In Enemy Hands (16 page)

“How could you?” she gasped, tears streaking down her face. “How could you deliver Nadia into the hands of that monster?”

“I thought he was her father— I thought he would protect her.”

There was a moment of utter silence as they all gaped at him. Nick found his voice first.

“Protect her from what?” he exploded. “In all her life, there’s been one threat. One horror. And you took her straight to him.”

Maria doubled over, clutching her sides. “Oh God, Nick. What will he do to her?”

Her husband shot her a pained look, but didn’t say anything. His silence seemed to agitate her, and she grew increasingly hysterical while she paced. Walking over to the Hummer she banged her tiny fists on the hood, then buried her face in her hands and made a strange, keening sound that made the hair on Dante’s arms prickle.

Whipping her head up violently, she stalked over to Dante and stopped in front of him. Leaning down, she yanked back her hair to show him her scars. “He did this to me. In the hospital, when I had Nadia. The nurse had just taken her back to the nursery or he would’ve gotten her too. A man dressed like an orderly walked in and threw acid in my face.”

Sickened, Dante looked at Nick. “He lied to me … about everything. He told me you did that to her.”

“Are you that stupid?” Nick sputtered, throwing his arms wide in frustration. “Does a man in your business not take the time to check out his clients? Especially when an innocent life is involved?”

“I
did
check him out. My research man confirmed Vandergriff’s story. He said that Vandergriff was her father-”

Nick spun around, so enraged that he was nearly frothing at the mouth.
“I’m
her father!
I
am. That first time was all a setup, wasn’t it? When you rescued Nadia outside that diner. Those men weren’t gunning for her. Not really. It was all a show designed to get you inside. You rushed in and saved her, then you gained our trust. How he must’ve laughed at me for falling for that!”

“Mr. Branson, I didn’t know-”

Nick stalked over to Ronnie and seized the gun from his hand. Pressing the tip of the barrel to Dante’s forehead, he said coldly, “I believe Ronnie asked you a question, Mr. Giovanni, and I’m interested in the answer. Give me one reason why I shouldn’t blow your brains all over these rocks.”

Dante swallowed hard and forced himself to meet Nick’s glare. “You need me for the same reason Vandergriff needed me. I’m good at what I do. I can get her back.”

Nadia could barely move. She felt like a competitor in the Ironman on the day after.

Stupid stun guns. What was it Ronnie had said? They changed the sugar in a person’s body to lactic acid or something. The muscles on top of her thighs felt like they were a couple of inches too short, and she was limping. To make matters worse, the cretin behind her kept poking her in the back, urging her to go faster even though she was doing the best she could do.

“Oh, come on!” he exclaimed, and pointed at the bright yellow plane in front of them. “They expect us to fly this piece of crap all the way to California? You’ve got to be kidding me.”

The other man didn’t answer. The cretin shoved her again, and Nadia nearly went sprawling onto the dusty airfield. A sliver of panic raced down her spine when the cell phone in her bra shifted. Afraid that it would fall out of her low boot, she’d managed to transfer the phone to her bra while Vandergriff barked orders to the two men who were escorting her. A good thing too, because they’d tied her hands again. Now she wished she’d left it in the boot.

“Leave the girl alone, Cahill,” the other man said mildly. “She’s going as fast as she can.”

Use being a female to your advantage
, Nadia thought, and smiled up at her captor.

Peterson.

The corners of his mouth twitched and he almost returned her smile before he caught himself. She judged him to be in his mid-forties, with salt and pepper hair. The hazel eyes that met hers were intelligent and kind.

Good. Maybe she could work on him.

Peterson gripped her elbow and tried to steady her while she struggled to climb the steps of the plane. Apparently, the three of them were going to be the small aircraft’s only passengers.

My luck is changing for the better
, Nadia thought when Cahill climbed into the cockpit. At least she wouldn’t have to sit with him during the trip. He had a #2 pencil stuck behind his ear, and he struck her as the kind of guy who’d sit beside her and poke her with it for the duration of the flight, just for kicks.

“Hey, Peterson, you want to sit up here with me?” Cahill shouted when the plane started to move. “No parachutes back there. The girl’s not going anywhere.”

“No, thanks,” Peterson said with a yawn. “I think I’ll stay back here. Maybe catch a nap.”

Nadia had gotten the distinct impression that Peterson didn’t like Cahill any better than she did.

Use being a female to your advantage
, Nadia reminded herself, and began to cry. She had a knack for it, could cry on cue. Her crocodile tears had served her well in the past. Maybe they would this time too.

She sniffled a time or two-quietly, like she didn’t want him to realize that she was crying. Peterson shifted uncomfortably in his seat.

Nadia let a sob squeak out, and he glanced at her with a frown. She allowed her eyes to meet his and started crying harder.

“Ah, shoot, miss. Don’t do that.” Peterson took a crumpled handkerchief out of his pocket and dabbed at her eyes. “Everything’s going to be all right.”

“I’m so s-scared,” she sobbed. “And my shoulder hurts where Vandergriff used that stun gun on me.”

“He shot you with a stun gun?” Peterson sounded disgusted. He grabbed Nadia’s arm and gently pulled her forward.

“Which one?” he asked, peering at her shoulder blades. “Never mind. I see the mark.”

He mumbled something under his breath, then reached under one of the seats to pull out a little metal box. Peterson popped the latch and grabbed a bottle of aspirin. Nadia watched him twist off the top and fish a wad of cotton out. He shook four tablets into his palm and gave her an apologetic shrug. “I’m sorry. I don’t have any water.”

