Текст книги "Visions"

Автор книги: Kelley Armstrong

Соавторы: Kelley Armstrong,Kelley Armstrong
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Текущая страница: 24 (всего у книги 30 страниц)

SHARK TANK

The Morgan residence was patrolled by a security guard. At what level of wealth did one require a home security guard? Actually, Gabriel knew the answer to that, having dug deep into Morgan’s finances while looking for ammunition to use against him.

Morgan was rich. A juvenile term. At Gabriel’s age, he should be more specific with his terminology. But he’d been young when he set his sights on his future goals, and that was the wording he used, at least to himself.

He could not achieve “rich”—it was for those who came from money, though it allowed for the occasional entrepreneur. Gabriel’s goal was “successful.” Wealthy and very successful.

Morgan’s wealth came from both family money and his business, and it far exceeded anything Gabriel could hope for. It did not, however, warrant a roving security guard.

One problem with the rich was that they lacked basic survival skills. Morgan considered himself a shark, devouring anything that got in his way, but he was a shark in a tank, relying on others to keep him safe. The rich bought their fancy locks and security systems and, it seemed, even security guards. Yet it was like wearing a breastplate into battle—it still took only one good stroke to lop off your head.

And so it was here. The guard was useless. Stationed a hundred feet away from the house, at the gate. Patrolling the grounds every twenty minutes. Once Gabriel determined the schedule, he waited until the guard returned to his post and then scaled the back fence. Two minutes later, he was knocking on the front door.

Morgan answered. He stopped short and his gaze shot to the guard post.

Gabriel waved at the manicured spruce behind him. “While I’m loath to criticize gardening choices, may I suggest that’s a very poor place for a shrub?”

Morgan cursed under his breath as he realized that the tree blocked Gabriel from the guard’s view. Then Morgan’s hand slid up the wall.

“You can certainly summon the guard,” Gabriel said. “I’ll understand if you’d like him to be privy to our conversation. While my size is no fault of my own, some men find it intimidating.”

Morgan’s lips tightened and his hand moved away from the intercom. Such a fool. There was nothing wrong with being a shark in a tank—Gabriel supposed it was a fine and comfortable life—but one should have the good sense to see the glass walls and realize one’s limitations.

“May I come in?” Gabriel asked.

Morgan nodded and moved back. As Gabriel entered, he heard a noise on the steps and looked up to see an older woman eyeing him with suspicion. It didn’t matter how fine his manners or impeccable his dress, when women like this saw him, they backed up clutching their purses. Which was not an unwarranted reaction, all things considered. Ten years ago, he’d have salivated walking into a house like this, mentally running through all the most likely hiding places for valuables and mapping out the most efficient route for snatching them. He didn’t miss those days, but admittedly there were still times when he looked at a woman’s necklace or a man’s watch and his brain threw out a dollar figure—not the cost but how much he could fence it for.

“It’s Olivia’s lawyer,” Morgan called up to her. “On business.”

“At this hour?”

“It’s barely eleven. Everything’s fine, Mom. Go back to bed.”

She retreated, but slowly, still eyeing Gabriel, her expressionless fear than warning now. Gabriel turned his back on her.

“May we speak in another room?” he asked Morgan.

Morgan waved him into a parlor or some such room designed for sitting, which neither of them did. They walked to the middle and faced one another.

“If you’re here to intimidate me…” Morgan began.

“In your own home? With your mother and your security guard at hand? That would seem unwise.”

Gabriel kept his voice soft, free of emphasis, but Morgan still tensed at the mention of his mother and his guard.

“I would like you to stop contacting Olivia,” Gabriel said.

“I’m sure you would. The answer, as I said, is no.”

“Let me rephrase, then. I insist you stop contacting her or I will obtain a restraining order, which I will publicize.”

“If you do, I’ll tell my side of the story, and it will be clear who is the victim here. I will also send a copy of that file to every reporter in my contact list.”

Gabriel took out his phone. “In that case, I’ll e-mail you my list of journalist contacts. Please send copies to all of them. Some would be very put out if they were excluded.”

