by Janie Crouch
“You will still have a job. Nobody at Omega would think you blew up that lab. You work too hard in it, put in way too many hours a day, to ever be the one who destroyed it. Drackett will have your back, believe me.”
Molly wasn’t so sure, but she hoped so. “Either way, I’d like to get started cataloging. It won’t help with your case or any of the other open cases when the lab blew, but I can definitely make progress organizing past cases.”
They made sandwiches again to eat, then called Jon. He was right on time and Derek put the phone on Speaker so Molly could hear, too.
“It’s an absolute mess here,” Jon explained. “Steering clear is the best thing you can do.”
“What’s going on?” Derek asked.
“Whoever the government official is behind all this is a freaking genius, that’s what’s going on. The whole division is crawling with Internal Affairs types.” Frustration was clear in Jon’s tone.
Derek muttered a curse.
“Yeah, no kidding,” Jon continued. “You can’t do anything around here without someone asking what it’s for and which case it involves. We’re in red tape up to our ears. Nobody can get into Steve’s office. He’s in conference with someone 24/7.”
“Can you track whose office the bureaucrats are from? That would give us a good clue as to who’s behind this.”
“It was my very first thought. Joint task force, my friend. Omega is a joint task force. Four different government offices involved. And we conveniently have people from all of those offices, so no hints there.”
Jon sighed. “Oh yeah, Molly is considered a fugitive and a number of people are asking about you, Derek.”
Derek’s lips tightened into a straight line. “And damn it, we’ve got absolutely nothing. No clue who the government person is, no evidence left from our lead and no easy way to prove Molly’s innocence.”
“Thus far it seems like Drackett has been able to sidestep any knowledge about us going down to Colombia. Of course, our government bad guy wants to keep his ties to Belisario as close to the chest as possible, so evidently Belisario having Molly has not been made common knowledge, nor has our rescue mission.”
That sounded like good news, but honestly Molly wasn’t even sure.
“It’s overkill again, Derek. Just like with everything else. All these suits in here asking questions and causing delays? It’s all a part of our guy’s plan to keep us from getting close to him.”
“Yeah, well, if he wanted us scattered and discombobulated, he’s succeeded,” Derek muttered. “And now we’re back to ground zero.”
“You should probably make an appearance at some point, Derek. Talk to the suits. Lead them away from the Molly trail. I don’t think anyone has considered that the two of you are hiding out together. Molly’s still the one they’re after with an arrest warrant.”
Derek slipped an arm around her waist. “I don’t want to leave Molly alone. Not for any reason.”
“I agree, someone needs to be with her. Maybe Liam or I can take turns.”
“Jon, do you think it would be possible for you to get my laptop from my condo?” Molly asked him. “If I’m going to be stuck out of the action, I’d like to at least get as much done as I can. But nothing that will link me to Omega or be traceable.”
“Without a doubt someone will be watching your house in case you come back there. But I can probably find an excuse to get inside. Although if someone really did have a legit warrant out for your arrest they probably already confiscated the laptop,” Jon said.
“I appreciate you trying. And bring me some clothes, if you can, okay? I look like I’m wearing a clown suit these clothes are so ill-fitting.” She glanced up at Derek. “And bring some underwear, too.”
“Something sexy,” Derek said low into her ear. Molly shivered.
“Hey, I heard that,” Jon chuckled. “Although I will pretend I didn’t. Okay—computer, clothes, underwear, anything else? Too bad your lab coat burned, Molly. I’m sure you’d love to have that. I can hardly picture you without it.”
Molly smiled. “Thanks, Jon. And actually my lab coat didn’t burn, although it smelled like a chimney. It’s sitting in my dirty clothes hamper and—”
Oh my gosh, her lab coat.
She wrapped her fist in Derek’s shirt.
“What?” Derek said, looking into her face. “Molly, what? Are you okay? Does something hurt?”
“What’s going on?” Jon asked from the phone.
“My lab coat.” How could she have forgotten? “I wore it home after the explosion and took it off when I got in the shower.”
“What about it, hon?”
“That evidence you gave me, when you came into the lab two days ago, or whenever it was... It’s still in the pocket of the coat.”
She watched Derek’s blue eyes narrow. “It wasn’t destroyed?”
“No. I don’t think so, I didn’t even check. You put the stuff in my pocket, remember? So I would know which pieces to concentrate on. I didn’t have a chance to get to them that night. They should still be in my lab coat sitting in my dirty clothes hamper.”
“Jon—” Derek started.
“I’ll check what’s going on and get over there as soon as I can.”
“I know where it is,” Molly said. “I can get it.”
“No,” both men responded at the same time.
“Jon will get into your condo and get any evidence still there,” Derek told her.
“They’re looking for you, Molly,” Jon chimed in. “You can’t go to your house.”
“Well, you’re going to at least need to find another lab or somewhere for me to work once he gets it.”
Derek was giving her a look that said he was determined to keep her as far from any danger as possible. “We’ll see.”
