California Schemin' (11 page)

He led me out of the hotel room, dragging me
along by my wrist. I felt like a rag doll, bouncing along behind
him with Moose following behind laughing to himself.

“Slow down, would you Hammie? I can’t walk
that fast in these shoes.”

He stopped at the elevator and looked at the
shoes. They were sexy as hell and matched the blue of the dress
perfectly. A crease appeared between his eyebrows. He probably
thought all women wore four-inch heels. The elevator dinged, and
the doors opened.

Hammie and I sat in the back of the car on
the way to the concert, not that we had any choice. There wasn’t
room for two in the seat next to the driver. Anyway, it was a limo,
and people would expect parties arriving in limos to emerge from
the back of the car. I tried not to think about Hammie's thigh,
which was touching me, or the feel of his hand next to mine, not
that I was at all tempted to cheat on Beau. Hammie was the kind of
guy women follow with their eyes, and it was distracting to be
sitting next to him. His personality radiated out and enveloped any
woman who happened to be near, and at the moment that woman was
me.

Thanks to our long-sleeve jackets, we managed
to get ourselves seated in the theatre without anyone commenting on
the fact that we were linked together. There wasn’t anyone else
seated in our row. We were well toward the front of the auditorium,
but not so far forward we’d have to strain our necks to see the
performers. The rows around us were beginning to fill. Hammie
fidgeted and glanced at his watch with a faint frown.

“Who are you expecting?” I asked.

“My boss and his entourage. My fiancée is
supposed to be here, too, but I’m hoping the senator discouraged
her from coming.”

“What? You don’t want your fiancée to see you
handcuffed to another woman? Where’s your sense of adventure,
Hammie?”

“Will you please stop calling me Hammie? My
name is Richard.”

“Richard? I think Hammie suits you
better.”

Hammie gave me an exasperated look. He looked
past me down the aisle, and his face cleared. Then he scowled.

“I take it she’s here?”

“The blonde in the red coat.”

The blonde shot me a look of pure hatred
before she took her seat.

“Wow,” I said to Hammie. “I’d watch out for
her later, if I were you. She’s out for blood.” Hammie rolled his
eyes and leaned across me to shake hands with the balding
bespectacled man who had seated himself beside me.

“Senator,” he said.

“Richard, a pleasure as always.” He shifted
his gaze to me. “And this must be our guest, Ms. MacGowan. Pleased
to finally make your acquaintance. I hope Mr. Hambecker and Mr.
Moore have been treating you well. I have something I’d like you to
do for me.” He nodded his head and squeezed my left hand that was
on the armrest beside him.

“Gosh, Senator … I’m sorry, but I don’t know
your name. Are you in the habit of abducting your guests and
keeping them handcuffed?” Funny, I wasn’t angry with Hammie, but
this guy got my blood boiling.

“Hush now. My name is Senator R. Carl
Wallace.” He glanced around and went on in an undertone. “I can’t
afford to lose you again. I need to talk to you, and I don’t have
time to spend chasing you across the country. I apologize, but I
think you’ll soon see that I have the best of intentions.”

I raised my eyebrows, working at composing a
suitable comeback, but the lights dimmed and the two guitarists
came to the stage. They played some perfectly beautiful jazz; but
the theatre was warm, and the drugs still must have been affecting
me because I felt myself sliding toward unconsciousness again.
Hammie leaned into me, keeping me upright with his shoulder, and I
struggled to keep my eyes open and failed.

I might have fallen into a dead sleep and
stayed that way for the entire concert except that the auditorium
exploded into applause as the vocalist arrived on stage. She was a
majestic black woman with a fabulous voice that vibrated in my
chest. My eyes came open and stayed open as she sang. I’d never
heard anything like her before.

After the encore, Hammie led me into the
lobby. There were a couple of men from Senator Wallace’s entourage
close behind me, and the blonde in the red coat was behind them
trying to push by. A State Trooper in dress uniform made his way
toward us, and Moose appeared beside me, reached his arm around and
clipped the nylon handcuff which fell to the floor as Moose whisked
me away from Hammie and the Trooper and escorted me out of the
lobby and into the waiting car.

