Relative Strangers (16 page)

Recognizing his dare to look away, she held his gaze. "I'm sorry for your loss."

"He was a good man."

"So I've heard."

"Have a seat," he said, gesturing at an armchair.

She started to sit, but tensed at a movement outside the sliding glass doors beyond the office area she had seen earlier. A man in dark clothing, a gun strapped to his hip, stood on the other side of the glass.

"Relax. He works for me," Ryan said.

Not knowing whether to feel safer or more afraid, she settled into the leather chair as Nick leaned against the arm of the sofa facing her and withdrew a crumpled pack of Marlboros from his shirt pocket. Placing a cigarette between his lips, he offered her the pack. "Want one?"

"No, thank you."

"What about a drink?"

She shook her head, impatient. "What do you know about Margot Rhinehart?"

"We'll get to that." He put the pack back in his pocket. "You're a reporter?"

She didn't look at Ryan, though she felt him watching her. The memory of his lips on her skin was distracting, and she was certain her face was still flushed from the experience. What had Nick asked her? Oh, yes, he was establishing control of the conversation. "Yes, I'm a reporter," she said, not having the energy to wrestle him for the upper hand.

"What's your beat?" he asked.

"I'm sure you already know that."

"Nothing wrong with playing along, is there?" Nick asked.

"Is it really necessary? I overheard the part about you researching me," she said. "Certainly, you've turned up more

than you'd ever need to know."

"Humor me."

She pressed her lips together. Showing her frustration would achieve nothing. "I cover courts."

"That must be interesting."

"Most of the time it's intensely dull."

"How long on the courts beat?"

"Including the time I was at the paper in Arlington Heights, a year and a half," she said.

"What'd you do before courts?"

"Cops."

"Cops," he repeated, nodding and smiling around the unlit cigarette flopping between his lips, which made him look ridiculous. "Bet you saw a lot of action on that beat."

"Not really."

He faked surprise. "No?"

"Reporters usually arrive on the scene
after
the crime has been committed." She wanted to tell him that he shouldn't act. He wasn't good at it. And she suspected he had no intention of smoking that cigarette.

"Lots of crime up there in Arlington Heights?" he asked.

"It's about average for a town its size."

"There was a case up there not too long ago. Didn't get national attention. Some guy was laid off from his job the same day he found out his wife was fooling around. Went home with an Uzi and shot up his entire family, including the dog. Remember that? Guy was a postal worker, I think."

Meg sensed that the two men watching her were holding their breath. "What is this? A test?" She glanced at Ryan, who gazed back at her without expression. She saw his fingers tighten around the half-f glass in his hand, saw him zero in, for just an instant, on her lips.

She turned her attention to Nick. "I wouldn't put too much stock in your source of information, Mr. Costello. The man was an engineer, and he used a hunting rifle."

"You covered the case when it got to court?"

"It never went to court," she said.

"Why not?"

"The man—his name was Jack Curtis—turned the rifle on himself before the police arrived."

"I see."

"Anything else, Mr. Costello?"

"One more thing," he said. "Is that your natural hair color?"

"What?"

"Is it?" Ryan asked.

She kept her gaze steady on Nick. "Yes."

"What about the curls?"

"Yes, they're natural," she said through clenched teeth. "The eyes also are mine, and so is the rest of the body."

Nick flashed a grin at Ryan before circling her. "We might have to lighten it."

Meg twisted in the chair to watch Nick. "Excuse me?"

Ryan drained the rest of the drink. "It seems like a perfect match to me."

"It's darker," Nick said. "Probably not as much sun exposure. It might not even be noticeable, but we won't want to take any chances."

"Hello? I'm right here. What are we talking about?"

"You're going to become Margot Rhinehart," Ryan said, as if he had just told her that the day would be mostly sunny with winds out of the southwest.

Nick thrust the pack of cigarettes at her. "Time to take up smoking."

Meg didn't know what to say. At first, she thought it was another test, perhaps a ploy to get her to say, "Please don't send me back there, they'll kill me." But then she thought of Jimmy Buffett and the two men who had abducted and most likely killed Dayle. They were all associates of Margot Rhinehart. Ruthless, brutal murderers. And she wore the per-fect disguise to walk into their midst and nail every one of them. For Dayle. For herself.

She accepted a cigarette from Nick's pack.

Ryan watched her as his friend held a lighter to the tip of her cigarette. He had seen the suspicion that first darkened her eyes, followed by panic, then fury, and finally, a surprising resolve. She didn't argue. She didn't fight it or whine about the danger. He didn't know whether he should be impressed by her courage or frightened for her life.

Meg was aware of Ryan's tension as he poured himself another drink, but she ignored him. Concentrating on drawing smoke into her lungs, she remembered Dayle standing in her living room with the ashtray in her hand. She'd thought Meg sitting on her balcony alone trying out a bad habit had been worrisome. What would she have thought of this?

Pushing away the memory, she asked Nick, "How do you know Margot smokes? Do you know her?"

His forehead creased as if with regret. "We never met. We found cigarette butts with lipstick on them in an ashtray on Beau's deck."

Meg squinted at him through the smoke. "Did you have a falling out with Beau, too?"

"No. I was working overseas for KamaTech when Beau was killed. I'd been there about a year. I moved back to do what I could to assist in the investigation."

She picked a tiny piece of tobacco off the tip of her tongue. "If Beau and Margot were a couple, how come there were never any pictures of them together in the media? I mean, Beau was a mover and a shaker, wasn't he?"

