In Broad Daylight (17 page)

uncomfortable with women who were deemed to have an intelligence that ranked above the

norm. Yet he didn't look uncomfortable, she thought, studying him. She relaxed a little.

Still, she didn't want to dwell on the slip. Instead, she told him the partial truth. "Just

worried."

"Yeah, me too."

And he was. But not about what she was referring to. He was worried that the letdown he

had come to expect, the one that always came soon after he had attained his goal—had

slept with the woman who had caught his fancy—wasn't coming. Because if it didn't come,

then he was playing a completely new ball game, on completely new ground and he hadn't a

clue what was going to happen next. If he didn't know, how was he going to be prepared?

The night they had spent rode with them in the car like a huge elephant both pretended

not to see.

The phone rang as they were let into theTylermansion. Swiftly beckoning her forward,

Nathan pointed to Brenda.

She rushed into the room, but Simon snatched the receiver up before she could reach it.

"Hello." The single word was a demand more than a greeting as he barked it into the phone.

"Is she there?" the tinny voice on the other end of the line asked. Despite the metallic sound, Dax could swear he could hear a gleeful note in the voice. "Your housekeeper, is she

there?"

Simon's brows drew together, dark as thunder. "Yes." He jerked the receiver away from

his ear and thrust it at Brenda.

Her heart took its by now familiar position in her throat. "Hello?"

"Good, he's being sensible. Rare for him."

She knew she was supposed to draw the call out, to keep the monster on the other end

talking, but all she could think of was getting Annie out of wherever she was. "Where's

Annie?"

"All in good time, my dear, all in good time. You know, I originally asked for two million, but that seems like such a small sum, don't you think? Especially to a man like Simon." The

voice grew impersonal. "So I'm upping it to five million. Five million in unmarked,

unsequential bills in two black bags that won't have powder exploding over the money the

second I open them. Drop it off atMulberryPark." He paused for a moment. "Are you

familiar with the bird sanctuary in the middle of the park?"

It took her a minute to remember the park's layout. "Yes."

"Good. The center bench that faces the sanctuary. Leave the money under it. Bring it

yourself.Two o'clocksharp."

He still hadn't said anything about the little girl. "Annie," she cried, aware that Rebecca Allen-Tyler watched her every move, her eyes haunted. Maybe she'd misjudged the woman.

But how awful that her daughter had to go through something like this to make the woman

realize how precious Annie was. "What about Annie?"

She heard a chuckle. Brenda's hand tightened on the receiver, wishing it was the man's

throat instead. "Don't worry, she'll be returned by and by."

Her eyes met Dax's. She knew if the bargain went this way, there was a chance they

might never recover the girl. "No, she has to be returned at the same time."

"Tyler's rubbing off on you. Probably in more ways than one. Too bad. You don't make the

terms. I do."

"But—"

Like a match bursting into flame, the man on the other end lost patience and viciously

swore at her. "You listen to me, you do exactly as I say, or she dies. When I have my

money, I'll call with the directions on where you can find her."

A dial tone hampered any protest Brenda could have made. She looked at Dax as she

placed the receiver down, defeat fighting for possession of her soul. "The bastard hung

up."

Dax turned to the technician positioned beside the phone. "Anything?"

The man shook his head. He looked at the path the signal had mapped out on the monitor.

They were several seconds short of honing in on a location. "The guy's playing with us. He

knows just how long to stay on before hanging up."

Dax nodded, expecting nothing less. "His game, his rules." He looked at Simon. "Can you raise five million dollars beforetwo o'clock?"

Money was never the problem. Simon impotently shoved his hands into the pockets of his

designer slacks. "My bank's been alerted and is on standby." Blowing out an angry breath, he turned on his heel, heading for the study. "I'll let them know what I need."

The man was talking about it as if it were mere pocket change, Dax thought. He could see

why the kidnapper was attempting to humiliate him. If his goal was meant to incorporate

personal humiliation, then treating Simon as if he were a useless underling was the only

way. The key to getting toTylerwas certainly not his money.

Dax nodded at the information. "Have them get the money here as fast as possible." He

turned to look at Nathan. The latter knew what they needed to do. This wasn't their first

ransom drop off. "We can have one of the policewomen do the drop off—"

Brenda pushed herself into his line of vision. "He said he wanted me to drop the money

off."

Dax repressed a sigh. Her feelings about the girl, or his feelings about what happened

between them last night couldn't enter into this or color his thinking one way or another.

And there was something more at play here than her just being a civilian amateur in this.

"He doesn't know what you look like," he pointed out. "He does, however, know what Mrs.

York of theHarwoodAcademylooks like. If he sees you there, he might bolt." His voice

softened. "No slipups, Brenda. We can't afford it and it's not something you want to live

with."

"I need to be there, Dax."

He was already taking out his cell phone, calling for backup. There was surveillance to set

up, police personnel to get into undercover disguises.MulberryParkwas the main park in the

city. It was where everyone who wanted to commune with nature went. That meant there

was a cross section of the city's population in the area. It gave them options.

He couldn't find it in his heart to tell her to stay here. But she had to be clear about this.

"You can come in the car with me," he told her.

Across the room, he saw that Simon was in the study, on his phone. Calling the bank to

have them prepare the money. The kidnappers had to be pretty happy with themselves,

Dax thought. They had everyone, including Simon, jumping through hoops.

The question was, would that be enough? And would they ultimately let the little girl go?

He couldn't let himself think about that. He stock to getting the pieces into place.

"How many of these people are with the police department?" Brenda murmured to Dax

through barely moving lips.

