Winter Winds Page 8

  But he was the one who was wrong! He was. Let him feel the guilt.

  “Well, you’ve got enough time now,” Phil said, grinning. “You’ve got six months.” He rubbed his hands together. “And I for one can’t wait to see what happens.”

  Dori wanted to slap him. This situation was anything but funny. It didn’t matter that her deepest dream was to reconcile with Trev, to make the terrible separation go away, to know his love again. But it needed to happen because Trev came to her, fell to his knees, and begged her forgiveness, not because they were manipulated into it.

  She sighed inwardly. She had thought she had these ugly feelings of unforgiveness under control, that the spitefulness had faded, indeed had all but disappeared. Blame their resurgence on proximity, she thought. The yearning too.

  She stared at Honey, stony faced. “I have a business in California to run. Trev has his work here.”

  Honey was unmoved. “You and I both know that Meg is more than able to manage for a little while without you.”

  “Six months is hardly a little while.”

  “Honey.” Trev’s voice was too calm, too reasonable, a fact that fed Dori’s anger. “You can’t force people to live together, to love each other.”

  “Six years and neither of you filed for divorce,” Honey reminded. “Six years!”

  Dori shut her eyes. That didn’t mean anything. They’d just never gotten around to it. That was all.

  But six months together. More than enough time to love him all over again. More than enough time to open herself to the same kind of pain, only somehow she knew that when it fell apart this time, it would be much, much worse. “Honey, please,” she managed. “Don’t.”

  “We want your promises, Seth and I.” Honey’s eyes flashed with purpose. “Your promise, Dori? To a sick old man who’s loved you since the day he met you.”

  Dori sagged. How could she fight that burden of gratitude? She sighed. “Oh, all right. I promise.”

  Honey turned to Trev. “Well?”

  Trev nodded. “I promise.”

  “Six months. Not a day less.”

  Both Dori and Trev nodded, careful to avoid each other’s eyes.

  Honey smiled, looking far too pleased with herself in Dori’s opinion. She reached into her purse and pulled out a sheet of paper. As she held it out, Dori noticed for the first time that several of her knuckles were swollen with arthritis. When had that happened?

  Pop might be dying. Honey showed signs of getting infirm. Trev was going to live with her. And Phil was smiling like a monkey, enjoying the whole mess, at least the part about her and Trev.

  God, what are You doing? I was doing fine on my own. Just butt out!

  Honey handed the paper to Trev who scowled at it, then handed it to Dori. It was the directions to a motel on Route 100 in Exton.

  “I made the reservations for you as soon as Phil said you were coming,” Honey said. “You and Trev can go on over and get yourselves settled.”

  “I can’t leave—” Trev began.

  Honey raised an eyebrow. “You can come back here to the hospital or not as you please.” She looked from one to the other, suddenly smiling. “You’ve made us very happy.”

  You maybe. But what about us? Dori thought as Honey continued to watch them with a sweet smile on her lips.

  Sweet like a crocodile’s grin.

  Eight

  JOANNE COWERED BEHIND THE CHAIR as Vinnie fell to his knees and searched the suitcase again. He muttered, “It’s got to be here,” over and over.

  “What’s missing?” she managed to whisper. She tried so hard not to do anything that would upset or disappoint Vinnie because she was afraid of his anger, but she’d really done it this time. But what had she done?

  “The pictures!” he yelled. “Where are the pictures?”

  Jo pointed to the silver and gold frame she’d found in the suitcase. “Is that what you mean?”

  Vinnie glanced up, hope in his eyes. When he saw the frame, he turned to her with a terrifying sneer. “Not pictures like that, you idiot! Pictures like in a museum.”

  “A museum? But I didn’t go to a museum, Vinnie.” Her underarms ran with nervous perspiration. “Was I supposed to?”

  He gave her a disgusted look. “No, you wasn’t supposed to.”

  Relief flowed through her. She hadn’t messed up after all, at least with the museum. A new thought made her shiver. What if Vinnie found out she had let the suitcase out of her sight?

  When he saw her off for the airport yesterday, he’d said, “Whatever you do, don’t let that suitcase out of your sight.”

