Hard Landing Read online

  Maya Schultz's hushed voice came through the hands-free system in Rebecca's car, and her heart leaped like a racehorse out of the gate.

  "He just pulled into his garage," Maya added from her hiding place in a mid-sized RV. It was parked on Max's street, several houses down, where he wasn't likely to notice it. "Give him a few minutes to prepare for your arrival."

  Parked on the same dead-end road where Tony and his thugs had bound and gagged her, Rebecca hugged herself both for warmth and to subdue her shivers. Darkness surrounded her. It was just past seven o'clock, the time when Max had invited her to arrive.

  Half an hour earlier, Maya had prepped her for the dreaded date. She'd been invited into the FBI-owned RV, where state-of-the-art surveillance equipment lining three interior walls offered immediate reassurance—that was, until the techs failed to bring up the feed from Max's cameras.

  "What's happening?" Maya had demanded. "Why can't we see inside the house?"

  The tech had shaken his head. "Apparently, he forgot to arm the system when he went to work this morning."

  Maya had shared an incredulous look with Doug Castle. "And we're just now realizing this?"

  "He never forgets." Rebecca's assertion had wrought a tense silence in the RV's dim interior.

  "But he turns the system off whenever he's home," Maya had insisted, "at least during the day. That's what we've observed."

  "Right, but he never forgets to arm it when he leaves the house. At least not when I lived there," Rebecca had amended. "Perhaps he was preoccupied today." He certainly ought to have been, heading to a memorial for a man he had tried to kill.

  Maya had crossed her arms and gnawed on a thumbnail. "I don't like this," she'd admitted. She surprised Rebecca by reaching out to touch her arm with concern. "You really don't have to do this if you don't want to."

  Rebecca's knees had knocked together. Having dinner with Max was the last thing in the world she wanted to do, but if it led to Max being court-martialed and to her and Bronco getting to see each other, then she had to do it.

  "I'm fine," she'd assured the investigator. "I'll just make sure that he arms the system as soon as I get inside. I'll tell him I don't feel safe without it."

  Maya had given her arm a squeeze. "Okay. But if, at any time, you feel overwhelmed and you want to leave, just slip away into a restroom and text me the word Out. We have a contingency plan in place to get you out of there."

  Rebecca had agreed. And after receiving a few more instructions about what sort of incriminating language they needed Max to use, she'd been told to wait on this dead-end street for word on when to approach the house.

  "Okay, Rebecca." Maya's soft voice held an edge to it that betrayed her uneasiness. "You can start for the house now. We'll be able to see you enter the front door from here, but until he arms his security system, you'll be out of our sight and hearing."

  Sliding her gear shift into drive, Rebecca drove slowly out of the dead-end street. Behind her, her two FBI watchdogs in their sedan crawled along in her wake. Keeping their lights off, they would follow her to within a hundred yards of Max's property, get out of their vehicle, and approach the house—near enough to see into the windows, but not close enough to activate Max's motion-sensing floodlights.

  Fear dropped like a cold rock into Rebecca's stomach as she turned onto her old street, her gaze going at once to the familiar outline of her former home. Lights shone brightly in the front windows, making the home look as hospitable as it did when Max hosted his enormous parties.

  The closer she drew to the long driveway, the more ragged her breathing became.

  "We're right here, Rebecca," Maya reminded her.

  The disembodied voice provided momentary comfort, but soon she would be entirely on her own.

  Just don't be afraid. Bronco's words of caution returned to her as she slowed to a stop before the closed garage. Max is a predator. If he smells your fear, he'll start to suspect.

  Oh God. Her fear was so palpable right now, Max would suspect a ruse right away.

  Get yourself together, she ordered herself. You can't afford to be afraid.

  Implementing a technique she practiced in yoga, she managed to slow her breathing, steady her frantic pulse. Then she settled the mantle of self-imposed calm around her like an invisible cape. That same calmness had seen her through hundreds of life-and-death situations in the ER, and it would see her through this one last evening with her husband. She prepared to turn her car off.

  "Okay," she said to the listening occupants of the RV. "I'm going in now."

