Elizabeth Lowell - Innocent as Sin

Rand waited, willing himself to breathe again.

The side door popped open. A tall, lean man in blue jeans and a Gore-Tex windbreaker stepped out.

Though Rand had walked out of St. Kilda Consulting five years ago, he still had friends there. He recognized Joe Faroe instantly-Faroe, who had come close to dying last year in a shootout with a drug lord on the Mexican border.

Reflexively Faroe ducked his head, avoiding the helicopter’s rotor. As he did, he realized he was walking on the perfume of crushed flowers.

“Sorry, Rand,” Faroe said when he was close. “Hope we didn’t kill any of them.”

“So do I.”

“I suppose if I offered to shake your hand, you’d clock me.”

“Now there’s a thought.” Then Rand shrugged and forced the tension clamping around his neck and shoulders to loosen. He associated Faroe with Reed’s death, which wasn’t precisely fair.

But it was real.

“You’re wasting my daylight,” Rand said roughly. “I don’t want to talk about old times; they weren’t much fun. I don’t want to get drunk with you; I don’t get drunk anymore. And I sure as hell don’t want to re-up with St. Kilda Consulting. I’ve lost my taste for useless adventures in feral cities and failed states. So just climb back in that helo and disappear.”

Faroe rubbed his neck and hid a grin. “Grace was right. I should have brought her. You wouldn’t be rude to a pregnant woman.”

Rand looked at the horizon. He’d liked Faroe once. What happened to Reed hadn’t been Faroe’s fault. They’d all been consenting adults. With a muttered curse he combed his fingers through his wild mane of hair, yanked the watch cap back into place, and practiced being civilized.

Because rude or civil, hot or cold, Faroe wouldn’t leave until he was good and ready.

“Heard you’d been wounded and got yourself a wife and a kid,” Rand said.

“Marriage was a lot less painful.”

Rand almost smiled. “Heard she’s a judge.”

“You have good ears. But Grace resigned. Now she has all of her brains and expertise and no federal bureaucracy cramping her.”

“She’s good for you,” Rand said, surprising both of them. “The last time you came after me, we ended up brawling.”

Faroe smiled like a choirboy. “Yeah, she’s knocked off some of my rough edges.”

Rand gave the other man a long look. “You’ve still got plenty to go.”

“Makes your heart warm, doesn’t it.”

Shaking his head, Rand gave in. “What do you want?”

“St. Kilda has found the Siberian.”

Rand went completely still. Then his heart slammed and his senses sharpened to the point of pain, the hunter fully in control for the first time in years. He’d searched long and hard for his twin’s murderer, only to be frustrated by failed states and stonewalled by his own government.

“You’re certain?” Rand asked.

“Very. You still have the negatives?”

“Yes.”

Faroe waited.

Rand started gathering up his painting supplies. “My cabin is just through the trees. We’ll talk there.”

Pleasure Valley

Friday

10:37 A.M. MST

Kayla Shaw let the silence expand as she looked at the Bertones. She was a ranch girl, born and raised. She rode, she shot, she killed her own snakes with the little folding knife she always carried.

But she had a cold feeling that Bertone was way beyond her varmint-killing skills.

It’s too late to worry about your job. Worry about your freedom instead.

And with that, Bertone had pocketed her little recorder.

She hadn’t asked for it back. She knew she wouldn’t get it.

“I do believe that’s as silent as I’ve ever heard our little banker be,” Bertone said after a time, smiling at his wife.

Elena’s smile was meant to comfort Kayla.

It didn’t.

“There’s no need to be frightened,” Elena said casually. She tapped the heavy letter-size envelope that Kayla had dropped. “This is a great opportunity for you. Every woman needs her own independent means. This is how you’ll become free.”

Silently Kayla watched the Bertones. She sensed that the less she said, the less she’d sink into the quicksand that suddenly had appeared beneath her feet.

Andre sat down next to Kayla and laid a large, plain brown envelope on the white linen tablecloth.

“You become free,” Bertone said, “or you lose your freedom. The choice is yours.”

Kayla swallowed and hoped her voice sounded less frightened than she was. “What choice?”

“Quite simple. You’re a felon.”

“What?”