"Beau hated the spotlight," Nick said. "He had a talent for avoiding it, and my guess is that that suited Margot's plans just fine." He pulled an object out of his pocket. "This is hers, too. We found it at Beau's."

Accepting the watch, Meg examined it. The face was encrusted with tiny diamonds, its band slim and silver, elegant. "It's beautiful. How do you know it's hers?"

"Leap of faith. You might want to get used to wearing it."

After removing her own watch, she slipped on Margot's. "How am I going to hook up with Slater Nielsen when you and the feds have no idea where he's based?"

"His henchmen know where he's based," Ryan said. "And they're eager to get their hands on you."

Her pulse stuttered, and she thought she saw him smile. But then Nick blocked her view, saying, "We're going to have to adjust your makeup."

"That shouldn't be a problem," Ryan said. "She's not wearing any." Stalking to the glass door that led outside, he slid it open, stepped into the darkness beyond and slammed it shut so hard it was a wonder it didn't shatter.

Arching a questioning brow at Nick, she hoped her relief at Ryan's exit didn't show.

"Don't worry about him," Nick said. "He's a bit conflicted, which is something he's never handled well." Then he startled her by running his fingers through her hair, inspecting it as if for flaws. "We're going to have to cut your hair some. Do you mind?"

"Whatever gets the job done." Taking a drag on the ciga-rette, she thought about what she had just agreed to do—im-personate a woman she had never met. Had she lost her mind? But she reminded herself that she was doing it at least Partially for Dayle.

"Damn." Nick's ruddy cheeks paled as he eyed her throat.

"That psycho on the yacht really did a number on you."

"Yeah, he did." She shoved hair behind her ear and stubbed out the cigarette in an ashtray on a nearby wrought iron table. "Are you a detective, Mr. Costello?"

"Please, it's Nick. And no, I'm not a detective. I'm a security expert."

"It apparently pays well," she said. "You have a beautiful home."

"I've managed to invent some handy security devices over the years."

"Such as the camera that caught Margot stealing the emeralds."

"Actually, that was one of my more simple devices," he said. "It's part of the hook you'd hang a painting on. When the painting is removed, the camera starts recording. Most thieves would expect a camera to be inside the safe or mounted on it in some way." He stopped, as if realizing that he'd gotten carried away. "Anyway, KamaTech's business is state-of-the-art security, and I happen to have some handy, uh, computer skills."

She remembered the comment he'd made to Ryan about his many trips through the FBI's computer network. "You're a hacker."

"Not in the illegal sense."

"The FBI doesn't mind letting you peruse their files?"

He flushed. "Not in the illegal sense professionally," he clarified.

"So you're one of those people who hack into a company's network to show them where they're vulnerable."

"That's part of what I do, yes."

"You're also researching me for Ryan, aren't you? Going other places with that computer that you're not supposed to go."

"He's my friend. Friends help each other out," he said.

"Suppose I tell you something about me that your computer probably hasn't turned up? Something that might explain what's going on here."

"I'm listening."

She took a breath, held it. "I was adopted. I don't know anything about my biological family. Their name, where they live, who they are. I think Margot and I might be related, maybe even sisters." She paused, wishing she'd accepted his earlier offer of a drink. "Or twins."

He opened his mouth to speak but seemed to think better of it and shut it.

"Would you be able to look into that for me?" she asked.

He sat across from her, his cheeks pink again. "Have you told Ryan about this?"

"I'm afraid he would think I'm trying to trick him. But if you turned up the paperwork, the proof... he'd believe you."

Leaning back against leather, Nick pressed the palm of his hand to his forehead, nearly dislodging his Marlins cap. "Jesus."

She didn't give him a chance to dwell on it. "There's something else," she said. "A concern I have."

He lowered his hand and sat forward. "I'm still listening."

"What if Slater Nielsen just wants Margot dead? When I refused to deal with the lawyer who came to see me at the jail, he said to me, and I quote, 'It's time to choose a side.' I then accepted help from the brother of the man Nielsen's hit man allegedly killed. That's going to look to Nielsen like I made my choice, isn't it? I mean, what will he think if I let his men take me to him and pretend to be his little lost sheep after all the protesting I did with his henchmen and all the time I've been spending with his enemies?"

Rising, Nick crossed to the door through which Ryan had

escaped and stared outside.

Meg cleared her throat to get his attention, and he turned his troubled brown gaze back to her. "I'm not stupid, Nick. This is a win-win situation for Ryan. I imagine you're going to hook me up with some kind of wire and a locator device. If I
am
Margot, then I know what I need to say to get Nielsen to incriminate himself, and your locator device leads you and Ryan right to him. If Nielsen just kills me, whether I'm Margot or not, it'll be on tape. Either way, you've got him on murder. Mine."

Nick went back to peering outside, as if he could will Ryan to return. "Ah, here he is," he said, sliding the door open. He stumbled back when Ryan rushed in on a stream of salty air, blood wetting the front of his white shirt.

Meg shot to her feet. "Are you all right?"

Ryan swooshed the door shut behind him and hit a nearby light switch. Darkness claimed the room. "We've got trouble."

"What is it?" Nick asked.

"Two of my security people outside are dead."

Meg stood frozen, waiting for her eyes to adjust to the dark. The moonlight outside was bright enough to outline the shapes of the two men by the door, and she told herself that Ryan didn't sound or act hurt. But she was certain she had seen blood, fresh and dark red.

She didn't have a chance to analyze her fear for his safety before he was coming toward her. Grasping her by the arms, he gave her a firm shake. "Who did you call earlier?" His voice was low and urgent.