Maggy's Child (42 page)

“Don’t you worry about my son. I’ll always take care of him. No, you should be worried about yourself, right now. I’m giving serious thought to killing you, you know.”

Looking at him, at the predatory face and shining blue eyes, Maggy believed it. She was willing to believe anything of Lyle now. It took every bit of willpower she
possessed not to glance behind her, at the door. She knew where it was without needing to look. She knew every inch of this house. At the first opportunity she could cut and run—but what about David?

She could not leave David. If she did, she might never see him again. But if she didn’t, would she die?

“Yes, I certainly am. David’s old enough to be able to cope without a mother, and in a few years you’ll be a social embarrassment to him. But on the other hand, he loves you, however misguidedly, and I don’t want to cause him unnecessary grief. And that boyfriend of yours seems to be a faithful sort. Perhaps, if he knows that I have you, he’ll be a little more careful about what steps he takes against me in future. So, on balance, I suppose I’ll let you live. For now. But here’s the deal: you must do just exactly as I tell you, and pretend to David and the rest of the world that things are hunky-dory between us. If you do, you won’t die, and you’ll get to act as mother to our boy. But if you do something that makes me think that your presence in this world is more liability than asset, I won’t hesitate. You’ll suffer a tragic accident, maybe fall off a hideously high cliff, or drown in the surf, or perhaps you’ll be struck by a car. I’ll work out the details if you put me to the trouble.”

Lyle smiled at her, a supremely confident smile with no bravado in it. He had no doubt that he held the upper hand—which, she realized, he did, just as he always had. Maggy felt her composure begin to crumble and fought to keep the utter despair that was filling her from showing.

“Oh, and darling, there’s just one other thing: If you do put me to the trouble of arranging an accident, right after you go to your maker I’ll make sure David sees this. That way he’ll know just what you are, and he won’t grieve so much.”

Lyle picked up a remote control device from his desk, pointed it toward a console in the corner, and pushed a
button. Immediately a wall-size screen descended. He pressed another button, and an image sprang onto the screen, larger than life, in minute resolution and vivid color. An image of herself, dancing almost naked on stage, while “Born to Be Wild” wailed loudly in the background.

Smiling at the stunned expression on her face, Lyle hit the mute button. The grotesque image continued to dance, but without benefit of sound. Maggy watched her teenage self shake her bare behind with every evidence of enjoyment at the audience of drooling men, and felt sick.

“What would David think of his mother if he could see that, do you suppose?” Lyle asked, raising his brows at her. “I have to admit, I was shocked myself. I knew you were a little slut when I married you, but I didn’t know you were a professional.”

“Where did you get that?” Maggy felt as if she were suffocating.

“From your very charming—aunt, is it? She was, uh, reluctant to surrender it at first, but Tipton was able to persuade her.”

Fear clutched Maggy’s throat. “If you hurt
Tia
Gloria …”

“Yes? What are you going to do about it, my darling wife?”

There was nothing she could do, Maggy knew. Nothing she could do except hate him. And to think she’d had an attack of conscience when she suspected Nick was planning to murder him, she thought with a touch of hysteria. If she had had any kind of weapon within reach at that moment, she would have murdered him herself.

“That’s what I thought.” When Maggy said nothing, Lyle nodded in satisfaction. Then he stood up and walked back behind the desk, clearly so confident of her that he didn’t even feel the need to keep his eyes on her any longer. Opening his desk drawer, he took from it a pistol.
The midnight-blue steel of its barrel gleamed dully in the lamplight.

Maggy felt cold terror run up her spine.

“For insurance,” Lyle said lightly as he saw where her eyes rested. “But I won’t need it, will I, because you’re a smart girl. We’re going to get in the car with David, and go to the airport like any other happy little family. And we are happy, are we not? So smile, my darling. Smile.”

Maggy smiled. As long as Lyle had David, he had her, too, just where he wanted her: under his thumb. She was not going to even try to flee without her son. And he knew it.

