Buch lesen: «In The Arms Of The Enemy»

For all my SHS friends

Contents

Cover

Back Cover Text

Introduction

Title Page

About the Author

CAST OF CHARACTERS

Dedication

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Epilogue

Extract

Copyright

Chapter One

Her head throbbed as she stared at the dead guy. He had to be dead. She zeroed in on his chest, watching for the rise and fall of his breathing. Nothing.

Dried foam clung to his parted lips and chin in silvery trails, clinging to his beard like gossamer spiderwebs. His open, bloodshot eyes bugged out from their sockets like those of a surprised cartoon character.

She checked the carpet around his body—no blood, no weapon, just a plastic water bottle on its side with a quarter of its contents still inside.

She sat back on her heels and massaged her temples, which now throbbed as much as the back of her head. What had happened in this cheap motel room? Who was he?

Who was she?

A sob bubbled in her throat. That terror had slammed into her head-on before she even saw the body on the floor, when she’d come to, lying diagonally across the bed, fully clothed. She’d put that problem on the back burner when she noticed the dead guy, but a complete memory loss couldn’t be ignored forever.

There had to be a clue to her identity somewhere. She rose to her feet, her gaze sweeping the room, with its upended lamp, disheveled double bed and cracked picture frame above that bed.

The dead man hadn’t gone down without a fight. With her? Had she killed this man in a fight?

She took in his large frame sprawled on the threadbare carpet and shook her head. Hard to believe. But then maybe—she glanced at her toes, painted with pale pink polish—she was some ninja amazon woman.

A hysterical laugh crackled through the room and she clapped a hand over her mouth. She didn’t like the sound of that laugh. Wrapping her arms around her midsection, she tiptoed toward the open door of the bathroom. She held her breath and flicked the light switch with her knuckle.

At least no more dead bodies greeted her. She shuffled toward the chipped vanity and slowly raised her head to face the mirror.

She gasped. Leaning forward, she traced the outline of a red spot forming high on her cheekbone, beneath her right eye. Then she rubbed the painful area on the back of her head, her fingers circling a huge lump. Had she and the man gotten into a brawl?

She stepped back, studying the fine-boned face in the mirror, a slim column of a neck and a pair of narrow shoulders encased in a flimsy T-shirt. That slip of a thing that stared back at her with wide eyes couldn’t have taken down a kitten, never mind a full-grown man.

She bit her bottom lip and winced. She hunched forward and dabbed at the lip she now saw was swollen. The dead guy had done a number on her before...succumbing. But what had he succumbed from?

Maybe someone had attacked them both and left her for dead. Maybe that someone would return. She backed away from the mirror and stumbled out of the small bathroom.

The walls of the dumpy motel room closed in on her all at once and she listed to the side like a drunken sailor on the deck of a ship. Reaching out a hand to clutch the faded bedspread, she sank to the edge of the bed. She should call the police, 911.

Her gaze traveled to the inert form on the floor and she shivered. Unless she’d killed him.

She crept to the window, where she hooked a finger between two slats of the blinds and peeked outside. She squinted into the gray light. The green numbers on the digital clock by the bed had already told her it was just after six thirty in the morning.

A small, dark car huddled in a parking space in front of the room. Could it be theirs? His? Hers?

She patted the pockets of her jeans—no keys, no ID, no money. She gulped back her rising panic and lunged for the closet. She swung open the door and jumped back as a small wheeled suitcase fell over on its side, just missing her bare toes.

Dropping to her knees, she scrabbled for the zipper with trembling hands. When she flipped open the suitcase, she plunged her hands into a pile of clothes—her clothes. She’d packed in a hurry.

She pushed the bag away from her and crawled on her hands and knees to peer under the bed. Nothing but dust occupied the space and she sneezed as it tickled her nose.

What woman didn’t carry a purse with her?

She searched the rest of the room, giving the body on the floor a wide berth. She ended in the middle of the room, hands on her hips.

One place left she hadn’t searched. She slid a sideways glance at the dead man, and then pivoted toward the bathroom. She yanked a hand towel from the rack. She returned to the man and crouched beside him. With the towel covering her hand, she tugged at his jacket, which fell open, exposing his neck and an intricate tattoo curling around it and down his chest. Vines, barbwire, a skull and the letters L and C intertwined. LC. Larry?