Morgan studied him, squint-eyed. He probably thought it made him seem tougher, but he only looked as if his contact lens had slipped.

“Don’t bluff, Walsh,” he said. “I’ll call you on it.”

“Go ahead. What you’ll discover is that most reporters have heard every allegation in that file. While I’m sure most suspect there are kernels of truth, rooting them out has proven too much trouble. It is established fact that I have been persecuted and maligned by false accusations since I passed the bar exam. Unless you have a video of me bludgeoning prostitutes to death—and expert witnesses to guarantee the veracity of the recording—no one’s going to touch it. But I’m sure you know that. So let’s discuss your backup plan.”

“Backup plan?”

Gabriel lowered himself onto the sofa. “Don’t play coy with me. If you are an expert at this game, as you claimed, then you know exactly what I’m talking about. The file is the decoy; as was my threat about McNeil. Naturally, you have more, as I do.”

Morgan’s squint deepened. “You’re saying that if I send out the file, you’ll retaliate with some other blackmail.”

“Certainly not. I gave you permission to send the file. The difficulty comes if you refuse to leave Olivia alone. Then I will be forced to reveal what other intelligence I’ve gathered on you.”

“I will not leave Olivia—”

Gabriel sprang to his feet and had Morgan against the wall before the man could blink. He pinned him there, feet barely touching the ground, his shirtfront gathered in Gabriel’s fist, pressing into his windpipe.

“You will leave her alone. If you harm her, in any way, you will wish to God for blackmail, because you can recover from that.”

“Is that a death threat?”

“I would never be so unimaginative.”

Gabriel dropped Morgan but stayed where he was, effectively keeping him pinned there, unable to move more than an inch.

“You tell me you love her, but this isn’t love,” Gabriel said. “It’s anger and it’s wounded pride. Your history is open to anyone with a laptop, Morgan. You had another woman you planned to marry, but she was dull and insipid. Olivia is neither. You dumped the old girlfriend. You pursued Olivia. You won Olivia. Now you’ve lost her. And that looks bad.”

“You think this is about politics? Her biological parents—”

“—are convicted serial killers. Now about to undergo an appeal, which may set them free. And you stuck by Olivia the whole time. You believed in her. Except … she wasn’t grateful. Now she’s run off with a biker. A biker. How humiliating. You should walk away. But you can’t. You want her to grovel. You want her to pay.”

“I would never—”

“No? Look me in the eye and tell me this is about love.”

Morgan’s jaw worked, and Gabriel eased back to watch him squirm. He noticed the movement a split second too late. His own fault, really, the smug satisfaction that he’d intimidated Morgan into impotence. Then the blow to his jaw that sent him reeling.

Gabriel recovered and slammed his fist into Morgan’s gut. He caught Morgan’s expression when he saw the blow coming. Shock, as if he couldn’t believe Gabriel would pull such an ungentlemanly move. Again proving the man was an idiot. On the streets, there’s no place for fairness. You put your opponent down fast, by any means possible.

Morgan crumpled to the floor, doubled over, his eyes bulging as he gasped for breath.

“You might want to see a doctor about that,” Gabriel said. “I believe Olivia was telling me just the other day that Harry Houdini died from an untreated blow to the stomach.”

He walked into the hall. As he did, he heard the pounding of Mrs. Morgan’s footsteps on the stairs.

Gabriel looked up at her. “May I suggest you teach your son not to strike a man significantly larger than him. It rarely ends well.”

She started shrieking threats. Creative threats, actually, making Gabriel suspect she would have been a far more worthy adversary than her son. He continued to the door as she hurried down to tend to her wounded boy.

Gabriel pulled open the door—and nearly yanked the security guard in with it. Behind the guard were two uniformed police officers.

“Gabriel Walsh, you’re under arrest for trespass, break and enter, issuing threats…”

CHAPTER FIFTY-EIGHT

After the Huntsman left, I fell asleep. I’m sure there was something preternatural in that—there was no way I’d drift off with everything pinging through my head.

