Countdown - Iris Johansen [26]
“Caught.” He smiled over his shoulder as he started up the aisle. “But that’s what she gets for making herself a legend. Make sure you profit by her example.”
“No danger. As I said, we’re nothing alike.”
“Oh, I’ve noticed a few similarities besides that face. You’re intelligent; you’re definitely not weak. And you like to shape circumstances to suit yourself.” He opened the cockpit door. “And if you consider the Internet and media publicity you’ve already acquired, you’re well on the way to becoming a legend yourself.”
“That’s bull. I don’t have any desire to—”
He’d already closed the door behind him, and she wearily leaned back in her seat. Brenner was wrong. She liked everything clear-cut and aboveboard and she hated being in the limelight. Not like Cira, who had effortlessly manipulated the hearts and minds of both her audiences and the people around her. Yes, she felt as if she understood Cira, but that didn’t mean she would ever react in the same way. It seemed as if she’d been making that argument with everyone since the day that nutty killer had decided she was some sort of modern-day reincarnation of the woman his father had worshipped and he had hated. She had thought she was on the way to putting it behind her, but here it was again. Lord, she was tired of it.
Trevor,” Joe echoed. “Where the hell is he taking her?”
“I told you everything Jane told me,” Eve said. “That’s the big question. And the second one is how Trevor became involved in this.”
“I don’t give a damn. The only thing that matters is that he stay away from Jane. Dammit, I thought he was out of her life for good.”
“I didn’t. There were too many loose ends when she left Herculaneum. But I hoped for a few more years.”
“What loose ends? It was finished. We caught that killer and Jane got on with her life.”
“So it would seem.”
“You’re being enigmatic as hell. Talk to me.”
“I don’t mean to be. I’m just trying to say that we were so desperate to get Jane away from that nightmare and back to normalcy that we may have rushed things. We may have made a mistake.”
“Bull,” Joe said flatly. “There’s no way I’d have let her hang out in Italy searching for those scrolls while Trevor was on the same continent. She’s got a good head on her shoulders, but it was clear he was something new in her experience and he fascinated her. He’s like a hypnotist, and I didn’t want her deciding she wanted to follow him.”
She had said something of that nature to Jane, Eve remembered. Trevor and Jane had been thrown together too closely, and toward the end Eve thought she’d seen signs that Jane was not unaware. “Well, she’s following him now. She said she’d call us in six or seven hours.” She paused. “It’s Cira again, Joe. Cira and that damn gold. And now it’s killed Mike and that Donnell boy.”
“We don’t have any proof of a connection yet.”
“Why else would Trevor appear out of nowhere after all these years? The hunt for that gold has always been a passion with him. And he held up Leonard as bait to get Jane to go with him. There is a connection.”
“Then we’ll find it. Let me get off the phone and I’ll call Interpol and see if we have any word on what Trevor’s been up to lately.” He paused. “She’s calling you in six or seven hours? What destination would take that long from Boston? Naples?”
“God, I hope not.”
Bartlett tells me that you called Eve before we took off.” Trevor was coming down the aisle toward Jane. “And that you mentioned me. That must have pleased her.”
“No, but I couldn’t leave her completely in the dark, and I thought the devil she knew . . .” She shrugged. “Maybe I was wrong. She’s quite aware of how reckless you are, and in spite of herself, she still has moments of thinking of me as a child stumbling around in the dark.”
“No, she doesn’t. But she’s protective of the people she loves and she’s never really trusted me. That’s why I’m surprised you mentioned me.”
“She trusts you—within limits.”
“Because she’s