Face of Danger (37 page)

Cara just shook her head, still looking at the papers. “This is unbelievable, Vivi.” She beamed at her. “I think you’ve found the killer, I really do. Please sit here for a minute while I take this in.”

What the hell was these to
take in
? Vivi’s head felt like it was exploding at the base of her neck now, patience and time evaporating with each passing second.

“Sit here,” Cara ordered, in a voice she might use for her dog.

“The FBI has some solid leads on some artificial hairs found at both crime scenes,” Vivi said, a sharp edge of impatience in her voice. “I need to deal with this now.”

“I’ve heard. Did they tie those hairs to Joellen?”

“Well, according to those papers—”

“Please sit down, Vivi.” It was no longer a suggestion, and Vivi knew if she didn’t follow the instruction she’d get no help from Cara. Irritation scampered up her spine, but Vivi took the window seat, still holding her phone.

“Who knows about this evidence?” Cara asked. “Have you told your FBI agent yet?”

He wasn’t
her
FBI agent. “Mercedes just gave these to me.”

“Mercedes found them?” She considered that. “I guess that’s okay.”

“Okay?”

“We have to do something about this,” Cara said softly, bending over. Stella trotted closer at the cue, but Cara didn’t pick her up. Instead she dug through a designer bag open in the aisle next to her.

Vivi chose her words carefully, itching to jump and run but knowing she couldn’t. “I know you need me, Cara. And I know you want the luxury of a second body to be where you can’t, but getting Joellen into the FBI for questioning is far, far more—”

Cara jumped up, the papers fluttering all around as she pointed a gun directly at Vivi. “No, it isn’t.”

Vivi just blinked in shock. “What the hell are you doing?”

“Saying good-bye to my decoy, who is flying to Boston as me.” Her last words were drowned by the whine of the engines starting up.

“Seriously?” Vivi asked with a choke. “You’re going to threaten to shoot me if I don’t go? You can’t force someone to work for you, Cara. I don’t want to do this but, sorry, you leave me no choice.” She pushed up, staring at the gun without fear. “And you can leave the drama on the movie set. Tell the pilots to—”

“Sit!” She lifted the gun, her hand remarkably steady as the plane lurched back. “I’m a good shot and you’ll be dead before we hit the runway. And the cabin, as I may have mentioned, is one hundred percent soundproof. Put your seat belt on.”

“Cara—”

“On.”
Gone was the innocence, the interest in what she’d found. It was replaced by the deadly calm expression of a woman who would kill.

If Vivi put the belt on, she couldn’t jump her and get the hell off this plane.

But if she didn’t, something told her Cara was completely capable of firing that gun.

She pulled the belt over her hips, purposely holding Cara’s gaze. As she did, she secretly pressed a button on her phone and hit Send. It was somebody’s speed dial, but she had no idea who.

“Throw the phone,” Cara said, using her head to indicate the other side of the cabin. “Now. One, two…”

She pitched the phone and it landed softly on the bed. “Why are you doing this?” Vivi asked.

“Because you’re a hell of an investigator. And that was my biggest fear when you walked into my trailer in L.A. But also my greatest opportunity. That’s why I called you here. I certainly didn’t expect you, or Mercedes, to find this.” She gestured to the fallen papers. “The FBI should have. Weren’t they searching that house?”

Why was she behaving like this? “Cara, are you trying to protect Joellen? Because if she killed those actresses—”

“Protect her?” She snorted softly. “I’m trying to frame her. But the plan wasn’t for that to happen quite yet. I still need the publicity of the Red Carpet Killer, now more than ever since my name will be associated with that pig and his vile business.”

“Why would you frame her for murder?”

She just angled her head and gave a wry smile. “Better her than the real killer, kiddo. And they’re finding hairs and God knows what else now that the FBI is on the job. It’s only a matter of time until they zero in on… me.”

Cara
was the Red Carpet Killer? Vivi just stared at her, speechless.

“You don’t have to be so surprised, Vivi. This is Hollywood. Only the strong survive. And, Christ, I hated Adrienne for beating me out of that award. I was pissed.” She spat the word, venom in the hiss.

“You weren’t even nominated,” Vivi said, vaguely aware of the plane easing back to the tarmac, turning slowly as it taxied toward a runway.

