Authors: Christine Feehan
Water Bound (29 page)
He was grateful that she’d thought to get him coffee as well. Moving around hadn’t helped with the headache, and he was determined to get as much accomplished as fast as possible since they were out in public. He didn’t want to attract attention, but he needed clothes and he knew he’d left a couple of suitcases somewhere—ready for a quick exit. He needed to orient himself again and find where he had left them. He had her drive around for a while, while he sipped the coffee and tried to remember.
“I recognize this place,” he affirmed. “I’ve been here before.”
Rikki pulled a U-turn and stopped the truck just outside the high chain link fence. “Why would this place be familiar?”
“I always leave a suitcase with money, passport, ID and clothes for a quick emergency exit in several places.” He carefully assessed the area. He could see the security camera was broken. He remembered throwing a rock with accuracy to make certain no pictures of him were captured on film. The camera hadn’t been fixed.
“Several places?” she echoed. “Why several?”
“I believe in being prepared,” he explained absently, his attention on the storage facility. “Which is why we’re going to add security to your house. You need to take better precautions.”
“Did you rent a space under the name Sid Kozlov?”
He shook his head. “Too dangerous. If I was on the run, I could be traced through that name. I always use a clean identity.” So even his handlers couldn’t trace him. One never knew when a hit might be ordered to clean up a mess. He trusted no one, least of all the people who had robbed him of his parents, family and childhood to train him to be a top operative. He was a tool, nothing more, and when his usefulness was at an end, they wouldn’t hesitate to kill him.
Rikki touched his arm to bring his attention back to her. The moment their eyes met, he experienced a strange pain in the vicinity of his heart, like a vise gripping him hard. That expression, so close to tenderness, nearly shredded his heart. “How terrible to have to live like that. I’ve been afraid and angry and guilty for too many years of my life, and I’ve found peace here, Lev. I hope that you do as well.”
She
was
peace. That’s what she didn’t fully understand. Looking into her eyes, touching her skin, kissing her mouth ... Hell, just watching the expressions come and go in her eyes gave him an immeasurable gift.
I could look at you forever.
was
peace. That’s what she didn’t fully understand. Looking into her eyes, touching her skin, kissing her mouth ... Hell, just watching the expressions come and go in her eyes gave him an immeasurable gift.
I could look at you forever.
He swallowed what he’d been about to say, because nothing would be right. There was no way to express what he felt without sounding like a complete lunatic.
She smiled at him. “You don’t sound like a lunatic, you sound sweet.”
He grinned like an idiot. He should have known they were connected, but the flood of warmth was worth sounding like such a fool. “There’s nothing sweet about me,” he warned.
Her smile widened. “Really? Because I’m thinking the color red suits you very well.”
He touched his face. Color had crept beneath the permanent tan of his skin. “That’s a first.” He leaned over and kissed her, brushing his lips lightly across hers just for the thrill. “Stay here. I’ll be back in a few minutes.”
“I feel like the gangster’s moll in the movies.” She leaned out the window and watched him walk around the truck. “Are there weapons in there?”
“Of course.”
She laughed and shook her head.
Lev’s head jolted the moment he put his feet on the ground and began walking, but her soft laughter changed everything. Nothing mattered. Not pain. Not what was in that storage unit. Only Rikki and the way she just let him find his way. He had his identity in place and he’d sent away for his “lost” items. He even managed a police report in San Francisco where poor Levi Hammond had been mugged. His mother was Russian, his father American. He was born in Chicago. He liked his new past. It was all very normal.
He let his mind rest while he went on autopilot. His body found its way to the third row, where several smaller units were housed in a long line, all looking exactly the same. It didn’t matter, his feet took him to the eighteenth mini garage. Using the hem of his shirt, he punched in his code. He kept the code the same, as one nobody would know but him. Nevertheless, he entered the storage unit with extreme caution, going on full alert the moment the door unlocked.
