Hush (39 page)

He couldn't think of one person who hated him enough to want him dead. There were plenty
greedy
enough to want him dead, but this didn't smell like a money grab. They wanted to make him hurt. This felt personal. All rational signs pointed to this being a plan enacted by someone close. Close enough to know where to find the brothers and be on top of them when they called. So close Zak had eaten in the man's kitchen.

Buck.

Fuckit
. Zak had the
who
in the equation, he was sure of it; now he needed the
why.
It didn't make sense for Anthony Buckner to go to such elaborate lengths to dispose of the Stark brothers. Money couldn't be his motive. Buck was financially conservative by nature. He had more than he could spend in a lifetime, even with a shopaholic wife and a couple of great, but indulged and spoiled, kids.

“No, of course not,” Acadia assured him, rubbing his upper arm in an absent gesture. “But I trust your judgment.” She left her hand on him, light, but so strong and capable. Her touch helped more than she could possibly know.

“Let's move into the shade,” she told him briskly, tugging on his arm. “We need to rethink this.” Her brow furrowed in concentration as she walked a few yards to a patch of shade under a nearby tree. “What about that Savin guy? You say he tried to recruit you for his black-ops thing when you were at MIT?
He'd
certainly have the contacts and resources to pull off something of this magnitude, wouldn't he? Did anything happen between you that he might've
misconstrued?
” She shrugged helplessly. “Sometimes people perceive a slight when none was intended. Did you guys ever go on some bender where he told you something and now he has to kill you?”

Savin would certainly have the contacts and the resources. On the other hand, Buck had the resources to
make
the contacts. He appreciated her effort, but Jesus, he knew he was right. “Haven't seen or even spoken to Marc
in—hell, must be ten or twelve years now. I was damned surprised that he even remembered telling me to call him if I ever needed help. It's not him, sweetheart.”

Christ. Zak wished with everything in him that he had a more logical suspect than Buck. But things were starting to click in his brain, and as much as he didn't want to go down this road, there wasn't anyone else who fit the bill. Then again,
Buck
didn't fit the bill.

“It was Buck who suggested the Angel Falls trip,” he told her, leaning against a tree trunk. BASE-jumping the falls hadn't been that high on their daredevil scale, not by a long shot. He rubbed his hand across his mouth. “Why else would he do it?”

“Because he thought you'd enjoy it?” Acadia suggested.

“Maybe.” Zak considered it briefly, then shook his head. “But I doubt it. Within hours of my calling him, two people tried to kill us at the Gran Meliá. Within hours of
that
, the company jet blew up, right after I told Buck we were headed to the airport. And this whole thing started with someone
knowing
that Gid and I were in that small hotel; that info wasn't exactly available on Page Six.”

“What about back home? Can you remember anything that might strike a chord?”

“Nothing big. Buck keeps the business running like clockwork. You and he would get on great.”

“Not if he wants to kill you, Zak.” She brushed her hair off her shoulder. “So, he runs the business. Was
there something major he wanted to do? Something new he wanted to try, that you were arguing about?”

He hesitated. “We're in the process of doing a buyout of a small rival search engine company; the deal is being finalized next month,” he said slowly. “But the sale has been amicable, and Buck has that under control. I don't know, Acadia. None of this makes sense. No matter how I look at it.”

She reached out to touch him, offering whatever comfort she could without words. He didn't deserve it. Every passing second that left Gideon alone in the jungle with no backup was agony. Zak pressed his fist between his eyebrows for a second, his gut twisting as he noticed the small change in the numbers indicating Gideon's movement. God, there was a possibility that his brother had escaped.
He'd
done it; so could Gideon.

But the kidnappers had been caught unawares when they'd escaped, and incapacitated by Acadia's quick thinking and multipocketed clothing. Hell, half the reason they were still alive and walking around was her ingenuity. And pure luck.

Besides, Gid's ribs might be broken, which meant he'd be slower. Zak hated feeling so inept. So freaking
powerless.

He refused to consider the alternative. That Gid was already dead, and someone else was wearing his watch. “Once you eliminate the impossible,” he quoted bitterly, “whatever remains, no matter how improbable, must be the truth.”

