Risky Obsession (Wolf Security #3)

22. Kane

CHAPTER 22

Kane

“ I can’t believe he’s dead.” Tory’s tone was shrill as she turned up the radio volume.

“. . . still trying to piece things together and we don’t have any details on who or why someone would have murdered Gunt . . .” The woman’s voice on the radio faded.

“Shit. Shit.” Tory adjusted the dial.

At a T-intersection that had a pub on both corners, I turned left and drove through a town that had no traffic lights. The buildings that lined both sides of the street morphed into paddocks and the ancient stone fences that guarded the properties went on forever. The temptation to stomp on the gas was huge, but we didn’t need a cop pulling us over for speeding. Not that I’d seen another car for at least twenty minutes.

“Damn it.” Tory shoved back on her seat. “I can’t find the channel again. We need to ring Aria.”

“Oh fuck! My phone was in my tuxedo jacket. And I left my jacket on the chair back in our room.”

“Bloody hell.” Tory nibbled on her knuckle. “Why would he kill Gunter? And how did he even get into the gala ball?”

I shook my head. “I don’t know.”

“There’s one reason why he’d kill Gunter.”

“I’m listening.”

“To set us up for his murder. We had already kidnapped him. ”

“Kidnapping is a strong term for what we did.”

She gave me the side eye. “He was taken against his will. That’s kidnapping.”

“Okay, I’ll give you that. When they catch the murderer, he can be pinged for the kidnapping, too, and we’ll be off the hook.”

She rolled her head back and stared at the ceiling. “I need a drink.”

“I doubt we’ll find a pub open.”

She scowled at me. “I mean water.”

“Right. Well, I’ll take either.” I pointed at the GPS. “See if that thing can find the nearest gas station.”

She tapped the buttons on the GPS. Then she swiveled her gaze my way. “Please tell me you have your wallet.”

I patted my sweatpants pocket. “Yep. Thank Christ I grabbed that.”

“We better get some cash out before they figure out who we are and put a BOLO out for us as well as this car.”

“Ha, you’re getting good at this.”

“Not funny.” She tapped a few more keys on the GPS.

“The cops will be focusing on the castle and Gunter’s murder, so hopefully it will be a while before they figure out the hotel we stayed at,” I said.

She shook her head. “It just takes one person to make a call about the gunfight at the hotel and the police will piece two and two together. That hotel had security cameras everywhere. They’ll match it to the footage at the castle and within an hour, every cop this side of Berlin will be looking for us. It doesn’t help that we’re Australians in a foreign country.”

“That’s true.”

We drove in silence for a while.

“You know what I don’t understand?” I said. “How quickly that bastard was onto us. First, he found us the same night we bought the map from Gunter. Then he murdered Gunter, and that must’ve been right after we climbed out the castle window and before the guards found Gunter. Then he found us again at the hotel before any cops did.”

Tory blinked like she was trying to piece all the crap together. “It doesn’t make sense.”

“It does if someone has been tracking us since we got here.”

She leaned between the two seats, reaching into the back and giving me a sweet view of her ass. The sound of a zipper being pulled down confirmed she was opening her suitcase. “Want me to pull over?”

She wriggled her body back into the front seat with the silver clutch in her hand. She pulled out her phone and without hesitation, she wound down the window and tossed it out.

I chuckled. “That’s one way to solve that.”

The concern on her face remained.

“Aria gave me that phone. If someone was tracking it, it has to be someone close to her.”

“That would be fucked. If they hacked your phone number, they could have heard all your calls and texts. Did you tell Aria we were going to the antique fair to look for maps?”

The blood drained from her face.

“I’ll take that as a yes.”

“I sent her a text. Oh, shit, Kane. That bastard has been on our tail since we left Australia.”

“Fucking Aria!”

“What? No, it’s not her.”

“Bullshit. You said yourself she doesn’t trust me. She’s been tracking us.”

“Even if she is tracking the phone, she doesn’t want to kill us! And why would she kill Gunter?”

Gripping the steering wheel, I glanced at her. “Maybe she hired that bastard to follow us, and he’s making his own rules.”

Tory groaned.

“We can’t risk making contact with Aria again,” I said.

Tory seemed to deflate.

“I mean it, Tory. No more contact with Aria until we know who is on our tail.”

Lights glowed in the distance. “Is that a fuel station?”

She peered through the windshield.

“Yes, it is.” She straightened on her seat. “We can’t go in there together.”

I frowned at her.

“They’re looking for an Australian couple, so I’ll go in.”