She rifled Larry’s front pockets and heard the jingle of the keys before she saw them. She closed her fingers, still wrapped in the towel, around a key chain and pulled it free of Larry’s pocket. She cupped the keys in her palm, frowning at the yellow daisy key chain—didn’t seem like Larry’s style at all. Maybe the car belonged to her.

A pair of boots, socks stuffed inside, was lined up near the door of the motel room, and she put them on—a perfect fit, kind of like Cinderella in an alternate universe. She eased open the door and pressed her eye to the crack.

Luckily for her, the motel didn’t seem to be a hotspot of tourist activity or any other kind of activity—except for in this room. She swung the door wide and stepped into a cool, damp blast of air. Tucking her chin to her chest, she scurried to the compact car and jabbed at the key fob hooked to the key chain.

The lights of the little car flashed once in greeting, and she blew out a breath. She dropped onto the front seat and slid down. Then she pulled open the glove compartment, and a stack of napkins tumbled out.

Leaving them where they fell, she plunged her hand into the glove box and started pulling papers out, glancing at each one before tossing it to the floor.

When she found the car’s registration, she ran a finger across the printed words and read aloud, her voice filling the car, startling her. “Hazel McTavish.”

The dead man in the hotel room didn’t look like a Hazel. Could she be Hazel? Hazel lived in Seattle, Washington. Was that where she was now? No bells of recognition rang in her head. Seattle meant about as much to her at this point as Timbuktu.

Peering into the back of the car, she scanned the seat and floor. She plucked a black leather jacket from the floor and shook it out. It had to be hers.

With her blood racing, she jammed her hands in the pockets. Her trembling fingers curled around a slip of paper, which she pulled free.

Timberline, WA.

At least there was a common denominator here—Washington. Could she be in Timberline now?

She scooted from the car and locked it with the key fob. She reached into the motel room and yanked the Do Not Disturb sign from the inside door handle, hooking it on the outside before slipping back into the room.

Larry hadn’t moved.

Tapping her toe, she assessed the big man on the floor. Did he have a wallet? A phone? He’d landed on his back, and if he kept his wallet in his back pocket, she doubted she could turn him over to do a search.

Her stomach churned. She didn’t want to try. Didn’t want to touch him.

She had to make some kind of move. She couldn’t hang out here until someone came looking for Larry—or her. And where was here?

She scurried to the other side of the bed and the telephone on the nightstand. She grabbed a cheap notepad printed with the words Stardust Motel, Seattle, Washington, and dropped it.

She returned to the closet and pulled out the suitcase. The clothes in there obviously belonged to her. She wasn’t stealing. Her gaze shifted to the dead guy. Theft was the least of her moral concerns right now.

As she slid the door closed, she noticed two bags stacked on the far side of the closet. She parked the suitcase by the front door and dragged open the other closet door.

She unzipped the first duffel bag and peeled back the top, releasing a stream of air between her teeth. Stacks of bills were nestled neatly in the bag, and she clawed through them all the way to the bottom.

Hugging a few thousand dollars to her chest, she stumbled backward until the back of her legs hit the bed. She sat.

What did it all mean? Were she and Larry bank robbers who’d had a disagreement? Lottery winners who couldn’t decide how to split their windfall?

She dropped the cash on the floor and returned to the closet. With both hands, she pulled the money duffel off the other one and unzipped the bag on the bottom. This time she swayed and grabbed the closet door to steady herself.

She ran her fingertips along the plastic baggies in the duffel, which looked like they were stuffed with ice chips—but this ice didn’t melt. She snatched her hand back from the drugs packaged neatly in the bags.

With her heart hammering in her chest, she swept up the hand towel she’d dropped next to Larry’s body and darted around the room, wiping down surfaces from the bathroom to the TV remote to the duffel bags and all the doorknobs and handles in between.

Maybe the dead man had keeled over from a heart attack or a stroke or an aneurysm, but she had no intention of being here when the cops showed up.

She zipped up the drug bag and hoisted the money bag back on top. She gathered the stacks of bills from the floor where she’d dropped them and froze.

She had no purse, no ID, no memory. How could she make her getaway, find herself with no money?

The cash in her hands felt solid, sort of like a crutch, something to hold on to. She needed this money now. If it turned out she was a drug dealer, she’d return it to...someone. She’d pay it back once she discovered her identity.

