Red Alert, page 5
His use of her first name struck a chord she wasn’t entirely comfortable with, and had her hissing out a breath. A week. He was going to be dogging her tracks for the next seven days, probably ambushing her attempts to gather investors.
She didn’t know much about Erik Falco, but she had a pretty good idea he wouldn’t give up easily. Hell, he’d been working to get the deal done for months, and it hadn’t been until the last few days that Cage had begun yielding to the hospital’s growing financial pressures.
Come to think of it… “None of this started until Cage agreed in principle to FalcoTechno’s offer,” Meg said slowly. “What if someone’s trying to sabotage the deal?”
“If that’s the case, I expect you’ll track them down and offer to help.” Erik’s grimace suggested he was being sarcastic, but he continued. “It is possible, though. Several other companies are in the running for the NPT technology.”
“Nobody’s in the running,” Meg snapped. Her eyes itched, her brain felt as if it were stuffed with cotton batting and she was perilously close to tears. She bit her lip until the urge receded. “But I think it’s a valid hypothesis. If—and this is only hypothetical—if we agree that Erik and I were the target of these attacks, then our attacker could be someone trying to tank the deal.”
Detective Sturgeon flattened an index card on the table in front of him, apparently eschewing his partner’s technology. “Names?”
Erik flicked his fingers to dismiss the question. “I’ll work that end of things.”
Meg expected the detectives to rip a layer off him for the I’ve-got-money-I’m-above-your-rules attitude.
Instead Peters said, “We’d appreciate it—on an unofficial basis, of course. But I’ll still need a list of everyone who might have reason to want you or Dr. Corning dead.”
The last word sent a chilly spear through her midsection and she fought a shiver.
“I’ve got a few names,” Erik said, not sounding particularly upset by the fact. “How about you, Doc?”
“There’s nobody,” she said, pressing her fingers to her temples, where stress and nerves pounded in an increasing rhythm. “I can’t imagine anyone wanting to hurt me.”
“When the NPT technology is released, there’s going to be a big shift in the open market,” Erik pointed out. “Jobs’ll be lost. Cash equity is going to move around. Money is a powerful motive.”
Meg scowled, hearing the sentiment echo in her father’s voice. For some people, money is the best motive.
Even as a young girl, she’d known he meant her mother. Though many years and a few awkward meetings with the woman who had birthed her had given Meg some perspective, the fact remained. Her mother had cared less for her family than she had for things that couldn’t be bought on an academic’s salary.
The door opened and a dark-haired cop stuck his head into the room, interrupting. “Detectives? I think you’ll want to see this.”
Sturgeon rose and followed the man out. Peters shut down his PDA and said, “Wait here, I’ll see what’s up.”
But before he cleared the room, Sturgeon was back. The older detective spoke quietly in his partner’s ear. Peters stiffened and cursed before turning to Meg and Erik. “We’ll have to continue this later. We’ll be in touch.”
Erik rose. “A break?”
“Yes, but not in your case,” Sturgeon answered on his way out the door.
Peters paused and leveled a finger at Erik. “Don’t go Lone Ranger. You’re not on the job anymore. Find out what you can from the sidelines and leave the heavy lifting to us.”
“I don’t have much of a choice,” Erik said, leaning on the two-toned cane.
But Peters’s eyes darkened speculatively before he let the door swing shut in his wake, leaving Meg to think he’d noticed, too, how Falco’s reliance on the cane seemed to change with his mood.
Or maybe that was her imagination, brought on by too much stress and her unwilling awareness of the man.
She gathered her things and rose. “I guess I’ll head back to the lab.”
Surprise flashed in his dark eyes. “You’re not going home? Surely, you can take the rest of the day off after the morning you’ve had.”
“Sorry, no. I have work to do.”
The truth was that she didn’t want to go home.
It had been hard enough the night before, when she’d checked the doors and windows twice and still hadn’t felt completely safe. Now, knowing that the accident with the cement hadn’t been an accident at all, she didn’t imagine the wooden storm door with the single-barrel bolt would feel any safer. She was better off in the lab, which had levels of security between her and the outside world.
“I’ll walk you over.”
Though part of her wanted to tell him to leave her the hell alone and go back to his own life, she sucked it up and nodded. “Fine.” Then she slanted him a look. “The question is, am I safer with or without you?”
Though the question could have too many layers, he grimaced and took it at face value. “I wish I knew. If I’m the target, then you’re safer without me. If you’re the target, then you’re safer—at least marginally—with me. If we’re both being targeted…hell, who knows? We’re watching each other’s backs or we’re making it easier on them by leaving a single target. Hard to tell.”
His answer was anything but reassuring, but Meg appreciated the honesty. She jerked her head toward the door. “Okay. Let’s go.”
They were both tense as they left the Chinatown police station and turned toward Washington Street. It would take longer for them to find a cab and fight the lunchtime traffic than it would to walk the four short blocks back to Boston General. But walking left them out in the open.
Unprotected.
Meg wasn’t sure whether the creeping feeling that descended the back of her neck and set up residence in her stomach was the power of suggestion or not. As they waited to cross Washington Street, she glanced over her shoulder, looking for…damn, she didn’t know what she was looking for.
