Nauti Seductress Read online

  With the top down, a hard rock station on the satellite radio, and Billy’s smile of pure delight as he drove the sleek, little black two-seater, Billy headed out of town. It usually took a while for him to get over the boyish giddiness at driving the car. He wasn’t much for chitchat during those times. But Zoey found she wasn’t much for it herself. The night before had been too damned unsettling.

  Her brother had made it to the apartment before Jack left, his pale green eyes somber and intent when he pulled her into his arms for a hard hug. Doogan had made himself scarce, making calls, he’d told her, while Dawg was there. Dawg had been unusually quiet though, his expression heavy, concern for her or suspicion she wasn’t certain. When he’d left he’d made her promise to call him if she even thought she needed him.

  “Let me help you, Zoey,” he’d whispered as he hugged her, his voice quiet at her ear. “I swear, we’d work things out however you need. Don’t hide from me, sweetie.”

  She’d wanted to sob against his chest, wanted him to help her. The closer she’d come to doing so, the heavier the pressure had built in her head, though.

  The pain made no sense. Almost as though it were a programmed response.

  The pressure was there now, just behind her temples, threatening to develop into the agonizing strikes of sickening pain.

  Programmed.

  Rubbing at her temples Zoey fought to find a way around it. Natches and Chaya played a little game whenever they couldn’t tell each other something directly. They proposed a little story to the other. A “what-if,” their daughter Bliss had laughingly confided. Zoey understood imagery, imagination, painting words into pictures, but she couldn’t find an image to push past the pain to the truth. If she could, she’d sketch it, paint it, give a picture to the hell she knew waited beyond the pain, then she’d do just that. She could face it, if she knew for certain what the truth was. Was it blood and death? Or was it a voice whispering in her ear, painting memories into her brain that weren’t really memories?

  The pain was building in her head, sapping her strength, her ability to think.

  Pushing back that particular angle of the problem facing her she turned back to Doogan instead.

  He was there because of an investigation, he’d told her. Top-secret stuff she’d thrown at him, irritated at the answer. Somber, filled with regret, his gaze had remained on hers as he nodded at the description. Then he’d pulled her into his arms and drew her to bed. Not for sex, though. How he’d known she’d needed him to just hold her, just protect her for a few hours while she slept, she didn’t delve into at the time. But he’d done just that. He’d held her, his arms wrapped around her, her head tucked against his shoulder as he sheltered her while she slept.

  Her thoughts held her until Billy pulled into the parking lot behind the gallery and activated the retractable roof to slide into place.

  Davis Caston was waiting for her, just as he promised, a check already made out to her when she turned over the paintings. He eyed a quiet, brooding Billy warily.

  She had to give Billy credit, though. Every time she’d asked him to accompany her anywhere, he’d always played Mackay bodyguard perfectly. Just as he did this time. Albeit silently. Mackays rarely did so silently.

  Thanking the gallery owner as well as the buyer, Zoey felt satisfaction fill her. It had been months since she’d made a really good sale. And this one rated there at the top. She might even be able to squirrel a little away.

  “We did good then?” Billy flashed her a smile as he opened the car door for her.

  “Yes, we did. I can now officially pay my bills next month,” she stated happily, sliding into the passenger seat of the little convertible.

  “And your loss in the race.” He winked cheerfully, closing her door and striding to the driver’s side. Minutes later, the top down once again, they were heading out of town to the bank Zoey used. One outside Somerset, and she always hoped, her family’s nosiness.

  Billy cleaned up good, she admitted. Black jeans and a dark gray cotton shirt buttoned conservatively, the cuffs rolled back only twice and neatly at that. Dark blond hair, a little long with the slightest wave. At twenty-three, he was considered one of Somerset’s newest bad boys. Zoey considered him a friend, except on race nights.

  On race nights she didn’t let friendship interfere.

  “I’m going to beat your ass next race,” Zoey promised, smothering a yawn.

  “Sure you will,” he laughed, glancing at her as she leaned her head against the headrest tiredly. “Take a nap, Zoey, I swear I won’t speed. I’ll wake you when we get to Danville.”