  "Good luck, Rebecca," came Maya's final words.

  The hands-free connection ended as she turned off the motor. She swallowed hard and pushed her door open.

  Max's silhouette drifted past the window. He'd sensed her arrival. Clutching her purse to her chest, she stepped out of her car. A sense of surrealism accompanied her across the paving stones to the front stoop. When she'd fled the house, just before Tony had abducted her, she had thought she would never again walk up this particular path and enter this house. As she climbed the steps, her gaze fell to the potted plants illumined by the porch light. In her absence, Max had let the geraniums wither and die. The brown blossoms and shriveled stalks struck her as a bad omen.

  But then a sound like the twitter of a bird reached her from the periphery of the front yard. It was all she could do not to turn her head toward the cheerful sound. Bronco. It had to be him, offering whatever encouragement he could. Straightening her spine, Rebecca reached for the chime just as the broad black door swung open.

  There stood Max, filling the threshold with his larger-than-life presence. Just the sight of him inspired another wave of panic, but by sheer force of will, she beat it back, fixed a smile on her face, and approached him with outward confidence.

  "Hello, again," she said.

  His glittering gaze went from the mulberry colored blouse to her black slacks and matching black boots, back up to her face. "I was hoping you would wear a dress," he said on a sulky note.

  "Next time," she promised, leading him to believe that there would be one.

  His gaze shot past her toward the dark street. "Where are your bodyguards?"

  "They have the night off." He wouldn't mention his relationship with the Scarpas if he thought anyone was skulking about his property. "You said you could protect me," she reminded him.

  His expression brightened. "Of course. Come on in." Stepping back, he invited her into her former home.

  There was nothing the least bit welcoming about the prison she had spent so many hours redecorating. The familiar smells of leather and lemon wax turned her stomach, even though they were masked by the distinct aroma of Vietnamese food. Max had remembered to pick up dinner on his way home.

  "You'll have to forgive my own attire," he said, gesturing to his work khakis. "I didn't want to sully my dress whites by leaving them on at work, and I just got home a minute ago, so I haven't had time to change." He gestured for her to follow him through the great room, where a peek into his office gave her a glimpse of the laptop she'd given back to him, charged up and sitting on the corner of his desk.

  Through the wall of windows at the back of the room, she noticed that the swimming pool had been covered by a tarp for the off-season. Without the submerged pool lights glimmering in its depths, she could clearly see the boathouse and the pier, jutting out into the glinting inlet.

  "What a lovely night," she said, for lack of anything better to say.

  "Perhaps we'll walk out to the water later," he suggested.

  His words offered the perfect opportunity to bring up his security system. "Oh, I wouldn't feel safe doing that." She shook her head and shuddered simultaneously. "Not with your friend Tony stalking me constantly."

  "He's not a friend," Max retorted shortly. "You should never have spoken to him in the first place. Do me a favor," he added, storming into the kitchen, where she could see the take-out boxes on the granite island and the dinett
e table set with plates and silverware. "Don't bring him up again."

  Dismayed, she trailed him into the kitchen, glancing up by force of habit to see if the camera was on. The absence of the telltale light turned her mouth dry. Maya was still waiting for the security system to be activated.

  "Could you at least turn on the alarm?" she requested, pretending to cast a nervous glance out the window. "I really don't feel safe without it."

  Max shot her a penetrating look.

  Fighting to keep her expression as neutral as possible, she returned it.

  "If it makes you feel safer," he agreed. "Help yourself to a drink." Gesturing to the pair of tumblers he had set out below the liquor cabinet, he strode out of view through the laundry room and into the garage.

  Rebecca opened the liquor cabinet to assess its contents. They could both use a stiff drink. Alcohol would keep her panic at bay and hopefully loosen Max's tongue. Selecting a bottle of top-line whisky, she filled their tumblers with ice from the fridge dispenser, then added whisky to the halfway mark.

  What was taking Max so long? Cocking an ear toward the garage, she could hear him muttering obscenities. What now? she wondered, taking a sip of her drink. It scalded her throat and pooled warmly in her stomach.

