Heart of a Hero Read online

  Rusty moved on to the next item. “I’ll also need a list of friends.”

  Her eyes narrowed almost imperceptibly. “Don’t you have any of your own?”

  She was sharper-tongued and less frantic than she had been last night or even this morning. Had the kidnapper contacted her? And if so, why wasn’t she saying anything?

  “Mine won’t help, yours might,” he said dryly.

  There weren’t any friends, not here. She couldn’t allow herself to get close to anyone anymore. The woman at the day-care center where she left Vinny had tried more than once to get her to open up, or at least to get together with some of the other mothers, but she had steadfastly remained distant. It was safer that way.

  “I told you, I’m a private person.”

  His expression was innocent as he studied her. “No friends?”

  “No need.”

  It was a lie. She had a very real need to share, to lean, and there were friends, but they were all back in Las Vegas and she couldn’t risk contacting any of them. It was like being in the witness protection program without the comfort of safety.

  Rusty didn’t buy that answer, either. No one was an island, even if they thought they were. Because of what he’d gone through, his brother Chad had been distant, like Dakota, but even Chad had eventually recognized his own need for contact, for warmth. Rusty reasoned that it would be the same for Dakota.

  “Has there been anyone you noticed hanging around in the area lately? Anyone unusual?”

  One side of her mouth raised a fraction of an inch as she looked at him. “You mean, other than you?”

  She was referring to the times he had tried to get a conversation going with her. “I live there, remember?”

  The hint of a smile faded and she shook her head. “No, no one unusual.”

  He looked at her steadily. “And no one’s contacted you?”

  Her impatience surfaced again. “I already told you they hadn’t.”

  Rusty sighed inwardly. He felt like a lawyer with a hostile witness on the stand. It wasn’t usually like this. Most of the time the parent was only too eager to keep talking, hoping that something would lead to their child’s recovery. Doggedly, he pressed on.

  As he continued asking questions, he noted that Dakota vacillated between being wary, snappish and wry. Writing down her answers in his own brand of shorthand, Rusty continued to wonder why she would behave in such a fashion, considering the circumstances.

  He had no way of knowing that the woman sitting so rigidly in front of him was wrestling with her thoughts and her conscience. Throughout the questioning, she kept trying to decide whether or not to be completely honest and tell Rusty who she believed had abducted her son. But each qualm of conscience brought fear with it. Fear that if Rusty knew who he might be facing, he would back away. And she did need him.

  But not telling him might delay finding Vinny. In addition, keeping Andreini in the dark might also prove dangerous to him, if not fatal.

  The man had a right to know who he was up against.

  But, she insisted silently, she had a right to get back her son.

  Dakota played with the tips of her nails and decided, for the time being, to keep silent about the identity of the man who’d cast such a dark shadow over her life for the past two years.

  Half an hour later, she saw Rusty close his notepad and hit the stop button on the tape recorder. For now, the questions stopped.

  She had a question of her own.

  “You haven’t talked about payment.”

  He’d never been good when it came to talking about money. As a teenager, because he had always been naturally handy, he had worked on neighbors’ cars to earn spending money. But he had always had trouble asking for what was due him. Exasperated when she thought people were taking advantage of him, Megan had taken over the financial end of his business.

  “You can stop at Carrie’s desk on your way out, she’ll be happy to go over everything with you. If there’s any problem,” he said, anticipating that there would be strictly because of what she’d said in her apartment last night, “it can be worked out. The main thing is to find your son.”

  She was starting to believe that he believed that. “Yes, it is, but I don’t intend to do that on credit.”

  Dakota dug into her purse, searching for what she’d slipped inside just before she’d left. Her fingers curved around the multifaceted surfaces.

  She tossed the item on his desk with a carelessness that surprised him. He’d thought that every woman revered jewelry. The diamond necklace sitting on top of his papers would have inspired reverence in a Spartan.

  The sparkle emanating from it was almost blinding. “Is it real?”

  “As real as you are.” She tried to not think about when she had received it from Vincent. He’d made her close her eyes before he’d slipped it around her neck. She’d felt like a queen. She’d felt loved. What she’d been, she knew, was blinded. She smiled at Rusty. “I never accept imitations.”

  The smile struck him as incredibly sad. Rusty picked up the long, gleaming string of near-perfect diamonds. When the sunlight hit it, it was like holding blue fire with his fingertips. He couldn’t begin to estimate its worth.

  “I don’t think the bill’s going to be quite this high.”

  She shrugged carelessly. The necklace had been in its box since Vincent had died. Because she’d accidentally discovered the necklace’s true origin, the gift no longer meant anything to her. He’d bought it for someone else, but had taken it back after the breakup.

  “Make change,” she told him, rising.

  “Two bracelets and a pair of earrings?” he offered, raising a brow.

  “Whatever.” She didn’t care about the necklace. She cared about getting Vinny back. Quickly. Dakota paused in the doorway. “You’ll call me if there’s anything?”

  He crossed to the doorway to stand beside her. Who had been the man in her life? Did she miss him? Had she hardened her heart to everyone because losing him had been so devastating? Questions occurred to him that weren’t restricted to the immediate case at hand. He wanted them answered.