  “Make sure of it,” she muttered, letting her eyes close as she slid her dark sunglasses over her eyes. “Or I’ll tell Natches.”

  “You’d think those boys would get weaker as they got older,” Billy sighed. “I think they get stronger as they get older.”

  Zoey had no doubt in her mind. They also got more protective and confrontational. Not to mention more nosey.

  The lack of sleep the night before and the pure irritation had exhaustion tugging at her. With the easy speed Billy kept the car at and the warmth of the day, she was nodding off, slipping into a light nap despite her best intentions.

  How long she’d slept, she wasn’t certain, but before she knew it they were pulling into the bank’s parking lot. Depositing the check, she glanced around the bank casually. She swore she could feel someone watching her. No one in the bank paid any attention to her, though. Shrugging the feeling away, Zoey collected her receipt and returned to the car. Once Billy got on the road again, she slipped back into a light nap.

  She could hear the music, and Billy’s low voice as he sang along with it. She was comfortable, the music soothing. For a while.

  “Fuck! Fuck!” Billy suddenly yelled, fury pulsing in his voice as the car surged with speed and her eyes snapped open in alarm.

  “What . . . ? What the hell?” Zoey came awake in a snap as she was suddenly staring at a hole in her windshield.

  “Get down!” Billy screamed furiously, shifting gears and pushing the little car harder.

  Turning her head, Zoey peeked between the two sports seats, eyes wide as she saw the car racing behind them and the male passenger aiming at them with a handgun.

  “Oh God!” Flipping around, she stared at Billy in horror. “Dawg . . . they’re all out of town, Billy. Dammit, I didn’t bring my fucking guns either,” she cried, suddenly terrified.

  “Jack. Call him.” Tossing her his phone, his hand went back to the wheel, the other one shifting gears as the little car screamed around the curves. “He has friends close. Call!” he screamed as another shot hit the windshield.

  “Billy?” Jack answered, his dark tone curious.

  “Jack, help us!” Zoey yelled above the whine of the motor as the windshield shattered in front of her face. “We’re about three miles past the county line heading back from Danville in my car . . .”

  The line disconnected.

  “He hung up on me.” She turned shocked eyes on Billy. “He hung up on me.”

  “He’s getting help!” Billy was fighting the steering wheel, pushing the car as hard as he could, the back end fishtailing around a hard curve. “Jack don’t waste time.”

  She wished she’d texted Doogan before she left. Hell, now she wished she’d had Dawg go with her after all. No one would have dared attack her in this way.

  Billy’s phone rang.

  “Jack . . .” she answered desperately, nearly crawling into the floor as a bullet whined close to her ear.

  “Zoey, listen to me.” Doogan’s voice was calm. “Billy’s coming up on a side road on his right. Take it.”

  “Side road ahead on the right,” Zoey cried out as more shots rang out. “Take it.”

  “Oh man, that road will kill the car . . .” he moaned.

  “Take it!” she screamed as a bullet shattered the dash between them.

  Billy cursed furiously as he slung the little car into the
turn. The back end fishtailed as Billy fought the wheel, the veins in his neck standing out, a snarl on his lips.

  “Jack there?” Billy yelled.

  “He’s here,” Doogan answered.

  “Yes,” Zoey answered, bracing herself with one hand on the dash, her feet digging into the floor as the car rocked, tires sliding before biting into asphalt and propelling the car forward.

  “Oh, my poor car,” she cried as more shots rang out, pelting the back of the car as the pitted road banged the undercarriage.

  “Zoey, ask Jack if he remembers what happened in San Diego,” Billy yelled.

  Before she could ask, Jack’s voice came over the phone.

  “Tell him I got it,” Jack growled. “You’re almost there, Zoey.”

  “We’re almost there . . . Billy!” Turning, she saw his head slump. “Billy!” she screamed. “Oh God. Doogan . . .”

  The car was still racing hard and fast as dozens of cycles poured from the trees bordering the road. Zoey ignored the sound of return gunfire and a crash of metal behind them as she fought to control the steering wheel.

