Avenging Angel

“How do you know about that?”

“The big blond guy told me. He was asking questions about you.” Mike cast her a grin and added, “Don’t worry, I told him I’d never seen you fall off a horse before today.”

She hung the lead from a nail as she said, “Thanks. Well, anyway, I’m not coming back.” Her voice sounded serene. She was a good actress.

For a second, it seemed she might never be herself again.

But that was stupid. The trouble was she was too much herself. She couldn’t seem to stop responding to things. To Peg’s disappointment in her, to news of the judge’s arrival, and lordy, lordy, to Pete.

He made her feel she was on fire inside.

First the verbal teasing, which she’d enjoyed, then that kiss. A man like that didn’t kiss a woman for the hell of it, he’d been prying into her life with that kiss and she’d let him.

And she’d enjoyed it.

She smiled to herself. The naked part hadn’t been planned, but it sure had caught his attention. She’d gotten out of the shower, heard a noise, grabbed the gun from the cabinet behind the sink and entered the room without hesitation. Along with her passport, she hid papers under a loose floorboard. Papers about her family’s murders, about the suspects, about Alazandro.

The expression on his handsome face when he turned around had been priceless. And admit it, she’d enjoyed the sensations his strong body pressed against hers had aroused. His lips, the flicker of his tongue.

The flames leaped.

She reminded herself of her goal: get close to Alazandro. And then she added a new goal: keep away from Pete.

“That’s a cool job,” Mike mused. “You must be real excited about it.”

She nodded and smiled. She was kind of excited, which was dumb. She wasn’t going there to play with the horses and make a great stable. She was going to discover the truth about Víctor Alazandro and bring him to justice—dead or alive.

That sobering thought wiped the memory of Pete’s playful banter and kiss right out of her thoughts.

Mike grabbed the broom from against a wall and started sweeping the walkway. As he rambled on about his plans for the future, uncomplicated plans Elle envied, she decided she had to get Peg to understand that Mike deserved a chance. He and Peg would make a good team. Peg’s savvy, Mike’s personality. They could make a go of whatever remained after Alazandro got finished with them.

Wait, an additional goal: ruin Alazandro before he could ruin Peg.

“Who’s going to take over the riding lessons here?” Mike asked.

Elle blinked a couple of times. She’d been lost in her thoughts. How to answer? She didn’t want to raise any false hopes—

The answer came from behind Elle. “You are, Mike,” Peg said as she entered the stable.

“But I have to tend the horses,” Mike said, leaning on the broom. “I have to exercise and—”

“Starting tomorrow, you do everything Elle did. We’ve already got Pam and Tracy coming in to help with mucking out stables and exercising. I’ll get the Hoskins boy to do your chores until we can find someone more permanent. Get some sleep tonight, you’re going to have a big day tomorrow.”

With that, she nodded at Mike and left the stable.

“What’s with her?” Mike whispered to Elle. “She didn’t even look at you.”

“She’s got a lot on her mind,” Elle said.

Mike nodded and then grinned. “I wonder if she’ll let me move into your cabin. It’s bigger than mine.”

“You’re kidding.”

“Nope. I have to use the outhouse.”

Elle laughed. “You’re moving up in the world, my friend.”

“Yeah,” he said. “Thanks to you and Mr. Alazandro.”

A HALF HOUR LATER, Elle was in her car, trying in vain to get the motor to turn over. The oil light shone red, which meant she’d neglected to add oil the last time she used the car. Great, she was probably willing Mike a car with a cracked head. On the other hand, he was getting a practically new Learn Japanese in Thirty Days tape, which was still stuck in the car’s tape player.

Someone rapped on her window.

She cranked it down to find Pete leaning down, peering in at her.

“Trouble?” he said.

“No.”

“Are you sure?”

Shrugging, she made a decision. Fate had taken a hand, she wouldn’t drive into town.

Meeting with the judge would be a waste of time, anyway. She could hear his arguments in her head. The dean owes me one, I know I can get you back intograduate school. Your grandfather is caught up in senseless vengeance and neither you nor that nurse of his is helping. Don’t buy into it. Leave the past alone, don’t risk your future, what’s done is done, nothing will bring your dead family back to life. Justice will be done in the end.

