"You, too," he said softly.
As soon as he hung up, Faith called Renee. She felt guilty for not having thought of it sooner, knowing how upset Renee had been.
Her grandmother answered the phone. When Faith asked for Renee, the old woman said in a fretful voice, "Guess she's gone. Took her clothes and lit out, night before last. I ain't heard from her."
Faith's heart sank. Renee had probably panicked after confessing what had happened at the summerhouse, and now she was running again, for no reason.
"If you hear from her, Granny, there's something I want you to tell her. It's important. The man who killed Guy Rouillard is dead. She doesn't have to be afraid anymore."
Her grandmother was silent a moment. "So that's why she was so jumpy," she finally said. "Well, maybe she'll call. She left some stuff, so she might come back for it. I'll tell her, if she does."
Mr. Pleasant's car was pulled from the lake the next afternoon. Mr. Pleasant was in it.
Probably on Gray's orders, a deputy came to the motel to tell Faith. The young man was uncomfortable and respectful, twisting his hat in his hands. He couldn't say how Mr. Pleasant had died, but the body was being taken to the parish morgue, where he would lie in the same room with his killer. Faith had to bite back an instinctive protest, knowing it would be useless.
After the deputy left, she sat down on the bed and had a good cry, then called Detective Ambrose. Poor Mr. Pleasant didn't have any remaining family, but the detective promised to find out what he could about any arrangements Mr. Pleasant might have made for his own funeral, given the state of his health. There was red tape to go through, of course, since his death was a homicide, but with his killer already dead, gathering forensic evidence for a trial wasn't an issue.
Guy Rouillard's Cadillac was found the next morning, not far from where Mr. Pleasant's car had been found. The long skeleton in the backseat was the only earthly remains of Gray's father. Alex Chelette's method of disposal had been simple: put them in their cars, prop a brick on the accelerator, and put the car in gear. Sheriff McFane was the one who had thought about finding the cars, and there were only three places on the lake where the water was deep enough to hide a car, and it was possible to get a car there. With their search locations narrowed down, it hadn't taken them long to find the bodies.
Faith didn't get to talk to Gray, but information flew around the town, and she knew he was ruthlessly using his influence to get Guy's remains released as soon as possible, for a funeral twelve years delayed. Noelle Rouillard appeared in town for the first time since her husband's disappearance, looking tragic and unbelievably beautiful in a black dress. Gray's cynical assessment of his mother's reaction had been on target; being a widow was far preferable to being abandoned. Now that everyone knew her husband had not left her for the town whore, she could hold her head up again.
The funeral was held four days after Guy's remains were found. Though she knew people would whisper about her presence, Faith bought a black dress and attended the service, sitting on a back pew beside Halley and her family. Gray didn't see her there at the church, but later, after the funeral procession had transported Guy's body to the burial site, his dark gaze was drawn by the sunlight on her flaming hair.
He was standing with a supporting arm around Monica. Sheriff McFane was on her other side, so Faith supposed the engagement was still on. Noelle was bearing up with the sympathetic support of all her old friends, the ones she had refused to see for a dozen years. Faith was some ten yards away, separated from him by a group of people, but their eyes met and she knew he was thinking about what she had said. Guy was sincerely mourned by his children; what Noelle felt didn't matter.
She stared at him, drinking him in with her eyes. He looked tired, but composed. His mane of hair was pulled back and secured at the back of his neck, and he wore a beautifully fitted, double-breasted black Italian suit. Sweat gleamed on his forehead in the noonday heat.
She made no move to go to him, and he didn't gesture her closer. What was between them was private, not for public display at his father's funeral. He knew he had her support, for he had cried out his grief in her arms. It was enough that she was there.
It was as they were leaving the grave site that Faith saw Yolanda Foster, standing by herself; Lowell was nowhere in evidence. Yolanda had been crying, but now her eyes were dry as she stared at the grave, an open look of heartbreak on her face. Then she gathered herself and turned away, and Faith felt all the pieces of the puzzle click into place.
It had never made sense that Guy would leave everything for Renee, not after all the years they'd been having an affair. Alex had said that Guy had been planning to divorce Noelle, and that had made more sense, but abruptly Faith knew that it wasn't Renee Guy had been planning to marry. After all his years of tomcatting around, Guy Rouillard had fallen in love that summer, with the mayor's wife. He had protected Yolanda's reputation, not even telling his best friend about her. Gossip about them had leaked out, or Ed Morgan wouldn't have known, but their affair hadn't been common knowledge. It was even possible Renee had told Ed that Guy was seeing the mayor's wife.