“Not necessarily,” Acadia said very seriously. She
stopped speaking as three teenagers on skateboards rode toward them. They stepped off the path to let them go by. “Technically,” she continued, shading her eyes against the bright sun, “anything
is
possible, therefore, nothing is impossible. Therefore, there is no impossible to eliminate. Therefore, anything
can
be true. Right?”

He crowded her against the back of a nearby bench. Then cupped her cheek, because he needed to touch her to feel grounded, if only for a moment. “Convoluted.” He stroked his thumb across her sun-warmed skin, and she leaned a little into his touch, but didn't say anything.

Zak shook his head and stepped away from her. She was like a magnet and he a lodestone; he was so attracted to her that if she was in touching distance, he couldn't keep his hands to himself. He really needed to start learning how.

He stuffed his hands into his front pockets and stared off into the middle distance.

He had to find a safe place to stash Acadia. Where? He wasn't sure if the police and National Guard were after them because of the stolen police car or because they were on someone's payroll. Either way, the officials had her photograph and identification; there was nowhere she could hide and no way he could get her out of the country. And he could forget about the money. Buck would have made sure there was no access.

The longer he took to find a safe haven where he wouldn't have to worry about her, the longer it would take him to find Gideon. And the longer it took, the less chance of finding him—

His phone rang, and he snatched it out of his breast pocket.
Buck
. “Hey,” he said by way of greeting. His throat closed and acid roiled up in his stomach. He'd known this man for almost half his adult life. They'd gotten drunk together when Jen had died. And again when Buck's teenage son had overdosed on drugs last year and almost hadn't made it. They'd built a business from nothing, and taken rare family vacations together.

Other than Gideon, Anthony Buckner was the one person on this planet he had trusted the most.

Zak couldn't even comprehend how it had come to this … or why.

“Buddy, my guys want to be wheels-up sooner than later. What's the holdup?”

“I have to keep a low profile; the cops were looking for me at the airport,” Zak said, not quite lying. “I had to ditch the car, and I'm waiting to rent another one. Taking longer than I thought.”

Acadia tapped away at the keyboard of her phone as he talked.

“Screw the rental,” Buck said impatiently, then hesitated. After a moment, he said with more calm, “I'll have one of my men come pick you up; it'll be faster. Give me your location.”

Acadia turned her screen so Zak could see the list of car rental places she'd ZAG-searched. He chose one as far from the airport as he could find and rattled off the street address, shooting her a grateful smile.

“Okay, bud, hang tight. I'll have someone there ASAP,” Buck assured him. “We'll get Gideon, Zak.
Whether it takes a duffel bag of cash or they go in guns blazing. We
will
retrieve Gideon.”

Sure you will.
“Thanks, Buck. Appreciate your confidence.” He took the phone from his ear and heard Buck ask casually, “What happened to the woman?”

Without answering, Zak disconnected, then stood there for a moment, looking blankly across the pond, where the little boy waited patiently for his mother to build him another paper boat. Ducks swam lazily on the reflection of a hard blue sky.

Everything around him looked so normal, yet his entire world was upside-down.

He needed help. Pissed him off, but he needed help and he needed it now. He dialed again. “Who are you calling?” Acadia whispered, and he held up a hand for her to hang on as the line connected.

“Marc?” he said into the phone. Acadia's expression cleared. “It's Zak Stark. Here's the deal.” Quickly, he told him the whole fucking story from beginning to end.

After a silent moment, Marc sighed. “Hell of a clusterfuck. Give me ten minutes, okay? I'll call you back with the location of a safe house.”

The line went dead, and Zak pocketed his phone. Next to him, Acadia watched the surface of the pond, her eyebrows knotted tightly.

“Don't look so worried,” Zak said, tracing a finger over her frown. “He'll get us to a safe house and come up with a solid plan. Not as good as yours, but his weapons are bigger than a bottle of eyedrops.”

Granted, he didn't know much about Savin aside from
what he'd told Acadia already. He might very well have just made a bargain with a man who could kill him without leaving a trace of his body. But his gut didn't agree.