“Relax,” Erik said quietly from beside her. “I’ve got your back.”
The light turned then and the pedestrian sign went the white of “walk.” As they started across, she glanced at his stern, set profile. “Who’s got yours?”
“I don’t need anyone to get my back. I’m a tough guy.” His lips twisted in a self-deprecating smile as he walked with a heavy hitch in his step. “Or not.”
But Meg was starting to see the holes in his act. She remembered the detectives’ attitudes toward him—part caution, part camaraderie. “You were a cop, weren’t you?”
His step faltered, then resumed as they reached the other curb and turned up the final block to the hospital. “A long time ago.” His cynical smile twisted tighter. “Why? Does that make you feel safer? It shouldn’t. I’ve been a civilian for the past eight years.”
“What happened?”
“It’s not important,” he said flatly. “It has nothing to do with the attacks.”
They reached the hospital and crossed the main atrium in a tense silence that told her there would be no more small talk.
She paused at the stairs, where the door was propped open and the foot traffic was unusually heavy. She glanced over at the elevator lobby and her stomach tightened at the sight of crime scene tape and cops.
“Let’s take the—” She broke off and shook her head. “Never mind. Sorry. We can take the other set of elevators.”
“I can climb stairs,” he said sharply. “It’s a cane, not a wheelchair. You don’t need to make a big deal about it.”
“Why not? You do,” Meg snapped, irritated with him, with the whole rotten situation. Then she blew out a breath. “Sorry.”
“Don’t be.” He turned away and headed for the stairs, back straight and stiff, walking almost normally.
She hurried to catch up and reached to grab his shoulder. “Wait.”
The heat of him radiated through the material of his shirt, and his muscles were tense and bunched beneath her touch. He stopped and turned, forcing her to drop her hand. His dark brows were drawn low over his piercing eyes, and his expression held something dark and forbidding. “What?”
She forced herself to stand up to him when she wanted to fall back a step. “Look, I said I was sorry. It’s just…this is weird for me. I don’t like it.”
His lips twisted. “I’m not a big fan of attempted murder, either, especially when I’m the target.”
She blew out a breath. “It’s not just that. It’s this whole situation. You’re not actually planning on shadowing me for the next six and a half days, are you? I mean, I don’t spend that much time with anyone. You hardly know me.”
“I know enough,” he said. “Meg Corning, daughter of Felicity and Robert Corning, divorced. Your mother is married to the president of TCR Pharmaceuticals. Your father, who raised you from the age of five when your mother left, won a Nobel Prize a few years ago for his early work on gene therapy.
“In an act of teenage rebellion you left home at eighteen and hitched your way around the globe, working your way from one extreme sport to the next.” His eyes were unreadable as he continued. “You had at least two serious relationships during that time—one with a skydiver, one with a scientist, neither lasting more than six months. You resurfaced in grad school at twenty-five and swore you’d prove that fetal cells circulate in the maternal bloodstream. It sounded like another extreme sport, only extreme science this time around. But to everyone’s surprise, you actually succeeded, and hit the cover of Science magazine with your first major paper on Noninvasive Prenatal Testing. Since then, you’ve settled down and focused on perfecting the technique.”
When he paused, she gritted her teeth. “Are you done?”
“Not quite.” Now he looked at her, and those piercing eyes seemed to cut through to her core. “You live alone in a town house near Beacon Hill, you don’t date, and you joined a gym last winter. You attend yoga classes three times a week and climbing classes every Friday night.”
A chill worked its way through her. “Are you trying to tick me off or freak me out?”
He looked away. “Maybe a bit of both. I want to make sure you understand how easy it is to get that sort of information if you don’t mind paying.”
Meg stalled as fear tangled around resentment in her chest. Resentment won. “You’ve made it clear that you don’t mind paying, whether or not something’s for sale.” She frowned. “I don’t suppose you want to return the favor and give me the thirty-second version of Erik Falco? Since you’re threatening to shadow me for the next six-plus days, it seems only fair that I know something about you.”
His expression closed suddenly, becoming blank. Impenetrable. “What I want known is public record. The rest is private.”
“Which tells me exactly nothing.”
He took a breath and glanced around, a not-so-subtle reminder that they were standing in the Boston General elevator lobby. “Let’s go upstairs.”
“Let’s not,” she countered, knowing she was being petty, but damn tired of letting circumstances push her around. “I’d like to know who’s looking over my shoulder.”
He gritted his teeth. “Fine. My name is Erik Charles Falco. I’m thirty-eight, I’m single, and I’m looking to stay that way.”
“There you are!” a female voice broke in, and suddenly Raine Montgomery was between them. Dark hollows beneath her eyes spoke of a sleepless night, but her expression brightened when she ranged herself beside Erik and touched his sleeve. “Are you coming up with me?”
He stared at her for a moment as though he barely recognized her. “Yeah, sure, I’m headed—” He broke off with a telling glance at Meg. “Of course.”