If he had any inkling she was flying out with Alazandro tomorrow morning, he’d kill her. Or Alazandro.

“Elle?”

She got out of the car and leaned against the door. After a moment or two, Pete joined her, his body too close for comfort. She contemplated moving and decided it would send the wrong message. Or the right one.

Face it, she found his presence disconcerting. The man exuded confidence from the ends of his short sandy hair to the tips of his worn boots. Add the physique, the eyes, the rugged features, the voice—

When he looked at her, a private spot inside melted.

Life was confusing enough without him. Why did he have to come along now, why did he have to be connected to Alazandro? And why couldn’t she walk away from him without looking back?

“Going to be a beautiful evening,” he said.

Lake Tahoe lay down the sloping property, a glittering jewel this late in the day, a beautiful blue gem caught in the palm of towering trees.

“You seem upset,” Pete added.

“A little.”

“I came out here this evening to deliver some papers to Peg Stiles. She seems upset, too.”

Elle cast him a quick glance. Her gaze landed on his lips and she quickly raised her eyes. He smiled down at her.

Damn him.

She said, “As a matter of fact, I’m annoyed with my adopted father, not Peg. How about you, Pete? Do you have a father? Or a last name? Or a dog? Anything?”

It took him a moment to answer. She could almost feel his thoughts spinning. “Yes to the first two, no to the third. Father alive and kicking in Maui with his fourth wife. My last name is Waters.”

“Peter Waters.” She wasn’t sure she believed him, though why he should lie was a mystery. Maybe he had a record or something. Maybe instead of being a cop in his former life he’d been a felon.

He apparently wasn’t finished prying. “So, what did this adopted father do to upset you?”

“For most my life, showed me nothing but kindness,” Elle said in a burst of truth.

“The cad.”

She laughed softly.

“But lately?”

“Lately he’s been—unreasonable.”

“With you? That’s hard to understand.”

She heard the smile in his voice. “I haven’t always been this easygoing,” she said.

“Now that’s hard to believe.”

“Yeah, right.” In another burst of candor, she added, “I wasn’t an easy child to bring up. I had nightmares. My family had all died in an…accident…and I was left alone. The judge was my father’s best friend. They worked together on the police force. They had set it up to take care of each other’s children if something happened to one of them. But the judge didn’t have any children of his own and a year after he and his wife adopted me, she died, so he got the full burden of trying to take care of a bereft little girl.”

Pete started to speak but didn’t. She was relieved, afraid that if he offered a sympathetic shoulder to cry on, she’d take him up on it. “Anyway, now he just wants me to go back to school and become a professor and make him proud.”

“While your life’s ambition is to work at a resort for Víctor Alazandro.”

“Does that mean I got a go-ahead from Mr. Alazandro’s security people?”

“That’s what it means. You fly out with us tomorrow.”

She bit back a smile and a shudder, both of which were spontaneous responses to the same stimuli. “Where is Mr. Alazandro, anyway?”

“He’s having dinner at one of the casinos with an investor.”

“Who’s watching his back?”

“Night shift.”

She pushed herself away from the car. “I have to find a phone and call the judge to tell him I’m not coming. See you tomorrow.”

“We’ll pick you up at six. But wait a minute.” He caught her hand and pulled her gently back to stand in front of him, a battle waging behind his eyes. Ignoring the warmth radiating up her arm from contact with his hand, she waited.

Taking a deep breath, he said, “If you tell Alazandro I told you this, I swear I’ll shoot you.”

She stopped breathing. “Tell him what?”

He narrowed his eyes. “Don’t come with us tomorrow. Stay here. Go back where you came from. Just don’t come to Puerta Del Sol.”

“Don’t you start this, too,” she said with a sigh.

“I know you want to get close to Alazandro.”

“What?”

“He’s a rich, important guy. You’ve had a hard life and your adopted father is bugging you. Flying off to Mexico must sound exciting—”

She started to laugh again, but stopped. “You’re not joking, are you?”

He lowered his head until his breath felt warm against her face, intoxicating and frightening at the same time. Whispering, he said, “No, I’m not joking. He’s a dangerous man.”

“Like you?”