“No, you won’t. You have visible injuries.” I nodded at her hand.

“They won’t notice.” She turned her hand over, hiding her bruised fingers.

“Tory, don’t argue with me. I’m going in.”

She clenched her jaw. “Okay, fine. See if they have prepaid cell phones.”

“Got it. I’ll also get cash out, grab water bottles and some snacks. Anything else?”

“Yeah. Anything to disguise us, hats or beanies, glasses, makeup.”

“Good thinking.” I pulled into the gas station that was lit up like a Navy port, and parked at the side of the entrance, away from the front door.

She draped her hand over mine. “Any sign of trouble, ditch everything and come straight out. And try not to talk too much.”

“Yes, boss,” I said, enjoying the touch of her hand. “Won’t be long.”

“Be careful,” she said as I climbed out.

The sharp scent of gasoline filled my nostrils as I strolled to the glass door. A bell sounded over the doorway, and the middle-aged man behind the counter dragged his eyes from a television screen over his left shoulder to glance my way. I offered a smile as I grabbed a basket.

A flickering fluorescent light cast an annoying strobe over the rows of packaged food in the first aisle. As I grabbed water and snacks, my mind slammed between Aria tracking us, and the bastard on our tail. I couldn’t shake the gnawing suspicion that something else was going on.

But I had no fucking idea what.

At the end of the aisle was the ATM machine, but the damn thing had a sheet of paper taped to the front. I couldn’t read the note, but it was obvious the ATM wasn’t working.

I pulled out my wallet and counted how much cash I had left. Just over five hundred euro. That wasn’t going to last long.

This may be my last chance to use my credit card, maybe I could take some cash out at the counter. A swivel rack containing hats, scarves, and beanies stood at the back wall. I tugged off two beanies and added them to my basket. Hunting along the rows, I found sunglasses and reading glasses. I quickly chose two pairs of each. The cell phones were on a rack at the front of the shop. I grabbed the cheapest one and a car phone charger to suit the model and headed for the counter.

As I dumped out the contents of my basket, the storekeeper, who looked bored out of his brains, didn’t say a word.

Neither did I.

His uninterested expression reminded me of Tory’s comment about her boring job. I couldn’t see her doing a career like that .

On the back wall behind the storekeeper’s head, the TV screen changed.

Oh fuck!

A picture of Tory and me was on the news. We were dressed in our gala attire, and Tory had the stolen fur shawl across her shoulders. We both had a glass of champagne in our hands and seemed to be looking straight at the camera. The image was taken when we were searching for Gunter in the crowd at the gala.

My heart thundered as the cashier rang up my items, and I prayed he didn’t turn around as headlines that I couldn’t read raced across the bottom of the screen.

“ Das sind einhundertachtundsiebzig Euro ,” he said, leveling a bored expression at me as he shoved the items into a plastic bag.

Ditching the idea of using my credit card, I pulled two hundred euro notes from my wallet, hoping it was enough.

He swept the notes off the counter, and feeling like a ticking bomb was in my brain, I glanced at the television. Another photo image of us flashed on the screen. This time it was in the hotel lobby.

Then the picture changed to a young woman and a man wearing a red coat. They were the couple who had greeted us when we’d arrived back at the hotel after the ball.

Are they dead?

The TV switched to footage of a body in a bag being wheeled on a trolley toward an ambulance outside the hotel we’d stayed at.

Fuck. They are dead.

Dread clawed up my spine.

The cashier pushed the change across the counter. Attempting a smile, I grabbed the money and the bag, and then forced myself to walk casually away from the counter, fighting the urge to run like hell.

The frigid air hit me, and panic threatened to consume me. Once I was out of view of the cashier, I legged it to the car, jumped in, and tossed the stuff onto Tory’s lap.

“What’s wrong?” she asked.

I pressed the ignition and stomped on the gas. “We’re all over the news. They have photos of us at the ball and the hotel.”

“Shit! Did he recognize you?”

Pulling on my seat belt as the tires screeched against the pavement, I sped away from the gas station and turned the car onto the main road. “I don’t think so.”

“Jesus. Slow down.” She pressed her hand to the roof as I yanked the car into the lane. “We don’t need to draw any extra attention.”

I pulled back on the speed.

“Did you use your credit card?” she asked.

“No. Not once I saw our photos on the TV. I used cash.”

“Good. Hopefully they won’t track us to that gas station.”

She fished into the plastic bag and pulled out a water bottle. “Thank you,” she muttered as she opened the bottle. “Want some?”

