Force of Nature (9 page)

Jules couldn’t believe this. He could understand Alyssa telling Sam, but…“As my boss or—”

“As your friend,” Max corrected him. “I just wanted to make sure that you understood, despite what the President said in our meeting—”

“Grooming me as your replacement,” Jules remembered. With everything going on in the search for Peggy Ryan, he’d actually forgotten
that
giant anvil that had dropped on his head from out of the blue. Max actually thought that when he moved onward and upward,
Jules
would be able to fill his gigantic shoes. It was almost too much to assimilate, not without bursting into tears—which could well make Max change his mind.

“You’re not going to disappoint me if you decide to take a different path,” Max told him quietly. “If you and Ben—”

“Whoa,” Jules said. “Whoa. Yikes. The man sent me an
e-mail.
I haven’t seen him in months. It’s crazy to think…I mean, God, even when we were together, it was only for a week. It was just an extended one-night stand. It was sex, all right?”

Ben was incredibly good-looking, and even though as a Marine he had to be in the closet, they had hooked up for a while because, well…Because Jules was human. But it wasn’t worth it—it drove him nuts to have to hide, to sneak around…They’d broken up, and Ben went to Iraq. End of story.

Except they’d started exchanging e-mail a few months ago. As friends. Just friends—Jules had made that very clear.

The idea that Ben was suddenly talking long-term commitment was absurd.

Wasn’t it?

Although, with Ben in Iraq, their relationship had been whittled down to words, thoughts, feelings—in the form of those near-daily e-mails. Jules had found it oddly enjoyable. Ben was a good writer—a skill that Jules appreciated and even shared. They’d gotten to know each quite well over the past four months—something that was much easier to do without Ben constantly pressuring him to make their friendship physical again.

But this latest e-mail had caught Jules by surprise.

“He’s willing to give up his career. You won’t have to hide anymore. Isn’t that what you wanted?” Max asked Jules now.

Jules nodded. First yes, then no. “I don’t know what I want,” he admitted. “I honestly don’t.”

No way was he torturing Max by telling him this, but the sex hadn’t been all that great, shadowed as it was by the knowledge that Jules was getting intimate with someone who would never even dare to hold his hand at a Pride parade. Not that Ben wasn’t plenty affectionate in private. Jules just found it hard to invest a hundred percent in a relationship that could never be permanent—not without Ben giving up his career.

God, the thought of Ben throwing everything away for Jules—for something that had never been real—made him feel claustrophobic. As if his tie were tightening around his neck as water closed around his head.

Which was probably close to the way Max was feeling right about now, too.

“You sure you don’t want a beer?” Max asked.

Jules stood up. Because Max was right—it would all be here tomorrow. Peggy’s reports. Ben’s e-mail. His future trying to fill Max’s shoes as the leader of the most elite counterterrorist team in the entire FBI.

“Yeah,” Jules told his friend. “Let’s go get a beer.”

C
HAPTER
T
HREE

A
nnie didn’t understand much of what was going on inside this limousine, but she did learn one thing pretty fast: Speaking would get them hit.

“Who’s Mr. Burns?” Annie had asked Ric, and the goon named Foley had slapped her.

And
that
had made Ric lunge for him, which was totally insane, considering that the second bodyguard—the one built like a refrigerator—was holding a gun on him.

Thankfully, he didn’t shoot Ric with his gun, but he did hit him with it, opening up a nasty-looking cut on the arm that Ric had thrown up to block it. But despite that, Ric still bristled. “Don’t you dare hit her! I fucking saved your boy, and you
hit
her?”

The skinhead named Gordie Junior, the one with the leather jacket and the foul mouth and the enormous gun that screamed of compensation for feelings of physical inadequacy, was looking at Annie now, disgust in his eyes. “Who’s Mr. Burns?” He repeated her question as if she were an idiot. “What rock you been living under, bitch?”

