.

Something made her turn. She caught a glimpse of the man who had been talking to the airline employee. He was coming toward her, not stopping at luggage claim, all that energy she'd sensed now concentrated on her.

Then she saw two other men approaching her. They had no luggage. No briefcases. Their gaze was focused on her, too, and they had the same look as the men who had entered her shop days ago and turned her world upside down. Only neither one was Tommy, and she sensed malevolence in their movements.

She looked toward the door. People out there were waiting for pickups or for buses. Where was the taxi line? There shouldn't be much of a line at this time of night. For a split second she searched for the first man … the tired one with the arresting eyes. She caught sight of him again and had the strongest urge to run toward him, to ask for help.

But he was taking a diagonal path in front of the other two men, as if to cut them off. As if he'd known she needed help.

Her imagination again. Whatever the reason, she sent him a silent thank-you he could neither hear nor see and continued toward the door … and escape.

She spurted forward, no longer rolling her luggage but holding it, ready to use it as a weapon. She looked for police, for someone in uniform. There was no one. She could yell at tired passengers waiting for luggage, but she had no proof of impending trouble.

Just the feeling of being stalked and hunted.

Fear had never ruled her before. Now it did.

She heard a shout. “Stop!”

Then she pushed the door open and rushed outside. With a quick glance back, she saw the sandy-haired man cut off one of the two men who had so disquieted her, blocking his way. The other one was looking around, then homed in on her and headed in her direction. There was no mistaking his intent now.

She bumped someone. A policeman.

Thank God.

He looked down at her. “Is there a problem, miss?”

She didn't know what to say.
I belong to the Merritta family and I think someone is chasing me
. Not likely. What if the men had been sent to protect her? What if news got out and destroyed her mother? What if no one was following her at all? Maybe she had just become paranoid.

“I thought someone was following me,” she said, looking back now that she felt safer.

A shout from inside made the officer look that way, then at her. She saw a line of taxicabs just ahead and nearly crumpled with relief. She had to get away from here. “I'm all right,” she assured the policeman. “It's been a long day.” Smiling, she backed away and stepped toward the nearest cab, all but lunging inside.

“I have to wait—” the driver said.

She reached in her purse and grabbed a fifty, handing it to him. “Please.”

He turned to look at her for a moment that seemed an eternity. Then he pulled away from the curb and sped off.

Nathan McLean swore long and hard.

He shouldn't have waited. But he hadn't been sure that the tall, dark-haired woman was the one he sought, especially not after another passenger put his arm around her. They had looked as if they were traveling together, the man following her off the plane.

Then her companion had leaned over and whispered in her ear and she'd stalked off.

Despite that odd second of attraction that flashed between them, he had no interest in getting involved in a lovers' spat. He studied the other passengers. At least he had the passenger manifest and phone numbers where passengers could be reached in case of flight changes.

He damned his inability to obtain a photo. He'd had several people working on the case, going back and checking all the information they had on Tracy Merritta. They'd located one relative—a sister—but she'd been out of town. Calls to her children only elicited the fact they all believed their aunt to be dead.

If he'd had more time …

But how to find a needle in a haystack, when all they had was a quick cell call from Colorado? All the conversations had been too brief to track the location any closer. No names. No descriptions. No leads.

If Tracy Merritta was indeed alive, she had dropped off the face of the earth, and to do that, he knew, she'd needed professional help.…

The woman who'd so distracted him had blue eyes and dark hair. She started across the gate area, the man beside her. Nate studied her again. Her eyes were blue, and her hair not quite as dark as Nick Merritt's, but there was something about her …

Then another woman deplaned alone. She had the same basic coloring, and he stepped up to her, only to discover she was a physician returning to Boston. There were no other likely prospects.

A fool's errand, he thought to himself. It had been a long shot from the beginning. He started to use his cell phone to call Gray when he saw the first woman stumble. Their eyes met again, and the man who had been accompanying her left her.

Adrenaline suddenly flowed through him. Perhaps he'd hesitated earlier because of the intense gaze they'd exchanged. It had hit him like a sledgehammer. He'd quickly dismissed any thought she could be Merritta's daughter. No way. None at all.

But now …

She was alone. She had Nick Merritta's coloring, even his tall, slim figure.

Damn it.

He mumbled something to Gray on the cell phone, turning to go after her, when the airline employee blocked him, saying all passengers had debarked. When he looked up again, she was gone. He trotted down the concourse looking for her, even as he swore all the way.

He saw her just as she entered the baggage area, and he increased his pace. Almost as if she knew he was there, he saw her turn, a startled expression on her face. Then she paled as two men walked toward her. He knew one of them. A paid killer. A freelancer.

They moved toward her, nothing welcoming or protective about them. He acted instinctively, cutting one of them off, giving the woman a chance to get away.

Through the corner of his left eye, he saw she was aware of the danger, and she started running. He wanted to go after her, but the man he'd blocked had a knife in his hand. Someone shouted, and people started running for doors.

He ducked then swiveled to avoid the blade. The other thug tripped him and shouted something to his companion. They took off and a uniformed guard stood over him, a gun in his hand.

It took several minutes for her panic to subside as the cab maneuvered out of the terminal area.