“That’s okay. I appreciate it,” Nadia said.

She opened her mouth, and Peterson placed the pills on her tongue. As she crunched them, she shrugged off the bitter taste. She was already planning ahead. There was a weird little door to her left.

A bathroom?

Nadia toned down the waterworks a bit. She didn’t see any point in overplaying her hand.

“So, what did you do to get on Vandergriff’s bad side?” Peterson asked.

Nadia fought back an amused smile. Maybe he’d decided talking to her was better than listening to her cry.

“I was born.”

Peterson lifted a bushy eyebrow.

“Really,” Nadia said, shifting. “That’s when Vandergriff started coming after me. My mother is his ex-wife.”

“Ah.” Peterson nodded. “I was wondering … I’m fairly new here. Didn’t know what his beef with Andreakos was.”

Andreakos. The name still sounded funny to her ears.

Nadia decided to gloss over the story a bit. No one would believe the horrors Vandergriff had revealed to her back at the main house, but she needed to work on Peterson with something. “Vandergriff married my mother when she was fifteen. He beat the crap out of her on a regular basis, but she was too scared of him to get out of there. She lived in that hell for four years. Then Vandergriff hired Nick Branson as head of security at the main house. Nick and my mother fell in love and ran away together. She divorced Vandergriff to marry him.”

Peterson leaned back in his seat and squinted at her. “If he was so hung up on her, why didn’t Vandergriff fight the divorce? I know from experience that one can be pretty hard to get if the other party holds out.”

Nadia shrugged. “He tried. But what can you do when your ex-wife has videotapes of you beating her with a fireplace poker?”

“Not much, I suppose,” Peterson admitted.

“Of course, Vandergriff—egomaniac that he is—couldn’t handle the fact that they’d embarrassed him. That his wife had left him for another man.”

“Ah, I don’t know … that seems pretty thin.” Peterson wrinkled his nose. “Why obsess about one woman for, what—twenty odd years? Even a psycho like Vandergriff can get women when the money’s right.”

“Other than the fact that she looks like me?” Nadia joked, and Peterson’s face creased in a grin.

“Oh, sure. Other than that,” he conceded. “But I have to say, I’ve seen him come and go with some pretty hot-looking women.”

“More going than coming, right?” Nadia said, and Peterson laughed again.

“Stop that. I drank a gallon of coffee this evening and hate the thought of trying to squeeze myself into that crap-per over there.”

“Oh, man!” Nadia breathed. “You mean this thing’s got a restroom? I’m about to bust a kidney here.”

Peterson snorted and scratched his ear. “Restroom is too grand of a word. It implies you could actually get comfortable in the thing. Santa Claus couldn’t squeeze in there.” He winked at Nadia. “But I can see where it might work for you. You are kind of elf-sized, aren’t you?”

“Watch it!” Nadia reprimanded, but a smile tugged at the corners of her mouth. “Can I go? Please? You know, it’s my time of the month, and—”

“Yeah, yeah,” Peterson interrupted, clearly not wanting to hear anything about female bodily functions. Nadia restrained a giggle. It was another trick she’d learned. If a woman ever wanted to run a guy off, that was one subject that worked like a charm. She stood and presented her back to him.

“Well?” she said a moment later, when he still hadn’t moved. “Are you going to untie me or what? I’m good, but I’m not that good.” She glanced over her shoulder at Peterson, who looked uncertain.

“Come on.” She gave him her most winning smile. “What am I gonna do, flush myself?
Drown
myself?”

Peterson snickered. “Not in that john, you won’t. I assure you.” He rolled his eyes. “Okay, okay.”

He rummaged through his pocket and pulled out a knife. Flipping it open, he cut the plastic zip ties that bound her wrists.

“Oh, thank you, thank you, thank you!” She threw her arms around his neck and gave him a quick hug.

Peterson grunted in surprise, then gave her a patient smile. “Okay, but hurry up in there.”

“Will do,” she promised with a wink. “I’ll give you the rest of my Vandergriff theories when I get back.”

Nadia limped to the door, opened it, and looked back at Peterson in astonishment.

“I told you so,” he called.

Even for a person as small as she was, using the potty would require a tactical maneuver. She could only imagine Dante trying to squeeze in there. He couldn’t have gotten those broad shoulders inside.

The thought of him sobered her. Focused her. She wasn’t planning on using the thing anyway.

Standing on the sides of the toilet was preferable to leaning over it, so Nadia climbed on top of it and dug the phone out of her bra.

With a feverish prayer, she punched in her father’s cell phone number.

Dante told them everything, from his first contact with Vandergriff to the point where they’d found him on the side of the road. He even thought they believed him. At least they had holstered their guns.

“A drug dealer …” Nick snorted. “You seriously thought
I
was a drug dealer? That’s rich.”

“Yeah, well, so are you. How was I supposed to know where the money came from?” Dante said, but he knew how he was supposed to know, and he hoped Sanders had a good explanation.

Harry Sanders had been his researcher for nearly five years, and a good friend for nearly twice as long. Dante didn’t like to think someone he had trusted so completely would betray him like that.

Nick waved his hand toward Dante. “Ronnie, check out his gunshot wound. Looks like he and Waynie got hit in nearly the same spot. How do you suppose they managed that?”

Nick’s cell phone chirped a song Dante didn’t recognize, and he flipped it open to answer it.