At five minutes to two, they were sitting on a park bench, close enough to the drop-off

point to be able to quickly sprint in if and when the need arose. Dressed in casual clothing,

they were playing the part of a young couple with eyes only for one another.

Under any other circumstances, Brenda thought, it wouldn't be hard to lose herself in the

part. But right now, her entire body was rigid with anticipation. And fear.

The team had fallen into place quickly once word went out. If he didn't know them

himself, he could have been hard-pressed to say which people were on the job and which

were civilians.

Dax grinned. "Try to pick them out."

Stretching, as if she'd been sitting too long, Brenda glanced around. The scene appeared

to be completely natural to her. There were two nannies, talking to each other, their

charges apparently two of several who were playing in a large sandbox not too far off. A

couple of tough youths, hugging skateboards and arguing over something, were to one side

while a tired-looking businessman was stretched out, grabbing a little shut-eye on another

bench. A couple of more people stood by the sanctuary, obviously taken with the birds.

One of them had an encyclopedia with them, cataloguing the various species.

She shook her head, presenting her face back to his. "I give up. How many?"

Because the part called for it, he cupped her cheek and kissed her, all the while keeping

his eyes on the scene behind her head. It took a great deal of concentration not to lose

himself in what he was doing. In what he was tasting.

"All of them," he finally told her.

Stunned, she glanced to her far left. There was a man in a navy-blue jumpsuit, pushing a

cart before him. He paused to sweep up something. "Even the guy cleaning up?"

Dax allowed himself a grin. "Especially the guy cleaning up. That's Nathan."

She knew she couldn't stare without giving the man away. But she wanted to. "You guys

are good."

"That's the goal," he murmured. About to kiss her again, Dax went on the alert.

A man on a bicycle headed their way. Wearing a helmet and a spandex uniform of black

and white, the twenty-something youth looked no different than a lot of other cyclists,

except that he rode straight toward the bench beneath which the bags had been stored.

Dax took a moment to smooth his collar, actually raising it to his lips. "Heads up, people,

looks like this might be show time," he murmured into the tiny microphone pinned to the

underside of his shirt lapel.

The cyclist barely broke rhythm as he reached under the bench, retrieved the black bags

and then turned around and headed back in the direction he'd come.

No one seemed to move. At least, not after the cyclist. Hadn't they heard Dax, Brenda

wondered. For that matter, Dax was still sitting there himself. Letting the cyclist get

away.

She was on her feet instantly. He had to grab her arm to keep her from running after the

man. "Why aren't you getting him?"

"Because we want him to lead us to the kidnapper. This guy's obviously just a flunky.

Anyone who's gone to this kind of trouble has thought things out, Brenda." On his feet,

Dax headed toward his car parked less than a hundred feet away. "He's on the move,

people," he said into his lapel. All around them, the various police officers dropped their

facades and began walking toward their vehicles. "Don't worry," he assured Brenda.

"We've got people on the outside of the park, ready to follow him."

As if to confirm what he told her, his scanner squawked to life. "Looks like he's on his way to the bus terminal," a disembodied voice informed them.

"And so are we," Dax told Brenda as he started up the car.

They gave the cyclist a wide berth until he'd placed the bags into a locker located in the

last row of lockers at the far end of the bus station. He no sooner began walking away

from the locker, key in hand, when Dax gave the word.

"Looks like this is going to take a while, guys. Grab him."

The moment he said it, even as he and Brenda hurried over to the man, the place came

alive with police. All wore various outfits and they closed ranks around the cyclist, pulling

out their badges and letting them hang out on plain sight as they came.

The cyclist looked completely thunderstruck. His eyes grew as huge as two serving plates

when he saw the displayed badges and the drawn service revolvers that went along with

them. Despite the disbelief on his face, his hands went straight up in the air in surrender.

"Hey, what is this?" he cried. "Some kind of prank?" Hands still raised above his head, he looked from side to side as if he was expecting one or more of his friends to pop out of

the wings, laughing with triumph as they pointed at him.

"If it is," Dax promised, "you just might wind up wishing you were never born." Gun still trained on the cyclist, Dax nodded toward two of his men. "You and you, stay here, keep an

eye on the locker. The rest of you, come with me." He made eye contact with Brenda and

nodded in response to the silent question in her eyes. She could come with them to the

police precinct.

"But I didn't do anything wrong," the cyclist cried, tugging against the cuffs that had been slapped on him. "This is all a mistake."

"We'll see," Dax promised grimly, leading the way out of the terminal.

The cyclist, looking as if he were on the verge of a nervous breakdown, clung to the story

he'd given them the instant they were in the interrogation room. He looked at Dax,

repeating the words not like a man who'd memorized his alibi, but a man who was terrified

of being convicted of something he hadn't done.

"A guy in a bar told me I could make an easy two-hundred dollars if I picked up a couple of

bags for him and delivered them to the locker at the bus depot. I'm out of a job, so I said

okay." He took a breath. "No," he repeated before the detectives in the room could ask him again, "I don't know who he is. I never saw him before. He gave me the money and then

left."

Dax looked at him skeptically. "And he trusted you."

The cyclist, booked as John Michael Powell with no priors, shrugged his shoulders. "I

guess I've got an honest face."

Dax leaned into him, his face inches away from Powell's. "And a non-functioning brain. How

did you know that what you were transferring weren't illegal drugs?"

The cyclist stared straight ahead. "I didn't." And then he twisted around to look at the other two men in the room. "Look, if I'm guilty of anything, it's being stupid. I don't know what this is all about."

Exasperated, Dax slid the sketch Brenda had made in front of the man. "Did the guy in

the bar look anything like this?"

Relieved to finally be believed, Powell stared at the sketch for a long time. When he