Ric answered for her. “She’s new in town. She works for me.” He wasn’t talking to Junior, he was focusing his words on Foley and Refrigerator, who were both significantly older than Junior and his friends, and seemed to be in charge. “If you let her out at the corner, she’ll go back and get her car from the Gardens. She’ll go to my office and wait for me to—”

“Shut up,” Foley said.

But Ric wasn’t done trying to get Annie out of that limo. “Just let her go, and Mr. Burns doesn’t have to know that you treated us like this, after we—”

“Ow!”

Foley slapped Annie. It wasn’t particularly hard, but her head knocked into the side of the car, which rattled her teeth.

“Now shut the fuck up,” he told Ric, “or I hit her again.”

Ric fell silent, shooting her a look of apology and misery that was almost as palpable as that kiss he’d given her, back in the Palm Gardens parking lot.

God, but Ric Alvarado knew how to kiss—no big surprise there. Annie let herself think about it, about his mouth, his hands, his incredible body beneath
her
hands. God knows it was better to do something more positive with her time than soiling her pants as they drove north on Route 41, curving around past the festive lights of the harbor.

She held Ric’s gaze across the spacious expanse of the limo, remembering the look in his eyes just before he kissed her. She’d made him laugh with her silly rhyme, but his smile had faded until there was only heat. And for that instant, as he gazed down at her with the vertigo-inspiring bottomless midnight of his dark-chocolate eyes, she’d actually felt…beautiful.

And okay, yeah, it was all just pretend. Annie knew that. He’d kissed her because they’d needed to stall.

But there was pretending, and there was the kind of pretending that was inspired by the reality of living out a longtime fantasy—and she was not the only one who’d been doing that. They’d both gotten undeniably lost in the moment.

And that look in his eyes, when he’d pulled away from her…?

He’d been shaken up. Scared to death. Conflicted.

And despite stammering something about a kiss like that never happening again, he’d definitely wanted more. If they survived this meeting with this mysterious Mr. Burns, Annie was going to kiss Ric again. She was just going to do it. Just grab him and…

The limo was slowing, turning down a side street, heading toward the water. Most of the properties in this area were in the filthy-rich price range, many of them gated estates. They turned again, indeed, waiting for an electronic gate to open, then continued down a brick driveway, through lushly landscaped grounds lit by pretty solar lanterns.

Ric, too, was looking out the window, trying to get a glimpse of the house—a garishly baroque palace, right on the bay.

The limo stopped. Someone from the outside opened the door nearest Ric, and light poured in.

“I want to talk to Mr. Burns,” Annie heard Ric demand as he was dragged out, onto the well-lit driveway.

Junior had Annie roughly by the arm, and he pulled her toward the same side of the limo. He swore at her as she skidded before she reached the door. She went down, hard, on her knee.

“I’m sorry,” she gasped, sharp pain mixing with fear. But then she pushed herself back up and realized that it was blood that she’d slipped in. It was on her sneaker and all over her jeans and both her hands and oh, dear God, it was
Ric’s
blood.

He’d been shot, back at Palm Gardens.

He’d been shot, and he’d just sat there in the limo, bleeding, and he hadn’t said a freaking thing.

“Get off of me.” Annie yanked her arm free when Gordie Junior tried to grab her again. Instead he grabbed her by the hair. “Ow, ow, ow!” The ungrateful son of a bitch!

“What did you do to her?” Ric fought to get away from the refrigerator who was holding him. His elbow must’ve connected with some tender part of the big man’s face, because he got himself free and scrambled toward her as she was dumped unceremoniously onto the bricks. “Annie, Jesus! Where were you hit?”

He thought
she
was bleeding. He thought
she’d
been shot.

“Get away from her,” Foley ordered.

Ric either didn’t see or didn’t give a crap about the arsenal of weaponry that was now pointed in their direction as he searched her for a bullet wound that didn’t exist. “Call for an ambulance,” he ordered their captors even as she tried to tell him she wasn’t hurt.

“Get away from her,” Foley ordered again.