Yolanda and Guy had made secret plans. And now, after all these years, she knew that her lover hadn't deserted her. Guy was sincerely mourned by someone other than his children, after all.
It was late that night before all of the sympathizers ran out of excuses to stay any longer, and Gray had a private moment with his family. He sipped his Scotch as he studied Noelle, who was infinitely more cheerful now after burying her husband than she had been during the twelve years he'd been missing. He needed Faith, he thought. He wanted to be with her. Seeing her at the cemetery had made the hunger even sharper. Sexual hunger, emotional hunger, mental hunger. He simply wanted her, in all the ways possible. He remembered the way his heart had swelled in his chest when she'd told him she loved him, remembered the moment of blinding joy. Like a fool, he hadn't yet told her that he loved her, too, but that was an oversight he intended to rectify as soon as they could be alone.
Right now, he had something to say to his mother and sister.
"I'm getting married," he said calmly.
Two startled pairs of eyes looked back at him. He saw Monica's dismay, saw it quickly change to acceptance, and she gave him a tiny nod.
"Really, dear?" Noelle murmured. "I'm sorry, I haven't been keeping current with your social life. Is it someone from New Orleans?"
"No, it's Faith Devlin."
Calmly Noelle set her glass of wine aside. "Your joke is in extremely bad taste, Grayson."
"It isn't a joke. I'm marrying her as soon as it can be arranged."
"I forbid it!" she snapped.
"You can't forbid anything, Mother."
Though he said it calmly, Noelle reacted as if he'd slapped her. She rose to her feet, holding herself as erect as a queen. "We'll see about that. Your father may have associated with trash, but at least he never brought it home and expected me to associate with it!"
"That's enough," he said, his tone soft and dangerous.
"On the contrary, if you lower yourself to marry that slut, you'll find it's just beginning. I'll make her life here so miserable "
"No, you won't," he interrupted, slamming his glass down so that the Scotch sloshed over the rim. "Let me make your position plain, Mother. I know what's in Dad's will. He left you enough money to keep you in style, but he left everything else to Monica and me. If you behave yourself, and treat my wife with every courtesy, you may continue to live here. But make no mistake, the first time you upset her, I'll escort you out the door myself. Is that clear?"
Noelle shrank back, her face pale, her eyes livid as she stared at her son. "Monica," she said, her voice abruptly frail. "Help me to my room, darling. Men are so uncivilized..."
"Put a sock in it, Mother," Monica said tiredly.
"I beg your pardon." The words were freezing.
Monica visibly braced herself. She was as pale as Noelle, but she didn't back down. "I'm sorry, I shouldn't have said that. But Gray deserves to be happy. If you don't want to come to his wedding, fine, but I'll be there with bells on. And while we're on the subject, I'm getting married, too. To Michael McFane."
"Who?" Noelle asked, her face blank.
"The sheriff."
Disdain curled Noelle's lip. "The sheriff! Really, dear, he's "
"Perfect for me," Monica finished firmly. She looked both scared and exhilarated at finally having stood up to Noelle. "If you want to come to my wedding, I'll be pleased, but you can't stop me from marrying him. And, Mother I think you'll be happier if you move to New Orleans."
"Good idea," Gray said, and winked at his sister.
The next morning, Faith drove down to New Orleans for Mr. Pleasant's funeral. She had hoped Gray would call her, but understood why he hadn't. She had pestered Sheriff McFane mercilessly about doing what he could to get Mr. Pleasant's body released, and he had told her that Gray was embroiled in the process of having Guy's will probated, using his influence to hurry the process. The legal difficulties of a forged letter of proxy, under which he had been governing their financial holdings all these years, were mostly negated since Guy's will had left everything to Gray and Monica anyway, but there were still problems to handle.
Margot flew down to New Orleans to be with Faith, somehow discerning over the telephone that she was more upset about Mr. Pleasant than she had let on. The brief funeral service was attended by only a handful of people: some neighbors, herself and Margot, the little blue-haired lady from Houston H. Manges's law office. To her surprise, Detective Ambrose came by, wearing what looked like the same fatigued suit. He patted Faith's hand, as if she were Mr. Pleasant's family, and all the while his cynical cop's eyes never left Margot's face.
Too tired to drive home, Faith got a hotel room for the night. Margot decided to stay overnight too no surprise there and went out with Detective Ambrose.
"I don't sleep with men on the first date," Margot said the next morning, chattering nervously. "I mean, I just don't. It's too dangerous, and tacky besides." She couldn't sit still as they ate their breakfast at the room service cart in Faith's room; she fidgeted with her napkin, her silverware, her clothes. Her gaze flitted around the hotel room; hers was connecting, and virtually identical, but she seemed to find everything of immense interest. "I may be old-fashioned, but I think sex should wait at least until there's a commitment, and waiting until marriage would be even better. Women risk too much by sleeping with men who aren't their husbands "
"So was he any good?" Faith interrupted, sipping her coffee.