Before entering the enclosed room, he went very still, reaching with his senses, ensuring there was no one lying in wait. Next he inspected the door itself for hidden traps before cautiously stepping inside. The suitcase was exactly positioned where he left it, but he didn’t approach it. He studied the floor for signs of disturbance first. There was a light sprinkling of dust over the concrete surrounding the single shelf where the suitcase rested. He could see no prints and the spiderwebs were intact. Still, he was careful as he made his approach, studying the case from every angle before he touched it.
He was tempted to open it and inspect the contents, but he didn’t want to chance being discovered, better to walk away while no one was around. He walked back to the truck and slid in. “Let’s get out of here.”
Rikki obediently started the engine and drove onto the highway, a small frown on her face. “You think someone is going to come after you, don’t you?”
“Yes.” His reply was deliberately abrupt, clipped, a signal to back off.
“But if you were Sid Kozlov, won’t everyone think you died? The odds of you surviving were minuscule. They have to believe you’re dead. They only recovered a few bodies, it’s a big ocean. Eventually others may wash onto shore, but that isn’t guaranteed and the more time that passes, the less likely it is.”
He kept his eyes on the rearview mirror. “They won’t accept that I’m dead, Rikki. They’ll come looking.” She glanced at him, but he didn’t look at her—he was too busy watching the road around them. “Do you want to go to the boat?” he asked.
“Yes, but we’re not going to,” she said firmly. “I’m taking you home and you’re going to rest. You’ve been up too much today. And who is ‘they’? Have you figured that out?”
He shrugged, not arguing with her. He wanted her to at least be on the water, even for a short time in the harbor, but he was hanging on by a thread. “I’ll tell you when we’re in bed. In the dark.”
“I’m fine with that.”
Rikki drove in silence, wanting Lev to rest. She found herself enormously pleased that he’d wanted to go to the boat. That told her he was aware that she had difficulties if she was away from the water too long. A storm was supposed to hit around midnight, and she intended to sit in her swing on the porch and enjoy every second of it. Lev was looking gray beneath his skin. She doubted if anyone else would have noticed the changes in him, but she was aware of every breath he took, and he was hurting again.
When she would have turned onto the road leading to the farm, Lev stopped her. “Keep driving. Isn’t there a back entrance?”
“I can take the road just past this entrance, but it’s much longer and leads through the forest, so it’s quite a distance coming in through the back. The back gate is kept pad-locked.”
“I take it that no one travels on that road?”
“Rarely. There’s two undeveloped properties off this road and I’ve never seen anyone come out this far, but then I don’t take it that often.” She glanced at him. “It’s really long.”
“Good. Drive in about a mile and then stop on the road and let me examine it.”
“For what?”
“It rained, remember? This is a dirt road. I’ll recognize the tire tracks of the bastard stalking you.”
She turned that over in her mind, afraid to hope. “Lev, are you certain there was someone up on the ridge?”
“I told you I wouldn’t lie to you and I won’t. He loves fire, Rikki. It would be too big of a coincidence that someone shows up, watching the house and starting small fires just to pass to the time, and he not be the man responsible for the things that have happened to you.”
“But it doesn’t make any sense. What could I have done at thirteen to make him hate me so much that he was willing to kill people?”
“It doesn’t have to make sense to us,
lyubimaya,
it only has to in his mind.”
lyubimaya,
it only has to in his mind.”
She liked the way he called her that name, the only time he used a Russian accent; otherwise, his American accent was perfect. “How many languages do you speak, Lev?”
He shrugged and continued looking out the window, examining the ground as she slowed to make it easier. The road was unkempt, cutting through heavier forest to circle the farm’s acreage. There were two sets of tire marks marring the muddy road, as if two vehicles had traveled there in front of them. Both led to a gate to another property, the only evidence of others anywhere on the long winding road.
“Your neighbor,” he asked.
“That property is undeveloped. We actually thought about trying to buy it, but it’s priced a little too high for us right now.”