When my phone rang, Ricky woke first, and by the time I surfaced, he’d already pulled my cell from my discarded slacks.

He swore and turned the phone toward me. It was James. The call went to voice mail.

“What time is it?” I asked.

“Two in the morning. Has he been doing this?”

“No. It’s because … he sent a package this morning.”

His look of concern sharpened to alarm, and I laughed softly.

“It wasn’t a bomb or a dead rat,” I said. “Just a file on Gabriel. Rumors and allegations. There was one on you, too. He didn’t dig up anything more than a couple of dismissed traffic violations, but I should have mentioned it. I planned to, and then last night…”

“You had trouble with Gabriel, followed by motorcycle rides, which aren’t conducive to conversation. We should talk, though. If James is—”

The phone rang again. Still James.

“Okay,” Ricky said. “Three ways to handle this. One, you answer, though I’d rather you didn’t, because it seems to only give him an excuse to keep calling. Two, you turn the phone off. Three, I answer.”

“Go for it.”

His eyes glinted. “Seriously?”

“I was hoping for a mature breakup, but he’s not letting me have it.”

Ricky answered. There was a pause, as James presumably processed the fact that a man was answering my phone at this hour. Then Ricky said, “It’s Rick Gallagher. We haven’t met.”

A murmur on the other end of the line.

“It’s the middle of the night. Can I pass on a message?”

Another murmur.

“If it’s important, I’ll wake her, but she’s been working double shifts. I’d like to let her sleep.”

He could have insinuated some other reason why I was exhausted, but he was taking the high road. Which was more than I could say for the guy calling me at 2 a.m.

Ricky listened for another minute, and I could see confusion and then surprise in his eyes. “Sure. I’ll tell her. Oh, but I’m going to ask you not to call her in the middle of the night anymore, okay?”

I heard James start to respond, but Ricky cut him off. “Also, I heard you sent her some information on me yesterday. If you’re interested in getting to know me better, just ask. In fact, if you’d like to get together for coffee, I could stop by your office tomorrow—”

Ricky stopped. He looked at me. “He hung up.”

“And you were being so polite.”

“I was.” He handed me the phone. “He called about Gabriel.” Ricky reached for our clothing and tossed me my slacks as he sorted through it. “It seems your boss paid your ex a visit tonight, in response to that package. He’s been arrested.”

I had my shirt half on. I stopped. “Gabriel?”

“Yeah. James made it sound like Gabriel tore over there, broke in, and beat the shit out of him, which I know isn’t the real story. Whatever happened, though, Gabriel’s in jail. I’m going to go bail him out.”

“I’ll do it.”

“Bailing guys out is actually one of my jobs for the club. But you’re welcome to come along. Unless you’re so pissed off that you’d like to see him stew in a cell overnight.”

“Mmm, tempting. But no. I’ll come. I should learn how to do this for clients.”

I don’t think this particular station was accustomed to seeing bikers. Considering the median property value of the area it serviced, that’s probably a given. I was the one the desk clerk recognized first. Ricky introduced himself and told the clerk why we were there, and suddenly I swear every officer in the place found an excuse to come up front as we waited.

It was like the setup to a joke: the gang leader’s son and the serial killers’ daughter walk into a police station and … Well, hilarious shenanigans ensue, I’m sure.

The reality, I fear, was not nearly as entertaining. Ricky and I waited, talking in low voices, causing two officers to creep ever closer until they overheard Ricky discussing a marketing project. One walked away in disgust. The other hovered, as if convinced it was really code for some nefarious scheme.

Finally, someone came to process our bail request. In Chicago, you pay the police, not a bondsman. Bail had been set at under two thousand dollars, which is why Gabriel hadn’t called anyone to spring him—he’d be able to cover it himself with a call to the bank in the morning. The police knew that, so they were holding him in the drunk tank rather than shipping him to the Cook County jail. They could have let him stop at an ATM on the way, but this was Gabriel Walsh. The cops weren’t doing him any favors.

