by Rebecca York
As she looked toward the stairs, she was suddenly able to picture her cozy bedroom. She’d painted it blue and white, and continued the theme with the curtains and bedspread. She knew it was better not to go up and look at the mess, and better not to go up there and get trapped.
With a grimace, she returned to the kitchen, picked up a set of measuring spoons from the floor and looked around. Oak cabinets. Ceramic tile on the floor and some kind of fake stone on the countertops. The room looked like it had been renovated in the past five years, but it was as wrecked as the office. Cabinet doors hung open, and food had been emptied out, as though someone had thought she might hide important information in a cereal box.
Matt joined her.
“Sorry. It looks like they would have found anything of value.”
“Maybe not,” she muttered.
The searchers had taken apart all the obvious places, but was she clever enough to have thought of somewhere they wouldn’t have considered?
Like, would she have hidden something in a box of tampons? Probably not, because every spy knew that old trick.
After returning to the office, she looked around and saw a bulletin board. Excitement leaped inside her when she saw several name tags from conferences hanging on pins.
“I’m a social worker,” she breathed.
“Looks like it.”
She swallowed hard. “I guess we have that in common—taking jobs where we could help people, because that was the only way we could connect.”
“Yeah.”
She picked up a framed diploma from the floor. “And I have a master’s degree from the University of Maryland.”
“Which might mean you grew up in the area—or not. It could be that they had the kind of program you were looking for.”
Matt walked into the closet area. When she heard him open the window, she poked her head around the filing cabinets.
“What are you doing?”
“What I learned to do in Africa. Making sure there’s an alternative exit if we need it.”
* * *
GARY SOUTHWELL LOOKED at his watch. He and Hank Patterson had been staking out Elizabeth Forester’s house since he’d gotten his new orders from Mr. Lang. They were supposed to check in with each other every half hour, and Patterson hadn’t phoned. Which was unsettling because the man had been punctual as clockwork until this time.
Southwell clicked the phone one more time, trying to get his partner. Finally he gave up and wondered what he should do. Not call Lang. His boss was already annoyed by their lack of progress in apprehending Elizabeth Forester. The woman had determination—and grit. He’d give her that. And apparently she’d found a guy who wasn’t going to leave her twisting in the wind.
Had they known each other before she landed in the hospital or what? If not, it was shocking that the doctor was laying his life on the line for a woman he’d met only a few days ago. Gary sure wouldn’t do it. He laughed. Or for any other broad. They simply weren’t worth it.
He slipped out of the car where he’d been sitting for hours and looked around as he stretched, then started down the block, glancing back at the house before turning the corner. If Forester and the doctor were in there, he was giving them the chance to get out the front, but on balance, he had to risk it.
In the alley, he hurried to the back door, where Patterson was supposed to be stationed. He wasn’t there, but as Gary approached the house, he heard a muffled sound of distress in the bushes. When he cautiously approached, he found his partner lying on the ground, taped hand and foot.
Gary pulled the tape off his mouth. “What the hell happened to you?”
“They got the drop on me.”
“You mean Elizabeth and that doctor?”
“Yeah,” Patterson said as Gary freed his partner’s wrists and started working on his legs.
Patterson shook his hands and kicked his feet to get the circulation going.
“What happened, exactly?”
“I’m not sure. It was like...” He stopped and glanced at Gary. “Like they hurled a thunderbolt or something at me.”
“That’s impossible. Maybe they had a Taser gun.”
Patterson considered the idea. “I don’t know what it was. I’m just sayin’, be damned careful if you get near them.”
“Were you unconscious?”
“Maybe for a little while.”
“Okay,” Gary muttered, wondering what they were going to do now and thinking about that five-minute window when he’d left his post and headed back here—to find Patterson.
Could they have gotten away while his partner was out?
“Did you see them leave?” Gary asked.
“I don’t think so.”
“Then we’d better assume they saw me out front, which means they wouldn’t go out that way.” Gary glanced at Patterson. “You steady on your feet?”
“Steady enough to kill those bastards.”
“Waste the guy. The boss wants to do the woman himself.”
“You mean do her—then kill her?”
“Yeah.”
* * *
IN THE OFFICE, Elizabeth picked up some of the papers scattered on the floor and thumbed through them. “These are records of some of my clients.”
After righting the desk chair, she sat down and started to read one of the cases. “This woman was living in a flophouse in Baltimore. It looks like she came into the country illegally.”
“I know you want to understand what you were doing, but I think you don’t have time to read cases now.”
She gave him an exasperated look. “They could be clues to what was going on—when those thugs tried to grab me after the accident.”
“Maybe you can take some with you. We’ve got to get out of here pretty fast.”
She nodded but didn’t move.