Margot clapped her hand to her chest and rolled her eyes dramatically. "Oh my Gawd, was he!" She jumped up and began to pace the room. "I couldn't believe what was happening, I just don't do that, but that man had made up his mind and it was like being on a roller coaster, there was just no way to get off. Well, that's not exactly what I mean. About getting off, that is, because I did " She stopped and turned dark red. Faith almost choked on her coffee, she was laughing so hard.
"He wants to see me tonight, but I told him I have a flight back to Dallas, and he should call me at home if he wants to see me again." Margot looked anxious. "Do you think there's any way I can slow this down and get back on the right track?"
"Maybe," Faith said, but she had seen Margot in love before, and doubted anything could slow her down.
They spent the morning shopping, replenishing Faith's wardrobe from the chic New Orleans boutiques. She left the city about two o'clock, giving Margot both the privacy and time for another meeting with Detective Ambrose.
She arrived back at the motel, her temporary home, at four. Reuben waved to her, and came out to help her carry in her purchases. Then, hungry from the exertion, she drove downtown to Halley's cafe.
She chatted with Halley for a while, then ordered the chicken salad sandwich that had become her usual supper. She was sitting in a booth with her back to the door, and her sandwich had just been placed in front of her, when she heard the door crash open behind her, and an abrupt silence fell over the cafe.
Startled, she looked up and found an enraged Gray Rouillard towering over her. Reuben must have called him, she thought absently. His black hair was loose, tangled around his shoulders. "Where the hell," he barked, "have you been?"
"New Orleans," she replied in a mild tone, though she was acutely aware of the breathless interest of everyone in the cafe.
"Would it be asking too much of you to let me know where you're going to be?" he snapped.
"I went to Mr. Pleasant's funeral," she said.
He slid into the booth opposite her, some of the fury fading from his face. Beneath the table, his long legs clasped hers, and he reached across to take both her hands in his. "I was scared sh spitless," he confessed, quickly adjusting his first word choice to something more socially acceptable. "You hadn't checked out, but Reuben saw you put a suitcase in the car. I even had him open your room to see if any of your things were still there."
"I wouldn't have left town without telling you," she said, secretly amused that he thought she might have left town at all.
"You'd better not," he muttered. His hands tightened on hers. "Look," he began, and stopped. "Ah, hell, I know this isn't the best place to do it, but I've still got tons of paperwork to wade through and I don't know how long it'll be before I see daylight. Will you marry me?"
He had succeeded in surprising her. He had gone beyond surprising her. She sat back, stunned into speechlessness. Gray wanted to marry her? She hadn't dared let herself even think of it. With their tangled pasts... the thorny situation with his mother and sister... well, it just hadn't seemed to be an option.
Evidently he took her reaction as rejection, and his dark brows drew together. Being Gray, he immediately took ruthless measures to get what he wanted. "You have to marry me," he said, loudly enough that everyone in the cafe could hear him. "That's my baby girl you're carrying. She'll need a daddy, and you need a husband."
Faith gasped, her eyes rounding with horror. "You fiend," she shrieked, scrambling out of the booth. She wasn't pregnant and she knew it, her period having arrived right on time, three days before. She had a confused, dizzying impression of a room full of avid faces, staring at her, and Gray wore a ruthlessly satisfied look on his face as he smiled at her, enjoying her sputtering, incoherent fury. Maybe he saw something in her eyes, a split second of warning, but it wasn't enough. Her hand shot out for her glass of iced tea and she dashed it full in his face. "I am not pregnant!" she yelled.
Gray climbed out of the booth, wiping tea from his eyes with Faith's napkin. "Maybe not now, but if you want to be, we'd better get married."
"Marry him," Halley advised, leaning over the counter. She was grinning hugely. "And make his life hell. He deserves it, after this stunt."
"Yeah," he said positively. "I deserve it."
Faith stared up at him. "But what about your mother?" she asked helplessly.
He shrugged. "What about her?" Faith opened her mouth to yell at him again, and he grinned, holding up his hand. "I told her and Monica that I intended to marry you. Mother went into her acute disapproval syndrome, but Monica told her, literally, to put a sock in it. Funniest thing I've ever seen. Well, except for one." His eyes glittered at her, outrageously reminding her of the courthouse. "Monica gives us her best wishes; she and Michael are getting married next week. She strongly suggested to Mother that she move to New Orleans, which she's always liked better than Prescott, anyway. So, baby, I'm going to be rattling around in that big house all by myself, and I need my own personal redhead to keep me company."