  Suddenly, a tall lanky body jumped from one of the cycles to the back of the car and lifted Billy, tossing him literally on top of Zoey as the other man slid into the seat and seconds later brought the roadster to a smooth stop.

  Peeking over the unconscious Billy’s shoulder, she stared at the biker. Frosty blue eyes filled with joy, he was young, maybe Billy’s age. A do-rag covered his hair; a teardrop was tattooed beneath his left eye.

  “Motor still sounds good.” His deep baritone voice was a complete shock. “The body, though.” A crooked grimace pulled at his lips. “Maybe Natches’s boys can fix it.” He grinned. “Come see me if they can’t, we’ll work something out.” A wicked wink and he brought his boot-shod feet up to her seat and launched himself smoothly from the car.

  Helping hands pulled Billy from her, rushing him to a van as Doogan strode across the small clearing toward her.

  He was in Brom clothes, dammit.

  He moved to the car, leaned against the frame of the shattered windshield, and crossed his arms over his chest. “Dawg is probably going to have those pups now,” he stated calmly.

  She craned her neck to stare behind her at the men being dragged from the other car and thrown over the shoulders of two of the larger members of Jack Clay’s group and carted off.

  Zoey’s teeth clenched. “The world just ain’t right anymore.”

  “Hmm.” He nodded. “I guess we better get the blood cleaned off you before Dawg . . .”

  Blood?

  There was blood?

  It was everywhere. So much blood.

  Zoey screamed.

  The blood was on her hands, on the knife. . . .

  Harley.

  She couldn’t escape the sight of the scarlet fluid. It soaked his shirt, her hands.

  She screamed his name. The knife fell from her hands and there, coating her palms, was the crimson proof of her crime. Or was it?

  She stared at her hands, only vaguely aware of Doogan rushing her from the car and into the cool silence of the woods surrounding them. Jack Clay moved ahead of them, his expression hard-core pissed off from what she saw of it. When she saw it.

  The images shooting through her head like crazy fireflies were far more terrifying than the nightmare. They flashed between nightmare and memory, strangling her with fear and pain, paranoia and fury.

  Tied to the bed, helpless, gagged. The syringe pushing into her arm, the drug the color of sunlight as it was pushed from the plunger into her vein. And once it hit her system, it boiled in her blood, like lava inching through her, ripping through her mind with agony. She tried to scream, but the sound was blocked, smothered by the gag over her mouth. Instinct had her fighting, her fingers curling into claws, fighting to reach the smirking, malicious face of the bastard staring down at her.

  She stared into the eyes of the man drugging her. Ice blue, a jagged scar running down his face. She knew him. He’d been there at the party the night she had danced with Doogan. There hadn’t been a scar, but she remembered his face and his eyes, and the malevolence that filled them.

  And when his partner stepped to the bed and straddled her, she stared into his green eyes, into a face from the past. He’d smiled. He’d enjoyed her pain, enjoyed making certain it hurt as much as possible.

  He wasn’t Johnny Grace, the cousin Natches had been forced to kill sixteen years before. He was Johnny’s clone. Or his son. In his twenties, his gaze malicious, his voice filled with hatred.

  Her stomach cramped as the memories poured over her. Pain lanced her head, tearing through her temples with brutal punishment, just as he’d warned her. She couldn’t remember anything but what they told her, she’d been instructed. She would only know what they told her, nothing more. And as the drug began speeding through her system, she hadn’t been able to fight it. She’d tried. She’d fought . . . and then the real pain had begun.

  Stumbling, collapsing against Doogan now, Zoey fought to breathe, to let the memories just pour in. As though they belonged to someone else, not her, she let them spill over her. She would be angry later. She would cry later when she could deal with it. For now, she just wanted the truth.

  She hadn’t killed Harley, but she was terribly afraid they might have. They planned to. They knew where he was and they were going after him next. After they dumped Zoey on her sister’s patio for Sam Bryce to find.

  So she could confess to killing Harley, and Sam would have to arrest her. When she did, the Mackays and all their friends would lose favor with Homeland Security and lose the protection they’d gained over the years. As well as the power base they’d built not just in Kentucky but within the law enforcement agencies as well. And once that was done, not just the Mackays would be taken care of, but Doogan as well. She hadn’t known then who Doogan was or why it would affect him.