He pushed the remote-control button, turning off the video, and ejected the tape, which he slid into his jacket pocket. Then he walked toward her, caught her elbow, and led her toward the door.

“You’re going to have to change on the plane,” he said disapprovingly as he reached around her to grasp and turn the ornate brass knob. “You look like a bag lady. What’re you wearing,
his
clothes? How sweet. How truly sweet.”

He pushed her ahead of him out into the hall. Maggy supposed his hold on her arm could be viewed as affectionate by their son, who stood waiting with Tipton in the vast entry hall. The outside door was open, letting in a burst of cool, rain-damp night air, and the Rolls waited at the foot of the steps.

“Hey, Mom, Dad says we’re going to Brazil! I don’t even have to finish out the school year! Isn’t that cool?”

“Cool,” Maggy agreed with the best smile she could muster, pulling her arm away from Lyle’s grip and walking over to embrace her son. David suffered her hug with fairly good grace, not returning it but not pushing her away. As she looked down at his smiling, innocent face, at the dancing red highlights the chandelier picked up in his wavy hair, she felt her heart clench.

To keep David, she was going to have to give up Nick.

Nick, whom she loved more than all the world—except for her son.

Something, she was never afterward sure exactly what—a sound or a sixth sense, maybe—made her glance up. When she did, she froze.

Nick, with Link behind him and what seemed to be a squadron of other men fanned out down the steps beyond Link, stepped through the doorway as calmly as if he owned the house. He was clad in tight jeans and a leather jacket, and raindrops glinted in his black hair. In his hand was a gun.

“D
EA,”
Nick said, flashing a badge in his left hand. “Don’t anybody move.”

Nick’s pistol was trained on Lyle. His eyes never touched her, but Maggy gaped at him, frozen in place by shock. DEA? Nick? The idea was so bewildering that she could hardly take it in. Could it possibly be true? And even if it was true, under what pretext could the DEA raid Windermere? As far as she knew, none of the Forrests had ever used drugs of any type. Which was more than could be said of at least one of the gentlemen who had just taken over the room.

“Hang on a minute,” Nick said to the armed men who were now streaming through the doorway behind him. To Link, he growled, “Get the kid out of here.”

“Mom!” David was wide-eyed and panicked. Maggy’s arms went protectively around his thin shoulders, and then she looked up over David’s head to meet Link’s eyes. David’s uncle’s eyes. Link gave a quick nod as if to promise that he’d see to it that David was taken care of.

Maggy leaned down to whisper in David’s ear. “It’s all right. Go with him. His name’s Link. He’s a good guy.”

David glanced up at her uncertainly and then over at Link. Maggy hugged him again and dropped a quick kiss on his cheek. Then she pushed him toward Link.

“Come on, kid, you ever sat in a police car? I’ll even let you work the lights.” Link took David’s arm and gently but firmly propelled him toward the door.

“I don’t care about that. I’m too old,” David proclaimed scornfully. With a quick glance back at Maggy, he asked, “What’s going on?”

“I’ll explain it all to you once we’re in the car,” Link promised and led him out the door.

Once David was out of sight, Nick nodded, and a quartet of men surrounded Tipton, saying something to him that Maggy couldn’t quite decipher, then snapping handcuffs on his wrists and shaking him down. Nick himself, with three other men behind him, came toward Lyle. The two men locked gazes. Nick smiled, a hard, taunting smile.

One of the men accompanying Nick intoned: “Lyle Forrest, you’re under arrest. For violating Section …”

What he said after that was lost forever for Maggy as a hard arm whipped around her neck without warning, choking her, knocking her off-balance, pulling her back against a whipcord-lean body. She grabbed at the arm for balance and felt the cold muzzle of what she knew instinctively was Lyle’s pistol pressed against her temple.

Lyle was using her as a hostage!

“Back off!” Lyle warned in a voice that Maggy scarcely recognized as his. His arm around her neck tightened so that she had to fight to breathe, and her nails sank into the soft cashmere of his sweater as she struggled to stay on her feet. Icy fear shot through her veins as Lyle dug the mouth of the pistol punishingly into her temple. “Back off, or I’ll kill her. You know I will, King.”