  She nodded as she looked at the big black car that was going to drive her to Philadelphia. Wow. Mr. J sure knew how to treat a girl. “Don’t let it out of my sight,” she repeated absently. Was that a TV in the car?

  Vinnie grabbed her chin and forced her to look at him. “Our future depends on that suitcase, Jo. Do not let it out of your sight for even a minute.”

  She’d let it out of her sight for hours.

  What if Mr. J found out? She went dizzy at the thought.

  She’d been the last person to walk down the Jetway for the trip back to Philadelphia, her stomach in turmoil at the thought of the flight. Usually a Just Say No person because she didn’t want a fried egg brain, she stopped halfway to the plane and grabbed the tranqs Vinnie’d given her, much like a person too far out in the waves grabs the lifeguard who has come to save her. She swallowed them with the bottled water in her purse and hoped they kicked in before the plane took off.

  She continued to the plane and bumped into a group of people at the door. She tried to go around them.

  “Excuse me, miss,” a lady in uniform called to her. “We’ll need to take your bag.”

  “What?” She couldn’t let the lady take the bag. Vinnie’d kill her. “Don’t let it out of your sight!”

  The lady smiled. “The plane is very full and all the overhead space is taken. Don’t worry Your suitcase will be waiting for you in Philadelphia.”

  Now as she stared at an infuriated Vinnie, she knew she’d lie until she died.

  “Did you let this out of your sight?” Vinnie demanded, his shaking finger pointing to the bag. “You did, didn’t you?”

  “What?” she squeaked. “Of course not! You told me how important it was. I did just what you told me. I swear.”

  God, if You’re there, I’m sorry for the lie. But I got to.

  “Then where’s the paintings?” he roared.

  “I don’t know!”

  Vinnie pulled out a penknife, flicked it open, and began slicing the suitcase lining to pieces. Jo swallowed a yelp of distress at the fury of his slashes. She couldn’t tell whether he thought he might find the paintings in some other hiding place or whether he was just good and mad.

  “What were the pictures of?” she asked.

  “I don’t know.” Grunt. Slash. “Just real old stuff by some French guy.” Grunt. Slash. “Masterpieces worth millions.”

  Millions? She’d been carrying around stuff worth millions? Vinnie reduced the suitcase to strips of black fabric, but he didn’t find anything. When he straightened and looked at her, she saw his anger was spent, and fear had taken its place. That scared her even more than the missing paintings. Nothing made Vinnie afraid.

  He fingered the red yarn, his face pale. “We’re dead men walking.”

  Joanne started to cry.

  “Shut up,” he muttered.

  She sniffed and tried to be quiet. She wrapped her hand over her mouth to stifle the sound. It didn’t work. Little gasps and sobs escaped.

  “I said shut up!”

  Joanne grabbed a pillow from the chair and shoved it against her face.

  The phone rang. Joanne didn’t move. She was afraid to.

  On the third ring, Vinnie turned on her. “Answer it!”

  She grabbed it up on the fourth ring. “H-hello?”

  “May I speak to Vinnie, please? He is there, isn’t he?�
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  “Y-yes, he’s here.” She held out the receiver to Vinnie.

  “Who?” he mouthed.

  “I don’t know,” she mouthed back.

  He took a deep breath and said, “Hello, this is Vinnie.”

  He turned pale. “Hello, Mr. Jankowski. What a pleasant surprise. I thought you were in Aruba.”

  Vinnie listened. He glanced at the ribbons of black nylon. He wiped beads of sweat from his forehead. “Don’t you worry one bit, Mr. Jankowski. Everything is going like clockwork. The paintings will be waiting for you when you get home next Sunday. Oh yes, I’m sure. You just relax and have a good time. Yes, sir. Just trust me, sir. I’ll see to everything. Good-bye.”

  He held the phone out to Joanne with shaking hands. He collapsed into the stuffed chair.

  “What, Vinnie? Are you in trouble?”

  “We,” he snarled. “Not me. We. You’re the one who lost the paintings, not me.”

  Jo licked her lips. “What does he do to people who lose millions?”

  Vinnie snorted as if the question were dumb. “What do you think?”