I took the bottle from her and as I swigged a third of the contents, I decided she had to know what else I saw. We were in this together.

“I think I was right about that asshole eliminating witnesses at the hotel.”

Fear blazed in her eyes. “Why?”

“The bellhop and the woman who greeted us last night were on the television, too. I couldn’t read what the headlines said, but the next screenshot showed a body in a bag being put into an ambulance.”

“Oh God.” She covered her hands over her face, and her breath shot in and out.

“Want me to pull over again?”

“No. It’s not that. Those poor people.” She lowered her hands and gripped the edge of the seat like she was trying to hold herself together.

“It wasn’t our fault, Tory.” My heart thumped against my ribcage as I confirmed our direction on the GPS. We were coming up to a crossroads. Much like our mission. Should we continue? Or should we quit before we ended up dead? “Do you still want to do this?”

She blinked at me. “I’m not giving up. Not now. We need to get that gold, figure out who is fucking with us, and prove our innocence.”

“You make it sound easy.”

“No, I don’t,” she snapped. “But we didn’t kill Gunter or those poor people.”

“Okay. I’m on your side.”

Her shoulders sagged. “Sorry. I’m just so . . .”

“I know. Me too. So, what’s our next step?”

At the intersection, I turned right and drove along a deserted road flanked by massive hedges on either side.

“We have to figure out the clue on your map. That’s what we do next,” she said.

“That clue could lead to nothing.”

“It could also lead to the gold.”

I glanced in the rearview mirror for the umpteenth time. The long straight stretch of road behind us was empty. If anyone was following, they were doing it in stealth mode.

Her eyes glimmered with anger and frustration in the dim light of the dashboard. “We have to keep going.”

If she wanted to continue, then I was absolutely in. “Okay, but we need help now.”

She frowned. “I thought we agreed?—”

“I have a friend I trust.”

Her frown deepened. “Who?”

“His name is Archer Mahoney. He’s a treasure hunter, too, and we met about five years ago.”

She pulled a protein bar out of the plastic bag, tore it open with her teeth, and handed it to me. “And you’re certain about this guy?”

“Absolutely. Archer and I started out as adversaries when we were both commissioned by a wealthy collector to find a lost artifact in the Amazon jungle. Archer had already located some stolen Nazi treasure that had been hidden in that jungle for decades, so he was a perfect choice.”

She opened a second protein bar. “That’s interesting. So why did this wealthy collector choose you?”

“You make it sound like I was a poor choice.” I bit off a chunk of the chewy bar.

She tutted. “Just answer the question.”

“All right, bossy boots. I had the knowledge and history behind the artifact the collector was after.”

I checked the GPS for our estimated arrival in Cuxhaven. We had four more hours to go. “Can you unbox the phone and get it charging?”

She pulled out the phone box, turned it over and bit into the plastic to break open the wrapper. “Did you find what you were looking for in the jungle?”

“Yeah. Wasn’t easy though. I wouldn’t have found it without Archer, that’s for sure. ”

Being careful not to use her injured fingers, she pulled the phone from the box. “Aren’t you worried about giving him information on this gold?”

“No. He’s located several Nazi treasures before, so he knows that if we find the gold, we won’t be able to keep it.”

“ When we find the gold, you mean?” She pushed the charger into the phone and plugged it into the car.

I grinned at her. “Right. When we find it.”

“When was the last time you spoke to Archer?”

“We ring each other a few times a year. Haven’t seen him since we left Brazil though.”

“Do you think he’ll help us?”

“I know he will. He owes me one.”

“Why?”

I felt the curiosity burning in her eyes. “I saved his life.”

“How?” She pulled her knee onto the chair so she could look at me better.

My damn cock throbbed under the heat of her gaze. “We were ankle deep in mud and crap in the jungle, and Archer got caught in a tripwire. He ended up dangling over a ravine. I risked my life to pull him back up.”

“Ha! So, you’re a hero.”

I chuckled. “Not really. He’d do the same for me.”

She nodded slowly, processing the information. “Okay, so he owes you one. Do you think he’ll be willing to get involved in this mess we’re in?”

“Are you kidding? He lives for this stuff. The more dangerous a situation is, the more he wants in.”

Her brow furrowed with worry. “He sounds like a cowboy.”

“A cowboy you’ll want on our side. Trust me, Archer’s a good guy. He’ll want to help, especially since it involves Nazis and treasure. He’s made a reputation for himself for retrieving stolen artifacts. You can trust him.”

She searched my face, then nodded. “Do you know his number?”

