Wild Ways. Naomi Horton

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ for the mob, but Royce Bennett Packard of Packard Industries.

      Meg closed her eyes and tried to conjure up the image of Royce brushing his teeth, to no avail. Did Royce brush his teeth? She imagined he must, they were such perfect teeth. Like everything about Royce—the country club tan, the health club physique, the gentleman’s club portfolio. Not a hair, a molar or an investment out of place.

      She wondered, very idly, what he would have thought if he’d seen her today. Not just the spandex and the wig and the four-inch heels—those would have rendered him speechless on the spot. But the rest of it: her lying flat on her belly on a barroom floor in the middle of a gunfight, a fifteen-round semiautomatic Beretta pistol in her handbag and a hundred and eighty pounds of good-looking Nevada cop on top of her.

      Not pleased, she decided. Royce’s vision of the future Mrs. Packard did not include guns, bullets or cops of any variety.

      And then, to her annoyance, she found herself thinking about that good-looking Nevada cop. If that’s what he was—the cop part, not the good-looking part. As skeptical as she was about the first, the second was beyond argument.

      The last she’d seen of Rafe Blackhorse, Haney had told him to park himself in a chair and wait, and Blackhorse had done just that. He’d apparently spent the afternoon asleep in a wooden chair that he’d tipped back against the wall in the booking room, long legs stretched out, booted feet resting comfortably on a desk, ankles crossed, looking as relaxed as a cat.

      “Miss Kavanagh?”

      Meg looked up as Reggie poked his head hesitantly into her room.

      “My pajamas are in my other suitcase, and it’s in the car.”

      “Forget it, Reggie. You’re not setting foot outside this motel until tomorrow morning.”

      He managed to look both contrite and indignant. “But I always sleep in pajamas.”

      “Well, you’re not sleeping in pajamas tonight.”

      “But—”

      “Reggie, we nearly got killed this afternoon because of you, so I’m not feeling as generous as I could be, all right? No pajamas.”

      “It’s not my fault we nearly got killed,” he said prissily. “You are supposed to be protecting me, after all. It was up to you to—”

      “All right!” Meg threw her hands up to stop him. “All right, I’ll get your pajamas!” She got to her feet and grabbed the car keys from the nightstand, then paused and turned back to the bed and dug the Beretta from under the pillow. She tucked it into the back waistband of her jeans and headed for the door, jabbing her finger at Reggie as she walked by him. “You sit down and stay out of trouble. I’ve told the manager if he puts through any calls from either of these rooms without my go-ahead, I’ll have his head on a plate. So don’t even think about trying to contact Honey. And I’ll be just outside, so there’s no point in trying to make a run for it.”

      He looked hurt. “I wouldn’t do that.”

      “In a pig’s eye you wouldn’t,” she replied uncharitably. “I wish you’d get it into your head that Spence O’Dell is your only hope of getting out of this alive, Reggie. But if you make another run for it, he’ll let Stepino kill you just on principle and make his case some other way.”

      Leaving him standing there to mull this over, she turned off the lights both inside and outside the room, then pulled open the door and stepped out into the cold North Dakota night. She closed the door behind her and stepped well away from it, tucking herself into the shadows under the open stairway to the second story. There were a handful of cars in the parking lot and she scanned the dimly lit area for movement.

      She’d been careful when she’d found this place, doubling back a couple of times, keeping Reggie out of sight when she’d registered and telling the manager she was traveling with her senile old aunt, which explained the no-phone rule. She’d taken every precaution in the book, but she was still jumpy as she eyed the parked cars.

      Pagliano had almost gotten them that afternoon because she’d been careless. That wouldn’t happen again, but Pagliano wouldn’t be the only hired gun out here on Reggie’s trail. Gus Stepino obviously figured that Tony Ruffio and his hired gun weren’t up to the job and was taking care of it himself. So odds were there were others out here hunting for Dawes, all working independently, all stone killers, all very, very good at what they did.

      She, on the other hand, had the requisite month of generic agency training under her belt, plus another month of field agent training done on the sly and without O’Dell’s knowledge. Had this been an authorized assignment, she would be out here with no less than six months of special training behind her, and she sure wouldn’t be alone. She would be with at least two others, relegated to fetching coffee and standing guard while learning everything she could.

      If she didn’t get herself or anyone else killed after a few of those jobs, and if O’Dell was in an expansive mood, she might then be assigned as second agent on a case, working closely with a mentor who would be testing her every step of the way, watching for weakness, for flaws, for anything that could be a problem. And after maybe a year of that, if she was very good and very lucky and was still alive and still interested, she might get assigned a solo job.

      Might, because regardless of how good she was, she was still a woman. And O’Dell didn’t like women field agents.

      There had been two in twenty years. Now there were none. And O’Dell made no bones about the fact that he intended to keep it that way.

      Which was why she was out there half trained and without a clue, determined to prove she could handle the job if it killed her.

      Bad choice of words. Meg shook her head and gave the parking lot another searching look, then walked across to her rental, wishing she had eyes in the back of her head. No wonder Bobby used to be so darned jumpy when he was home. Now and again she had walked up on him without warning and he’d nearly leapt out of his own skin, hand going instinctively to where his gun would be had their father allowed them in the house. Now Bobby was dead, and she was the one leaping at shadows. Little wonder everyone wished she would marry Royce Packard and concentrate on charity luncheons and babies.

      She unlocked the trunk of the car and raised the lid. Reggie’s suitcase had slid toward the back and she couldn’t reach it without practically crawling in after it. She rested one knee on the bumper and leaned way forward, balanced precariously on her belly and one braced arm, wondering for the umpty-millionth time why everyone in her family had inherited their father’s height except her. Bobby used to say it was because she was the youngest and by the time she was born, all the tall genes had been used up. And Maureen always said—

      “That’s one hell of a tantalizing view, Special Agent Mary Margaret Kavanagh. But if I were one of Stepino’s men, you’d be as dead as last night’s halibut.”

      For his pains, Rafe damn near lost her.

      One instant she was teetering over the lip of the car trunk, rounded little bottom upthrust and perfectly showcased by the loving caress of soft denim and moonlight. And in the next, she’d shot off sideways, moving faster than he’d ever seen a woman move.

      He caught her, but not without effort, and he swore savagely at himself as he fought her up against the side of the car, where she couldn’t turn on him. Mistakes like that could get a man real dead, and he didn’t like СКАЧАТЬ