  She could think of lots of things, and her heart went ka-thump! “K-kill?”

  “Let’s just say that people who disappoint him are never seen again.”

  Jo groaned. Without thinking, she bent and began picking up the pieces of suitcase. She tossed them into the plastic trash can as she wondered how Mr. J did away with people.

  Please let it be painless, God. And don’t let him throw me overboard way out in the ocean. Please!

  She gathered another handful of black nylon, putting the hard plastic name tag lying in the mess on the end table beside Vinnie’s chair.

  “What’s this?” He picked up the luggage tag. “Dori McAllister. Who’s that?”

  “I don’t know.” Jo’s voice shook as she thought of all kinds of fish nibbling on her, maybe even a shark taking a big bite. She shuddered. Then she remembered a pretty lady with big brown eyes who reached for a suitcase with her, a suitcase with red yarn tied to the handle.

  “Sorry. This is mine,” the woman had said. And Jo’d automatically stepped back.

  If she’d been sweating before, it was nothing to the cold film of terror that coated her whole body now. She’d let someone else take Mr. J’s million-dollar paintings.

  Nine

  MAUREEN SLOUCHED IN HER CAR, parked nose out in the hospital parking lot for a quick getaway. She was thoroughly bored. She hated surveillance because she hated inactivity. Unfortunately, much of police work was step-by-step and methodical, hours spent on the phone and at her desk. But sitting in a car on a frigid winter day was the worst. She had the motor running and the heater cranked, but still she felt stiff with cold. She could see pneumonia in her future as clearly as clairvoyants saw dark, handsome men in the lives of their rich women customers.

  There had to be a better way to catch a thief. There had to be. She just wasn’t sure what it was.

  Then they walked out of the front door, Phillip Trevelyan and the girl. And another man. He was big and dark haired and looked like a rougher version of Phillip. His brother, the preacher? He must look very impressive in the pulpit.

  Maureen quickly turned off the motor so plumes of exhaust wouldn’t attract their eyes to her. The last thing she needed was for them to know they were under surveillance. The cold immediately bit more deeply, and she shivered in her down anorak. The girl in her lightweight jacket must be freezing.

  The three walked to Phillip’s car and opened the trunk. Maureen sat up straight. Another transfer of the Matisse paintings? They were small, one a rectangle of five inches by eight, the other larger, nine inches by ten. Their size made them much too easy to transport or to pass off to another.

  The brother—what was his name?—reached into the trunk and pulled out the black suitcase. Even from here, five cars down and one aisle over, Maureen could see the red yarn tied around the handle. He set it down and pulled up the handle. The girl reached into the trunk and pulled out her laptop. Phillip reached in and grabbed the carry-on. Together they walked to a dark green Caravan parked almost directly across from Maureen’s car.

  She muttered under her breath and slouched to hide behind the steering wheel. If she slid any lower, she’d slide right off the seat. She lowered her window, hoping she could hear some of their conversation. The biting air swept in and froze her breath in her lungs.

  For extra cover she grabbed the magazine Fleishman had been reading back at the airport and held it in front of her face. She blinked as she caught sight of the photo of a naked woman just inches from her nose. Not that she’d never seen such a magazine before. After all, she’d been a cop for several years now, and she knew more than she wanted to about real life. Rather, she never read such magazines herself, just like she never opened the porn sites that appeared regularly in her e-mail. She threw the magazine on the floor in disgust and went back to depending on the steering wheel for cover.

  The preacher opened the side door of his van, and all the luggage went inside. The chalk streak on the side of the black bag was clear as it disappeared into the vehicle.

  Then he opened the passenger door, holding out a hand to the woman.

  As he did this, Phillip turned and looked directly at Maureen. Directly at her. He smiled slightly and raised an eyebrow as their gazes met through the steering wheel.

  Maureen’s eyes widened. It was like he knew she was there, like he knew she was watching them. She forced herself to nod, just a slight incline of the head, then made herself look away. She was just a bored woman slouched in her seat, waiting for someone she was supposed to pick up at the hospital, nothing more. She had just been watching them for something to do. That was all.