The three of them climbed the stairs to the fifth floor while Erik briefed Raine on the elevator “accident.” The other woman made all the right noises of fear and distress, but kept herself firmly wedged between Meg and Erik.
I’m single, he’d said, and I’m looking to stay that way.
But as Meg watched Raine guide him away and keep him carefully engaged, she realized that single hood was as good as gone if Erik’s vice president of pharmaceuticals had anything to say about it.
And that thought annoyed her to no end.
THE DETECTIVES APPEARED in the lab a few hours later to continue their questioning. As he sat in Meg’s office, listening to Peters ask her about her business contacts and ex-employees, Erik’s attention was split.
Part of him analyzed the information like the businessman he had become, mentally reviewing the files he’d amassed on the major players at Boston General and Thrace University, and considering whether the threats could be coming from an enemy of FalcoTechno. Part of him listened with the ears of the cop he had once been. But still another part of him was too aware of Meg, of the way she caught her lower lip between her teeth before answering each question, as though this was an exam she was determined to pass.
He was aware of the curve at the side of her neck, where her red-gold hair hung down to shade her face ever so slightly, and he was aware that she looked at him sidelong when she didn’t think he was paying attention, as if she was trying to figure him out.
Or was that all calculated?
The part of him that noticed her scent wanted to believe that she was genuine. But a pulse of pain—phantom, perhaps, but real nonetheless—in his leg was a living reminder of a fatal summer day when he’d learned one important lesson.
When a beautiful woman who has every reason to hate you shows interest instead, she has an agenda.
“I’ve racked my brain,” Meg said, returning Erik’s attention to the detectives’ questions. “I’ve come up with a few other scientists who were fairly vocal in their efforts to disprove NPT.” She grabbed a pen and scribbled three names. “The top two lost fairly major drug-company funding after I made my announcement. They weren’t pleased.” She grimaced, indicating that was an understatement, but continued. “Still, I can’t imagine them thinking that hurting me would fix anything. They’re smart, rational people.”
Erik snorted. “Rationality has a tendency to fly out the window when large sums of money are involved.”
She glanced at him. “Which is why I think that it’s much more likely we’ll find our man on your list. Industry attracts the scientists who are more—” she paused before saying “—aggrandizing. Self-centered. In it for the quick buck.”
Erik tipped his head. “Are those your words or your father’s?”
Her eyes darkened and her mouth compressed to a thin line. “Don’t believe everything your investigators told you.”
“Believe me, I make my own opinions. I just like to collect all the available data before I do,” Erik said.
“Getting back to the matter at hand,” Detective Peters broke in, “our reason for coming here this morning was twofold.” He nodded at Meg’s scrib bled list. “We wanted to see if you’d come up with any possible suspects. But we also wanted to update you on our investigation.”
Erik stiffened, knowing damn well that self-respecting cops usually tried their hardest to keep civilians out of the loop until they had something definitive. That meant that either they were extending him an ex-cop’s courtesy or they had something major to report.
The grim expression on Sturgeon’s jowly face suggested the latter.
“We had an engineer look at the elevators. There were remote-controlled charges wired to different cables in each of the shafts. You two got lucky,” Peters said. “If you’d picked either of the other cars, the emergency brakes wouldn’t have kicked in near the bottom.”
Oh, hell, Erik thought. “How much of a radius did the remote receiver have?”
“A few hundred yards, maybe less,” Peters answered.
That drew a gasp from Meg. “Someone triggered it from inside the hospital?”
“They had to be inside to plant the charges in the first place,” Erik reminded her. “And don’t forget that someone was in the cement truck the other day to drop that load on top of you. This wasn’t the first time he—or she—was near us.”
The truck’s real driver had been found between the skids of a nearby front-end loader. He’d been attacked from behind, knocked unconscious and gagged, and hadn’t been able to describe his assailant. But knowing that their attacker had been right near them inside the hospital, waiting to see which elevator they would board, which charge to detonate, added to the sense of invasion.
“Does the hospital have video surveillance on the hallways?” Erik asked.
“In the hallways and lobbies.” Peters lifted one shoulder in a negative half shrug. “Not in the elevator shafts, though, or in the access areas.”
“In other words, we don’t have a picture of our saboteur,” Erik said flatly. “Or if we do, there’s no way for us to identify him because there are hundreds, if not thousands, of people in and out of the hospital on a daily basis.”
“Which leaves us where?” Meg demanded. She’d gone pale and her fingers were knotted together in her lap.
“Still working on it,” Peters said. He glanced between Erik and Meg. “Until we’ve got a better idea of who and what we’re looking for, I think we need to assume that both of you are in danger.” He focused on Erik. “You carrying?”
“No,” Erik answered flatly. “Not with my current balance—or lack thereof.”
The detective shifted uncomfortably. There was little a cop hated more than being reminded of his own mortality. His own potential for disaster.
“Don’t worry,” Erik said, glossing over the awkward moment. “I’ll keep a very close eye on Dr. Corning.”
“Who asked you to?” she scoffed. “I’m perfectly safe in the lab—have you seen how many codes it takes to get in here? Besides, I have work to do.”