“There’s got to be something here,” she murmured as she looked around the shambles that had been her office. “Something they missed.”
“How do you know?”
She shrugged. “I just do. And maybe you can help me figure it out.”
Standing, she reached for Matt. Pulling him close, she molded her body against his as they stood in the middle of the mess. His arms stroked up and down her back, and as she held on to him, she felt the familiar merging of their minds that had so quickly become necessary to her existence.
Yes, he silently agreed.
She wanted to simply revel in the special closeness they shared, but she knew there wasn’t time for that now. What she had to do was search for the memories he’d brought back to her. Not something long ago. Something recent.
Eyes closed, she mentally looked around the room trying to figure out what she couldn’t remember on her own.
Her mental gaze shifted to the bulletin board. There were several whimsical things stuck to it including a couple greeting cards, a Mardi Gras mask, two cocktail swizzle sticks and a key ring with a small flashlight attached.
Matt followed her thoughts as she stepped away from him and reached for the key ring. She had just taken it down from the board when an unwelcome noise made them both go still.
In the quiet of the house, they heard the front door open.
Chapter Nine
Matt froze. He’d known all along that coming to Elizabeth’s place was taking a chance, but he’d also been desperate to help her get more information about herself. Now it appeared that they’d run out of luck. He looked at Elizabeth, seeing the terror on her face—and also the anger. These guys kept coming after her like a relentless robot killer in a science-fiction movie, and now one or more of them were in the house with them.
Stealthy footsteps crept slowly down the hall.
What are we going to do? Elizabeth asked.
Get out the escape hatch.
Thank God you thought of one.
He ushered Elizabeth behind him. Climb out the window.
What about you?
I’ll block them, then follow. Head for the car.
He knew she wanted to argue about the hastily conceived plan, but she silently acknowledged there was no alternative.
Stepping around the filing cabinets, she headed for the open window.
He pulled out the gun that he’d taken away from the guy they’d encountered out back. What had happened while they were inside, exactly? Had Polly’s killer found his partner and set him free? Or had the guy out front come around back? And did whoever was out there know Matt was armed?
Matt tensed as the footsteps came closer, his attention divided between Elizabeth and the invaders. In his mind he could see her climbing out the window and dropping down to the narrow space between her house and the one next door.
When he knew she was outside, he breathed out a small sigh. She was safely out of the house, but he knew the man who had killed Polly Kramer wouldn’t hesitate to do the same to Matthew Delano.
“We know you’re in there,” one of the thugs called out. “Come out with your hands up, and you won’t be hurt.”
Oh, sure.
Could they really know he was in here? Or were they guessing? Apparently they didn’t remember there was a back way out of the room. But Matt couldn’t just run for it. If they came through the door, they could catch him on the way out and drill him in the back.
To give himself a few extra seconds, Matt fired through the doorway.
Curses rang behind him—the voices telling him there were at least two guys out there—as he ducked into the area behind the filing cabinets.
One of the men in the hall fired an answering shot through the door.
Matt reached the window and was thankful that Elizabeth had pushed it open farther. Climbing halfway out, he returned fire before hurling himself through the opening.
He wasn’t surprised to find Elizabeth waiting for him on the ground. Even without reading her thoughts, he knew she wasn’t going to take off and leave him there.
Thank God. Her exclamation of relief rang in his head as he pressed his shoulder to hers.
He didn’t waste his breath or his mental energy upbraiding her for staying in the path of danger. Instead, he focused on the window, knowing she was following his thoughts and lending him power. When a head appeared above them, Matt hurled a bolt of energy at the man, who made a wheezing sound and dropped back inside.
Come on.
With Elizabeth right behind him, Matt ran down the narrow side passage, then climbed over the waist-high fence between the two houses, reaching to help her over.
They sprinted through the yard, through the back gate and down the alley.
No shots followed, presumably because the guys weren’t going to take a chance on a gun battle outdoors in a residential neighborhood. Or maybe they were worried about Matt’s secret weapon.
But he and Elizabeth weren’t exactly home free. Before they’d reached the end of the alley, a police siren sounded in the distance.
“Someone must have heard the shooting in your house,” he said as he slowed his pace, walking at normal speed toward his car.
Moments later, they were inside the vehicle and on their way out of the neighborhood, leaving the cops and the thugs behind them.
Elizabeth sat rigidly in her seat, and Matt knew what was in her mind. He was torn between escaping and giving her the reassurance they both needed.
He turned onto a side street, made another turn, and pulled up under a low-hanging maple tree that partially hid them from the street.
When he cut the engine, she turned to him with a little sob that was part relief and part frustration. He slid his seat back and reached for her, pulling her into his arms, holding tight as he ran his hands over her back and shoulders, thankful that they had both made it out of her house alive.