“It’s not me,” Annie told Ric. “It’s you. It’s you!
Ric.
” There was an entire army surrounding them—he was going to get them both shot. Although, in his case, it was going to be
shot again.
“Look at your sneaker!”

He finally looked down at his own blood-soaked shoe, at the hole in his jeans that still oozed. “Whoa,” he breathed. “It’s me?”

She nodded as Foley’s voice got even louder. “Get. Away from her.”

“What’s going on here?” A man’s voice rang out. “Are we
trying
to get the police to visit us tonight?”

The crowd parted for him. He was slight of stature, with thick salt-and-pepper hair, but he walked like royalty and wore a very expensive suit. He looked at Gordie Junior. “Get inside. To a safe room,” he ordered.

The kid holstered his gun, heavy on the attitude. “I can fucking take care of myself.” What a way for a son to talk to his father.

“We’ll discuss this later,” Burns said. “For now, take care of your…friends.”

Junior, his skinhead friend, and Brenda all trooped inside.

“Mr. Burns,” Ric said, taking advantage of the sudden silence. “There’s been a misunderstanding. My name is Ric Alvarado—I’m a private investigator. I was hired by Florida State Insurance to check out a back-injury claim made by Screech’s Nightclub on behalf of Brenda Quinn.”

What? Why would he lie? But the look Ric shot her was filled with warning, and Annie kept her mouth tightly shut.

“The case was a simple identify and verify the injury,” Ric continued. “Very straightforward. I assure you, I wouldn’t have brought my assistant into the field if I believed otherwise. I had no idea of Miss Quinn’s connection to your son, sir—not before tonight.”

All this talking was taking way too long. Yes, Burns appeared to be listening, but Ric had already been bleeding for too much time.

“I’m sorry, sir,” Annie interrupted, “but my boss, here? He needs to go to the hospital. He happens to be bleeding, maybe to death, if he doesn’t get some medical help, STAT. The fact is that someone tried to kill your son tonight, Mr. Burns. Ric spotted the gunman and threw himself between the gun and your son, taking a bullet in his leg. So will you
please
call us an ambulance?”

Burns glanced at Foley, who came toward Ric and Annie. “Mr. Foley used to be a paramedic.”

Foley crouched next to Ric, giving him a cursory but apparently none-too-gentle examination. He used a deadly-looking knife that the limo driver handed him, to cut open the lower leg of Ric’s jeans.

“Ow, shit!”

“Easy,” Annie admonished the man, but he was already done.

“Small-caliber bullet,” Foley reported, wiping his hands on a handkerchief. “No exit wound. It’s still in there, but not too deep. I’m guessing it was pretty much spent.” But then he frowned at the limo, crossing over to finger the bullet hole that marred the side of the vehicle. “But this is from at least a .44.” He looked at Ric. “Were there two weapons?”

Ric shook his head. “I saw only one. And just a glimpse of it, too. I didn’t get a good look at the shooter. He was in the shadows. Best I can tell you is he seemed shorter than average height. I think he was wearing some kind of overcoat. Other than that…” He shrugged.

“Can we
please
—” Annie started.

Foley cut her off. “He’s not going to bleed to death. He
will
need a tetanus shot, though. If there was only one weapon—a .44—your boyfriend’s injury is probably a result of a ricochet. If I were a betting man, I’d put money on the doctor digging a chunk of rock outta there.” He looked at Ric. “You’re lucky. If that had been a bullet from a .44, you’d be minus a leg.”

“I’m lucky, too,” Burns said. “If you hadn’t been there, Mr. Alvarado,
I’d
be minus a son.” He turned to Foley. “Let’s have our men stand down, and invite our guests inside, shall we?”

Annie opened her mouth, but Burns anticipated her request.

“My personal physician is on his way over,” he told her. “It’ll be faster—and far more discreet—than calling for an ambulance, Miss…?”

It was clearly an invitation for her to provide her name, but Ric beat her to it. “Jones,” he said as the larger bodyguard helped him to his feet.

