Extreme Danger (McClouds & Friends #5)(36)

“Hey.” He grabbed a handful of the thermal blanket and jerked her closer to him. “You may find this hard to believe, but slitting throats is not one of my top five favorite activities. Truth is, it puts me in a foul mood—”

“You’re insane!”

“Right. I started out that way and went straight down from there. Now listen. Arguing is a waste of time that could cost us both our lives. Do you understand that?”

The force behind his words knocked her backward. Everything she had just witnessed him do came back to her again in a sickening rush. He operated, if that was the right word, with the lethal precision of a specialist.

The bubble of manic courage was popped. She was cowed again. She gave him a small nod, and huddled into the blanket.

He turned away. The motor roared back to life. The boat picked up speed until it was skimming over the choppy, wind-whipped waves.

Maybe it was enough to get through the day with her life intact. She could worry about her pride later.



Becca kept her mouth shut for the time it took to get to Crane Cove. Nick was grateful for that small favor. The ice cave in his mind was great for certain complex mental activities, like calculating bullet trajectories and wind vectors, but it was not the mental place to be when dealing with a stressed-out, hysterical woman.

They rounded a bend, and the lights of Crane Cove spread out before him. So there was to be no high-speed boat chase, no bullets flying. Almost home free. It was uncanny how lucky they’d been.

First, he had to get Becca squared away, returned to wherever she belonged, and then he would have to face up to his own personal failure.

He pulled into the marina. It seemed quiet enough. He’d considered renting a slip at Shepherd’s Bay, which was closer, but the marina was small, and people were more likely to comment on his boat or notice his truck. Crane Cove was no bustling metropolis, but it was several times larger than Shepherd’s Bay.

And they were conspicuous. He was soaked, spattered with blood, and he had a near-naked woman in tow. Anybody who saw him would have lots to tell the private investigator that Zhoglo would send. He’d used a false ID to rent the slip. Looked like that ID was a goner, if the place had a security camera. He hated compromising alternate ID’s. They were expensive.

He moored in his slip. Dim lights, no sound. A nothing evening in Nowheresville. Good. He climbed out of the boat, hauled on a line to draw it closer to the dock, and beckoned to her. Spent a teeth-grinding eternity waiting for her to collect herself to her feet and get out.

True to form, her blanket slipped seductively down to show off the outfit. Classic Penthouse Pet material: naked tits, clingy transparent fabric clinging to tight nipples, dark muff. Her hand was like ice when she grasped his. Her legs shook under her like a newborn foal’s.

“What now?” she asked. Her voice was husky and raw from the wind.

He yanked the blanket away from her and wrapped her up like a burrito, then scooped her into his arms. She protested and wiggled, but she was effectively neutralized, swaddled in the blanket.

“We’ll talk in my truck,” he muttered.

“Your truck?” She stiffened in his arms. “Wait! Aren’t we going to the police? We have to tell them what happened, don’t we?”

He nuzzled her fragrant hair, noticing at random that she still smelled faintly like violets, though she tasted like salt. “In my truck,” he reiterated. “Where we won’t be seen or heard.”

“But I—but we—”

“And after we talk, if you still want to, I swear I’ll leave you at the local cop shop,” he lied. “Cross my heart.”

That calmed her down, and he made good time through the walkways of the deserted marina. The darkened shopping district was quiet too. The empty street outside the gate was dotted with pools of orange light at regular intervals. Nobody in them. He hurried to the long, graveled strip along the water that functioned as marina parking.

There was a bar up the street. Nick saw the flicker of a large-screen TV, heard a guttural roar of male voices crying out in unison. Some big sports event—that explained the deserted streets. He had no clue what the sport might be. He’d been out in orbit for too long.

There was his truck, waiting where he’d left it some days before. Not stolen or vandalized. One advantage of living in Nowheresville. Except that he’d grown up in a place like this, and he’d been the kind of no-good punk who’d have made sure that any abandoned truck was properly f*cked up before its owner came back to claim it. At the very least he would have slashed the tires. They must sedate the teenagers in this town. But he’d take any luck he could get, however undeserved.

He bundled Becca into the passenger seat without ceremony and got that sucker fired up with a roar of the motor, spattering gravel. Becca braced herself on the dash and gave him her owl-eyed look. She fumbled for the seat belt.

He dragged his cell out of his pocket, and punched in a number.

An irritated female voice answered in Ukrainian. “Who is this?”

“Milla. It’s Arkady,” he said rapidly in the same language. “It’s all gone to shit. My cover’s blown. So watch your back.”

“What? What? He will kill me now! You *! You fool! How can you do this to me?”

“Just thought I’d warn you,” he said evenly. “Good luck.” He hung up over the woman’s shrill protests. There was nothing else he could say.