  “I’ll call you regularly one way or another.”

  She only wanted to hear from him if he had something positive to tell her. She didn’t know how much more of this she could take without breaking. “Make it one way,” she instructed.

  She left Rusty standing with the necklace still in his hand and myriad questions preying on his mind.

  “Can’t say much about her.” The thin, aristocratic-looking bald man mopped his head before stuffing his handkerchief back into his jacket pocket. The overhead light in his cubicle seemed designed to make him perspire despite the temperature in the rest of the department store.

  “She does her work well enough,” Seth Masterson continued. He gave Rusty the feeling that he was testing out each word in his head before saying it out loud. “Not a real go-getter, like some who work here, but customers seem to think she knows what she’s talking about because she’s so attractive.”

  A wispy smile crossed his lips. In Rusty’s judgment the man almost sounded as if he had some sort of a crush on Dakota. He made a mental note of the man’s name. Maybe Masterson’d taken Vinny to secure Dakota’s love. Stranger things happened.

  “Half the women who shop here probably hope that they can wind up looking like her if they just use the right kind of makeup and buy the right kind of clothes.” The department manager stopped, reconsidered his words. He leaned forward, lowering his voice. “Maybe I shouldn’t have said that. That didn’t sound sexist, did it?” He nibbled his near-nonexistent lower lip nervously. “They’ve got me going to one sensitivity program after another, and it’s gotten so I’m afraid to say good morning to someone for fear they might read something into it that I never intended.” He mopped his brow again, shaking his head mournfully. “Whole different world than when I first got started in retail.”

  Rusty nodded, doing his best to look symp
athetic. He wasn’t here to discuss the man’s inability to adapt to the changing times. “How long has she worked for you?”

  “For me?” The phrasing made Masterson smile again as he savored the notion. He didn’t bother looking down at the sheet of paper in front of him. “Been here only six weeks. Little boy kidnapped you say, huh?” He shook his head. “I didn’t even know she had a little boy.” This time, he did glance at the form within the thin file he was holding. He ran his index finger over a space. “Yes, here it is under Dependents. She never talks about him. Never really talks at all,” he amended. “Except to the customers.”

  Rusty leaned forward over the desk. He indicated the form. “Mind if I see that?”

  Masterson hesitated, obviously debating the political correctness of sharing the information. He didn’t appear inclined to hand over the form.

  Rusty looked at him pointedly. “It might help me find her son.”

  Masterson debated a moment longer before surrendering the document.

  “I don’t see how, but knock yourself out—” And then self-preservation kicked up another notch. “Just don’t mention this to anyone, all right? I’m not sure about policy…”

  “No problem,” Rusty promised, taking the sheet from him. Blessed with a healthy ability to recall whatever he read, he perused the data quickly. What was on the form made him pause. Dakota had listed seven different addresses in seven different cities over the past two years. She was obviously on the run from something. “Moves around a bit, doesn’t she?”

  Masterson looked pleased at the observation. “That’s exactly what I said to her. She told me she was looking for someplace that felt like home. Don’t see anything wrong with that.”

  “No, nothing wrong with that,” Rusty replied absently. “Just seems a little curious.”

  Her point of origin, he noted, was Las Vegas. At least, it had been two years ago. She hadn’t mentioned that to him. Probably thought it was unimportant, he reasoned. He found himself wondering what kind of work she’d done in Vegas. He looked, but for some reason that had been left out of the report.

  He’d looked for the department manager after talking to several other saleswomen on the floor. None of the conversations had yielded anything, except to prove that Dakota hadn’t lied to him earlier. She wasn’t close to anyone she worked with.

  It was time to try another avenue. He handed the form back to the manager.

  Masterson rose to his feet as soon as Rusty did. “Tell Ms. Armstrong that she doesn’t have to come in tomorrow. Jackie’ll cover for her.” He nodded toward a small woman behind the register in the evening wear section. “And that we all hope you find her little boy.”

  “She’ll appreciate that,” Rusty told him, pocketing his notepad.

  And he would appreciate a few more answers, Rusty thought, leaving the store.

  She was going out of her mind.

  She was just no good at waiting, no good at being patient. She wasn’t patient by nature—at least, not with anyone but Vinny. With him she could be infinitely patient. She had to be. Vinny was pure charged energy and rarely seemed to be tired. He filled up all her hours at home to the point that she usually collapsed just after she put him to bed.

  That was probably why she hadn’t heard anything the night he was kidnapped, she thought, upbraiding herself. She’d probably dozed off without realizing it and been dead to the world.

  Angry, she paced the length of the small living room again.

  Maybe she should just take a plane to Vegas and confront the bastard.

  But what if he wasn’t on his estate? He liked to travel and there were a number of places the man could be. Vincent had once even told her that there was a family villa in Italy. Not to mention that there was a house in Chicago and a town house in New York. He could be in any one of a number of places.

  With her son.