Please, God, let it be a busy day at the Nantucket Airport.

Wasn’t Lang taking off about now? Would his plane delay them long enough to get out of this? She had to get
off. Or reach the pilots. She risked a glance to the call button, too far away for her to make a dive.

“I read for that role,” Cara said. “It should have been mine. And since Joellen had worked for her for a while, it was easy enough to find out Adrienne’s schedule, her driving route.”

“You’re the last person I would have imagined,” Vivi said honestly. “So much for my investigative skills.”

“But you honed in on Joellen, and that was what I wanted. She’s the perfect fall guy for this. The poor, drunk, overlooked sister. But you’ll have to die in her last act of stupidity: killing the decoy.”

“Someone else will investigate this, Cara.” Her gaze dropped to the gun, steady in Cara’s hand. By the time she got the seat belt off she’d be dead. “You’ll never get away with this.”

“Oh no? I’ve gotten away with a couple other murders,” she said. “I’m not worried about the investigation. They’ll never focus on me if my
decoy
is accidentally the victim of the Red Carpet Killer. They’ll hone right in on Joellen, who isn’t even my sister after all.”

Vivi swallowed in a desert-dry mouth, sweat prickling under her arms. Cara wasn’t lying… about anything. “Why did you kill Isobel DeSoto, then? Did you plan to be a serial killer?”

“She had the part in
Now, Voyager
and I wanted it. I knew it was my breakout role. So I helped her take a few pills, okay? If you put this to someone’s head—”She glanced at the gun. “They do stuff.”

Still holding the gun, Cara reached into her bag again and pulled out a roll of bandage adhesive tape. “Taking this from that hospital was pure genius.”

“What are you going to do?”

“Timing, they say, is everything.” She stepped closer. “If I time this right, you’ll go down in the Nantucket Sound, so it’ll be a watery crime scene, giving me weeks and weeks to produce more evidence that will nail Joellen’s ass once and for all.”

Her blood ran ice-cold as Cara used the gun to push Vivi’s arm onto the rest. What was she planning?

Cara bit the tape and kept the gun on Vivi, the seat-belt latch far enough from Vivi’s fingers that if she even made an attempt to get it, she’d be dead. One strip of tape smashed over Vivi’s arm, securing it.

Then Cara held the pistol, a sleek little Kahr K9, to Vivi’s temple. “I’m going to do the other one. If you move, I pull the trigger.”

Vivi just closed her eyes, her pulse pounding against the barrel of the gun. She’d get out of this, but not by doing something risky. The tape zipped over her arms, then Cara stripped off more and really secured her.

The phone on the bed beeped with a call and Cara glanced at it, then backed up, grabbing it to read the screen. “Lang,” she said. “The FBI guy?”

Vivi just stared, fighting the tape with every ounce of strength, doing exactly nothing to tear it. She’d speed-dialed
Lang.
Help was so close… and so far away.

Maybe Cara would answer and Vivi could scream.

Cara threw the phone on the bed, peeking out the window to see where they were. Vivi didn’t dare look away from her as she waited for the slightest opportunity to do something.

But what? Kick a shoe at her? Scream in a soundproofed cabin?

With Vivi secure, Cara set down the gun and returned to her designer bag of tricks, this time pulling out a small black device with red and blue wires wrapped around it.

“Roman Emmanuel was good for a few things,” she said softly. “Sex and creative ways to kill people. I will say that everything I’ve done, I learned from him.” She held the device up. “Like making a bomb.”

She set the bomb on the end table, pressing a button on it then turning the device toward Vivi so she could see a small digital readout of 10:00. “Ten minutes ought to be perfect. And we are done here, Miss Stella. Victim number three of the Red Carpet Killer. You’ve seen them all, pooch.”

Like she was packing up from a business meeting, she picked up the papers, stuffed them in her bag, snapped her fingers at the dog, and they both walked to the door.

“Thank you for all your hard work, Vivi. If it’s any consolation, I’ll see that your company gets full remuneration and they can start a scholarship in your name or something.” She flashed a Hollywood smile. “I’ll mention it in my next acceptance speech.” As she pulled the door open, she yelled, “I need the stairs opened, stat!” and disappeared into the cabin, closing the door before Vivi had a chance to open her mouth.