Nick froze, his face going utterly white.

“You heard him, back off!” he barked, holding up a restraining hand to the men who had been in the process of surrounding Lyle and who were now motionless as statues. They obeyed, melting back toward the door.

“Tell them to throw their weapons out the door. You, too.”

When Nick was slow to obey, Lyle screamed. “Do it! I mean it! Right now!”

Nick tossed his pistol out the open door, and gestured to the other men to do the same. With obvious reluctance, they obeyed. As if it were her death knell, Maggy heard the ring of metal clanking against stone as the pistols rolled down the steps. There was nothing now to stop Lyle from killing her if he wished—and killing Nick too.

Lyle had her in a choke hold with a pistol to her head. Nick, facing him warily, was unarmed. All that was keeping the two of them alive, Maggy felt, was Lyle’s recognition that while he could certainly shoot her and Nick before anyone could stop him, he would just as certainly not escape with his own life. There were too many men, and one or two of them would surely make it to their weapons before he could get away. Maggy prayed that that continued to be enough of a deterrent. She prayed …”

“Let her go, Forrest,” Nick said.

Lyle gave a short bark of a laugh. “So you can have her? I don’t think so.”

“So far, we just have drug charges against you. No one’s been hurt. You can hire a fancy lawyer and play beat-the-system. With your money, you just might win.”

“I might—but I might not. So I’m not prepared to play.” Lyle’s arm tightened punishingly around Maggy’s neck. Nick’s eyes flickered down to her face, involuntarily, she thought, and as she looked at him with all the horror she felt in her gaze his jaw turned to granite. That was the only sign of stress he gave before he once again focused on Lyle.

“Let her go. She doesn’t have anything to do with this.”

“Doesn’t she? I think she does. I think she’s the whole ball of wax. You never would have started checking into my affairs if it wasn’t for the little bitch here.” Lyle ground the gun so hard against Maggy’s temple that she cried out. Nick’s eyes met hers again, and Maggy felt
stark terror fill her at what she saw in his gaze. He was terrified, too. Terrified for her.

Lyle saw Nick’s fear and chuckled. “Afraid I’m going to blow her brains out right here in front of you, King? I just might, if for no other reason than to teach you a lesson. But if you’re smart, if you let me walk out of here, I won’t kill her. At least, not tonight.”

“Forrest …” Nick’s voice was hoarse. Maggy was sweating, her heart pounding so hard that she had trouble hearing above the thumping of her own pulse in her ears. She knew Lyle as none of these men, even Nick, did. And she knew that he was capable of any atrocity.

“Call them off,” Lyle growled, jerking his head at the men assembled between him and the door. “Tell them to get away from the door. Right now.”

“Move back.” Nick ordered tensely. The men—there were perhaps a dozen of them—did. Lyle dragged Maggy toward the door.

“Let ’em go,” Nick barked to some unseen soul, and Maggy felt Lyle tense. She closed her eyes, praying, then opened them again as Lyle yanked her over the threshold. On the way down the shallow steps she stumbled, only to have Lyle jerk her back onto her feet again with his arm around her neck. Gasping for air, hanging from his arm, she was forced around the waiting Rolls.

“See you in hell, King!” Lyle yelled jubilantly, opening the door and stuffing Maggy into the front seat. He jumped in right behind her and slammed the door shut. He kept the pistol pointed at her head. It took just a second for him to turn the key in the ignition—the keys had been left there by Tipton as was his custom when he brought the car around—and slide the transmission into drive.

Then with a triumphant laugh he stomped on the gas.

“The fools! It was unloaded! It was unloaded, all the time!” Lyle crowed.

Maggy got just a glimpse, in the rearview mirror, of
Nick and the whole army of men he’d brought with him spilling out the door as the Rolls gunned down the driveway. Then Lyle’s words sank in.