Sleepwalker (8 page)

Once again she shoved and pointed.

At last he seemed to get it. Sort of.

“Grab the suitcase,” he ordered.

Dropping the arm around her shoulders but clearly not quite up to speed with the program change yet, the thief caught her arm to, as he seemed to think, compel her obedience while at the same time keeping her from escaping.

“Are you kidding me?”

But pointing out the obvious—if she’d wanted to get away from him, she wouldn’t have been telling him which way to go—would, like arguing, take too long: Mick grabbed the suitcase and took off with him a step behind her. He still gripped her arm like he actually thought she was his prisoner. He also had her gun, which he kept pointed at her as they ran, like at this point he thought she really believed he would use it on her anyway. Linked in that awkward fashion, they sprinted toward the tennis courts.

There were two courts, fenced in, shielded by hedges and green privacy webbing. In a matter of seconds, they were through the nearest gate. It had barely closed behind them when Otis and company rushed down the sidewalk they had just abandoned. Glancing over her shoulder, seeing her pursuers as little more than shadows through the webbing, Mick was just in time to watch them stampede past.

“Iacono. You got Mick and the guy?” Otis shouted. “Iacono!”

She didn’t hear Iacono’s reply, but she knew it was just a matter of minutes before Otis and Iacono connected and Iacono made it clear he hadn’t set eyes on her and the thief.

“This way. To the boathouse,” she directed urgently, practically towing the thief around the edge of the tennis court, where the snow was the lightest. Her flip-flops were damp and freezing. Her feet were solid ice and as numb as if they’d been carved from wood. The state they were in made her clumsy, but fear helped her compensate.
“Hurry.”

“The boathouse?” Like her, he sounded breathless. She didn’t know why. He was big and fit, and she was the one lugging the damn suitcase.

“You know, the building that holds a boat. You got any other way out of here up your sleeve?” It was still snowing, still frigidly cold, but panic and exertion combined to make her feel almost warm, except for her beleaguered feet. “Out the gate up there. The boathouse will be right in front of you on the edge of the lake.”

Her arm ached from hanging on to the suitcase. As they burst through the gate at the rear of the tennis court, she would have dropped it, except she was absolutely certain he’d stop until it was recovered, and they didn’t have time for that. It hadn’t seemed to occur to the fool that if they were caught, he wasn’t going to need his money because he was going to be dead. She would have relished the thought, except she was horribly afraid she would be dead, too. Maybe not on the spot, because none of the guys here tonight would do such a thing. What they would do was call Uncle Nicco for instructions. Before tonight, the idea of having them call Uncle Nicco for such a reason would have made her laugh with scorn at their idiocy. “Let her go” would have been the least of what he would have said to them. But now—maybe he would say “Let Mick go.” Then again, maybe he wouldn’t.

Because of the damn pictures.

If he knew what they showed, and knew that she had seen them, she didn’t like her chances.

Uncle Nicco might love her like family, but he was a careful man.

Cold sweat broke out on her brow at the thought.

“There!” Pointing out the boathouse, which was maybe half an acre of undisturbed snow away, Mick caught just a glimpse of the gray metal building and the shining black water of Lake Erie beyond it before she skidded and dropped the suitcase. She would have fallen on her butt if the thief hadn’t caught her by the elbows. A split second later, the night seemed to spin as he whirled her around to face him. Before she could react, she felt the hard impact of a blow to her stomach. Astonished, she registered that she was being hoisted into
the air. Blood rushed to her head. Just that fast, the whole world went topsy-turvy.

“What the …?” she gasped, fighting for air. Only the fact that much of the breath had been forced from her body kept her from protesting more vigorously. It took her a second to get it: without a word of warning, he’d flung her over his shoulder in a fireman’s carry. Snatching up the suitcase himself, he took off in a sprint toward the boathouse. Mick found herself eyeballing a black canvas back, flashing black-clad legs and black boots churning through pristine drifts of snow. Her head bounced, her stomach felt like it was draped over a rock ledge, and breathing took real effort. As a mode of transportation, it wasn’t what she would have chosen, but she had to concede it was probably efficient from his point of view. At least he was moving fast in the right direction. Anyway, she was glad not to have to run down the path to the boathouse, which had not yet been cleared of the almost knee-high snow, in her soggy flip-flops. Grasping the sides of his jacket with both fists, she made the best of her position and set herself to hanging on.