“Why did you bother handcuffing me at all if
you were going to take it off at the first sign of trouble? I sat
through that whole concert handcuffed to Hammie, even though there
was no way for me to get away unless I climbed over the backs of
chairs in these damn shoes, and then you uncuff me right in the
lobby where I could easily get away? I don’t understand you
people.”

Mostly I was disgusted with myself. Why
hadn’t I screamed or made a fuss? The perfect moment to get
rescued, and I’d done nothing. Stupid.

Marshall Moore, aka Moose, locked me into the
back of the limo and slid into the driver’s seat. He rolled down
the privacy window. I wanted to hate Moose and Hammie. It felt
stupid not to hate them, but I couldn’t get the emotion to build.
They were nice to me, and I had the distinct feeling that they
weren’t happy about being involved in whatever this was.

I knew it had to be about the death of the
woman. I knew they probably were privy to the details. I hoped they
hadn’t done it. It was obvious that Hammie could have done it. He
seemed to have some very specialized skills. Trained in special
services? I thought it was likely. I didn’t want them to know who
killed Lily Carver Wallace, but I couldn’t get around the fact that
they probably did.

“You look like you smelled something rotten,”
Moose said to me. “What’s up?”

“What’s up? Don’t pretend innocence with me,
Moose. I’m in California listening to a jazz concert with a Senator
Wallace, who I’ve never even heard of before, instead of at home in
Vermont taking care of my farm.”

“When you put it like that.” Moose shrugged.
“It does sound a little fishy. Powerful men like the Senator are
used to getting what they want and don’t worry too much how they
make it happen. He pulled a lot of strings to get Hambecker on his
payroll just so he can make things happen.”

“So Hammie has a price. That’s not
surprising; everyone has a price.” But I was surprised and
disappointed. Somehow I thought he wouldn’t be motivated by money.
Naive
, I told myself.
Swayed by a pretty face.

“Wallace isn’t paying Richard,” Moose turned
toward me. “He’s got something on Richard’s dad. I don’t know the
details, but I think he paid someone to blackmail him, and Richard
ended up on Wallace’s payroll as part of the deal.”

“Hammie’s dad is being blackmailed? Who is
he?”

“Do you remember the State Trooper who was
approaching you when I removed you from the lobby?”

“Removed me from the lobby. That’s an
interesting way of putting it. He was a handsome, older man. Had a
dress uniform on.”

“That’s Richard’s dad.”

“That’s Richard’s dad,” I repeated. The
implications weren’t lost on me. I could see the red-coated blonde
and his father, both descending on Hammie, expecting explanations
about the strange woman he’d been with.

“That dress looks exceptionally good on you,”
Moose said. “Richard did a nice job picking that out. I wonder what
Paris would say if she knew he picked it out for you.”

“Paris? The blonde red coat?”

Moose laughed.

“That’s good,” he said, “but she probably
thinks he’s the red coat, sitting with another woman at the
concert.”

“If she knows the Senator, then she knows he
had no choice.”

“That won’t stop her from holding it against
him. Paris is used to getting what Paris wants.” Moose glanced out
of the window, got his body in motion and was out of the car in an
instant.

I glanced out to see Wallace, flanked on one
side by Hammie and the other by the red coat. Paris’s face was
stony, Hammie looked like he wanted to be anywhere else, but
Senator Wallace was smiling and talking animatedly. Hammie slid in
beside me as the Senator skillfully guided Paris to another
car.

Hammie normally sat in the front with Moose
unless we were handcuffed. His presence beside me left me wondering
if Wallace had requested it or if Hambecker felt the senator would
have expected it. Hammie sat back and closed his eyes. He looked
relaxed, but a twitch at the outer corner of his eye made me think
the stress was getting to him.

“Your girlfriend doesn’t look happy,” I said,
and Moose snorted in the front seat.

Hammie opened his eyes and scowled at
Moose.

“It’s going to take some time to convince her
that this wasn’t my idea,” he said. “Meanwhile, my ass is grass.”
He shrugged. “I’ve lived through worse.”

“Too bad she’s not more understanding.” I
wondered if he would notice that I was pumping for information.

“Paris? She’s all right. She doesn’t want
some other woman holding hands with her guy. I kind of appreciate
that in a woman. It would make me nervous if she was okay with
it.”