The desk sergeant was a middle-aged woman who seemed to know exactly who we were and, quite frankly, didn’t give a damn. We were being polite, so she was polite back.

According to her, James hadn’t called the police. His mother– Maura—had. Maura claimed Gabriel had broken in, drunk, and proceeded to beat the crap out of James, while issuing death and blackmail threats. When the police actually arrived, they’d discovered a few flaws in Maura’s story. One, no sign of break-in. Two, Gabriel was obviously sober. Three, no matter what they might think of him, they knew he wasn’t going to suddenly go raging bull on anyone. That wasn’t his rep.

The charges were simple assault and trespass, which were both misdemeanors. Serious enough, though, when you were an attorney. Yes, according to the desk sergeant, James had been taken to the hospital for possible internal injuries, but Gabriel would never have gut-punched him without provocation. James was being something I never would have thought possible. He was being an asshole.

Ricky and I were left in a room while the officer went to get Gabriel. When that door opened, I started forward, but Ricky stopped me. As Gabriel saw us, humiliation flickered over his face. It vanished in a blink, helped by the fact that I didn’t rush to him. We played it cool, as if this sort of thing happened all the time. The officer who’d escorted Gabriel gruffly told us to see ourselves out and then retreated.

Once the door closed, Ricky said, “Aren’t I supposed to be on that side of the room, and you over here?”

Gabriel only grunted, then seemed to realize Ricky was trying to lighten the mood and said, “I hope it never is reversed. I trust you know better than to get on this side. I’m presuming the police notified you, because I certainly didn’t ask them to call.”

“You should have,” I said. “And no, it was James, actually.”

“Liv was going to come bail you out,” Ricky said. “But I’m the one with the experience. So now that that’s done, I’m going to guess you’re okay handling car retrieval? I should grab some sleep before morning classes.”

He gave me a sidelong look, in case I was thinking of reminding him he didn’t have any morning classes. He was trying to make an awkward situation easier by extricating himself. I glanced at Gabriel. He looked like hell—exhausted and disheveled, with a bruise on his jaw and blood spatter on his shirt. There was a vaguely disoriented look in his eyes, too, as if he’d lost his footing and still hadn’t found it. I wasn’t letting him go anywhere on his own.

“I’ll go with Gabriel to fetch his car,” I said, passing Ricky my helmet. “Thank you.”

“Call me?”

I nodded. He made it halfway out the door before Gabriel seemed to snap out of it.

“Thank you,” he said to Ricky. “I won’t forget this.”

Ricky grinned. “That would be the idea. And I’d hope I don’t need to say it, but I’ll keep this between us. I’m sure you’ll get it resolved.”

I waited until he was gone, then handed Gabriel a hairbrush and tissue I’d dug out of my bag. I gave him my makeup compact, too, for the mirror.

“Since I’m guessing there’s no back way out…” I said.

“Right. Thanks.”

“If you pat some powder on your jaw, it’ll make the bruise less noticeable.”

He did. Yes, no one except the cops would see him. But to Gabriel, it still mattered. He cleaned up and brushed his hair, and by the time he looked presentable, he seemed a little more himself, reoriented, the usual chill back in his eyes, the steel in his jaw and spine. When we turned to go, that resolve softened again as he glanced over at me.

“Thank you,” he said. “For coming. I know I don’t deserve—” He cut himself short and pulled up straight again. “We’ll talk later.”

Gabriel’s car was where he’d left it—a half mile from James’s place. We took a cab and picked it up. I suggested Gabriel drop me off at the office, where I could hang out with a coffee while he went home and cleaned up.

“There’s coffee at my place,” he said.

I tensed. “That wasn’t a hint.”

“I know. I’m offering. I would be fine with it.”

I looked across the car at him. “No, you wouldn’t, and I’d like you to stop pretending otherwise. Your place is your place. I get that. You aren’t inviting everyone else over and telling me I’m not welcome, so I’m not offended.”

“You are welcome.”