I gave her the number I’d memorized for Archer many years ago and she put the phone on speaker.

“Do you know what time it is?” a man’s voice grumbled from the phone.

“Archer!” I said. “Guess who?”

“Kane.” He cleared his throat. “It’s the middle of the night.”

“Sorry. I didn’t know where you were, but I have a bit of a situation. ”

“Hang on a sec.” Shuffling sounds came down the line, and I imagined him getting out of bed.

“Where is he?” Tory asked.

“No idea. He moves around a lot on his luxury yacht.”

“Luxury yacht? Like yours?”

“No. His yacht is much bigger.”

“Okay, you have my attention,” Archer said. “What’s going on?”

“I have you on speaker with my fellow treasure hunter, Tory Parmenter.”

I winked at her, but she seemed to shrivel under my gaze. Maybe she didn’t want him knowing she was on the phone.

“Hi, Tory, how did you get hooked up with that sidewinder?”

She huffed. “It’s a long story.”

“It always is,” Archer said. “So, what’s this situation?”

“Have you heard of the Goering Gold?” I said.

“Sure. That Nazi bastard Goering melted down looted gold and made them into five hundred bars. They were divided into three portions that went missing at the end of World War Two, and some Aussie soldiers found a large portion of them last year.”

“That’s the one.” I laughed. Archer always had good recall when it came to treasure.

“You trying to find the missing portion that went onto the train?” Archer asked.

Tory bulged her eyes at me.

“You guessed it. And we think we’re onto something, but we hit a snag,” I said.

“More than a snag,” she corrected.

“Sounds interesting,” Archer said. “Let’s hear it.”

As the dark German landscape blurred past us, Tory and I bounced the conversation between us, filling Archer in on our last couple of days.

“So now we’re heading to Cuxhaven in a car we stole from a man who we think is a murderous asshole, we have limited cash, and we’re wanted fugitives.”

Archer released a hearty laugh. “Sounds like fun. Count me in. What do you need?”

I mouthed at Tory, “Told you.”

She nodded and seemed relieved .

“We need to swap cars and get cash, for starters,” I said.

“Done. I’ll have that ready for you when you get to Cuxhaven,” Archer said. “What else?”

I looked at Tory to see if she had any more ideas.

“Well . . . there is something else you can do.” She scrunched her nose as if debating whether or not to ask her question.

“You name it, Tory.”

“Can you research castles in and around Cuxhaven? See if any have any references to lions or had a moat around them.”

I nodded. “Good idea.”

“Lions? As in roaring lions?” Archer said.

“Yeah, Goering had them as pets during the war.”

“Of course he did. Fucking bastard,” Archer said.

“Speaking of bastards, it would be great to know what the Nazis were doing in Cuxhaven. It might help us work out where the gold went when it reached here.”

“I’m onto it,” Archer said.

“Thanks, buddy. We’ll give you a call when we reach Cuxhaven. Where are you, anyway?”

Archer moaned. “Rosalina needed a break, and she demanded that I take her somewhere that doesn’t involve treasure hunting.”

I chuckled. “Is there such a place?”

“Not in this part of the world, but she chose the Isles of Scilly. You know where that is?”

“Nope.” I looked at Tory and she shrugged.

Rain began drumming the windscreen, and I turned on the wipers.

“They’re a small archipelago of islands located off the southwestern tip of Cornwall, England. There’s only so much family time we can have on a sandy beach though.”

I laughed. “How are Rosalina and Luca?”

“They’re great. Luca is growing so fast. So, listen, I could come and give you a hand.”

I chuckled. “Thanks. You’re already a great help.”

“You’re gonna make me beg, aren’t you?”

“Go spend time with your family. I’ll call you in a few hours.”

“You’re mean, but okay. Don’t get dead.” He ended the call.

“I told you he was the man to call. ”

“Sounds like it.” She nodded but stifled a yawn.

“You should try to get some rest,” I said.

“I’m okay. Besides, it’s my turn to drive.”

“I’m fine. You get some shuteye, and you can take over from me after that.”

“You sure?” Her brows pulled together in the cutest expression.

“Absolutely.”

“Okay. Wake me in an hour, and I’ll take over.”

“Deal.”

“I mean it, Kane.”

“I know you do.”

She squinted at me, then curled onto her side facing the window.

As rain battered against the windshield, and nature unleashed its fury on us, I tried to focus on the road ahead and not her sexy butt.

But my mind was a pendulum that crashed between the bullets we’d dodged behind us, and what hell was going to be unleashed on us next.