We drove back into the parking lot under the
hotel, and the men escorted me up to my room. Moose tossed me an
oversized T-shirt with “Sacramento” emblazoned across the front,
and I went into the bathroom to change out of the swishy dress and
feet-numbing shoes. Moose had picked up a toothbrush and toothpaste
earlier, and I took care of the usual nighttime routine before I
walked back into the room. The T-shirt covered all the essentials
with a couple of inches to spare, but I was self-conscious anyway,
so I slipped under the covers and sat propped against the headboard
with the TV remote.

Hammie turned from the window where he’d been
looking out on Sacramento.

“Not much to see, is there? Sacramento is a
pretty small town,” I said.

“I wouldn’t say Sacramento is small.” He
looked down at the street below. “Used to be a much smaller
town.”

“Compared to say, Boston or Chicago, it’s
still pretty small.”

“At least they don’t roll up the sidewalk at
seven any more.” He looked at the remote in my hand. “I suggest you
keep your viewing down to a minimum. We have an early wake-up
tomorrow.” He looked at Moose and tilted his head toward me before
he stepped through the adjoining door.

Moose got up and walked over to me. He fished
around in the pocket of his jacket and pulled out a couple of zip
ties.

“Sorry about this,” he said. “We can’t risk
you taking a walk in the night.” He pulled back the covers and slid
the zip ties around my ankles, linking them together. Then he left
through the adjoining door, leaving it cracked open.

“Hey!” I shouted. “What if I need to pee in
the night? What if there’s a fire?”

“That’s why I left the door open, so I could
hear if you call out. Don’t worry, if there’s a fire the sprinkler
system will kick on. You’re more likely to drown than burn.
Goodnight.”

“Goodnight?” I grumbled under my breath. “How
the hell am I supposed to have a good night?”

I did eventually go to sleep, but every time
I tried to roll over I woke up. Around two a.m. I got totally fed
up and started yelling for Moose. He came in sleepily rubbing his
eyes and cut the zip tie off my ankles. When I came back from the
bathroom, he was asleep on my bed, and I stood there nonplussed.
How was I going to sleep with a huge guy sleeping sprawled across
my bed? I was looking at the bed, thinking about which side would
give me more room, when my brain finally woke up, and I looked at
the door. I was free.

I slid back into the bathroom and pulled on
my jeans, socks and bra. I kept the big shirt, since it smelled a
hell of a lot better than the one I’d worn on the plane. I crept
back into the room, watching to make sure Moose didn’t move, and
picked up my shoes. I wondered where the keys to the car were but
didn’t bother to look for them. I doubted I could get that limo out
of the parking lot.

The click the lock made when I turned the
deadbolt sounded way too loud, and I stood frozen for a moment
listening for movement from either of the men. I could see Hammie
through the open door to the next room. He was stretched out on the
bed, dressed in his jeans and a white T-shirt. He looked big and
rumpled and vulnerable, so sexy he knocked me for a loop. I shook
my head and slipped into the hall. I avoided the elevator and went
through the fire door to the stairs.

I sat on the top step and pulled on my
sneakers, lacing them tight and double-knotting the bows. Then I
started down the stairs quietly. I didn’t want to draw attention to
myself. When I finally shot through the door at the bottom flight
of stairs I realized I’d made a mistake. I was in the parking
garage. I’d been shooting for the main entrance.

I weighed the risk of taking the elevator
back up to the lobby against how much faster it might be than
climbing back up the stairs. Speed won, and I punched the elevator
button and waited. It didn’t come. I paced for a couple of minutes
hoping it would show up before I walked back over to the stairwell.
I grabbed the handle and tugged, but it didn’t budge. Shit. A sign
next to the door caught my attention. No access to the shopping
mall or hotel between midnight and six am. Great. I was beginning
to think I should have stolen the keys to the limo after all. I
trotted down the rows of cars, following the exit signs. Panic was
starting to rise in my chest, and I worked at pushing it aside.

“Be like Hammie,” I said aloud. “Cool and
calm. Work with the circumstances.” I jogged up the exit ramp,
trying to tread softly so I could hear if anyone was behind me. Out
on the street rain was falling softly so that the street and
traffic lights reflected off the roadway. I stopped and looked
around me. I was on the back side of a mall; a Macy’s towered above
me. I could see the hotel rising above a bank of stores, but I was
on the wrong side of the block to access it.