  Emotions rushed up at her, battering her from all sides. She bit her lip, determined to not cry despite the overwhelming urge to do just that. Crying wasn’t going to solve anything. It wasn’t going to get Vinny back.

  But she felt so damn alone. And so damn scared—

  The sound of the doorbell made her jump nearly an inch off the floor. What if that was the kidnapper, back to do away with her? She wouldn’t put it past the bastard to contract a hit on her now that he had what he wanted. That was his style. That was why Vincent had tried so hard to break away.

  Looking for a weapon, she grabbed a steak knife from the sink and tucked it up inside the sleeve of her sweater. She could feel the comforting presence of the blade flat against her skin as she opened the door.

  At first she was relieved, but relief was quickly followed by disappointment.

  He was alone.

  “It’s you.” A flicker of hope had her searching Rusty’s face. “You didn’t—”

  Rusty shook his head. “No, I haven’t found him.” Not waiting for an invitation, he walked into the apartment.

  “Well, nobody’s called.” She continued holding the door open, thinking he was going to leave. “Why are you here?”

  He turned and, to her surprise, closed the door for her. “I’ve got more questions.”

  She blew out a breath. She didn’t know how much more of this she could stand and still remain civil. “Questions aren’t going to find my son.”

  He wasn’t about to be outmaneuvered. “No, but answers might.” He pinned her with a look, meaning to get at at least some of the truth. “Like, why you don’t stay in one place for long.”

  He was supposed to be looking into finding her son, not into her past. “How did you—”

  He wasn’t about to be sidetracked. “Answer my questions first.”

  She shrugged, looking away. “I get bored easily. And I like to travel.” Dakota raised her eyes to his face. Men loved it when you made them the center of your universe. “Let’s just say I’m looking for the perfect fit.”

  Though she’d said the last sentence in a studied, seductive tone, he wasn’t buying what she was selling. The seductress didn’t ring any truer for him than the salesgirl did. There was more to this woman than was at first apparent. It was clear that she was a lady on the run with a secret, a secret that might or might not be directly related to her son’s kidnapping.

  “Let’s just say you’re lying,” he contradicted, “and get that out of the way.”

  The best defense was an offense. She took immediate umbrage at his assumption. Nobody talked that way to her—even if it was true. “Hey—”

  He cut her off. “Look, personally, it doesn’t matter to me if you move every day and hit three hundred and sixty-five cities in a year, but whatever you’re hiding or running from might have a direct impact on why your son was kidnapped and by whom. If you don’t level with me,” he told her again, “I’m not going to be able to help you. The choice is yours.”

  He was right. Or maybe he was just clever at wording things. Dakota resumed pacing, running her hands along her arms. She felt cold again.

  When she swung around, it was to challenge him. “How do I know I can trust you?”

  For all she knew, he could be a plant. The organization had a great many tentacles, she’d discovered, and they could all reach far.

  “I could show you my Boy Scout merit badge.” And then Rusty’s smile faded. He could give her references, but he knew she would distrust them, as well. Everything could be faked. “You’re going to have to start to trust somebody.”

  If he only knew how ironic that sounded. That had been how everything had begun. Because she’d trusted. Trusted Vincent to not lie to her.

  But he had.

  Because he’d been afraid of losing her, he’d told her, pleading for her to understand. But it had been a lie all the same. A lie that had gotten her entrenched in deception and brought her to where she was today. A fugitive.

  “I suppose you’re right.” She took a deep breath. “All right, I’ll level with you. I don’t need you to run yo
ur investigation for me.” The uncertainty she’d had last night about Vinny’s abductors had been rooted in denial. She wasn’t denying it any longer. “I need you for protection.”

  He waited for her to start making sense. “Go on.”

  She moistened her lips. This sounded so damn melodramatic, she thought, like something out of a script. But it was all true. “I need you to help me steal my son back.”

  “Then you do know who has him.” He’d had a feeling all along that she had.

  She nodded. “I think so.”

  The pieces fell into place. He’d seen the pattern before, though then it had been in a textbook. Being confronted with it in person put a whole different feel to it.

  “Look, Ms. Armstrong, if this is some kind of a custody battle, you need a lawyer, not me.”

  “No,” Dakota insisted, “I need you.”

  She heard the pleading note in her own voice and stifled it, ashamed of herself.

  If not him, then someone else. It was just that he was already here and he might as well stay. There was something sympathetic about his eyes. Sympathetic and soft.

  “Or, more accurately put, what I need is a hero.” She turned on all the considerable charm she possessed inherently and had cultivated on the runway. “Will you be my hero, Andreini?”

  Chapter 5

  He looked at her for a long moment without answering. “That depends,” Rusty said evenly, curbing an exuberance that came naturally to him and remembering Megan’s edict about always looking before he leaped. Although, in his estimation, the red-blooded American male who wouldn’t have leaped at the chance to be this woman’s hero had probably been dead for about three or four days.

  The cautious reply wasn’t quite the answer she’d expected. Men had always been quick to do things for her, mistakenly thinking it was the fastest way to get her into bed. It pleased her that he wasn’t like that, even though it miffed her a little at the same time.

  Her eyes held his. “On what?”