Donovans - Pearl Cove Part 12

"East b.u.mblefart," she muttered. "Anything else?"

Archer gave her a few more items, waited, and asked, "What do you want from me?"

"The betting is that you know all about Len McGarry's background."

"Until seven years ago, yes."

"Okay, slick. Listen up. Uncle never heard of Len McGarry."

Archer grunted. That wasn't good news. "Especially in the past seven years?"

"You catch on. Make d.a.m.n certain no one else does."

"Yeah, folks get really testy when friends spy on friends."

She muttered something in Chinese, which made Archer wish that his sister-in-law Lianne was along to translate.

"Slick," April said, "you sit down at a table where China, j.a.pan, and Australia are playing pearl poker, and you can count your friends on your c.o.c.k. McGarry was a loser, but he was a useful loser. Sometimes. Most of the time he was just a hemorrhoid. He took money from everyone at the table and some who weren't. He was a player without a handler."

Nothing new there, Archer thought. Len had never liked taking anyone's orders, no matter how compelling the reason.

"What does Uncle say?" Archer asked.

"We know French Tahiti's pearl farms are getting raped by international pirates mostly Chinese businessmen in league with the triads. We're not crying. The French told the world to go to h.e.l.l when they nuked that atoll. Now we're returning the favor."

"Just so I don't accidentally eat Uncle's lunch," he said, "all you're interested in is keeping Len's past quiet?"

April hesitated.

s.h.i.t. But what Archer said aloud was, "Right?"

"I'll get back to you on that."

"Don't wait until a postmortem."

"You planning on killing someone?"

"I'm planning on staying alive. Pa.s.s the good word."

"I will." She hesitated, sighed, and stuck her neck out. "Don't turn your back on anyone. Anyone. Pearls in general, and unique black pearls in particular, have become a very valuable bargaining chip at certain international tables. That could change in a week, a month, or a year. Until it does, there are some fairly lethal folks out there playing pearl poker."

"Does Uncle favor any of the players?"

"So far, we're just kibitzing."

"Let me know if that changes."

"I hope it doesn't, slick. Odds are we wouldn't be on the same side."

Archer wondered if the U.S. favored China, j.a.pan, or Australia in the black pearl free-for-all. But there was no point in asking. April had already said more than he had expected her to. More than she should have.

"Thanks," he said simply. "When this is over, I'll arrange a tour of the Tang jade collection, if you're interested."

"Am I breathing?"

He laughed.

"Stay alive, slick. I dream of seeing Wen Tang's jade."

"There it is," Hannah said, pointing.

Crouching on his heels, Archer ran his fingertips very lightly over the bent metal that once had been the door to the biggest pearl-sorting shed. Though the sun had long since fallen off the hazy western edge of the horizon, the metal was still hot.

He set down his backpack, opened it, and took out the small flashlight again. An intense beam of light leaped out, sweeping over the metal like a second noon. Holding the light almost parallel to the warped door, he examined the salt-stained steel.

"What are you looking for?" Hannah asked.

"Tool marks."

Anxiously she glanced over her shoulder. No one was nearby. No one was walking toward them. The ocean lay in shades of black with molten silver highlights. A fugitive moon winked between pillars of clouds. Fitful fingers of breeze combed water and land alike. The cooling air was silky, heady, laced with salt and the earthy scent of tidal flats bared by the retreating tide.

Intent on the remains of the shed, Archer was aware of the heat and rushing night and silence, but he didn't really notice it. He wouldn't, unless something changed in a threatening way. With small, smooth motions, he shifted the light from the lock and door handle to what was left of the hinges.

Between one heartbeat and the next, the chemical heat of adrenaline slid silently into his blood, bringing his whole body to a heightened awareness. It was just a small flick of the adrenaline whip, nothing like he had known in the past, but it was very real. The echoes and memories it brought reminded him of everything he had tried to leave behind.

"What is it?" Hannah asked, caught by Archer's absolute stillness.

"Looks like somebody went after the hinges with a hammer and chisel."

Swiftly she crouched beside him. The surface of the ruined door was like a road map of chaos dents, sc.r.a.pes, lines, gouges, pits, everything that a violent, debris-packed storm could do to metal.

"How can you tell?" she asked. "The whole door is scratched and banged up."

"Storm damage is random, not symmetrical."

As Archer spoke, his long index finger traced the faint, repeated parallel gouges that radiated out from or into the top hinge. The marks of purposeful damage were repeated on the middle hinge, as well.

Hannah shivered convulsively and stood up.

Without standing, Archer looked at her pale, drawn face. "You're certain that Len was inside the shed when the storm struck?"

She nodded jerkily.

"Alone?" he asked.

Again the jerky nod.

He watched her for a minute, wondering why the discovery of the marks had upset her. Earlier, when he had told her that someone had knifed Len and then rammed a fragment of oyster sh.e.l.l between his ribs to disguise the wound, she hadn't shown much response. Maybe she had just been too tired.

A soft breeze tugged at her hair and flattened the thin white tank top over her b.r.e.a.s.t.s and belly. She had changed from shorts to cutoff jeans. Her legs were racehorse-long, beautifully shaped, and bare. He wondered what she would do if he ran his palms up the back of her legs, over b.u.t.tocks hugged by worn jeans, beneath the tank top to her shoulder blades, then slowly around to the high b.r.e.a.s.t.s that were as naked as his tongue beneath the tank top.

With a silent curse Archer yanked his mind back to the business at hand. The steel door had buckled along the side, between the hinges. The damage could have come from a crowbar or from the storm itself, after some hinges had given way. He was betting on the crowbar. Once the door was pried partly open from the hinge side, the violent cyclone would do the rest.