  Max stormed out of the laundry room, startling her. As he glared up at the camera on the kitchen ceiling, she followed his gaze, noticing with a sinking sensation that the light was still off.

  "That inept motherfucker," Max exclaimed.

  A shard of fear imbedded itself between her shoulder blades. "What's wrong?"

  Casting her a distracted glance, he helped himself to his own tumbler and tossed the whisky down in one swallow. "Oh, those HomeWatch people were out the other day, supposedly fixing the system when it was working just fine. Now I can't get the damned thing to turn on." Tugging his phone out of his back pocket, he accessed the HomeWatch application, all the while shaking his head in puzzled exacerbation.

  Rebecca's blood abruptly thinned. The realization that Maya and her crew could neither see nor hear her ripped the mantle of self-imposed calm right off her shoulders. She was alone with the monster who'd tried to murder Bronco, a man who'd kept her under his cruel thumb for three tortuous years, who would certainly turn violent if she suddenly decided to leave.

  "Well," he declared, oblivious to her sudden distress and putting his phone away. "I just sent them an emergency repair request, but you know how those things go. I'll be lucky if they come out before noon tomorrow."

  All she could do was stare at him, the breath in her lungs petrified, completely mute.

  Max took a step in her direction, and she couldn't stop herself from retreating.

  He eyed her suspiciously. "What the hell's your problem?"

  "This just... isn't a good time for your security system to break down." Her thin voice was scarcely audible. If she told him she needed to leave, he would first accuse her of overreacting, then suspect her motives for coming in the first place.

  Max sent her an insolent smile. "Don't trust me to protect you?" he mocked. Snatching the tumbler from her hand he turned to the whisky bottle to refill it. "Here, drink some liquid courage," he invited, handing it back to her. "And have a little more faith in me," he added. His eyes glinted with dark promise.

  With a stab of regret, she realized Bronco was right. Max was planning to get her into his bed tonight. Never. She would rather die than endure his insufferable touch ever again. She needed to leave—now. And yet, putting an abrupt end to their plans would certainly infuriate him, not to mention spark his suspicions. She needed to extricate herself carefully. Recalling Maya's contingency plan, she laid her glass on the table.

  "The food smells delicious." She pretended to savor the aroma. "I'd like to use the restroom first, if you don't mind," she said airily.

  The roll of his eyes communicated that he did mind; however, he waved her toward the front of the house, where the guest bath was situated at the head of the hallway. Purse tucked under her arm, Rebecca hurried toward it, conscious of Max's observant gaze as he watched her retreat.

  She had just stepped into the L-shaped hallway and was reaching for the bathroom door when a soft sound drew her gaze down the dark, angled corridor. To her horror, a figure turned the corner, coming into the light. His aspect was so familiar and so unexpected that her throat closed up, keeping her startled scream locked inside.

  Tony Scarpa, followed immediately by two of his goons, neither of whom wore hoods over their heads tonight, bore down on her. Each carried a wicked-looking gun and wore a grin of delight. Rebecca froze in shock.

  "Well, look who we got here," Tony murmured, seizing her arm in a brutal grip. The point of his pistol jabbed her ribs as he jerked her closer. "Not a sound," he warned, thrusting her into the arms of his similarly stocky but bearded sidekick who covered her mouth with a beefy hand. "Don't shoot her yet," he added. "We'll make it look like the husband did."

  Fear coiled around Rebecca's body, squeezing her like an anaconda. Thinking she could outwit Max, the king of cunning, in the first place was naïve. Now she'd put herself squarely into Max's embroilment with the mob. Maya couldn't see inside to know how dire her situation had suddenly become. And even if Bronco, who had promised to watch over her, could see inside, how could he possibly prevent the bloodbath that she could sense was about to take place?

  * * *

  "What is going on in there?"

  Maya paced the narrow space between the walls of computers and monitors, waiting for anyone of them to blink on with an inside view into Commander McDougal's house. They'd waited ten minutes and nothing had happened yet. The worry that she had sent Rebecca like a lamb into a wolf's den kept her from drawing a deep breath.