He meant it. Faith swallowed, once again unable to speak. Gray's head tilted as he smiled down at her, dark eyes full of desire and tenderness. "There's something else I've been meaning to tell you," he murmured. "I love you, baby. I should have told you sooner, but things started happening."
She thought of hitting him. She thought of snatching someone else's tea to toss in his face. Instead she said, "Yes." He held out his arms, and she walked into them, to the accompanying spatter of applause from the cafe patrons.
All The Queen's Men
PART ONE.
Chapter One.
1994, Iran It was cold in the rough little hut. Despite the blankets hung over the one window and the ill-fitting door, to block the escape of any telltale light, frigid air still seeped through. Niema Burdock blew on her fingers to warm them, her breath fogging slightly in the one dim battery-operated light that was all Tucker, the team leader, allowed.
Her husband, Dallas, seemed perfectly comfortable in his T-shirt as he calmly packed the Semtex blocks into secure sections of his web gear. Niema watched him, trying to hide her anxiety. It wasn't the explosive she worried about; plastique was so stable soldiers in Vietnam had burned it as fuel. But Dallas and Sayyed had to plant the explosives in the manufacturing facility, and that was the most dangerous part of a job that was already hair-raising enough. Though her husband was as matter-of-fact about it as he would be about crossing the street, Niema wasn't that blase about the job. The radio detonator wasn't state-of-the art; far from it. This was deliberate, a precaution in case any of their equipment fell into the wrong hands. Nothing they were using could be traced to the United States, which was why Dallas was using Semtex instead of C-4. But because their equipment wasn't the best available, Niema had gone to great pains to make sure it was reliable. It was her husband's finger, after all, that would be on the switch.
Dallas caught her gaze on him and winked at her, his strong face relaxing from its normal impassiveness into a warm smile that he reserved only for her. "Hey," he said mildly, "I'm good at this. Don't worry."
So much for trying to hide her anxiety. The other three men turned to look at her. Not wanting them to think she couldn't handle the stress of the job, she shrugged. "So sue me. I'm new at this wife business. I thought I was supposed to worry."
Sayyed laughed as he packed his own gear. "Heck of a way to spend your honeymoon." He was a native Iranian who was now an American citizen, a tough, wiry man in his late forties. He spoke English with a Midwestern accent, the result of both hard work and almost thirty years in the United States. "Personally, I'd have picked Hawaii for my wedding trip. At least it would be warm there."
"Or Australia," Hadi said wistfully. "It's summer there now." Hadi Santana was of Arabic and Mexican heritage, but an American by birth. He had grown up in the heat of southern Arizona and didn't like the cold Iranian mountains in mid-winter any better than did Niema. He would stand guard while Dallas and Sayyed planted the charges and was occupying himself by checking and rechecking his rifle and ammunition.
"We spent two weeks in Aruba after we got married," Dallas said. "Great place." He winked at Niema again, and she had to smile. Unless Dallas had been to Aruba another time, he hadn't seen much of it during their honeymoon, three months before. They had spent the entire two weeks lost in each other's company, making love, sleeping late. Bliss.
Tucker didn't join in the conversation, but his cool, dark eyes lingered on Niema as if assessing her; wondering if he had made a mistake including her on the team. She wasn't as experienced as the others, but neither was she a novice. Not only that, she could put a bug on a telephone line with her eyes closed. If Tucker had any doubts about her ability, she wished he would just come out and say so.
But if Tucker had doubts about her, then turnabout was fair play, she thought wryly, because she sure as hell wasn't certain about him. Not that he'd said or done anything wrong; the uneasiness that kept her on edge around him was instinctive, without any concrete reason. She wished he was one of the three men going into the plant, rather than remaining behind with her. The thought of spending the hours alone with him wasn't nearly as nerve-racking as knowing Dallas would be in danger, but she didn't need the added tension when her nerves already felt stretched and raw.
Tucker originally had planned to go in, but Dallas was the one who had argued against it. "Look, boss," he had said in that calm way of his. "It isn't that you can't do the job, because you're as good as I am, but it isn't necessary that you take the risk. If you had to, that would be different, but you don't." An indecipherable look had flashed between the two men, and Tucker had given a brief nod.
Dallas and Tucker had known each other before Tucker put this team together, had worked together before. The only thing that reassured Niema about the team leader was that her husband trusted and respected him, and Dallas Burdock was no one's pushover-to the contrary, in fact. Dallas was one of the toughest, most dangerous men she had ever met. She had thought he was the most dangerous, until she met Tucker.