He swore under his breath as he released her hand. “You are the singular most irritating woman I’ve ever known and that’s saying something.”

“But I thought the danger came from outside.”

“What do you mean?”

“From whoever issued the death threat against him.”

Pete nodded solemnly. “Yeah, that’s right.”

“But now you’re telling me it’s Alazandro himself I need protecting from?”

He glared at her.

“You need to get your story straight,” she said brightly.

“The last time we were down there, a young woman died of a drug overdose.”

“That’s terrible, but how does that—”

“She was alone with Alazandro at the time. Alazandro was questioned. He claimed no knowledge of what happened.”

“Are you implying Mr. Alazandro killed her?”

Pete looked away, then back. “No.”

“That he gave her illegal drugs?”

“No.”

“Okay, then listen to me. I have to go to Puerta Del Sol. I want to go.” And with that she took off, anxious to get away from him before he could lure her back. She knew what kind of man Alazandro was, so why did Pete’s warning, if it was a warning and not some bizarre test, send the granddaddy of shivers racing down her spine?

AFTER A RESTLESS NIGHT spent wrestling the blankets, Elle was up and dressed early.

She’d had the nightmare again last night. Her father, facedown on the floor. Her standing at the top of the stairs. Her crying out, him turning, his face dissolving into a pulpy, bloody mess as he got to his feet, his flesh slipping from his rotting corpse as he started up the stairs toward her.

Always the same dream, not as often now as before, but always the same. She’d finally told her grandfather about it and he’d shaken his white head. “Janey, it’s clear to me your father wants justice for himself, for your mother and for your baby brother,” he’d said. He’d continued calling her Janey despite the judge’s protests. “I’ve been thinking about this ever since I was diagnosed with this blasted cancer. I shouldn’t have allowed their deaths to go unavenged and now it’s too late. Unless—”

That conversation had set everything else in motion and had strangely almost ended the dream, as though her father knew she was committed to avenge them all.

And now she was finally on the brink of making good on that promise.

The conversation with the judge the night before had been horrific. He’d demanded she return with him, she’d refused. He’d called her spoiled, she’d called him controlling. They’d finally agreed to meet for lunch, a promise she’d known she couldn’t keep. She’d be long gone by then. She felt wretched lying to him. Justified, but wretched.

She didn’t know what game Pete was playing or even if he was playing a game, but she knew she couldn’t afford to take the papers about her family’s deaths with her to Mexico. Pete seemed to have a penchant for spontaneous searches and every document she carried was way too incriminating.

Leaving the pink slip and the car keys on the table for Mike, she left her cabin at the first sign of daylight. She carried her purse strapped across her chest along with her duffel bag, packed with her clothes and the gun as well as a box of ammunition. It wasn’t chilly enough to wear both jackets, but she did so anyway as they wouldn’t fit in the duffel and she needed to have her hands empty.

The burn pile was located beside the hay barn and she made her way to it over uneven, dew-soaked grass. The papers went up in a cheery little blaze that did nothing to cheer her. The enormity of what she’d set in motion the day before had begun to sink in, creating a dandy case of performance anxiety.

She would have to flirt her way south today. She’d have to keep up the sexy, provocative persona whenever Alazandro was around. Playful, but not too easy because the goal was to avoid sleeping with him.

She heard approaching footsteps and turned to find Peg wearing a loose Windbreaker over jeans, a jacket Elle had never seen before. Peg’s face looked drawn as though she, too, hadn’t slept much.

“I saw the open flame,” she said, pulling the collar up around her throat with one hand as she raised a cigarette to her lips with the other.

“I had some old love letters to get rid of,” Elle lied.

Peg nodded as she flipped the cigarette into the last of the blaze. She exhaled a breath of smoke that mingled with the campfire’s. The two women stood there for a few seconds as the blaze flickered and died. Then they both started to speak at once. Elle said, “Go ahead, please.”

Peg glanced at Elle’s face, then away. “I was out of line yesterday,” she finally said as though each word took effort.

“Peg—”

“No, listen. I made a mistake getting involved with Alazandro. It was before I hired you, right after my husband died. I was broke. The mortgage we’d taken to see Bill through his illness—well, anyway, Alazandro somehow heard about my problems and swept in here like a conquering hero. He promised me I could keep everything as it was. He promised me the moon. My lawyer warned me but I couldn’t see any other way out. I signed papers and now—well, now it’s too late.”