  The girl said something, her voice drifting across the space between the cars but not her words. Phillip turned from Maureen to her, and Maureen sagged. Greg would have a fit if she was made. Surely Phillip’s glance—well, it was more than a glance; it was like a long stare—was just an accident. It meant nothing, impacted the case in no way.

  She watched as Phillip took the girl in his arms and gave her a great hug and a kiss on the cheek. He turned to his brother and said something. The preacher gave a rueful smile. The woman climbed into the van; the preacher closed the door and walked around to the driver’s side, Phillip walking with him.

  The preacher turned. “You’ve got my cell phone number. Call if anything happens. We can be back here in just a few minutes.”

  Phillip extended his hand and the brothers shook. “Just go, Trev If I didn’t know better, I’d say you were stalling.”

  The woman inside must have said something because both men looked into the van. Phillip laughed and Trev—for Trevelyan? Certainly no one would have named him Trevor Trevelyan—climbed into the van. Phillip stepped out of the way, and the van pulled from its parking place, then from the lot.

  Maureen raised her window and turned the key in the ignition, preparing to follow. She slid into first gear and put her foot on the gas, only to slam on the brake.

  Phillip Trevelyan stood directly in front of her, legs spread, arms akimbo.

  She frowned at him. He stared impassively back.

  Maybe she could back out and still have time to follow the preacher and the girl. She glanced behind her. Aside from a concrete parking buffer, a silver SUV sat with its nose to her back bumper. She wasn’t going anywhere that way.

  Muttering to herself, she turned back to Phillip Trevelyan. Opening her window and leaning out, she called, “Excuse me. I was just leaving.” She began to inch forward.

  He didn’t move.

  Father God, please make him move!

  She threw a desperate glance toward the green van, disappearing down the highway. If she was ruthless and nuts like Riggs, the Mel Gibson character in the Lethal Weapon movies, she’d just gun the motor and force Phillip out of her way. In the movies everyone always jumped out of Riggs’s way. But what if Phillip Trevelyan didn’t know the rul
es? What if he didn’t move, and she ran over him?

  She turned pleading eyes to him, but all he did was put one foot on her front bumper and drape his arm over his raised knee. He looked like he was posing for GQ, except for his nose turning red in the cold.

  She closed her eyes and leaned back on the headrest, failure washing through her. It was too late to catch the green van now. There were too many roads, too many possibilities.

  And it was all his fault!

  She straightened. She should arrest him for impeding the progress of an investigation. Maybe that would teach him a lesson. Or for transporting stolen goods.

  “What is your problem?” she shouted at him.

  “I could ask you the same question,” he called back calmly.

  “What?”

  He lowered his foot. “If I come close so we don’t have to yell at each other, will you promise not to drive away when I step to the side?”

  She looked again at the empty stretch of road that ran from the hospital and sighed. Like it mattered what he did now. She reached out and turned the car off. She had to hand it to him. He was good. He had effectively caused her to lose their best lead, their only lead, in the Matisse investigation.

  Apparently taking her turning off the Camry’s engine as an affirmative, he walked to her open window. She pushed the lock button, though what good it would do with her window wide open was debatable. He heard the snick of the depressed locks and, grinning, nodded. He stopped beside the car and looked at her. Just looked. She in turn stared impassively back. Suddenly he blinked, shivered, and turned his collar up. “It’s cold out here.”

  Maureen wiggled her frozen toes and silently agreed.

  He leaned down, resting his arms on her window ledge, his hands dangling inches from her face. Eying him warily, she leaned back. Hadn’t he ever heard of personal space?

  “Want to let me in so I don’t freeze?” he asked, his voice halfway between a question and an order.

  Right. Like she’d ask a strange man with ties to Jankowski into the car with her.

  He nodded. “Didn’t think so. Smart girl.”

  There was a power about him, an air of command that filled the car and made it hard for her to breathe. If she’d let him in, he’d probably asphyxiate her whether he meant to or not. Yet he didn’t seem overbearing or scary. In fact, if she didn’t know better, she’d never, ever imagine him to be the sort involved with the theft of such valuable property, not that criminals followed physical or personality stereotypes.