That in itself was scary, because Dallas was something else. Until five months ago, she hadn't really believed men like him existed. Now, she knew differently. Her throat tightened as she watched her husband, his dark head bent as he once again focused all his attention on his supplies and equipment. Just like that, he could tune out everything but the job; his power of concentration was awesome. She had seen that level of concentration in only one other man: Tucker.
She felt a sudden little ping of disbelief, almost a suspension of reality, that she was actually married, especially to a man like Dallas. She had known him for just five months, loved him for almost as long, and in so many ways he was still a stranger to her. They were slowly learning each other, settling down into the routine of marriage-well, as routine as it could get, given their jobs as contract agents for various concerns, principally the CIA.
Dallas was calm and steady and capable. Once she would have described those characteristics as desirable, if you were the domestic suburban type, but basically unexciting. Not now. There was nothing staid about Dallas. Need a cat out of a tree? Dallas could climb that tree as if he were a cat. Need the plumbing fixed? Dallas could fix it. Need to be dragged out of the surf? He was a superior swimmer. Need someone to make a difficult shot? He was an expert marksman. Need to blow up a building in Iran? Dallas was your man.
So it took some doing to be tougher and more dangerous than Dallas, but Tucker ... somehow was. She didn't know why she was so certain. It wasn't Tucker's physical appearance; he was tall and lean, but not as muscular as Dallas. He wasn't edgy; if anything, he was even more low-key than Dallas. But there was something in his eyes, in his characteristic stillness, that told her Tucker was lethal.
She kept her doubts about the team leader to herself. She wanted to trust Dallas's opinion of Tucker because she trusted her husband so much. Besides, she was the one who had really wanted to take this job, while Dallas had been leaning toward a diving trip to Australia. Maybe she was just letting the tension of the situation get to her. They were, after all, on a job that would get them all killed if they were discovered, but success was even more important than escaping detection.
The small facility buried deep in these cold mountains was manufacturing a biological agent scheduled to be shipped to a terrorist base in Sudan. An air strike would be the fastest, most efficient way to destroy it, but that would also trigger an international crisis and destroy the delicate balance of the Middle East along with the factory. A full-scale war wasn't what anyone wanted.
With an air strike ruled out, the plant had to be destroyed from the ground, and that meant the explosives had to be hand-placed, as well as powerful. Dallas wasn't relying just on Semtex to do the job; there were fuels and accelerants in the factory that he planned to use to make certain the plant didn't just go boom, but that it burned to the ground.
They had been in Iran five days, traveling openly, boldly. She had worn the traditional Muslim robes, with only her eyes revealed, and sometimes they had been veiled, too. She didn't speak Farsi-she had studied French, Spanish, and Russian, but not Farsi-but that didn't matter because, as a woman, she wasn't expected to speak. Sayyed was a native, but from what she could tell, Tucker was as fluent as Sayyed, Dallas nearly so, and Hadi less than Dallas. She was sometimes amused by the fact that all five of them were dark-eyed and dark-haired, and she wondered if her coloring hadn't played nearly as large a part in her having been chosen to be a team member as had her skill with electronics.
"Ready." Dallas hooked the radio transmitter to his web gear and shouldered the knapsack of plastique. He and Sayyed had identical gear. Niema had practically assembled the transmitters from spare parts, because the transmitters they had acquired had all been damaged in some way. She had cannibalized them and built two she had tested and retested, until she was certain they wouldn't fail. She had also tapped into the factory's phone lines, a dead-easy job because their equipment was of early-seventies vintage. They hadn't gotten much information from that, but enough to know their intel was accurate, and the small facility had developed a supply of anthrax for terrorists in Sudan. Anthrax wasn't exotic, but it was sure as hell effective.
Sayyed had slipped into the facility the night before and reconnoitered, returning to draw a rough floor plan showing where the testing and incubation was done, as well as the storage facility, where he and Dallas would concentrate most of their explosives. As soon as the factory blew, Tucker and Niema would destroy their equipment-not that much of it was worth anything-and be ready to move as soon as the three men returned. They would split up and each make their own way out of the country, rendezvousing in Paris to debrief. Niema, of course, would be traveling with Dallas.
Tucker extinguished the light, and the three men slipped silently out the door and into the darkness. Niema immediately wished she had at least hugged Dallas, or kissed him good luck, no matter what the other three thought. She felt colder without his bracing presence.
After making certain the blankets were in place, Tucker switched on the light again, then began swiftly packing the things they would take with them. There wasn't much; a few provisions, a change of clothes, some money; nothing that would arouse suspicion if they were stopped. Niema moved to help him, and in silence they divided the provisions into five equal packs.