Peg’s voice had softened to a whisper as she tucked both hands in her pockets and stared at the smoldering ashes. One side of her jacket hung lower than the other and obviously held a heavy cylindrical object like a flashlight. The thought of Peg wandering around her beloved property in the dark dressed in what looked like her late husband’s old coat made Elle’s throat swell.

Peg added, “But that has nothing to do with you. I shouldn’t have done what I did.”

“You didn’t do anything, Peg. You just expressed your opinions and—”

“I called your father.”

Elle closed her eyes and rocked back on her heels.

“I was just so blasted mad! Víctor Alazandro is one of those people who destroy everything and everybody they touch.”

Elle took a steadying breath. The judge wasn’t home, he was here, in Nevada, Peg couldn’t have talked to him. It was okay.

Peg said, “Mike told me your father was staying at the Lakefront Inn. So I called his room early this morning. Woke him up, but I had to do something. I told him you were leaving this morning with Alazandro. He said something about over his dead body and hung up the phone and then I saw you down here and I know I should have minded my own business, but it’s too late now. I wanted to tell you about this myself. Before he got here and—”

Elle grabbed Peg’s arm. “The judge is coming here?”

Peg nodded miserably. “There’s only one way out of this mess,” she said. “It’s up to me.”

Elle didn’t know or care much what Peg meant by that. She grabbed her duffel bag and took off toward the dirt parking area located by the largest stable. That’s where Pete and Alazandro would arrive. She glanced at her watch. It was almost six.

What would the judge do?

Threaten her? Threaten Alazandro? Would he say something that would alarm Alazandro enough to make him back out of taking her to Puerta Del Sol with him?

Of course he would.

She glanced back to ask how long ago Peg had talked to the judge. It took twenty minutes to drive here from town and if he’d been asleep, he would have had to dress—

Peg was nowhere in sight.

Elle scanned the area around the hay barn until a movement twenty feet above the ground at the opening used for loading feed drew her attention. Peg stood in the shadows, the flashlight in her hand.

Elle turned away and took a few more steps before realizing what she’d seen wasn’t a flashlight.

Peg was holding a gun. Most likely the .357 Magnum her husband had kept in the gun case located behind his big oak desk. Peg had bragged about him teaching her to shoot it….

At that moment, Elle heard a car on the gravel road and spun around to find a sleek sedan pulling into the parking area, Pete behind the wheel, Alazandro beside him in the passenger seat.

She ran as fast as she could, determined to get to the car before either man got out. She was closest to Alazandro’s side.

As the thinning verge turned to dirt, Elle skidded on the last of the dewy grass, landing on her knees, the duffel bag jarred from her hand. Pete and Alazandro opened their respective doors.

She looked up to see both men staring at her. Before she could utter a word, sunlight glinted off something on the hillside opposite the barn, behind the car. Narrowing her eyes, Elle saw the long barrel of a rifle. Behind it loomed a red truck.

The judge drove a big four-wheel-drive Dodge Ram, candy apple red. Gun rack in back. Vintage Winchester .401 caliber autoloading deer rifle always at hand….

She screamed a warning and ducked her head as a shot rang out and a bit of earth at Elle’s knee exploded. Covering her head with her arms, she saw Alazandro dive back into the car as more shots seemed to come from every direction. Pete was suddenly at her side, grabbing her arm, yanking her to her feet. She lunged toward her duffel bag until another shot took a bite out of the ground an inch from her boot.

To hell with the duffel bag.

She ran ahead of Pete who seemed to be one step ahead of gunfire. The driver’s door stood ajar. Pete all but threw her inside where she quickly climbed between the seats into the back, aware of Alazandro sitting crumpled with his head against the dashboard. Pete climbed in after her. The gun still clutched in his hand, he started the car, revved the engine and turned the wheel sharply to take off back down the gravel road.

Gasping for breath, Elle looked out the rear window.

Which one of them, Peg or the judge, had just attempted to murder Víctor Alazandro?

And as she looked at Alazandro’s slumped figure, a new thought surfaced.

Had they succeeded?