She took a deep breath so she wouldn’t punch him. “Fine.” She would deal with that later once Jon had the evidence pieces and they knew what exactly they were dealing with.
“Keep us posted as soon as you can get there,” Derek told Jon. They exchanged burner phone numbers, and Derek made her memorize the numbers, too. “Jon, be sure to watch your back. There are eyes everywhere.”
Chapter Seventeen
Waiting for Jon to be able to get into Molly’s condo was pretty agonizing. Derek had a lot more practice waiting, again thanks to his Special Forces background, than her. She was practically wearing a hole in the floor waiting for Jon to call.
He’d already distracted her—hell, distracted them both—right here on this couch, for an hour or so, then distracted her again while they took a shower. But now she was determined to focus on the evidence Jon would be getting from her condo.
She wanted to go, but there was no way he was taking her anywhere near there. Not when her place was undoubtedly under surveillance by multiple groups of people: federal agents, maybe Belisario’s men, the unknown government official’s men. Everyone was looking for her. And Derek wasn’t going without her—leaving her alone was not an option he was even willing to consider. After the scares he’d had with her over the past couple of days, he wasn’t sure he’d ever be able to let her out of his sights again.
Derek’s phone buzzed and Molly immediately sat down so they could read the text. Jon was finally able to make his way out of Omega HQ and was heading toward her condo.
“Okay, so we should go, right? It will take us at least an hour and a half to make it back into the city. Jon will have gotten into my place much sooner than that.”
They had agreed, Molly using one of their distraction times to sway him, to go back into Colorado Springs so she could process the evidence once Jon got it. Or at least look at it and see what needed to be done. They’d use a lab at a law enforcement training facility that Liam had access to.
“If
he’s just now leaving Omega, he won’t be taking a straight route there. He’ll have to get rid of any tails he’ll undoubtedly pick up.”
“How do you know?”
“It’s what I would do.” Hatton worked for the Crisis Management Unit putting out fires, but the man still had sharpened skills when it came to subterfuge and surveillance.
They got in the car not long afterward and drove toward Colorado Springs. Jon would be contacting them to let them know what he could find. Derek prayed Molly’s lab coat was still there and the evidence undamaged.
It was a huge break. The evidence in Molly’s lab coat was key to everything. Those pieces were the reason why Omega’s lab lay in ruins and Molly had bruises all over her face. And Derek was going to make sure he took down the bastard whose door it led to.
They rode in comfortable silence except for the tension Derek could feel humming through Molly. He wished she would sleep; her body needed rest since it was recuperating from a trauma. But he knew there was no way of that happening, not the way she was wired.
“What’s taking him so long?” Molly asked once they were just a few miles outside of the city. “Shouldn’t he have already checked in? Do you think something went wrong?”
“No. Don’t borrow trouble.” He reached over to hold her hand. “Getting rid of someone tailing you can take a long time, especially when you’re trying not to be obvious about it.”
“I know. This is why I work in the lab and don’t do cloak-and-dagger stuff! Just give me a microscope or a petri dish and I’m fine, but I can’t stand this.”
“Give Jon some more time, baby. He’ll be all right.”
The phone rang just a few minutes later. Derek put it on Speaker. “How’s it going?”
“Not good, man. I have multiple people tailing me. One was definitely government, I lost him. The other two? I don’t know who they are, but I can’t shake them, not by myself. They’re working together.”
Derek muttered a curse under his breath.
“Is Liam available?”
“No,” Jon told them. “He’s running as much interference as he can at Omega. Believe me, he’s more help there than he would be here.”
There was a moment of silence before Jon continued. “I think the best plan may be for me to lead them away and for you guys to get to her house, Derek.”
Derek didn’t like that plan, but he had to agree. If they wanted to get the evidence out tonight, he and Molly were going to have to do it.
“Roger that, Jon. Just keep trying to lose them. We’ll take care of retrieving the evidence.”
“Sorry, buddy.” Jon clicked off the call.
“Looks like it’s up to us.” Derek changed the direction of the car so they were heading toward her house. “But I can almost guarantee you there are other people watching your house. Waiting to see if you come back.”
Their best bet was to use the fact that they were together. The people watching her home would be looking for Molly by herself, but not a couple.
But he knew it wouldn’t be enough to actually fool anybody watching. No matter if it was her going in alone or her going in with another person, the teams watching her house were going to pounce as soon as Molly showed up.
Derek knew there was more than one group watching. Maybe they would take each other out, trying to get to them.
As far as plans went, that was the worst ever.
The second best plan was him going in by himself. But that would leave Molly outside, unprotected. He needed to stash her somewhere safe.
“Okay, I have a question,” Molly said. “Will the bad guys or whoever is watching my condo be watching my neighbor’s unit, too?”
“Peripherally, maybe. But not primarily. Why?”
“Mrs. Pope, three doors down, has access to the roof through a hatch door. So does my unit. Something about fire code.”