She stuffed the money into the suitcase by the door and added a few more stacks for good measure. She’d count it later. She’d use just what she needed to get by.

All the excuses she reeled out for herself couldn’t quell the sick feeling in her stomach. She’d make this right, but she couldn’t leave her fate to strangers when she didn’t even know her own story.

Larry’s body emitted a tinny classical tune, and she dropped the money on the floor. She tiptoed toward him and crouched down, clutching the towel in her hand.

A light glowed from the front pocket of his shirt, and she plucked the phone out, using the hand towel. The cell slid off of his body and landed beside his arm.

Squinting, she leaned forward. The display flashed a call from an unknown number, and then went dark. Drug dealers and bank robbers probably didn’t store contact names and numbers of their associates in their phones.

Since she was hovering over the body anyway, she swiped at the man’s pockets where she’d touched him. She would wipe down the car, take her suitcase and hit the road—first stop Timberline, the name of the town on the slip of paper in her pocket. She was about to rise when a dinging sound stopped her.

The phone lit up again, but this time a text message flashed on the display.

She hunched forward and read the text aloud to the dead man. “‘Did you get the girl? Rocky’s...’”

In place of an adjective for Rocky’s emotion, the texter had inserted a little devil face with smoke coming out his ears. Rocky must be very, very angry.

Was she the girl who had to be gotten? Would’ve been nice if the texter had used her name to give her a head start on reclaiming her identity.

Cell phones could be tracked. She pushed to her feet and finished wiping down every possible surface in the room. When she was done, she tucked a corner of the towel in the waistband of her jeans and peeked out the door.

She’d leave the car here—those could be traced, too. She might be Hazel McTavish from Seattle, but she needed to do a little research before stepping into Hazel’s life.

But before she left without the car, she wanted to check the trunk first. She’d found a bag of money, a bag of drugs, what next? A bag of weapons?

Poking her head out the door, she cranked it from side to side. The people at this motel didn’t seem to be early risers—probably because they were sleeping off the night’s activities or had used the room for just a few hours.

She kept her head down and scurried to the compact, unlocking the trunk with the key fob. It sprang open and she used the towel to ease it up.

Chills raced up her spine and her mouth dropped open in a silent scream as her eyes locked on to the vacant stare of her second dead body this morning.

Chapter Two

DEA Agent Cole Pierson turned away from the dead woman’s stare. Money, drugs, dead bodies—and he hadn’t even officially clocked in yet.

He returned to the motel room, where the odor of decomposing flesh had started to drift through the air. He swiped the back of his hand across his nose. Someone had left the heat blasting in here, which had accelerated the process of the body’s breakdown.

Cole still had no problem identifying the deceased—Johnny Diamond. Whatever had happened in this seedy motel room, it couldn’t have happened to a more deserving dirtbag.

The King’s County Sheriff’s Department had descended on the room like a pack of ants at a picnic. One of those ants, Deputy Brookhurst, approached him with a wide grin.

“Quite a haul for you DEA boys, huh? Crank, cash and Johnny Diamond.”

“Now we just have to piece together the rest of the puzzle. Where’d he get it, where was he going with it and who were his contacts? Oh yeah, and who offed him?”

With the toe of his boot, Cole prodded the black duffel bag on the floor, containing hundreds of thousands of dollars of methamphetamine, bagged and ready for the street. Then he wedged his hands on his hips and surveyed the room. What had Diamond been doing in this flea trap?

Why risk stealing a car, murdering the owner and stuffing her body in the trunk with this much cash and product on hand? Diamond had been a slick adversary from the day he’d burst onto the drug scene four years ago. He’d managed to keep out of their clutches precisely because he’d avoided missteps like this.

Maybe Diamond had been planning to cash out and head for a tropical island somewhere. Cole smoothed his gloved hands over the pile of money stashed in the other duffel bag and frowned.

“Brookhurst, are you sure your guys didn’t touch the cash?”

“Hold on.” Brookhurst widened his stance and hooked his thumbs in his pockets like some movie star cowboy. “Are you accusing my boys of something?”

“Stealing? No. Did they move it around? Reposition it? Run their hands through it?” Cole held up his own hands. “Hey, I wouldn’t blame ’em.”

Brookhurst’s puffed-up chest deflated. “I don’t think so. Why do you ask?”