“Of course,” Burns said. “Miss…Jones.” He didn’t buy her a.k.a. for a second, but seemed more amused than annoyed. “You look as if you’d enjoy a chance to get cleaned up.”

Enjoy. What an interesting word choice after the evening they’d had. Annie quickly moved to help Ric on his other side, but he wrapped his arm around her shoulders and held on tight, more as if he were protecting her than receiving her support.

“Stay close,” he murmured as they followed Burns into the house. That is, the palace.

Or rather, the castle. There were actually suits of armor in the marble-tiled foyer. And palm trees. Tall ones. And mirrors.

Annie caught sight of herself—no wonder Ric had flipped when he saw her. She’d managed to smear the front of her shirt with the blood that she’d gotten on her hands when she’d slipped. There was even some on her chin.

His blood.

Burns raised his voice. “Maria! Will you take Miss Jones to a guest room, so she can shower? Oh, and find her something to wear.”

“Yes, sir.” An older woman, dressed more like the hostess of a posh restaurant than a household servant, smiled at Annie. “This way, miss.”

“She’ll stay with me,” Ric said, at the exact same time Annie said, “I’ll wait for the doctor, with Ric.”

“Show them both to a guest room,” Burns ordered Maria. He smiled at Ric and Annie, every inch the gracious host. “I’ll send the doctor up as soon as he arrives.”

Ric lay on the doctor’s portable examination table with his eyes closed, soaked with sweat as the doctor finished stitching him up. It
had
been a piece of rock, not a bullet, that had lodged in his leg. Foley had been right.

But damn,
that
was thirty minutes of his life that he never wanted to revisit, ever again.

“Next time, don’t refuse the anesthesia,” the doctor told him, taking his gloves off with a snap. “For your information, local anesthesia only affects—”

“I know,” Ric interrupted. “I didn’t want it.” He didn’t trust anyone in Burns’s lair, particularly not Dr. Midnight Housecall, here.

“I’m giving you a ten-day course of antibiotics.”

There was a rattling sound, and Ric opened his eyes to see him holding out a plastic pill bottle. “Just write me a prescription.”

The doctor shook his head. He set the bottle down on the desk, near a pile of clothes that someone—the woman named Maria—had brought for Ric to change into, after he’d showered. “You know I can’t do that.”

Because this entire procedure had been illegal. Gunshot wounds had to be reported, but information about this one wasn’t going to get anywhere near the DA’s office. Not via a report from this doctor, anyway.

“What’s he got on you?” Ric asked. The doctor was an older man, surely well established in his career. “Gambling debts?”

“One pill, three times a day,” the doctor ordered. “Any sign of infection, redness, swelling—call the number on the bottle.” He gathered up his things. “Mr. Foley’ll put the bandage on, after you shower. Take your time, though. Don’t stand up until you’re ready.”

“To whom do I address the thank-you note?”

The doctor stopped. Turned to look at him. “Don’t ask too many questions, asshole. Even I’m not good enough to suture a throat that’s been slit. Neither of us are here because we’re angels. Just do your job and keep your mouth shut—the way I do.”

And with that, he was gone.

Ric let his head drop back on the pillow.

Voices—one male, one female—and the sound of ice clinking in glasses made him turn toward the sliders, which led out onto a deck overlooking a patio.

Annie was out there. She’d swiftly showered and changed before the doctor arrived, pulling her curls up into a bun-thing atop her head, which, with the brightly patterned sarong that Burns’s servant had brought, made her look like some kind of sacrificial virgin, about to be thrown into a volcano.

Ric had sent her out of the room, figuring it was the lesser of two evils, about three minutes after he’d refused Dr. Gloom’s local anesthesia. She’d resisted his demand, but he’d insisted, refusing treatment until she went outside, onto the patio.

And now, from the sound of laughter, it appeared she was no longer alone. And apparently she was pretending to enjoy herself, which had to be no easy task.

Ric sat up, gripping the edge of the table until his dizziness passed. He slid down onto the floor, catching himself with his left leg—his good leg. Cautiously, he tested his right leg and…