“It’s a wonder,” Machek said agreeably. “But I thought…I may be all wrong about this, but I thought this wasn’t entirely up to you. If Rule orders you to do something, you have to do it, don’t you?”
Rule’s eyebrows lifted. “And you thought I’d exchange Cullen for what you insist is an object, not a person?”
“Well…” He spread his hands. “I thought you’d come up with a way to make the exchange, then reclaim him. I leave it to you to figure out how to do that. As to why you’d go to all that trouble—”
“And a certain amount of risk,” Rule said dryly.
“And risk,” Machek agreed. “Judging by your actions in Washington in October, I’d say you’re willing to risk quite a lot to protect others. But perhaps there has to be some self-interest involved, too. Something of importance to you or your people, such as the man you claim was behind the attacks in October. You’d want to find him if you could.”
“Robert Friar?” Lily said sharply. “You know where he is?’
“Not precisely. Not his exact location. But he’s in California, and I have information that may lead you to him.”
“Is he behind all this? Did he hire you?”
Machek slid her a glance as opaque as Rule at his most closed down. “I won’t answer questions until I have my property back.”
He meant it. Lily was convinced of that. How much of the rest did he mean? He’d stepped around certain statements meticulously, as a man might who preferred to speak truth, but was constrained from real honesty. Or as a clever and expert liar might. He didn’t claim to know where Friar was. He didn’t say Friar was behind this. He implied the possibility, but he wouldn’t say who had kidnapped his partner. He wouldn’t admit King had been taken.
If Lily weren’t here, he might have told Rule that much of the truth, instead of talking about “property.” Even with Lily here he might have taken that risk if they’d brought Cynna along, hoping she could find King before his captors realized the FBI was involved. Instead, they’d brought Cullen. How convenient, he’d said. “How is the exchange—” Her phone chimed the opening to “Boy” by Ra Ra Riot…Beth’s ring tone. Lily grimaced and reached into her purse to turn the ringer off. “How will the exchange be handled?”
“I don’t know. I’ll get a call sometime today or tonight with the details.”
Rule spoke. “You had us meet you here at your home. I take it this mysterious they know you’re talking to us. What do they think you’re telling us?”
His eyes flashed with what might be amusement. “Why, right now I’m telling you that I’m acting as a go-between for the real thief, who is now willing to sell it back to you in order to avoid those violent types who attacked him and tried—unsuccessfully—to steal it from him last night.”
Lily’s eyebrows lifted. “They assumed I wouldn’t see through that and arrest you?”
“They expressed confidence in my ability to talk you out of that until you had the prototype back. To keep you busy, I’m to feed you misinformation about the attempted snatch so you’ll look in the wrong places until it’s time for the exchange. Then I lure Seabourne to the place named.”
“Just Cullen?” Lily asked.
He shrugged. “I’m to bring him alone if I can, but they accept that you might not agree to that. Once we’re all in place, ah…” He cast Cullen an apologetic look. “Seabourne will be incapacitated with wolfbane.”
Rule said, “Do you know how, exactly, they plan to do that? It’s not as easy to do as it might seem, given your success with the stuff on Big Sister.”
“They didn’t say. I assumed they’d burn it, but assumptions aren’t the best guide. Should I try to find out when they call?”
Rule shook his head. “Too easy to make them suspicious. They’ll expect you to be focused on getting King…on getting your property back, not on what they do with Cullen.”
“They know I’ve some concern about his welfare. That’s how I pried out of them that they’d be using wolfbane. They assured me he’d be treated gently, that he’s no use to them dead.”
Cullen snorted his opinion of that.
“Don’t get fancy,” Lily said to Machek. “Find out anything you can about the location and means of the proposed exchange, but don’t go beyond that.” She looked at Rule, wondering where he wanted this to go. He met her gaze, but his was shuttered, telling her nothing.
When in doubt, ask questions. Lily did, coming back to the same ones in multiple ways, until Machek politely suggested she could either arrest him or leave, but he hoped they’d agree to the exchange. And at last Rule spoke again.
“We can’t agree to anything without more information,” he said, standing. “When you know the where, when, and how for this proposed exchange, call me and we’ll discuss it.”
“I have your number,” Machek said calmly, rising like a good host whose guests were departing.
He hid differently than Rule did, Lily thought. He used lightheartedness for a shield. “And mine,” she added, taking out one of her cards and setting it on the cluttered coffee table. “Just in case.”
NINETEEN
THEY were gone. At last they were gone. Thank God.
Jasper closed the door and scrubbed his face with both hands as if he could erase some of the lies he’d told. No point in dwelling on it. He’d done what he had to do.
No, that was lying to himself, a sin at least as bad as lying to others and often far more destructive. He’d chosen to put Adam’s life above these strangers’ welfare. However terrible a choice it might be, it had been his to make, and he had to admit that. If one of those strangers was his half brother, did that matter?
Not enough, he thought as he headed back to the couch where he’d snatched a few hours of sleep last night. He’d cleared away the pillow and blanket before Rule Turner and his entourage arrived. It was the first time they’d been put away since that bastard took Adam. Funny how his innate tidiness had fled ever since he got that phone call. He’d been deliberately leaving clutter around as if that would create a homing beacon for his messy partner. Adam would laugh when he saw…
God, he hoped Adam would still be able to laugh.
He sank onto the couch and picked up the card that Rule’s fiancée had left. Lily Yu. He turned it over as if he might find a clue on its blank back. She sure didn’t look like an FBI agent…she had the serious part down, but she was so little. Pretty, too, though somehow that word didn’t seem to fit. Flowers were pretty. She was…compact, he decided. As if something much larger had been crammed into a deceptively small size.
Odd choice for his brother to make. He couldn’t picture Lily Yu putting up with a partner’s roving eye, but what did he know? Nothing, really, about the lady, and not much more about the man who shared half Jasper’s genetic inheritance. No more than however many zillion others who occasionally read a gossip mag. Jasper didn’t pick them up ordinarily, but he’d been curious. Now and then he’d toyed with the idea of meeting Rule Turner. Like when his mom was dying and he learned how much Isen Turner had paid for over the years. Or when he first came out. He’d come boiling out of the damn closet, pissed at the world, and that had seemed like a great target for his anger—the overwhelmingly hetero half brother who was sure to be disgusted.
If he’d been disgusted today, he’d hidden it well. But he’d hidden everything well, hadn’t he? Jasper had seen a certain intensity, but he had no idea what the man was feeling intense about. Maybe Rule wasn’t the heedless tomcat he’d been made out to be. Maybe he used to be, but had changed. Now and then people did.