Cole traced the uneven grid of the money stacks with his fingertip. “The bills are stuffed into the bag in tight rows, but those rows are messed up at the top—as if someone thumbed through the money. You checked Diamond’s pockets?”

“I told you—a set of keys with a flower key chain in the front pocket, wallet in the back pocket. Had maybe a hundred bucks in his wallet.”

The county coroners parked a gurney next to Diamond’s body. “We’re ready to take him if you’re done with him.”

“Copy us on the autopsy and toxicology reports. You still think it looks like poison?”

One of the coroners held up a plastic bag containing the bottle of water that had been on the floor, and shook it. “Smells like bitter almonds.”

Cole whistled. “Cyanide.”

“Along with the foaming at the mouth and his reddish skin color, that’s my guess. But it’s just a guess and we have a lot of tests to run.”

“Poison.” Cole drummed his fingers against his chin. “The murder weapon of choice for women, but the motel clerk said Diamond checked in as a single.”

Brookhurst nudged him and chuckled. “Maybe his old lady mixed up a little something special for him when she caught him cheating, or maybe she was cheating and wanted to bypass the divorce. I should start sniffing the drinks my wife mixes for me.”

Cole’s jaw tightened and he nodded once. Cheating-spouse jokes didn’t hold much humor for him anymore.

Hearing a commotion outside, Cole strode to the door of the motel room. A deputy had stopped two women outside the yellow tape. One of them, speaking Spanish, kept pointing at the car with the dead body in the trunk.

Cole joined the knot of people. “What’s going on, Deputy?”

The officer jerked his thumb between the two women. “This one’s saying the other one saw a woman here this morning.”

They’d already questioned one of the women, who was a maid at the motel, but hadn’t seen the second woman yet.

“Espera.” Cole sliced his hand through the air. “Wait. Habla inglés, señora?”

“Sí, yes, I speak English.”

“What were you doing at the motel this morning?”

“Trabajo. I work here as a maid. I have the overnight shift.”

“What time was this?”

“After seven o’clock, señor. I was almost done with work.”

“Where did you see this woman? What did she look like?”

“By this car. I thought maybe she came out of the room. She walked past the car and she was pulling a suitcase.” She twirled her finger in the air. “One with wheels.”

“Did you see what she looked like?”

The maid put her hands about six inches apart. “Flaca. Skinny. Not tall, not short. She was wearing dark pants, maybe jeans, and a dark jacket.”

The woman was observant. “Hair?”

“No, señor.” She shook her head.

His brows shot up. “No hair?”

“Under a hat.” She put her hands on top of her head. “Like una...gorra.”

The other maid spoke up. “Like a knit beanie, pulled over her head.”

Cole’s pulse ratcheted up a notch. Like she was trying to disguise herself. “Did you get a good look at her face?”

“No, sorry. I notice because there was nobody else outside. I don’t think she saw me. She walked past the car, fast, and then turned the corner up there.” The maid pointed to the front of the motel.

“Toward the road.” They’d already questioned the motel clerk and he hadn’t seen or heard a thing. Had this mysterious woman poisoned Johnny Diamond, taken some of his cash and hightailed it out to the road to hitch a ride?

Cole got the contact information for the two women, thanked them and returned to the motel room, where the coroner had already loaded Diamond onto the gurney. The DEA and Cole personally had been trying to nail Diamond for four years. It figured that Diamond’s death would provide even more questions than answers. Nothing had been easy with that guy.

What had Diamond been doing back in his old stomping grounds instead of plying his trade in Arizona, where he’d been wheeling and dealing for four years? Had that woman lured him this way?

Cole turned to Deputy Brookhurst. “Did you find any other fingerprints besides Diamond’s in this room?”

“We barely found any of Diamond’s.”

Cole narrowed his eyes. “Wiped clean?”

“Looks like it.”

“How about his phone? Did your guys search the Dumpsters and bushes for Diamond’s phone? There’s no way a man in Diamond’s business would be without a cell.”

“We looked. We’ll try to track his number through the different providers and see if we can locate his phone by pinging.” Brookhurst slapped Cole on the back. “Don’t worry, Agent Pierson. We’ll keep you guys in the loop. We called you as soon as we found out you had a flag on Johnny Diamond, didn’t we?”

“You sure did, and I appreciate it. I’ve been after this SOB for a long time.” Cole snapped his fingers. “Did any of the deputies do a search on the GPS in the stolen car? I noticed it had a built-in one.”