“Whether you suffer or avoid the consequences of being a felon,” Bertone continued, “is your choice.”

“I haven’t done anything,” Kayla said.

Bertone smiled. It wasn’t a gesture of reassurance. “You concealed the origins of five million dollars in dirty money.”

Unable to force any more words from her throat, Kayla could only shake her head.

“Trust me,” he said, laughing at the irony. “The money was dirty. You laundered it. According to your ridiculous government, that’s worth up to ten years in federal prison.”

“All I’ve done is provide you and your wife with routine banking services,” Kayla said hoarsely.

Bertone stroked his fingers over the brown envelope. “You opened several accounts at American Southwest for my lovely wife’s art-oriented activities, correct?”

Adrenaline rushed through Kayla, thawing the ice in her throat, her gut. “That’s what I’m paid to do-open accounts.”

“And you’ve accepted numerous deposits from our Aruba and Barbados banks to replenish those accounts,” Bertone said.

“Only when Elena had unusually large bills.” Kayla looked at Elena. The woman was sipping coffee and thumbing through the society pages.

“Don’t forget the Russian paintings I bought for Andre’s birthday a few months ago,” Elena said without looking up. “The sum was several millions of dollars. Five, in fact.”

“You paid what the gallery charged,” Kayla said. “Way too much, in my opinion, but I’m not an art appraiser.”

“Was the source of the money used for payment well documented?” Bertone asked idly.

But his eyes weren’t idle. They were the eyes of a predator that had just pounced.

Adrenaline and ice fought for control of Kayla. She had expedited the birthday transfer on Elena’s assurances that she would provide the supporting documentation for the transaction as soon as the paintings cleared customs.

Now Kayla knew why Elena had been “too busy” to gather documentation.

“I see you begin to understand,” Bertone said. “You established accounts and funded them without a clear idea of the source of the funds.”

“It’s a technical violation,” Kayla said tightly. “Hardly worth a fine, much less a jail sentence.”

“There have been several such technical violations over the past few months,” Elena said. “Coffee, Andre?”

“Thank you.” He glanced back at Kayla. “When those violations are added up, they make a disturbing pattern of complicit and compliant banking practices. Your practices, Kayla.”

Adrenaline urged her to flee.

Her brain overruled.

She had been and was under strong pressure from the bank to keep the Bertone account happy. She’d cut a few modest corners to do so, knowing that Steve Foley, the head of the private banking division, would strip naked, jump on a pogo stick, and sing “I Am Woman, Hear Me Roar” to keep Andre Bertone’s millions under deposit.

Can’t fight.

Can’t flee.

Think, she told herself savagely. There’s no other choice.

Bertone sipped coffee noisily, all but straining it through his modest mustache.

Kayla turned to Elena. “Is this what I get for trying to be helpful?”

“No,” Bertone said before his wife could answer, “this is what you get.” He picked up the brown envelope and offered it to Kayla.

She looked at it like it was a snake.

“Go ahead,” Bertone said almost gently. “The damage is already done.”

“This is a fine opportunity,” Elena said, her voice impatient. “Don’t be such a ninny.”

Kayla took the big envelope. She knew her hands trembled, but there was nothing she could do about it. She pulled out a sheaf of documents and fanned rapidly through them.

Escrow instructions.

Quit-claim.

My signature.

Bertone’s signature in the margin.

Realization came. “You’re the one who bought my ranch.”

“Exactly,” Bertone said. “I paid you an outrageous price for a few acres of sand and a dull, worn-out house. No matter what the Phoenix Chamber of Commerce claims, it will be many years before development comes to those dismal acres. Who would expect an international businessman like me to pay so much for so little?”

Kayla’s stomach slid down her backbone. No one would believe it. She certainly didn’t.

Not anymore.

Bertone ticked off points on his fingers. “You opened accounts, you moved money without proper documentation, you never even asked for copies of my passport and my wife’s.”

Kayla wanted to argue. She couldn’t. Taken alone, nothing she’d done would cause a problem.

Taken together…

“I see you understand,” Bertone said, saluting her with his coffee cup. “To a nasty, suspicious mind, the sale of your ranch would look like payment for the illegal services you rendered.”

North of Seattle