The main problem was, as she immediately saw, the fact that they were leaving a trail a blind man could follow. And if one thing was more certain than anything else, Iacono and Otis and the rest would scour every inch of the property and find those tracks through the snow. The only question was, how soon?

“Mick!” She could hear them shouting for her. “Mick! If you can, yell out!”

“Look in there!”

“They got to be here somewhere!”

“Check around the bushes!”

From the direction of their voices, the guys were combing the area around the pool house. Clearly the search was on. Her stomach clutched at the thought they might be caught. There was no way that was going to end well for anybody.

Go,
she urged the thief on silently. She would have said it aloud if she’d had enough breath to speak.

Lifting her head, Mick was straining to see back the way they had come when the thief’s gait changed. No sooner had she registered that they had reached the boathouse than he was leaping up the wooden steps. Stopping on the small stoop at the top of the steps, he dropped the suitcase long enough to grab at the knob.

“Damn door’s locked.”

“Eight-seven-four-one,” she gasped out. It was the code to the keyless lock that secured the door. She listened as he punched in the numbers. Then he snatched the suitcase up, shoved the door open and jumped inside.

Sliding to a stop—the soles of his boots must have been slick with snow; his pants from about midcalf down were white with it—he closed the door behind them with haste tempered by enough care to keep the sound of it to a minimum.

“Okay,” he said as total darkness enveloped them. “Now what?”

“Put me down.”

Mick found herself deposited, without ceremony, on her feet. One of the flip-flops had been lost, she discovered as she touched down, and she quickly kicked off the other. The weathered wooden planks beneath her feet were at least dry, which came as a welcome relief. The wet, fishy smell of the lake was unmistakable. She could hear the familiar creaking of the ropes securing the boats and the slap-slap of tiny wavelets against anything solid they could reach. The boathouse was basically a mammoth garage that had been built over a small, man-made inlet just wide and deep enough to accommodate the family’s various watercraft. Fortunately, Mick knew it well.

The thief was once again gripping her arm. Like he could hold her if she didn’t want to be held. Well, time to disabuse him of that notion.

It took one swift move to get herself free.

“Hey,” he protested as she spun away, but he made no move to try to recapture her: smart man. Like the house and just about every other structure on the property, the boathouse was outfitted with a security camera. Inside, the boathouse was as dark as pitch, and she was as sure as it was possible to be that nothing usable could be seen. But the boathouse had long been a favorite makeout spot for Uncle Nicco’s kids and their friends, and every teenager who had ever spent a balmy summer night on this property knew how to circumvent the single camera.

Mick yanked the plug from the socket.

“Lock the door,” she directed over her shoulder. Careful to avoid the ropes connected to the jumble of floats, water skis, life jackets and buoys stacked against the wall, she ran toward Uncle Nicco’s beloved thirty-six-foot cabin cruiser,
Playtime,
on which she had spent many a pleasant summer afternoon. It was currently tied up, along with a pair of Jet Skis and a runabout, at the dock, which ran the length of one side of the building. Her eyes adjusted quickly to the darkness, which wasn’t absolute after all. Moonlight shone through a quartet of windows set high up in the metal walls. The black gleam of the water contrasted with the duller charcoal of the wooden dock.
Playtime’
s white hull was bright in comparison.

“Is this some sort of trap?” he asked warily.

She could see him, barely, as a denser shadow in the darkness just a few feet behind her. His hand moved, and she caught a glimmer of metal. His arm was down by his side, but he held her gun—at least, she presumed it was hers.

“Did you lock the door?” She threw the question back at him.

“Yes. So are you setting me up or what?”

“If I am, then you’re screwed.” Grabbing a dock support for balance, she jumped on board
Playtime.
If she hadn’t wanted to make it look to Uncle Nicco and his men like she’d been abducted by this guy, she would have ditched him there and then and taken off in the boat.
The only thing was, unless she was willing to burn her bridges completely, she needed to take him with her. To maintain the illusion that she was a hostage, leaving against her will. Which might, or might not, at some point save her life. Or at least give it back to her. “Feeling lucky?”

