Chapter 3 #2
“It will be easy to say nothing since I intend to leave the island as soon as possible.”
“You do that. Have a safe trip.”
Dane left the minister a little shaky. It hadn’t been his intention, but as he walked out of the antechamber into the small hallway where the others stood in a huddle like they were a team planning the next play, he was glad he’d shaken the man up.
Dane was going to hell anyway, long before this latest sin.
He mentally shrugged and smiled at his small audience.
“Well?” Shana wanted to know. She always wanted to know.
“We’re good. Reverend Hall will not be staying for our party.”
“What a shame.”
Father Donahue said, “Looks like I’ll be getting up to bat then.”
“You’re the costar of our troupe,” Dane said and looked at Shana.
She returned his gaze with an evil smile.
“I’ll be playing the bride who packs a gun under her veil.”
Either the relish in her voice or the picture she conjured—Dane wasn’t sure which—gave him an ungodly chill of fear. He hated the scenario.
And he had only himself to blame as the concocter of the plan.
He said nothing as he worked on getting his churning gut and thumping heart under control before his anxiety caused sweat to pop on his forehead.
Father Donahue clapped his back. Must be a family trait. He knew this wasn’t a good thing and he knew Dane hated it. Dane hoped to hell Shana didn’t sense his discomfort, the flat-out sick feeling he had about making her the target of Max the Ax.
Finally, he said, “Don’t look so happy about putting an X on your back, girlie.
It’s a damn serious assignment. You—never mind.
” He stopped himself from talking like an old lady.
Everyone knew the dangers of the job. That’s why they were in it.
Because they were equipped to take on the danger and keep a cool head long enough to get the job done.
He needed to get his cool head back before he got called on it. Or before he compromised their mission.
He needed to get into mission mode. And stay there.
Shana studied him, turning her face from excited anticipation to grim in the process. It should have given him comfort to know she was taking it like the serious professional that she was, but no.
“I’m aware,” she said. He felt like she’d spit on him, figuratively. She was pissed at him for acting like a worried mother instead of a confident partner. Again.
They walked to the curb carrying the church’s quiet with them until they reached their cars. Dane was driving Toly’s rental.
Father Donahue said, “We’ll be wearing Kevlar, right?”
Dane gave a subdued chuckle and returned the man’s clap on the back.
Shana snorted and said, “You’ll be so wrapped you’ll look like the marshmallow man, only you’ll be impenetrable.”
Dane watched them all get in the Jeep with Petrov and Viktor in the back wearing sullen expressions.
He wasn’t sure how much they’d heard, but he’d have to read them into the mission and count on them more than he’d planned.
He went to the driver side window where Shana sat and leaned his arms on the opening, bringing his face close to hers.
She looked at him with those sparkling green eyes and that angel’s face and it took his breath away for a beat. Then without knowing what he was going to say, he spoke.
“You know I worry about you, girlie.” He left the “because I love you” part unspoken. But she got the message. Her mouth softened to a kissable pose.
So he kissed her. He let his mouth take hers in a possessive caress for a moment. Long enough to reinforce his message and not too long to allow commentary from their audience. Or from his conscience. Damn their truce.
The sun glistened over the western horizon of Dane’s harbor view by the time he and Shana returned to the beach shack.
The kitchen’s spring-loaded screen door banged closed a third time and Acer—Jeremiah Acerman, his closest friend from their old special ops unit—stepped into the small stifling room.
“Let’s power up the AC,” he said and swiped his brow.
“There’s a fan in the corner.” Dane pointed across the scuffed countertop of the peninsula that separated his kitchen and dining area to a box fan sitting on the floor. It was noisy as hell. They hardly ever used it.
He pulled open the freezer door, looked at the frosty bottle of tequila sitting on a crusted mound of ice, and then shut the door again.
“We’ll do six-hour turns on the surveillance cameras watching the perimeter of the Big Shack.” He looked at Acer. “No alcohol.”
Acer gave him a ‘who? Me?’ look.
“I’m taking a shower,” Shana said and brushed past Dane.
A frisson of awareness swept through him like a meteor shower leaving pinpoints of excitement across his skin.
His heart ramped up into the rapid beating pace of urgency.
Dane glanced at Acer, who was busy setting up the fan, and then back down the hall where Shana disappeared into the one and only bathroom they all shared in the shack.