“Can we drop this, please? Last night was not fun. I feel like I overreacted, and that’s embarrassing, but I don’t understand why you’d invite me—” I stopped and shook my head. “And that’s not dropping the subject. If you don’t want to leave me at the office, then join me for a coffee. I know a few spots we can hang out and watch the sunrise.”

It was almost comical to watch him process why anyone would want to watch a sunrise.

“We could do that,” he said at last.

“All right, then. You find me coffee, and I’ll show you a scenic parking spot.”

CHAPTER FIFTY-NINE

I had a few sunrise spots—places Dad had found where he could drive and enjoy some peace without leaving the city. This one was on a bluff. As we drove up, Gabriel peered around the darkness.

“Yes, I know,” I said. “It looks like a make-out point.”

“I was thinking more a convenient location for the exchange of illegal goods.”

“I’m sure it’s both at the right time of night, but at this hour it’s always empty. My dad used to bring me up here for hot chocolate before my early morning skating practices.”

“Figure skating?”

“Don’t give me that look.”

“I wasn’t—”

“Yes, you were. You are trying and failing to picture me in a tutu on ice. With good reason. It was my mother’s idea. Some mornings, if Dad and I got to talking up here, he’d conveniently lose track of time and I’d miss my lesson. When my mother finally realized I wasn’t getting better at skating—shockingly—she let me quit. Then I got to take up rowing, which was a compromise. It wasn’t quite as feminine as she’d like, but it was a suitably upper-class pursuit. What I really wanted to do was horseback riding.”

“I didn’t think one could get much more upper-class than that.”

“Exactly my point. But she said she had a friend whose child died after being thrown from a horse. Years later, I found out she’d just watched Gone with the Wind too many times.”

“So you never went riding?”

“Not until I was old enough to do it on my own, and by then I was driving. Horses don’t have quite the same…”

“Horsepower?”

I laughed. “Exactly.”

He ratcheted back his seat, getting comfortable. I waited until he was settled, then said, “I’m going to have to ask, you know. About tonight.”

He grunted, stared out the windshield, and sipped his coffee.

“If you don’t tell me, James will.”

Another sip of his coffee before he put the cup into the holder. “I made a mistake.” A pause. “I made several tonight. I’m not quite sure how that happened. They seemed to…”

“Snowball? Yeah. Mistakes are like that. So he called you after I left?”

Gabriel glanced at me as if surprised.

“I know you didn’t just randomly go over there and confront him. He must have called.”

“He did. We had words.”

“I bet you did.”

“The call was relatively civil, but it became clear that no matter what I said, he was not going to stop trying to contact you. I decided a personal visit was in order.”

“So you snuck past the gate.”

“I wouldn’t say snuck…”

“You found an alternate entrance. You rang the bell, presumably, since the breaking and entering charge was dropped. You then intimidated James into not calling for help.”

“I wouldn’t say—”

“You made him feel that calling for help would be cowardly.”

“I’m beginning to think I don’t need to tell you this story after all.”

“I’m saving time. You confront him. You ‘have words.’ He makes the boneheaded move of hitting you in the jaw, so you gut-punched him—”

“Gut-punch is a strong—”

My look silenced him. “Do I have the basics right?”

“You do.”

“Good. Anything else I should know?”

He considered, then said, “I am more concerned about him than before. No matter what I do—threats, blackmail, intimidation, or even civilized requests—the situation seems to deteriorate. I will admit that I’m not quite certain how to proceed. I could act on my blackmail threats…”

“The McNeil business?”

“No, that was merely a decoy. Morgan plugged the hole while I focused my attention elsewhere.”

“Is he really that dirty?”

“He’s a successful businessman. He has vulnerabilities. Mostly business problems that were resolved with a bribe to the proper parties. That’s common enough. It would, however, damage his political chances.”

I sighed and slid down in my seat. “If you’d told me he’d pull this crap a month ago, I’d have said you were delusional. The big question now is how this will affect you.”