Her apology rang in his mind.
I’m so sorry.
Not your fault.
You said it was too dangerous to go there.
But I also said we had to do it. We both knew it was necessary.
They almost caught us.
But they didn’t.
As they silently spoke, she brought her mouth to his for a frantic kiss. And his response was no less emotional. If they hadn’t been on a public street, he knew they would have been tearing each other’s clothing off in the next moment and making frenzied love.
But here in the car in a residential neighborhood, all they could do was clutch tightly, kissing and touching and silently proclaiming how glad they were that they’d found each other and how relieved they were that they’d escaped from Derek Lang’s men.
The name jolted through both of them. He knew that the heightened emotions of the moment had made it pop into Elizabeth’s head. But he also knew from her thoughts that she was sure it was right. He was the man who’d sent the thugs after her—when she’d crashed her car, then later at Polly Kramer’s house and now. She looked at Matt, and he caught the swell of victory pounding through her.
Derek Lang. That’s his name, she shouted in his mind.
Yes.
The next question is, what did I do to him?
I hope we’ve got the answer.
She nodded as she reached into her pocket and pulled out the small flashlight that she’d taken from the bulletin board. The men who’d searched the house had ignored it as just part of her kitschy office decorations, but when she’d unscrewed the top, she pulled out the thumb drive hidden inside.
“They got the hard drive, but they didn’t get this,” she said. “Hopefully it duplicates what was in the computer.”
“Clever of you.”
She grinned at him. “Yes, if I do say so myself.”
“Let’s hope it’s got what we need. I’d like to figure out what’s going on.”
“But we need a computer.” She smiled as she caught his next thought and murmured, “Your laptop is in your trunk.”
“Yeah.”
“Clever of you to bring it along.”
“I thought it might come in handy.”
She didn’t ask where they were going because he knew she saw the picture of the motel room that had formed in his mind.
She scooted back to the other side of the car. He slid his seat closer to the wheel again and drove away, being careful to stay under the speed limit.
Matt slowed at the row of fast-food restaurants where they’d bought lunch.
“We just used up a lot of energy with that mental stuff. We should get something to eat,” he said.
She tipped her head toward him. “That might be what came out of your mouth, but you were thinking about something else.”
“I guess I can’t hide that X-rated image of the two of us in bed. But we’ve got to keep our priorities straight. Food, work and then pleasure. What do you want for dinner?”
When a picture of a large pizza, loaded with cheese, vegetables and meat, leaped into her mind, he said, “Excellent choice.”
They bought the pizza along with soft drinks and brought it back to the motel.
* * *
MATT DROVE THROUGH the lot before he stopped, but as far as he could tell, nobody suspicious was hanging around. Still he had Elizabeth wait in the car while he retrieved the laptop from the trunk.
After he’d ushered her inside, he set the computer and the food on the table, then locked the door and checked out the bathroom.
“There’s a window in here,” he announced.
“In case we have to make another quick getaway?”
“I’m just being cautious.”
“It was lucky yo
u were being cautious at my house.”
They looked at each other for a long moment. We have to practice restraint and discipline, he forced himself to say.
Opening the box, he selected a slice of pizza and put it on a paper plate while he booted up his computer.
He looked over and saw Elizabeth watching him.
“You can just eat like that—after someone’s tried to kill you?”
“That’s the best time for a hearty meal.”
She shook her head and reached for a slice, pulling her chair around to his side of the table so she could look at the screen while she ate.
“Okay, this is good,” she admitted.
He inserted the thumb drive into the USB port. They both ate pizza and sipped their drinks while they waited for the start-up routine to complete.
“What do you think is on the drive?” he asked.
“I don’t know. Too bad it’s not my biography.”
“Since we know your name, I’m sure we can get an approximation. There’s probably a bio of you at the place where you work. Maybe one of the county or city social service agencies.”
“I didn’t think of that. But let’s read the thumb drive first.”
He switched the computer’s attention to the external drive and got a list of files.
“Which one’s first?”
“Might as well start at the top.”
The first file contained snapshots of women—all of whom looked like they might be of Eastern European origin.
Next was a picture of the Port of Baltimore and one of the huge containers that was often taken off ships and set directly onto tractor-trailer trucks.
They both stared at the pictures.
“It might seem far-fetched, but I think I understand the connection between the pictures,” Elizabeth said. “Does it sound crazy to think that Derek Lang is using cargo containers to smuggle women illegally into the country?” She swallowed hard. “And then something bad happens to them?”
“Well, we know something big is going on. Big enough for Derek Lang to want you out of the picture.”
“As in—dead.”
“You must have found out about it. But how could you stumble onto something like that?”