Vivi jerked her hands but they were thoroughly fastened to the armrests. Writhing, she caught a movement out of her peripheral vision. A man, running toward the plane, hundreds of feet away. But not so far that she didn’t recognize that body, that build, that savior of hers.

“Lang!” she screamed as loud as she could, more out of joy than hope as she watched him running like a damn
fool down the tarmac. To profess his love or save her ass? Right now, she didn’t care.

She just couldn’t let Cara escape and this plane take off.

But from the window across the cabin, she could see Cara bolting down the stairs in a run. Lang would see her and go after her while the plane took off. How could she get his attention?

The stairs lifted, and in seconds the engines screamed back to life.

No!
She had to get this tape off. She lowered her head, trying to bite the edge of the tape, but her teeth barely nipped it. She had to bend deeper, lower. Just like she did to get those damn boots off when she stripped in this very same seat.

With a grunt she doubled over again and locked her teeth on the tape, ripping. Something cracked—

The porcelain that the dentist had applied to make her slightly chipped tooth match Cara’s flawless one. She bit again, a fiery pain where bared enamel scraped tape, sending a flare into her head, but she ignored it.

She had to rip a hand free. Had to get to that bomb. Had to get off this plane.

But her teeth couldn’t get a grip and the engines whined with increased speed. As the jet turned a little, she caught a glimpse of Lang, his step slowed, his attention shifted, his body turning in the direction Cara had run.

“Lang!” She screamed at the sealed up window, banging her head against it. Even from this distance, she could see him take his phone out. Calling for backup. Doing things in order. Certainly not running after a private jet
about to take off. That would be a stupid, foolhardy risk he’d never take.

She bit the tape and yanked as hard as she could, her grunts of frustration and misery drowned out by the roar of the jet engines that were about to take off for the last time.

H
old it!” Colt yelled, but his words were drowned out by the whine of the mighty Rolls-Royce engines of the G650.

Even if she heard him, the woman who’d just gotten off the plane kept running toward an opening in the chain-link fence. Was it Cara or Vivi? From this distance, it was impossible to tell.

“Stop right there! FBI!”

She broke into a full sprint, stumbling a little as she held on to the dog. The plane rolled backward again, the engines revving once more to taxi to the runway. His phone rang incessantly, and he stole a look at the screen.

Gagliardi again. He grabbed it and barked, “Not now.”

“Yes, now! Urgent break in the Red Carpet case. Cara Ferrari is—”

The Red Carpet Killer.
He didn’t even have to hear the words.

“I
know.
And I’m two hundred yards from her in a full-out run.” Or was he chasing after Vivi?

“Roman Emmanuel’s been talking and that woman knows how to use explosives. Get her! That’s an order!”

But his gut screamed a different order.
Explosives.
If Vivi was on that plane, a victim could be set up to be killed—making Cara the last possible suspect if she made it look like someone had targeted
her
and killed the body double instead.

Lang smashed the End button without responding, his attention split between the rolling jet and the running woman. She slowed a little and dropped the dog on the ground, then bolted faster. The dog rushed to keep up, its crooked gait slowing it down.

No doubt about who that woman was, then. Stella wouldn’t run after Vivi.

But he would. He would
not
let that plane take off.

He tore across the tarmac as the jet started to pick up speed. The roar of the engines deafened him, but the plane was still on a slow taxi out of the parking area. Once he reached the tail, then what? Flag the pilots? Shoot?

He
was
going to have to climb the landing gear. Or at least grab the back of the wing when it turned on to the runway. He ran right by the opening to the parking area where Cara Ferrari disappeared.

Let her go. Vivi was on that plane, probably thinking she was doing some favor for her client, unknowingly flying to her death.

Twenty feet, ten. Heat rolled off the engines, the roar vibrating right through to his bones. Even if he got to the cockpit they wouldn’t see him. Just behind the left wing, the mighty wheel topped off at eye level, spitting gravel
at him, making a mockery of his chances of stopping the plane.

Unless he could grab hold of the landing-gear door, which was thin enough for him to grip as the plane slowed to turn. He’d have to time it just right, swing up to the wing, and get Vivi’s attention, and she could get the pilots to stop. He’d never get their attention from this angle.