  Doug Castle conferred with his agents via radio. "Hobbs, Meyer, we need eyes on our witness, right now. Cut the wire on the floodlight on the southwest side of the house so you can move in closer. I want a situational report in one minute."

  A sudden idea freed Maya's stymied thoughts. Snatching her phone from the nearest console, she accessed Brant Adam's number. "Come on, I know you're here," she muttered as it started ringing.

  "Adams." The terse syllable uttered in a low growl evoked an image of him sprawled on his stomach on some raised platform peering through the scope of a rifle into Max's house.

  "I need to know what you're seeing. The security system isn't working. What's going on in there?" she demanded.

  "Well," he drawled. "They talked a little. Poured drinks. Looks like they're about to eat, but Rebecca just headed toward the front of the house. I've lost sight of her. Max is dishing out their dinner."

  "Maybe she's about to text me. I told her to slip away and text me if she needed to get out. Something must be wrong with the security system. She was going to make him turn it on, but it wasn't armed earlier. What if it's broken? I should never have let her go in there."

  "Well, I agree with that statement. Oh, shit!"

  The expletive dropped on her head like a missile from a stealth bomber. "What happened?" she dared ask.

  "Scarpa scum. Three of them, at least. Fuck, they were in the house all this time! Must have been hiding in the back bedrooms." Disbelief laced the syllables rolling off his tongue. "Fuck!" he repeated.

  She could tell that his training alone kept his thoughts from shutting down completely.

  "Describe what you see," she begged.

  "They're all in the family room at the back of the house. I recognize Tony from her drawing—he's armed. One of his men is holding onto Rebecca—he's armed. So is the third man. Looks like they caught Max by surprise. He's got his hands in the air. They're talking."

  Maya clung to the console to keep herself together. "Stay on the phone with me, Brant."

  "I'll put you on speaker. I need two hands."

  "Wait, don't shoot anyone yet."

  Doug Castle had heard enough to catch the gist of what was going on. "Hobbs, Meyer, we have a hostage situation in the hous
e with three additional hostiles inside," he said into his radio. "Try to get eyes on them, but don't be seen."

  "They're all in the back of the house, the family room," Maya relayed.

  He repeated the information to his men then turned to one of the techs. "Ringo, you come with me. Maya, stay here with Blake. Blake, call SWAT. I want them here ASAP."

  She had been the one in charge until the Scarpas made an appearance. Frustrated, Maya watched the RV door close quietly as Castle and Ringo slipped out to help Hobbs and Meyer. Listening to the agent named Blake relay the situation to FBI SWAT, she wondered how her plan to implicate Max McDougal could have gone so terribly off track.

  * * *

  "Well, hello, Max," Tony purred, grinning at the look of stunned dismay that Max wasn't able to conceal.

  Having heard voices, he had rushed toward the front hall to investigate, only to realize that he'd underestimated the Scarpas.

  "What a nice surprise," the mobster added, advancing cautiously into the great room, his pistol trained on Max's heart. "We came here to chat with you, and who should we run into but your two-faced wife?" His dark eyes trekked to the kitchen where Max had just laid out the food on porcelain plates. "Oh, I'm so sorry." He affected remorse. "Did we interrupt your romantic dinner together?"

  "What do you want?" Max demanded. "You said you were cutting ties."

  Thanks to his training, he was able to keep calm, to catalogue as many details as possible, including how many weapons they had and the ashen hue of Rebecca's face. Caught in the arms of a bearded man whose resemblance to Tony suggested blood kinship, she knew full well the Scarpas weren't going to let her go this time. And, until he got a weapon in his own hands, Max didn't stand much chance of stopping them.

  Tony swaggered close enough to lean a hip against the leather love seat across from where Max stood. "You think we'd leave without getting our deposit back? You let us down, Max. We want our money."

  "Of course you do." Max hid a smile. Without meaning to, Tony had just evened the playing field. "Let me get onto my PC, and I'll transfer it back to you. All I need is your account information." He started edging toward his study.