“I’ll resolve it easily enough. It’s simply an embarrassing footnote to my career.”

When silence fell, I said, “To completely change the subject, I talked to that Huntsman tonight. The one who gave me the tusk.”

I told him what happened. Well, most of it. I didn’t explain exactly where I’d been or what I’d been doing when I met him. I also didn’t tell Gabriel what the Huntsman had said about him.

“It sounds crazy, right?” I said.

“It does.”

“What if it is? If I’m being set up with some crazy-assed scheme? Oh, look, I’m a special snowflake and dark supernatural forces are fighting over me. Maybe I’m just unbalanced enough these days to actually fall for it.”

“While I wouldn’t eliminate the possibility it’s an elaborate scheme for some criminal purpose, that does seem unlikely. And you aren’t unbalanced. At least, not enough to fall for such a story.”

“Thanks,” I said.

We exchanged a smile and then lapsed into silence, watching the sunrise.

We were about to leave when James phoned.

“I’m going to answer,” I said. “Otherwise, he’ll keep calling.” I picked up with a warm “Hey, there,” which earned me a full five seconds of silence.

Then James said, “I take it you haven’t spoken to Richard.”

“Ricky? Sure. Thanks for letting me know about Gabriel. He’d have been in that cell until morning if you hadn’t called.”

More silence. Then, “I’m guessing that’s sarcasm.”

“Irony, actually, but close enough. I am glad I got the heads-up to bail him out, though I’m not nearly so impressed that you put him in there in the first place.”

“That I put him in there? The man put me in the hospital.”

“A punch to the stomach for a right hook to the jaw. You reap what you sow. I hope you’re okay, but I’m not going to pretend it isn’t your fault.”

Another five seconds of silence. “What has happened to you, Liv? Is this his influence?”

“Yes. Completely, because I was such a sweet little doormat before.”

“I’m concerned about you, Liv.”

“You don’t need to be. Now—”

“There are people out there who are very worried about Gabriel Walsh and his influence on you.”

I gripped the phone. “Who?”

“It’s not important. I’m calling because I regret what happened, and I want to make amends. I’d like to drop the charges.”

“I would appreciate that.”

“Good. Then you’ll join me for dinner?”

“Um, no. It’s over, James, and as much as I regret how that happened—”

“Do you want those charges dropped, Olivia?”

It was a few moments before I could reply. “That sounds like extortion.”

Gabriel’s head whipped my way, his eyes narrowing.

“Of course not,” James said. “I’m just saying—”

“That you’ll drop the charges if I go to dinner with you.”

“No,” Gabriel said. “Absolutely not.”

“Is that—?” James began.

“Of course it is,” I snapped. “You called at two in the morning to tell me he was in jail. Do you think I’m just going to bail him out and take off? If this is about getting me away from Gabriel, it was a dumb-ass move, wasn’t it? The more you threaten him, the closer I’ll stick to watch out for him.”

“And the same for threatening you,” Gabriel rumbled. “Tell him I don’t want the charges dropped.”

“James? I’m sure you caught that.”

No answer, but I swore I could hear him seething.

Gabriel continued, “Tell him that dropping the charges suggests they had merit, and that he was coerced into withdrawing them. I will get them dismissed, instead. The only question is whether he wishes to go public with them.”

“Hell, yes, I’m going public,” James said as I put the phone on speaker.

“Excellent. I will save you the trouble and place the calls myself.”

“So you can lie to the press?”

“No, so I can tell the truth. About the harassment my client and employee is receiving at the hands of her ex, and how my attempt at a private discussion, following a documented late-night call from him, resulted in a physical altercation. I regret what occurred, but I would strongly suggest that the other party seek counseling, as he presents an obvious danger to others, most alarmingly the ex-fiancée who is struggling to rebuild her life after the tragic revelations of the past two months.” He paused. “How does that sound?”

“If you—”

“If you run with your story, they will contact me for a quote, and that is the one I will give. Now, it’s late. Or early, as the case may be. Good day, Mr. Morgan.”

I hung up.