Mackenzie's Pleasure (29 page)

"Not the original ones. There's a deep game going on, baby, and I'm afraid you just

jumped into the middle of it."

The sun beat down on her unprotected head, the heat increasing by the minute. Every

step seemed more and more of an effort. Her thoughts scattered. She might have plunged Zane

and herself into the very danger she'd wanted to avoid. "Maybe I
am
a
pampered society

babe with more hair than brains," she said aloud. "I didn't mean—"

"I know," he said again, and unbelievably, he squeezed her waist. "And I never said you

have more hair than brains. If anything, you're too damn smart, and it seems you have a

natural talent for sneaking around. Not many people could have gotten out of that suite

without me hearing them. Spook, maybe. And Chance. No one else."

Barrie leaned more of her weight against him. She was on his left side, and she felt the

hard lump of the holster beneath his jacket. When he'd grabbed her, he'd instinctively kept his

right hand free, in case he needed his pistol. What he
didn't
need, she thought tiredly, was

having to support her weight and keep his balance in a firefight. She forced herself to

straighten away from him, despite the way his arm tightened around her waist. He gave her a

questioning look.

"I don't want to impede you," she explained.

His mouth curved wryly. "See what I mean? Now you're thinking of combat stuff. If you

weren't so sweet, Mrs. Mackenzie, you'd be a dangerous woman."

Why wasn't he lambasting her? She couldn't imagine he'd gotten over his fury so fast;

Zane struck her as the type of man who seldom lost his temper, but when he did, it was

undoubtedly a memorable occasion—one that could last for years. Maybe he was saving it for

when they were in the privacy of the suite, remaining on guard while they were in the street. He

could do that, compartmentalize his anger, shove it aside until it was safe to bring it out.

She found herself studying the surging, milling, strolling crowd of tourists that

surrounded them, looking for ' any betraying sign of interest. It helped take her mind off

how incredibly weak she felt. This pregnancy was making itself felt with increasing force;

though it had been foolish of her to come out into the sun without eating breakfast, and

without a hat, normally she wouldn't have had any problem with the heat in this short

amount of time.

How much farther was it to the hotel? She concentrated on her steps, on the faces

around her. Zane maintained a slow, steady pace, and when he could, he put himself

between her and the sun. The human shade helped, marginally.

"Here we are," he said, ushering her into the cool, dim cavern of the lobby. She closed

her eyes to help them adjust from the bright sunlight and sighed with relief as the blast of

air-conditioning washed over her.

The elevator was crowded on the ride up. Zane pulled her against the back wall, so he

would have one less side to protect, and also to set up a human wall of protection between

them and the open doors. She felt a faint spurt of surprise as she realized she knew what he

was thinking, the motives behind his actions. He would do what he could to keep anything from

happening, and to protect these people, but if push came to shove, he would ruthlessly

sacrifice the other people in this elevator to keep her safe.

They got off on the twenty-first floor, the ride uneventful. A man and woman got off

at the same time, a middle-aged couple with Rochester accents. They turned down the hallway

leading away from the suite. Zane guided Barrie after them, following the couple until they

reached their room around the corner. As they walked past, Barrie glanced inside the room as

the couple entered it; it was untidy, piled with shopping bags and the dirty clothes they'd worn

the day before.

"Safe," Zane murmured as they wound their way to the suite.

"They wouldn't have had all the tourist stuff if they'd just arrived?"

He slanted an unreadable look at her. "Yeah."

The suite was blessedly cool. She stumbled inside, and Zane locked and chained the door.

Their breakfast still sat on the table, untouched and cold. He all but pushed her into a chair

anyway. "Eat," he ordered. "Just the toast, if nothing else. Put jelly on it. And drink all the

water."

He sat down on the arm of the couch, picked up the phone and began dialing.

Just to be safe, she ate half a slice of dry toast first, eschewing the balls of butter,

which wouldn't melt on the cold toast anyway. Her stomach was peaceful at the moment, but

she didn't want to do anything to upset it. She smeared the second half slice with jelly.

As she methodically ate and drank, she began to feel better. Zane was making no effort

to keep her from hearing his conversation, and she gathered he was talking to his brother

Chance again.

"If she was spotted, we have maybe half an hour," he was saying. "Get everyone on

alert." He listened a moment, then said, "Yeah, I know. I'm slipping." He said goodbye

with a cryptic, "Keep it cool."

"Keep what cool?" Barrie asked, turning in her chair to face him.

A flicker of amusement lightened his remote eyes. "Chance has a habit of sticking his

nose, along with another part of his anatomy, into hot spots. He gets burned occasionally."

"And you don't, I suppose?"

He shrugged. "Occasionally," he admitted.

He was very calm, unusually so, even for him. It was like waiting for a storm to break.

Barrie took a deep breath and braced herself. "All right, I'm feeling better," she said, more

evenly than she felt. "Let me have it."

He regarded her for a moment, then shook his head-regretfully, she thought. "It'll have to

wait. Chance said there's a lot of activity going on all of a sudden. It's all about to hit the

fan."

They didn't have even the half hour Zane had hoped for.

The phone rang, and he picked it up. "Roger," he said, and placed the receiver into its

cradle. He stood and strode over to Barrie. "They're moving in," he said, lifting her from the

chair with an implacable hand. "And you're going to a different floor."

He was shoving her out of harm's way. She stiffened against the pressure of his hand,

digging in her heels. He stopped and turned to face her, then placed his hand over her

belly. "You have to go," he said, without a flicker of emotion. He was in combat mode, his

face impassive, his eyes cold and distant.