As much as Dane loved his friend Acer, he hated that the man by virtue of his presence at the shack was automatically cast as chaperone.
The vein of tension struck between his shoulder blades as he fisted his hands in frustration.
If he’d been on easy terms with Shana, if they hadn’t called a truce in their romance, he would make a move and join her in the shower.
The problem was, if he tried that now, he’d risk a scene. There was no way he’d want Acer in the middle of that. Dane admitted that he wasn’t sure whose side Acer would be on, but it wouldn’t matter. He wouldn’t win either way. Acer’s presence would have a dampening effect either way.
He turned his attention back to the mission and walked into his makeshift office which would have been the living room in anyone else’s house.
He picked up the receiver to a deceptively old-fashioned-looking phone and dialed the Big Shack.
Acer had installed a similarly deceptive secure line there. Ryan picked up.
“Did you make the appointment?” Dane asked.
“We’re on for noon tomorrow. You’ll be with me?”
“You will be accompanied by a distinguished-looking couple. We’ll all be wired for sound by Acer before we go. Get a good night’s sleep.”
After Dane hung up the receiver he heard Shana close the door to her bedroom. The urge to follow her there beat him into submission and he slipped into the hall and knocked on her door, his heartbeat fast and quick with a picture of her dripping and naked on the other side.
She opened the door a slit and he slipped inside. She wore a towel. He wasn’t disappointed.
She said, “This better be business.”
He thought fast, surprised he was able to think at all.
“We’re on for tomorrow at noon. We’ll dress up for the occasion.”
“Anything else?”
He wasn’t fooled by her. She was giving him an opening—to fall into her trap. He worked at icing his veins putting that mind over matter notion to the test.
“We’re taking six-hour shifts on surveillance. I’ll go first.”
She nodded. “I’ll take the second shift.”
He slept on the couch while Shana took her turn monitoring the surveillance cameras placed around the Big Shack. Acer slept in his room.
It was almost dawn when Dane’s shift came around again. Before Acer went back to bed, Dane noticed some activity.
“Hold on.” He sharpened the picture and angled the camera to follow the car driving by slowly.
“You recognize the car?” Acer asked as he stood over Dane’s shoulder watching the square in the upper left corner of the monitor.
“No.” He picked up the pen and jotted down the make, model and plate number and watched until the car disappeared from the camera.
He picked up his secure phone and dialed Cap’s personal cell number.
Cap picked up and Dane spoke quickly, “I need you to run some plates. Pronto.”
“I’m not in the office. It’s—”
“I know. Five a.m. Do it as fast as you can and get back to me.” Dane gave him the plates, make and model of the car and where he’d seen it.
“I’ll make some coffee,” Acer said. They both went to the kitchen.
“Who’s watching the Big Shack now?” Acer said.
“I’m calling Viktor and Pavel now to put them on alert.”
By the time Dane had everyone awake and briefed, Cap called back.
“What do you have?”
“Interesting news.”
“Interesting good or interesting bad?”
“The car is registered to Maxim Xavier. Not his firm, not an associate. No attempt has been made to hide. He’s here on the island and he doesn’t care who knows about it,” Cap said.
“I thought you were watching for him. Shit.”
“I’ve been monitoring the boats and airport since you found out about his connection to the matter yesterday, but he likely flew in on a private plane under the radar.”
“Damn,” Dane said. He held a mug half filled with coffee. Urgency flowed through him fueled by the coffee and the proximity of trouble.
“This isn’t official police business,” Cap said. “I can’t put the office on it—only my personal time.”
“I know. Ryan arranged a business meeting with him today—as a firm client. See what he has to say for himself. Our goal is to confirm he’s the threat.”
“That’ll get you a step closer to an official police complaint,” Cap said. “If that’s where you want to go.”
“That’s always a possibility. A last resort possibility,” Dane said. “With Anatoly Ivanov—our very generous client—involved, official law enforcement intervention would get complicated.”
Dane and Shana were extra careful in following Ryan to the meeting with Maxim Xavier since they were all coming off the island and heading the same way.
They would meet for a business lunch in Boston at the Parker House restaurant.
It was a good arrangement partly because it got Max off the island, which would piss him off, and partly because it would help them to pinpoint his whereabouts.