He sat up straighter. “Stop for a minute.” The tracks indicated that one of the vehicles had driven back out the way they’d come, but the other had turned the opposite way and was following the route around the farm. Lev got out and crouched low to examine the tire tracks. He recognized the tread on one of the vehicles. The same truck had been parked on the ridge above Rikki’s house.
The man had driven in, following a second vehicle, possibly a real estate agent, and then after the first vehicle left, he had waited for a while, presumably until whoever had come with him was gone. While he waited, the man had smoked the same brand that Rikki’s stalker had smoked. Lev cast around looking for more evidence. He found what he was looking for just beyond the gate. Small burn circles in the grass. The stalker had been playing with fire again. This time, he’d been more creative. The circles were in a pattern.
Lev walked around the area, studying it from all angles. He had a continual map in his head and the arrangement of the circles seemed familiar, as if he’d seen the design before. If he was right, and he would bet his life on it that he was, the burned areas in the grass were a blueprint of Rikki’s five acres, everything from the trees to the terraced gardens and the house itself. The arsonist had studied the topography of the farm, paying close attention to the five acres belonging to Rikki.
“What is it?” she called.
He straightened slowly. “I believe this man means to come after you again and he’s planning an attack.”
She didn’t flinch. She kept her eyes on his face. “Are the others in danger?”
He shook his head. “I have no way of knowing for certain, but so far, his battle plans seem very concentrated on your immediate property.” He climbed back into the truck. “Keep driving. You can see his tracks in the road. I need to see every place he’s gone.”
Rikki tightened her hands on the steering wheel until her knuckles turned white, the only sign of her agitation, but she drove slow and steady.
“He doesn’t know about me,” Lev murmured, trying to reassure her.
“He’s got to know you’re in the house,” she argued, “He probably thinks you live with me. You’re in as much or more danger than I am.”
“I do live with you and he doesn’t know a damn thing about me.”
Her laughter was unexpected and unraveled a few of the knots in his belly. “I don’t know a damn thing about you either, Lev, and you probably don’t know much more than I do.”
“It’s coming back,” he told her, his tone grim. His memory was definitely returning, and little of it was good. “And anyone stalking you is in for a nightmare.” He wasn’t a passive man. He didn’t believe in waiting for the enemy to strike. He struck first and hard, and ended the war before it ever began, but he didn’t think it necessary to tell her that.
He noted a high chain-link fence starting. “And does this fence actually surround your entire farm?”
“Not the entire three-hundred-plus acres,” Rikki said. “We don’t have that kind of money, even with all of us pooling our resources. The fence surrounds the main part of the farm where we grow food and herbs. The orchards aren’t fenced either.”
She turned onto a dirt road. “We’re on our property now. We keep this road up ourselves. Lexi can handle a tractor or a backhoe like a pro. She’s amazing.”
“She’s very young. Did she grow up on a farm?”
Rikki stiffened and stared straight ahead, compressing her lips. It was more than obvious that the sisters didn’t talk about one another. She might tell Lev whatever he wanted to know about herself, a rare thing for her, but she would never disclose her chosen sisters’ pasts to anyone else—not even to him. And maybe especially not to him.
Lev didn’t press her. She was being unreasonably kind and generous to him. He’d never met anyone like Rikki before, and he wasn’t about to push her to reveal anything she was uncomfortable with. He’d been making conversation with her, trying to get more of a feel for the women she loved.
“It doesn’t matter,
lyubimaya
. Keeping your sister’s confidence is far more important than answering.”
lyubimaya
. Keeping your sister’s confidence is far more important than answering.”
“It’s just that I feel that each of us has a right to decide who knows us to that extent. I’m telling you things about myself I’ve only told them, but I’m giving that to you with no strings. I’m okay with being different. I’m not hiding it from you or anyone else. I like my life, Lev. In fact I’m very happy with it. I’m choosing to share with you because I want to.”
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