Silencing Eve

Jane saved my life and I can’t have her hurt.” Earnestly she said, “I know you’ve been stalking Jane since I met you, and it’s perfectly natural behavior for you. She’s probably very receptive to you on a basic level, but you mustn’t hurt her. You’re disturbing. I think she’s very vulnerable at the moment.” Her gaze left him and went across the crowd to Mark Trevor. “If she wants sex, Trevor would be better for her right now.”
    “No!” He smothered the violence. “Margaret, I’m becoming a little annoyed with you.”
    She nodded. “It happens. I just wanted to get everything straight between us.” She looked at her watch. “It’s getting late. Some of the media people are packing up to go. This should be over with soon.” She looked up the steps again. “I don’t want to hover. Does she need me?”
    “No.”
    “Then I’ll go see if I can help Joe.” She turned. “You’re probably going to hover around here anyway. Only in you it doesn’t look protective, it looks slightly sinister.” She drifted away. “See you…”
    Hover? He did not hover.
    And he would not go away from the cottage just because Margaret accused him of doing so. Those media people would love to corner Jane while she was in the cottage and bombard her with questions. It would do no harm to grab a drink from a passing waiter and stick around until the cameras and reporters were gone.
    Dammit, that was not hovering.
    *   *   *
    “HI.” JANE CLOSED THE DOOR behind her. “It’s crazy down there. Do you mind if I hide out for a while and join you?”
    “It’s your home. I’m the one who should ask you that. I just had some thinking to do and didn’t want to interfere.” Kendra got up from the couch and went to the kitchen. “Sit down. I’ll get you a cup of coffee. You look like you could use it.”
    “Don’t say that.” Jane grimaced. “I’m fine. If I remember, it was you who told Joe I had an infection from that gunshot wound, and he should take me to that damn hospital. If you weren’t so observant, I’d have—”
    “You’d have gone on until you were so ill that Quinn would have been frantic about you as well as Eve.” She handed her a mug filled with steaming coffee. “No apologies.” Her gaze raked Jane’s face. “And you’re looking a little fragile at the moment. Should I be calling Quinn?”
    “You do, and I’ll break your neck,” Jane said. “I’m grateful for everything you did to track Eve down to that ghost town, but you worry about Eve and not me. I’ll be fine.”
    “Maybe.” Kendra’s tone was skeptical. “But I’ll let it go. You’re right. Everyone and everything has to be concentrated on Eve.” Her jaw tightened. “We were so close. We almost had that bastard. Then everything went wrong. We can’t let it happen again. Everything has to go right this time.” She took a sip of her own coffee. “Zander. Doane will be targeting Zander. We have to target him, too. Where the hell is he? He left Colorado the day that Venable told him that Doane and Eve were still alive, and Venable says he’s not answering his phone.”
    “Joe will find Zander,” Jane said grimly. “We just can’t be obvious if we want to keep the surprise factor. It’s the only weapon we have against Doane. That’s what this idiotic show is all about.” Her lips twisted. “I try to tell myself it’s all a farce, but it hurts me. I keep thinking, what if it was real? What if we’re wrong about Doane’s wanting to keep Eve alive so that he can kill her in front of Zander.” She shook her head. “But we’re not wrong. He wouldn’t have gone to all that trouble to stage that fake death if he hadn’t wanted to keep her alive a little while longer. I have to keep thinking that’s true, or I’d go crazy.”
    “Me, too,” Kendra said. “I feel guilty as hell I didn’t figure it all out sooner.” She paused. “And I agree that Doane mustn’t have any idea that we know he’s alive. I’m scared to death he might decide to change his precious plans in midstream.”
    “And kill Eve?” Jane whispered.
    “I’m not projecting that kind of scenario, any kind of scenario. I just don’t want to set Doane on a different path than the one we know he wants to travel.” She moistened her lips. “So our actions must seem absolutely logical and normal to him. Before he disposed of his buddy, Terence Blick, we know he probably had him doing surveillance on us. Venable said