Molly’s home was a condo, but the building itself was set up more like town houses. The five units were stacked side by side to each other, rather than on top of each other. Each home was tall and narrow, but it gave them all their own little piece of backyard.
“Two of us together going to your Mrs. Pope’s house? That might work. We’ll just keep you bundled up so you can’t be identified.”
He liked it better than leaving her unprotected.
“It’s nine o’clock in the evening. We’d better hurry up because she goes to bed by ten, I’m sure,” she told him. “She’s not going to like this as it is.”
If the evidence at Molly’s house wasn’t so important, Derek wouldn’t even try something this risky. But he didn’t have a choice. So they were about to go disturb old Mrs. Pope.
They drove for a few minutes before Derek found the place where he wanted to park, three blocks from her house at the corner of a four-way stop. This would give them multiple directions to leave if one route was cut off. There were also at least five different alleys and side streets if they needed to abandon the SUV and leave on foot.
May in Colorado wasn’t hot, especially at night, which was good for how he and Molly would be huddling together down the street to Mrs. Pope’s unit.
“Okay, it’s just like at the hospital. Stay close to me, head down, so no one can see your face. I’m going to be doing the same, because anybody watching the house may know who I am, too. Just pretend like we’re lovers and want to be really close to each other.”
She cocked her head to the side and raised an eyebrow. “Pretend?”
Derek chuckled. “Just stay close.”
He could feel the tension in Molly as they walked down the block. Her arm was wrapped around his waist and his was down her back and resting at her hip. She was on his left side so he would have free range of motion if he needed to get to his weapon.
“Did I ever tell you I grew up on a horse ranch in Wyoming?” he said to her in a conversational tone. She had to relax or they were going to stick out to anyone looking. “I was raised by my uncle and the other ranch hands.”
“Really? I didn’t know that. Did you like it?”
“I don’t know that I would say that I liked it. It was hard, demanding work every single day. Good weather or bad.” He remembered many a morning in the winter when he’d had no desire to go outside whatsoever. “But the land there? The mountains? They’re carved into my soul.”
She nodded. “Wyoming. That’s a pretty amazing place.”
“And if you’re good, maybe I’ll let you see me with my cowboy hat on later.”
She laughed and leaned closer into him. Which was exactly what he wanted. The more realistic they were in looking like lovers going somewhere, the less likely they were to draw the surveillance teams’ attention for the wrong reason.
“I know what you’re doing,” she said as they continued walking.
“Doesn’t matter. You can still see me in it if you’re good.” He winked at her.
They turned the corner to the street her row of condos was on.
“Okay, Mrs. Pope’s house is right here.” She gestured to the door three down from her own.
Molly rang the doorbell. Derek stood directly behind her, trying to block her from the line of sight of anyone else. He also tried to keep an eye out to either side of them without making it obvious he was doing so.
They were at their most vulnerable right now. The seconds dragged on. Evidently Mrs. Pope wasn’t home.
“Let’s go,” he murmured. “She’s not here.”
“No, give her a minute. She’s slow and she’s probably irritated that it’s so late.”
Sure enough a few seconds later a woman old enough to be his grandmother opened the door, just slightly, chain obviously still on.
“Hi, Mrs. Pope. It’s me, Molly from a couple doors down?”
“Molly, dear, what
are you doing here so late?”
“Well, it’s a really long, funny story...”
Derek nudged Molly gently in the back. There was no time for a long story—funny or not.
“But—” Molly switched gears “—I won’t waste your time with that right now because I know you’re probably getting ready for bed. But do you mind if we get to the roof from your access? I locked myself out.”
“I keep telling you to make an extra set of keys, dear.” Derek prayed the older woman wouldn’t make this an object lesson.
“I know, Mrs. Pope, you’re so right. And I will, I promise.”
“Okay, come on in. I guess your friend can come, too, if he is trustworthy.”
Did the woman think he was going to pounce on her?
“Thank you so much, Mrs. Pope. We’re sorry to disturb you.”
The woman closed the door, and after a long moment opened it again, this time without the chain. Derek could almost feel eyes boring into his back. He needed to get them inside. Now.
He put his hand at Molly’s waist and ushered her inside. Mrs. Pope gave an audible sigh at the way Derek moved them all from the porch. He felt better as he closed the door behind them.
Once they were inside, Mrs. Pope got a good look at Molly’s face.
“Oh my goodness, Molly. What happened to you?”
Assuming Derek was the cause of Molly’s bruises, the older woman literally pulled Molly away from him and put herself in the middle. As if to make herself a barrier between them.
It was actually endearing, the way she was so protective of Molly. Until she turned a glaring eye at Derek. He had to fight the urge not to take a step backward.
“I’m okay, Mrs. Pope.” Molly touched the other woman’s arm. “I was in an accident. There was a fire at my work.”
“Oh, yes, I saw that on the news, dear.”
“Derek is one of my...colleagues at Omega. He’s very trustworthy.”
Mrs. Pope turned an eye back at him again. She didn’t looked convinced.