“Damn, I don’t think we’ve done that yet—a little distracted by what we found in the trunk.”

“Yeah, poor Hazel McTavish. I wonder how she had the bad luck to run across Diamond.” Cole flipped up the collar of his jacket. Seattle days could be cold enough, but Seattle nights could chill you down to your bones. “I’m going to check the GPS and see if I can find out where Diamond and his mysterious lady friend were headed.”

He shouldered his way through the deputies and EMTs gathered around Hazel’s trunk, and slid into the front seat of the car. He sniffed the air and got a whiff of some flowery scent—probably belonged to Hazel, but he’d have the King County boys dust for prints in here, too.

He poked his head out the door and yelled back, “I’m going to start the engine to look at the GPS.”

The GPS beeped to life as he cranked on the ignition. With a gloved finger, he tapped the screen. He swiped his finger across Recent Destinations and blew out a breath—next stop Timberline, Washington.

* * *

HER HEART STUTTERED when the bell above the door of the tourist shop, Timberline Treasures, jingled. She turned from the bin she’d been filling with little stuffed frogs, and released a sigh.

She smiled at the family with two young kids. “Welcome. Let me know if you need anything.”

The parents smiled back and started to browse through the key chains and magnets.

She wiped her sweaty palms on the seat of her jeans. She’d have to stop freaking out every time someone came into the store—or find another job. There was no way anyone could trace her to Timberline from that motel room. She’d wiped down all her prints and had even taken Larry’s phone just in case he’d had any more information about her, or pictures, or any references to Timberline.

Not Larry, Johnny—Johnny Diamond. When she got to Timberline four days ago, one of her first stops had been the public library to use a computer. It hadn’t taken her long to discover the dead man at the Stardust Motel was Johnny Diamond—drug dealer, thief and all-around bad guy.

What she’d been doing with him and how he’d wound up dead, she still didn’t have a clue. The online article she read didn’t give a cause of death, but the authorities suspected homicide—no witnesses and no suspects.

She brushed a wisp of hair from her face. Diamond’s phone didn’t contain any incriminating evidence, and she’d destroyed and dumped it soon after.

Linda, her new boss, new best friend and owner of the store, came from the storage area in the back and plunked a box on the counter. “Can you help me sort through these items, Caroline?”

She’d adopted the name from the North Carolina plates of the semi that had picked her up a mile from that motel outside of Seattle. The choice of a last name had been trickier.

“Of course.” She turned to the family. “Do you need any help?”

The mom swung a key chain around her finger. “We’ll take one of these—just a little something with the town’s name on it.”

Caroline plunged her hand into a bin filled with furry frogs. Holding one up, she shook it. “How about one of these? It’s a Pacific chorus frog and this particular toy is unique to Timberline.”

The little girl’s eyes widened as she tugged on her mom’s sleeve. “Mom, can I have it?”

“Okay.” She rolled her eyes at her husband, who shrugged.

Caroline brought the stuffed frog to the counter and winked at Linda. Linda rang up the family’s purchases and when they left the store, she patted Caroline on the back. “You’re a born salesperson.”

Scooping the trinkets from the box, Caroline said, “I want to do my best to repay you for your kindness, Linda.”

“When that haunted, hunted look leaves your eyes that will be repayment enough for me. It took my sister, Louise, years to recover from the abuse dished out by her boyfriend. When you told me your story of domestic violence and I saw that bruise under your eye—” she patted Caroline’s hand “—I knew I had to help you.”

Caroline blinked back tears as a pang of guilt twisted in her belly. She’d told Linda Gunderson a little lie to explain why she had no ID and why she was using a fake name, Caroline Johnson. She didn’t want her abusive ex tracking her down.

Linda had gone above and beyond by introducing Caroline as her cousin’s daughter, who’d moved out West for a fresh start. Linda extended her kindness even further by offering her the duplex next to her own, which she and her sister owned, and giving her a job at her shop so she could start earning some money with very few questions asked by the others in this small town.

But that haunted, hunted look in her eyes? That wouldn’t go away until she knew her identity and what had happened at the Stardust Motel.

“I appreciate everything you’ve done for me, Linda.”

“I needed help in the store, anyway, with Louise off on her cruise for a month.” Linda sniffled and dabbed her nose. Then she shoved a handful of magnets at her. “Can you stock these and the pencils before you leave?”