He snorted, which she took as a no. Well, at least they were on the same page about that.

“Get on board,” she ordered.

Heading toward the controls, she didn’t even bother to glance over her shoulder to check whether or not he obeyed. A moment later, the lurch of the boat as he jumped onto the deck told her all she needed to know.

“You stealing his boat?” Sounding slightly fascinated, the thief came up behind her as she fished the keys out of the cubbyhole beside the steering wheel where they were always kept.

“Unless you’ve got a better idea.”

“Nope. Wait, where are you going?” He turned to look after her as, securing the keys just in case it should occur to him that he could leave her behind, she jumped off the boat. As soon as the
Playtime
hit open water, any of Uncle Nicco’s guys who were anywhere near the vicinity would know what was up. That white hull would be way visible, and the sound of the motor would carry. To prevent them from instantly jumping on the Jet Skis or the runabout and giving chase, she needed the keys to every other watercraft in the building. Running from vehicle to vehicle, thankful she knew where everything was kept, she snatched them up.

“I was starting to get a little worried there” was how the thief greeted her when, after having untethered the boat, she leaped back aboard the
Playtime,
keys jangling all the way.

“If I’d wanted to hand you over to the security guys, I wouldn’t have told you to run through the tennis courts, now, would I?”

She pushed past him, pulling out the exhaust knob, which vented
any fumes that might have built up around the engine. Having thus prevented the boat from potentially blowing up, she shoved the
Playtime
’s key into the ignition and deposited the other keys on the wooden dashboard.

He watched her. He had, she noticed, set the suitcase down beside the mate’s chair nearby. She had bad news for him: the chance that he was going to get to keep so much as a dollar of that money was slim to nonexistent. But given the circumstances, she decided to clue him in later.

“I hate to remind you of less happy times, but at that point I was holding a gun to your head. Your cooperation was kind of expected.”

Before she did anything else, Mick hit the button on the remote that started in motion the garage-type door that opened onto the lake. It made enough noise going up to make her stomach roil and set her teeth on edge. Casting anxious glances over her shoulder at the door behind them, knowing the lock wouldn’t hold for long if any of the guys really wanted in, she turned the key in the ignition. Compared to the grinding of the door, the engine’s gentle purr as it started up was little more than a whisper. Uncle Nicco kept his toys in tip-top shape, and this, a vintage, lovingly restored, thirty-six-foot Chris-Craft cabin cruiser, was one of his summertime favorites.

“Speaking of, give me my gun.” Keeping one hand on the wheel, she held out her hand imperatively.

He gave her a long look. “I don’t think so.”

“It’s mine. I want it back.”

“You’ll get it back. When I’m sure you won’t use it on me.”

He was standing beside her now, at the helm, watching her work the twin throttles, which could be tricky. The deck behind her was open; the cabin was below, reachable by narrow stairs behind a door to her left. With a tiny galley and head,
Playtime
slept six, in very tight quarters.

“You say that like you think you’re the one in charge here. In case you haven’t noticed, I’m driving the boat.”

“You want to get out of the way, I’ll be glad to take over.”

“This thing is forty years old. It’s temperamental. For example, if you don’t handle the throttles just right, the engine floods. That happens, and we’re not going anywhere. You want to take that chance?”

He didn’t say anything, which she took as a no. She was too busy maneuvering the boat away from the dock to smirk at him.

The heavy metal door in front of them rose slowly, so slowly that she was practically dancing in place with anxiety as the smooth black surface of Lake Erie was revealed what seemed like an inch at a time. A path across the water gleamed ice-blue with reflected moonlight, beckoning her to follow it to safety. The city proper was to the north, accessed by water via the Detroit River. Heading that way was an option, but when Mick thought about how narrow the river was and how easy it would be to follow them through it, she elected to head south, into the vast environs of the lake. Impatient, Mick nosed the boat toward the widening opening even as she made the decision. When it was wide enough, she steered
Playtime
through it, avoiding the swathe of moonlight like it was radioactive.