Someone Safe. Lori Harris L.

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СКАЧАТЬ was folded nearly in half, the gray carpet beneath him rapidly turning crimson.

      The wave of nausea hit Nick with the solid vengeance of a Louisville Slugger.

      It was several seconds before Nick could move again. Refusing to look back, he calmly walked to his car, almost daring the shooter to take him out, too. Better the pain of a bullet tearing into flesh than what he felt inside.

      He called it in. As he waited for homicide, for the FBI and the crime scene technicians, anger replaced shock; determination, the pain.

      He could hear the keening of sirens. The muffled, mechanical scream as they climbed through the bowels of the parking garage. But they were nothing compared to the raw howls roaring inside his head.

      Ake and he went way back. Had gone to school together. Played basketball on weekends. He’d been the best man at Ake’s wedding. Was godfather to both of his boys. Ake was one of the few people he truly trusted.

      And now he was gone.

      Somehow, Nick would find whoever had done this. Someone would pay.

      Chapter Two

      Hell was probably ten degrees cooler than the Abaco Islands in late July, Kelly Logan decided.

      Massaging the stiffness in her neck, she tried to ignore the way her clothing stuck to her skin. The corrugated metal sides of the airplane hangar, when coupled with the island heat and the ceiling fan revolving slowly in the dense, skeletal shadows overhead, turned the structure into a large convection oven. Everything seemed to cook faster. Except for the company books.

      She lifted the top page of the bank statement. What she wouldn’t give to just cram all six months’ worth in the trash can. She could fly anything from a single-engine prop to a heavy cargo plane to a small jet, but even the simplest accounting managed to defeat her. She just wasn’t a numbers person.

      Fatigue overtaking her, she checked the time. Ten-thirty. No reason to take a dinner break at this point. In fact maybe she should just pack it in.

      And maybe she could have if her mechanic, Ben, Bird of Paradise’s only other employee, had managed to come back as promised after his dinner break.

      Closing her eyes, she scrubbed her face. What was she going to do if the ads didn’t bring in more business? Cutting fares again wasn’t an option; the margins were already nonexistent, and there was more meat in a poor man’s stew than left in her operating budget. And fuel costs were expected to continue to rise to the record levels of early 1970s.

      What was going to happen when she couldn’t keep it together any longer? What then?

      She studied the plane sitting thirty feet from her and wondered where in the hell she had gotten the dumb idea she could build an airline from the ground up?

      Her father had taught her how to dream, how to reach for what seemed impossible when her feet were flat on the ground. He’d taught her to set goals, to work hard to achieve them. But, unfortunately, he hadn’t taught her how to fail, which accounted for the sick feeling curled up inside her most nights when she closed her eyes.

      A noise broke the silence in the hangar.

      Kelly glanced toward the large opening at the front of the hangar, all thoughts of business vanishing. She couldn’t quite identify the origin of the sound. An animal foraging in the underbrush along the edge of the tarmac? Or had the sound been of human making? Considering the time, she knew it wouldn’t be her mechanic. If he was following his recent pattern, Ben was facedown on the pub’s bar by now.

      She continued to watch the doorway where the shadows of swaying palm fronds broke the halogen glare of the outside light. A gust of wind stole through the doorway, bringing the scent of the nearby Atlantic, and with it, the certainty that someone was out there.

      Watching.

      Waiting.

      She reached in the drawer for the small automatic weapon that she usually kept locked on the plane, was still digging through the clutter when a pebble shot toward her across the grease-stained concrete.

      Kelly looked up, her fingers closing around the butt of the gun. The silhouette of a man filled the opening, the lamp light from the desk barely reaching him.

      She stiffened, her gut carrying an odd mixture of fear and hate.

      Nick Cavanaugh.

      What was he doing in Marsh Harbor? And why now? Why come strolling back into her life after all these years?

      She watched as he calmly dropped his duffel bag and slowly raised his hands, his cocky grin never fading.

      “It’s good to see you, too, Kelly.”

      “What the hell do you want?” Her voice came out clipped and cold.

      Nick nodded at the gun. “Didn’t anyone ever tell you those things are dangerous?”

      “Depends which end of it you’re facing. It feels fine from this side.”

      He took a step forward. “A sound argument, I suppose. But I’ve never felt comfortable with a pistol in a woman’s hand. Especially when it’s pointed at me.”

      “Well, there’s an easy solution for that one. You could pick up that satchel of yours and leave. Save me the trouble of putting a bullet in you.”

      Nick seemed amused. “Are you any good with it?”

      “Good enough.” She nudged the revolver’s barrel upward. “How did you find me?”

      “Your mechanic.”

      “Now there’s a lie if I ever heard one,” she said, her tone scathing. “Ben has no more use for you than I do. He’d tell you to take a hike off the nearest pier before he’d tell you a damned thing.”

      “Perhaps he didn’t realize who he was talking to. He’d had a lot to drink.” His eyes narrowed. “Come to think of it, I may have told him I was an old friend.”

      “Same Nick. Whatever it takes. Lies. Fabrications. It doesn’t really matter, does it? As long as you get what you want.”

      He took another step, his hands dropping slightly. “I just came to talk.”

      Kelly thumbed the hammer back.

      The definitive click as it locked into position brought him to a sudden halt. Nick pushed his hands several inches higher.

      It was her turn to be amused, she decided. Not that he looked truly worried. It would take more than a gun leveled at his chest to shake Nick. Still, all in all, it wasn’t a bad moment.

      Feeling in control for the first time since he’d stepped through the door, she allowed herself to really study him.

      The neatly clipped, chestnut hair of seven years ago had been allowed to grow longer, until it brushed the collar of his T-shirt. His shoulders had always been broad, his body well-muscled, hard, but now there was a power about him. Dangerous, her mind prompted.

      It СКАЧАТЬ