He was right. Because of the baby, she had to go. She put her hand over his. "All

right. But do you have an extra pistol I could have—just in case?"

He hesitated briefly, then strode into the bedroom to his garment bag. The weapon he

removed was a compact, five-shot revolver. "Do you know how to use it?"

She folded her hand around the butt, feeling the smoothness of the wood. "I've shot

skeet, but I've never used a handgun. I'll manage."

"There's no empty chamber, and no safety," he said as he escorted her out the door.

"You can pull the hammer back before you fire, or you can use a little more effort and just

pull the trigger. Nothing to it but aiming and firing. It's a thirty-eight caliber, so it has

stopping power." He was walking swiftly toward the stairs as he talked. He opened the stairwell

door and began pushing her up the stairs, their steps echoing in the concrete silo. "I'm

going to put you in an empty room on the twenty-third floor, and I want you to stay there

until either Chance or I come for you. If anyone else opens the door, shoot them."

"I don't know what Chance looks like," she blurted.

"Black hair, hazel eyes. Tall. So good-looking you start drooling when you see him. That's

what he says women do, anyway."

They reached the twenty-third floor. Barrie was only slightly winded, Zane not at all.

As they stepped into the carpeted silence of the hallway, she asked, "How do you know which

rooms are empty?"

He produced one of the electronic cards from his pocket. "Because one of Chance's

people booked the room last night and slipped me the key card while we were eating supper. Just

in case."

He always had an alternate plan—just in case. She should have guessed.

He opened the door to room 2334 and ushered her inside, but he didn't enter himself.

"Lock and chain the door, and stay put," he said, then turned and walked swiftly toward the

stairwell. Barrie stood in the doorway and watched him. He stopped and looked at her over his

shoulder. "I'm waiting to hear the door being locked," he said softly.

She stepped back, turned the lock and slid the chain into place.

Then she stood in the middle of the neat, silent room and quietly went to pieces.

She couldn't stand it. Zane was deliberately walking into
danger—on her account
—and

she couldn't join him. She couldn't be there with him, couldn't guard his back. Because of the

baby growing inside her, she was relegated to this safe niche while the man she loved faced bullets

for her.

She sat on the floor and rocked back and forth, her arms folded over her stomach,

keening softly as tears rolled down her face. This terror for Zane's safety was worse than

anything she'd ever felt before, far worse than what she'd known at the hands of her kidnappers,

worse even than when he'd been shot. At least she'd
been
there then. She'd been able to help,

able to touch him.

She couldn't do anything now.

A sharp, deep report that sounded like thunder made her jump. Except it wasn't thunder;

the desert sky was bright and cloudless. She buried her face against her knees, weeping

harder. More shots. Some lighter, flatter in tone. A peculiar cough. Another deep thundering,

then several in quick succession.

Then silence.

She pulled herself together and scrambled to the far corner of the room, behind the bed.

She sat with her back against the wall and her arms braced on her knees, the pistol steady as

she held it trained on the door. She didn't see how anyone other than Zane or Chance could

know where she was, but she wouldn't gamble on it. She didn't know what any of this was

about, or who her enemies were, except for Mack Prewett, probably.

Time crawled past. She didn't have her wristwatch on, and the clock radio on the bedside

table was turned away from her. She didn't get up to check the time. She simply sat there

with the pistol in her hand and waited, and died a little more with each passing minute of Zane's

absence.

He didn't come. She felt the coldness of despair grow in her heart, spreading until it

filled her chest, the pressure of it almost stopping her lungs. Her heartbeat slowed to a heavy,

painful rhythm.
Zane.
He would have come, if he'd been able. He'd been shot again. Wounded.

She wouldn't let herself even think the word
dead,
but it was there, in her heart, her chest, and she

didn't know how she could go on.

There was a brief knock on the door. "Barrie?" came a soft call, a voice that sounded

tired and familiar. "It's Art Sandefer. It's over. Mack's in custody, and you can come out now."

Only Zane and Chance were supposed to know where she was. Zane had said that if

anyone else opened the door, to shoot them. But she'd known Art Sandefer for years, known

and respected both the man and the job he did. If Mack Prewett had been dirty, Art would have

been on top of it. His presence here made sense.

"Barrie?" The door handle rattled.

She started to get up and let him in, then sank back to the floor. No. He wasn't Zane

and he wasn't Chance. If she had lost Zane, the least she could do was follow his last

instructions to the letter. His objective had been her safety, and she trusted him more than she

had ever trusted anyone else in her life, including her father. She definitely trusted him more

than she did Art Sandefer.

She was unprepared for the peculiar little coughing sound. Then the lock on the door

exploded, and Art Sandefer pushed the door open and stepped inside. In his hand was a pistol

with a thick silencer fitted onto the end of the barrel. Their eyes met across the room, his

weary and cynical and acutely intelligent. And she knew.

Barrie pulled the trigger.

Zane was there only moments, seconds, later. Art had slumped to a sitting position

against the open door, his hand pressed to the hole in his chest as his eyes glazed with shock. Zane

kicked the weapon from Art's outstretched hand, but that was all the attention he paid to the

wounded man. He stepped over him as if he wasn't there, rapidly crossing the room to where

Barrie sat huddled in the corner, her face drawn and gray. Her ga2e was oddly distant and

unfocused. Panic roared through him, but a swift inspection didn't reveal any blood. She

looked unharmed.

He hunkered down beside her, gently brushing her hair from her face. "Sweetheart?" he

asked in a soft tone. "It's over now. Are you all right?"

She didn't answer. He sat down on the floor beside her and pulled her onto his lap,

holding her close and tight against the warmth of his body. He kept up a reassuring murmur,