Abandon - Carla Neggers [40]
He had two choices. Disappear and rebuild his life from scratch. Establish a new identity. Find a spot that he loved as much as Cabo. Give in to blackmail and thievery.
Or…not.
He was the one who turned other people’s lives into nightmares. People paid him to go away. Cal and Harris had turned the tables on him, threatening to become his nightmare. Jesse drove a hard bargain, but if they had cooperated and kept up their end, he’d be back in Cabo by now, investing his profits and enjoying his life.
Leaving behind the money those two weasels had stolen from him was possible but not desirable. It would be annoying to have to replace it. Very annoying. But he could. There were always people with secrets who would pay not to have them exposed to the world.
Jesse had secrets of his own. Cal and Harris hadn’t unearthed all of them.
It was almost as if they’d ripped out his soul and were holding it hostage. How could he just leave now, without putting things right? He wasn’t going to return to Cabo and look over his shoulder for the foreseeable future. He had no intention of giving up his life there out of fear of what they had squirreled away on him.
On the other hand, if they hadn’t betrayed him, he never would have seen Mackenzie Stewart. He never would have attacked her.
That’s changed everything, hasn’t it?
A silver lining in his dark cloud. How could he just fly away without seeing his redheaded girl marshal again?
A sudden bump from a shift in air pressure brought him back to the present. Flying required concentration. It anchored him. He couldn’t let his thoughts drift for very long or he’d crash.
A simple enough equation.
He landed at a small, private airstrip northwest of Baltimore. Another rented BMW awaited him. As he disembarked from his plane, Jesse visualized Deputy Mackenzie. She was self-reliant, too. Her ability to fight, her gritty determination and her work as a federal agent were incongruous with her delicate appearance and soft, heart-melting eyes.
She didn’t belong in the violent world she’d chosen. Jesse wasn’t at all sure that he approved.
He caught his reflection in the side mirror of the BMW. He didn’t appear hunted or out of control. It was a steamy, hazy Monday afternoon in the Washington area, and he looked good in his expensive, casual clothes. Nothing of the deranged mountain man remained.
Within the hour, he unlocked the door to the expensive condominium he’d leased in the same complex where Cal Benton had bought his post-divorce home. Cal’s condo was one floor below. But of course, he had no idea who his upstairs neighbor was.
Using his cell phone, Jesse dialed Bernadette Peacham’s number in New Hampshire. He knew it by heart, because he was a planner. He doubted she had caller ID, but it wouldn’t have mattered—his was a private number.
“Hello.”
Mackenzie. His throat tightened. He pictured her, her big blue eyes staring out at the beautiful lake. Was she healed enough to wear her gun? It was wrong, her and guns. So wrong.
He heard her inhale.
“Sorry,” he said. “Wrong number.”
He hung up and looked out at the Potomac River, calm and still in the hot afternoon sunlight. He was no longer a knife-wielding lowlife. He was a wealthy Washington consultant home from an important meeting.
His transformation was complete.
Fifteen
Mackenzie pulled her backpack out of the small plane’s overhead compartment and slung it over her right shoulder. The tight quarters and the rough skies had jostled her just enough to make her feel every millimeter of her wound, but she’d resisted reaching for pain medication. She hadn’t taken any since Saturday. It was late Tuesday now, four days since the attack that had slit open her left side.
Four frustrating days, she thought as she disembarked, trying not to look too grouchy in front of the flight attendant, pilots and her fellow passengers.
Time to return to her ghosts, fall into her own bed and get back to work in the morning. Her attacker’s trail was stone-cold dead. The search teams hadn’t turned up any evidence of