Chapter Four

What the hell was going on?

Pete glanced in the rearview mirror. His gaze collided with Elle’s. Wide brown eyes met his gaze and shied away.

“Are you okay?” he demanded.

She nodded.

She’d been worried that standing too close to Alazandro might be dangerous and she’d been right.

As far as Pete knew, there had never been a death threat made against Víctor Alazandro. That piece of fiction had been created by the DEA right before the staged shoot-out during which Pete had rescued Alazandro from a crazed gunman. Agent Ben Kipper had made a very believable, wigged-out drug addict firing blanks at Alazandro until Pete had single-handedly subdued him.

Alazandro hired him on the spot.

Still, Pete could understand someone taking shots at Alazandro. Peg Stiles came readily to mind. But would Peg shoot at Elle? No way.

That left Elle’s adopted father who Elle had told him was in the area last night. That meant the man had to love her enough to come to Tahoe to try and talk to her about something she obviously didn’t want to talk to him about, but hate her enough to take potshots at her when she blew him off.

Again, no way, it didn’t add up.

Someone had tried to kill Alazandro and hadn’t cared a whole lot who else they hit.

What was needed, of course, was a crime scene investigation. Collection of spent shells. Bullet trajectories. Witness interviews. All of that was as good as lost because Pete couldn’t break cover to call in the cops.

As he steered the car onto the main highway, he darted a quick look at Alazandro. Blood trickled down his forehead, ran along his cheek. “Sir?” Pete said, almost choking on the word.

Without looking up, Alazandro responded in a shaky voice. “Is it safe now?”

“Yeah,” Pete said. “You’ve been hit,” he added.

Alazandro’s voice was shaky as he mumbled, “I bashed my head when you shoved me into the car. It’s my arm that hurts like hell.” He turned in his seat. His left hand clutched the sleeve of his right arm. Blood soaked the tattered cloth between his fingers. The suit was history.

Following a gasp, Elle said, “The hospital is about fifteen minutes away. Take a right when you get to the second intersection—”

In unison, Pete and Alazandro said, “No!”

She was quiet for a second before trying again. “You need a doctor, Mr. Alazandro.”

“Doctors have to report gunshot wounds to the cops,” Pete said.

A longer silence was followed by a tentative, “But aren’t we going to tell the police what happened?”

Alazandro said, “No hospital and no police, Ms. Medina. I’m a busy man and don’t intend on getting stuck stateside in some worthless investigation when I have a jet waiting. Pete, get us to the airport. You know first aid, you can patch me up after we’re in the air.”

Pete drove. Another glimpse in the rearview mirror revealed Elle shrugging off her bulky jacket and the denim one she wore beneath. “You’d better use this to stop the blood from getting all over the upholstery,” she said, handing the denim jacket over the car seat to Alazandro.

He pressed it against his arm and smiled back at her.

“You’re very brave,” she cooed, sitting forward and touching his good shoulder.

Alazandro kind of puffed out his chest and sighed.

Wait a second. Shouldn’t Elle Medina be shaking like a leaf, shouldn’t she be demanding to be let off at the nearest police department? The woman had nerves of steel.

As enticing a potential spy as she might make, however, Pete couldn’t put her in harm’s way. He needed to find a way to make a surreptitious call and arrange an incident at the airport that would prevent Elle from boarding Alazandro’s private jet. A fake customs ploy, maybe. A phony arrest warrant—

Alazandro said, “Whoever is trying to get me came damn close this time.”

Pete said, “He came close to getting all three of us.”

Elle whistled. “You can say that again.”

Pete, sensing his chance, said, “We don’t need someone else to worry about, boss. Leave the woman here. She can fly down later.”

As Alazandro glanced into the back seat, Pete used the mirror. Elle’s blinding white T-shirt revealed an amazing amount of creamy cleavage. The top curves of her breasts looked smooth and inviting. The stirring in Pete’s groin had as much to do with the memory of her naked as it did with her wavering image in the mirror. She flicked a few blond hairs away from her heart-shaped face and smiled, eyes crinkling at the edges as she licked her lips for Alazandro.

The temptress was back.

Pete said, “We had to leave your duffel bag back at the stable. It probably held your passport—”