Absently Archer fingered the frayed wires of what had once been the door's electronic lock.

"Most electronic systems freeze in the locked position if the power goes out," he said. "Is that the way the shed was set up?"

"Yes."

"Is there a manual release on the inside?"

"Yes."

"Did Len spend a lot of time alone in the sorting shed?"

"Yes."

"Did everyone know it?"

"Yes."

"Not much help there."

She didn't respond.

"Hannah."

Though Archer's voice was soft, she flinched. Then she looked at his eyes and flinched again.

"What's the problem?" he asked. "You called me, I came, yet more often than not I feel like I'm opening oysters with my bare hands when I ask you questions."

Visibly she took a grip on herself. "I was all right before you came. I knew I had only myself, that I couldn't let down. So I didn't. But now..."

Archer knew that she hadn't been all right. She had been running on nerve and adrenaline, headed for a big crash. Yet all he said was, "Want me to leave?"

"No." The reply was instant, certain.

"Good. I wasn't going to go even if you asked."

Startled, she stared at him. What she saw in the reflected glow of the flashlight both frightened and rea.s.sured her.

"Len was murdered," Archer said evenly. "I'm in this for the whole distance, with or without your help."

"I know," she whispered. "I knew when you came back from Broome. You looked the way Len used to look. The way you look now. Deadly. But you're sane and he wasn't, not always. Not even most of the time." She rubbed her hands over her arms. "G.o.d, I hope I did the right thing by calling you. I don't want more death. I just want the Black Trinity."

"I'm not planning on Old Testament justice. The modern kind will do just fine."

Hannah's long eyelashes swept down as she let out a breath in a relief she couldn't hide.

"But one way or the other, there will be justice," Archer added softly. He stood and snapped off the flashlight. "Show me what's left of the main shed."

Without a word she turned and walked back to the path leading down to the water. Crushed oyster sh.e.l.l crunched softly underfoot. He walked just behind her, trying not to notice the rhythmic, elementally s.e.xy arc of her hips. He knew that she wasn't swinging her a.s.s for his benefit.

You look the way Len used to look. Deadly.

Archer didn't need to ask how that made Hannah feel about him. She needed him, but she didn't like it or him one bit. He didn't really blame her. He was a.s.sociated with the worst hours of her life, when Len had begun the transformation from a vital, virile husband to a bitter, crazy sh.e.l.l of a man.

Hannah wouldn't be the first one to shoot the bad-news messenger. Archer understood too well how she felt, nerve and resentment all tangled up, the child beneath the adult crying, I don't want to go there! He had spent years trying to put his past where it belonged. Behind him. Coming here, seeing Hannah, seeing Len, brought it all back in savage clarity. He didn't want to go there again.

But there he was.

The only thing he could do was wrap this mess up as soon as possible, then get out before all the sad, dark echoes of his past deafened him to the possibilities of the present. That had nearly happened once. He had nearly gone under, lured by the siren call of adrenaline and danger, until nothing was real but a world where treachery was the norm, multiple ident.i.ties were the rule, and death was the sole judge of who won and who lost. Some people thrived on that life. He wasn't one of them. But he had left Len mired in that brutal, covert world. He hadn't been able to pull his half brother out until it was too late. Len had gone under, and Archer felt a guilt at escaping that was as irrational as it was powerful.

"How much warning did you have before the storm?" he asked neutrally.

Hannah's steps hesitated, as though she was startled to find herself not alone. Or maybe it was the emotions she sensed battling just beneath Archer's level voice that made her pause. "We had several days," she said, "but we were expecting just a tropical blow, nothing to get excited about. The storm was supposed to hit land about two hundred kilometers north of here. That changed in a matter of hours. Even then, the force of the wind caught everyone off guard. No one was expecting a big one."

Archer came alongside Hannah as the path widened down toward the beach. "So Len's murderer didn't have a lot of time to plan."

Though his voice was low, carrying no more than a foot or two, Hannah looked around hastily to make certain no one could overhear. "Don't," he said. "What?"

"Keep checking to see if anyone is nearby. You're just showing your partner the storm damage so I can a.s.sess what can be salvaged and what's junk, remember? Why would you care if anyone overheard us?"

"But what if-"

"No worries," he cut in ironically. "I have eyes in the back of my head. If people are watching us, they're doing it at a distance."

Hannah hesitated, then strode forward again, matching strides with Archer's longer legs. "We could see better in daylight," she pointed out.

"We do that tomorrow, if necessary." And if they were still at Pearl Cove, which Archer doubted. But he didn't want Hannah to know they were leaving until they left. April Joy's warning had been quite clear. Don't trust anyone. In any case, he didn't want people to know Hannah was going until she was gone. "We can see things in darkness that full light hides."

"You sound like you've done this before."

"Done what?"

"Look for murderers."

"I've looked for a lot of things."

When he said nothing more, she glanced up at his face. Moonlight and the abrupt tropical night had turned his hair to absolute black and his eyes to silver. Beneath the short, sleek beard, the line of his mouth was hard enough to cut gla.s.s. He looked like what he was, moved like what he was, like Len once had been: a man trained to kill other men.

The ruined sh.e.l.l of the sorting shed appeared almost welcoming by comparison. She hurried forward, only to feel Archer's hand wrap around her upper arm, pulling her to a stop.

"Wait," he said, his voice as soft as the breeze lifting off the coal-dark sea.

"Why-"

A curt shake of his head cut off her words. "Talk in a normal tone about Pearl Cove, how it works, what you do. Don't mention Len's death."