“Where to, lady?” the cabbie said.

She had no idea. She certainly wasn't going to the hotel where she'd made a reservation.

That was the only thing she knew. She didn't know who those two men were. Or why they had filled her with such a sense of being menaced. Nor did she know why the first man she'd seen at the gate had not provoked that same sense of imminent danger. In his own way, he'd looked as hard as the other two men. But not threatening.

Go to the police, her mind shouted. But she couldn't stop remembering her mother's face when Sam had proposed that very thing. No. The answer had been unequivocal.

Her mother feared the law as much as she feared her former husband's family. But why?

Sam looked at her watch. Nearly midnight. It was only ten in Colorado, but she felt emotionally and physically drained. Who was the sandy-haired man with all his intensity? And what did he want with her?

And who were the other two men? Paul Merritta's employees?

“Lady, where to?” the cabbie asked again in an impatient voice.

“Know of a good reasonable hotel?”

“No reservation?”

She hesitated long enough to draw another glance in the rearview mirror.

“No,” she said.

He made a turn, then another. They were in downtown Boston. She suddenly wondered whether she was wise to entrust her safety to a perfect stranger. She looked at the identification card on the back of the front seat. A name she couldn't decipher.

He drove up to the front of a large hotel. She recognized the chain name. She dug in her pocketbook for the fare, adding it to the fifty she had already given him. “Thank you,” she said. She jumped out of the cab and went inside.

The lobby was nearly empty. She went directly to an elevator, rode it up to the tenth floor, then came back down in the other bank of elevators. She went out a side entrance. She'd seen the technique used in a movie. It made sense.

Paranoid. The word was echoing in her head again.
You've seen too many of those movies
.

She walked quickly across the parking lot and down several streets. She passed two hotels before settling on a third. It wasn't as elegant as the first but the desk clerk was understanding when she explained that her wallet with all its credit cards had just been stolen but that she always hid cash in a separate place. She paid cash for a night and left a fifty-dollar deposit for “extras.” Her name was given as Alice Carter.

She reached her room, secured the locks and ran water in the bath as she unpacked her clothes. One dress and several pantsuits. She searched the room for a minibar but didn't find one.

She wanted to call her mother, but not from here. Nor did she wish to frighten her out of hiding. Maybe she'd misconstrued everything, she told herself.

Instead of phoning, she sank into the tub full of hot water and sighed as the tension in her body melted into exhaustion.

Unfortunately, her mind refused to stop working. What in the hell was going on? The question played over and over again.

If her biological—and that was the only way she could even consider the relationship—father had sent for her, why would he wish her harm? And why would anyone try to hurt the supposed daughter of one of the most feared men in Boston?

Questions. So many questions.

She stayed in the bathtub for a long time, continually adding hot water. She wanted to wash away that feeling of fear, of being vulnerable. Of being a victim. She'd never allowed herself to be one. She didn't plan to start now.

“What now, Sherlock?”

If Nate didn't like Gray as much as he did, he would have punched him. Mainly because he couldn't hit himself.

He'd lost her. It had taken him several precious seconds to show the airport police his credentials. While he'd convinced them he was who he said he was, she'd already taken off in a cab.

But at least he knew she'd gotten away. They'd located the cabbie, and he'd told them he'd taken her to a hotel. Problem was no one of her description was registered there.

He'd called Gray from the airport and asked him to meet him at the office.

“They weren't Merritta's men,” Nate said now. “I know them all. Carver is a freelancer.”

“So all we have to find out is who hired him,” Gray said. “But after assaulting a federal officer, he's probably on a plane to Mexico or points south.”

“The first shot in a new war?” Nate said, ignoring the comment. “I can't believe even Merritta would send goons after his daughter after inviting her here.”

Gray sobered. “God knows what's at play. We have to find her.”

“At least we have her brother's phone tapped now. I'll bet my next paycheck she tries to contact him.”

“Thank God for McGuire.”

McGuire had been the third federal judge they'd approached. He'd been down on the list because he was up for an appellate appointment and Nate knew his record would be scrutinized. Yet he was an ex-cop who had become a prosecutor, and he was generally friendly to the FBI.

And they knew her name now. Nate had checked out every woman on the airline manifest. Only one fit what they now knew. Samantha Carroll. Thirty-five. Half owner of an art gallery in Steamboat Springs. Central Colorado. The age fit. The location fit.

“Photo?” Gray asked.

“I'm trying to get one from motor vehicles in Colorado.”

But Nate saw her in his mind's eye. He could give a description to one of their artists. Dark-haired with serious dark blue eyes. He remembered those dark blue eyes that had widened when she'd seen him. She'd been dressed casually in a blue shirt and black slacks. She wore a silver and turquoise bracelet, a silver necklace. She had an elegant walk and confident posture.

“Let's check all the hotels in the downtown area for a Samantha Carroll,” Nate said. “If we don't find her, then we start looking for anyone who paid cash.”

“It's just you and me, buddy, and there are a lot of hotels.”

“If we don't find her by morning, I'll follow Nicholas Merritt. She's going to dinner at Merritta's Saturday. She must have come early for a reason. Maybe that reason is Merritt.”

“That means they'll get to her first,” Gray said morosely.