  “Killing you won’t hurt Doogan near as bad as destroying you. You, your family, his power base. Too bad he let the wrong person see how much he cared, isn’t it? Now, Doogan and the Mackays all lose when they lose you. . . .” The words filtered through the agony, through the images of blood and death flashing through her mind.

  “Too bad . . .” another voice echoed through her head. “Too bad you had to choose the wrong man. . . . Too bad . . .”

  Jarring, horrifying, the pain dug into her head, breaking the words off, shattering the memories as she felt herself collapsing into Doogan’s hold, her strength stolen by the slicing pain saturating her head.

  “They were so confident,” she whispered, as she found herself cradled in Doogan’s arms, his back propped against a tree as Jack Clay crouched beside them. “One, he had green eyes, like Natches. He’s Johnny Grace’s son. He said Natches would pop my head like a little grape, just like his father, Johnny. I couldn’t go to my family; I had to confess to Sam, because he said Natches would kill me. His partner called him Luther. But I’ve seen him before. His eye color was different.” They were aqua before. The aqua eyes had thrown her off. She’d seen his face, seen him somewhere. “The other, he worked at Natches’s garage for a while. Scar, cold blue eyes. Luther called him Rigsby.”

  “Tom Rigsby. He’s actually former DHS. He worked in interrogation, which explains how he knew about that drug. Luther Jennings would be Johnny’s boy, I guess,” Clay said softly. “Tom was driving the car that chased you and Billy. I recognized him. He and Luther hooked up a few years ago when Tom was kicked out of DHS for failing to pass a polygraph. And you’re right, Luther’s eyes were aqua when he was here in Somerset a few years ago.”

  “He stayed at the inn.” Zoey held her head; the pain was bad, but it wasn’t as bad as it had been. “He was always trying to flirt with me. Creeped me out.”

  It was the way he looked at her. His gaze hadn’t been hateful or mean, but something had lurked behind his smile and in the eyes that seemed far too calculating.

  “Did you catch Rigsby?” D
oogan asked.

  Zoey stared at Clay, praying, oh God she prayed they’d caught both men.

  Instead, Clay shook his head slowly. “Rigsby was killed by one of my boys. The shooter with him was a two-bit hired bully out of Louisville.” Concern filled his eyes. “Luther won’t be happy to learn his buddies are dead. And if Luther’s anything like Johnny, then he’s as mean and cunning as a damned rattler.”

  “We have to tell Dawg,” Zoey groaned, laying her head on Doogan’s chest as she felt him tense. “Oh God, that’s going to be so bad.”

  “So bad doesn’t describe it.” Moving to his feet, Doogan helped her to rise, keeping his arm around her as they stared around the sheltering forest before turning his gaze back to Clay. “I need wheels. We have to get back to the apartment and I have to make some calls first.”

  “Take my bike.” Clay nodded to the Harley parked on the dirt lane cutting through the valley. “I have a call out to Sam and she’ll take care of everything here. Let me know when the Mackays are coming to call if you want me there.” He didn’t sound so eager to be there, though. Not that Zoey could blame him. Hell, she didn’t think she wanted to be there. Doogan kept his arm around her, holding her close to his side. And it was a damned good thing, because Zoey didn’t think her knees were strong enough to hold her up yet. She could feel herself shaking from the inside out and she hated it. She hated it to the point that her teeth were clenched, her muscles tight with the effort to hold back the shudders.

  “What do you have to do and what kind of calls do you have to make?” Zoey asked him as he helped her onto the back of the cycle. “Why did a former agent help Johnny Grace’s son try to convince me I’d killed Harley?” When he didn’t answer, she grabbed his arm before he could turn from her. “Talk to me, Doogan. Tell me what’s going on.”

  “That’s why I have to make some calls, Zoey. Hell, I didn’t even know Grace had a son or that Rigsby was involved in this. If I had, I might have been able to stop this before it started.” He handed her the helmet before straddling the Harley himself and starting the ignition.