“We'd better hope you weren't confiding in the wrong guy,” Acadia muttered, once again reading his mind. “On the upside?” She tucked her arm in his as if they were a couple of dating kids on a Sunday afternoon stroll. “If he decides to kill us, he'll know how to make it
quick.”
She shot him an impish glance.

It hit him like a rock between the eyes.

As if she heard the shifting of his heart, she swiveled on her toes to face him. She paused, as if wanting to say something, then shook her head and reached up to give him a swift, hard kiss on the mouth. She let go and took his hand, twining her fingers with his as they started walking back to the car. “Let's go see what a safe house looks like.”

THE SAFE HOUSE LOOKED
like a cheap hotel in a bad part of town. The sign read BATES HO L, featured a bullet hole in the middle of the O, and hung precariously by one rusted chain. Acadia gave it a skeptical look. “Are you sure this is it?” The building was squeezed in between other similar structures. They all desperately needed a coat of paint, and …

Who was she kidding? Paint wasn't going to do anything for them. No, they all looked like they should be razed to the ground and rebuilt. The plaster and bricks were crumbled on all the facades. Shutters hung askew,
and most of the buildings had metal bars covering windows and doors. Garbage, feral cats, and filthy, far too skinny, ragged children were
everywhere.

“That's the one,” he told her. He waited with his back to her as she slid across the driver's seat to get out of the car. “Keep your eyes open, and step lively. Ready?”

“Ready not to feel as though I have a bull's-eye on my back?” Acadia cast a nervous glance at the swarm of mini criminals edging closer to the car. She instinctively moved closer to Zak. “Damn strai—” She suddenly noticed he had a gun in his hand. “God, Zak, surely you wouldn't shoot little children!”

“Move!”

As they ran across the street, the kids swarmed around them like locusts. They grabbed at her clothes and hung on her arms; one boy about eight slid down her leg and grabbed her around the top of her boots so that she had to run with the child as an anchor. Despite the gun in Zak's hand, three more kids were clinging to his duffel bag, dragging their heels on the pavement, to no avail.

The black door of the hotel was thrown open, and they spilled inside while an enormous bald man with a barrel chest and thick black mustache picked the kids off them like lice. The door shut with a surprisingly solid thump, and the man rapidly engaged several locks, then slapped his palm on a pad next to the door. When the tumblers clicked into place, he turned and gave them an assessing look.

“Don't feel sorry for the little buggers, Miss Gray,”
he said, with a faint Scottish burr. “They'd as soon slit your throat as look at you.” He held out a ham-size hand to Zak. “Campbell Garcia, call me Cam. Manager of this here Bates Hotel.” He grinned as he and Zak shook hands. “You doin' all right, lass?”

“If this is the rabbit hole, sure.” She smiled when Cam gave her a broad white grin, then slapped her on the shoulder, almost toppling her. Zak grabbed her arm to keep her upright.

“Sorry about that, lassie. Just us boys here most of the time, I forget my strength around the ladies. Come through, I'll take you up to a room. We have your extraction team assemblin' as we speak. You'll be moving out in under an hour.”

The vestibule was small, and paneled in a blond wood that was worn and peeling. The dirty black-and-white tile floor was dotted with cracked and uneven squares; a small reception area was tucked under the uncarpeted stairs.

“Had some food taken up, nothin' fancy, but you'll need something in your stomach, now won't you? This way.” Cam started up the stairs, his footfalls so loud on the bare wood, Acadia was surprised they didn't splinter.

She met Zak's glance and made a what-the-hell face. He smiled, and she got a quick glimpse of his dimple. She much preferred seeing Zak with this expression than with the one of desolate betrayal he'd worn in the park.

The uncarpeted hallway, like the stairs, was scarred and battered wood. Acadia happily noted that the higher they climbed, the cleaner the hotel became. “First
floor,” Cam told them, rounding a landing with a row of six closed doors marching down the long corridor. “Should we ever be compelled to take in a real guest.” He looked over his massive shoulder and winked at Acadia. “Which we rarely do. Only one more flight. You'll have a bit of time to wash up, eat somethin', and say your good-byes. I promise,” he told Zak, barely taking a breath. “I'll keep your lady safe until ye get back. With your brother, is it?”