“Let’s get started, shall we?” Matt said, taking his place at the head of the table.
It seemed off not to have Jake there, challenging Matt’s place at the head of the table with his gaze. Those two had taken sibling rivalry into adulthood, which left Luke as the peacemaker. Luke dropped into his chair now, wishing Jake was here. He had a quick brain and good instincts, both of which they could have used right now. And he looked at life differently from either he or Matt. Drove Matt crazy, but it worked. As if Matt heard him think, he said, “Jake’s flying in. Should be here before we move out.”
“We have to talk fast,” Bryn said. “Dewey’s got an important date down south.”
“I can be fast,” Luke said. He leaned forward, his elbows propped on the table as he told his story in terse spurts. Bryn interrupted him just once.
“You had Prudence Knight and you lost her?”
Luke looked annoyed. “I didn’t know I had her until after I lost her, okay? She doesn’t know who she is.” If it weren’t so serious, it would be funny, them all running around with bits of the same whole, all thinking they were in control when they weren’t.
“Well,” Bryn gave him a wry look, “if she was grabbed so she could spill her guts on Shield, this could get interesting, since it doesn’t work. We should probably talk to a specialist, find out if truth drugs could crack her apparent loss of memory. If she really has lost it?”
Luke tried not to stiffen, not with them all looking at him. “Her injuries were real. I’m just guessing, but I’m thinking she somehow fell out of the chopper, which was probably flying low to avoid getting picked up by radar. Trees would break her fall and people have survived falls from far more serious heights. You say she had some kind of fight with her father?”
“That’s what Donovan said.” Bryn frowned. She filled them in on what she’d learned from Donovan. “What if Knight knew he was dying and told her he wasn’t her father? Then she gets kidnapped, falls. Trauma like that could lead to hysterical amnesia, I would imagine. At least it does on television,” she added dryly.
Luke remembered her “I hate lies” vehemence. It seemed she had good cause to hate it.
“It doesn’t really matter, does it?” Dewey asked. “You saw her get kidnapped, whether she knows her own name or not, she’s in trouble. How do we find her?”
“You don’t do anything,” Bryn said. “You have a date with Green.” Luke and Matt looked at her, so then she filled them in on this, fumbling a bit over how Dewey got involved with Green. It was obvious to Luke she wasn’t eager to clarify much, but at least now she knew who her friends were and told them enough. What also seemed obvious to Luke was the criminal movement on so many fronts and yet no one seemed to see a connection. Could it be a coincidence that Dewey was meeting Green this week, the same week someone tries to kidnap Amelia and use her to put pressure on Donovan?
“What if this Green is involved in the kidnapping?” he asked.
Matt sat at the head of the table, slumped in a chair with his feet thrust out. With one hand he beat tapped the table impatiently. “Merryweather is a biotechnology company, a favorite target of Green and other environmental activist groups. We’ve got a biotech conference in town this weekend. Did you see that bit on the news the other night? People dressed up like vegetables and other crap yapping about the evils of technology—after having driven or flown here in their cars and planes?”
Bryn nodded. “I saw it. And we know that’s bringing the former VP to town. He’s going to speak out at a big counter-demo. He’s the most important target in town this week.”
“Target?” Luke asked. He’d missed some key points it seemed.
Bryn filled them in on Donovan and his possible role as sniper in the proceedings.
“Would he really turn shooter for them in hopes that they’ll release Ame—Prudence Knight?” Luke asked. “Looked smarter than that to me.” In his head, Luke was relieved. It meant they wouldn’t kill Amelia as soon as they got what they wanted—or in this case what they didn’t want—out of her. On the other hand, they might be dealing with an out-of-control sniper before they were through.
“It does make me think Green must be behind the grab. No question she’s the key to Donovan’s buttons,” Bryn added, with a look of worry toward Dewey. “If they are turning violent—”
“—and Dewey’s date is our only lead, then how do we make sure we don’t lose him?” Matt finished for her.
This wasn’t his area, so Luke sat back, listening as the talk turned high tech and technical.
Dewey shook his head when Matt suggested an electronic tracking device. “This guy is smart. He’ll be looking for everything, up to and including a wire. I walk in there broadcasting anything, I’m dead. They’ll also be looking for tails, advance and post surveillance of the area. Trust me on this. It’s what I’d have done before I became a reformed man.”
Bryn jumped up and paced to the window, looking over her shoulder to say, “We can’t send you in without some kind of backup. Your community service hours don’t require you to go on a suicide mission.”
“Actually, I already have a plan,” Dewey confessed. “Well, Phoebe had a plan, but don’t tell Jake or he’ll kill me, making this all pointless.”
Bryn turned, leaning against the windows, her arms crossed defensively. Despite his worry, Luke found he could grin, though he hid it with his hand.
“Based on the assumption that this guy was beyond paranoid,” Dewey said, “he may make me change cars, clothes, even a watch, but who plans for a guy with glasses?”
Like a magician, he produced a pair from his shirt pocket. They were small, wire rectangles. Bryn stalked over and took them, peering through the lenses. “They have a prescription. Can you see with them?”
With a sigh, he nodded. “Unfortunately, my eye doctor thinks I can.”
Luke took them from Bryn. “So how do they help?”
“There’s a small, but powerful GPS transmitter in one of the nose pads. But it’s not active, so if they scan me for anything, it won’t read. When I feel safe, or I’m in trouble, I can activate using the other nose pad.” Dewey took the glasses back and put them on.
He looked studious and sort of like John Lennon, Luke decided, with an inward grin. Trust Phoebe, the Pathphinder, to find a way to beat paranoid.
“I’d sure like to put a team on the road ahead of you,” Bryn said.
Dewey shook his head. “He’ll be looking for that. That’s why the extended advance warning. He’s waiting to see if there’s any sudden activity in the area. You do anything and he’s gone. I could be wrong, but I’m betting he’s been where he is long enough to know whose new and who isn’t. This guy is smart.” He grinned. “He could be me. If I didn’t know I was here, I’d say you should be looking at me.”
In the olden days, that remark would have set Bryn off. Luke noticed now she just looked at him, a look so intimate he looked away. His gaze bumped into Matt’s, who was also trying not to notice the sudden rise in temperature.
“So what do we already know about the area?” Matt spread a map of the state across the table top. He looked at Luke. “Your chopper headed south, didn’t you say?”
Luke nodded. Bryn found the rendezvous point, then used her finger to trace a circle around the area. It was in the direction of the chopper, but a lot was.
“We’re assuming that Green is the culprit here,” Luke objected. “It’s kind of hard for me to buy. I mean, if they don’t like what Merryweather is doing, wouldn’t they be getting rid of Shield, not stealing it? Is there anyone else who might be targeting this Shield? I don’t like concentrating all our efforts in one direction without something more than some guy who wants to meet Dewey. If we’re wrong, then it’s over.”
The words sent a chill down his back. What if he never saw Amelia again? The chill turned into a sick feeling in the pit of his stomach. He had to fight to clear his thoughts so he could focus as they discussed other possi
bilities, but with the admittedly scant information at their disposal, there wasn’t a better lead for them to follow. Bryn promised to direct her team to look for other possibilities, which helped some, but not a lot.
“You know…” Bryn’s fingers stopped by a town, then moved to a spot at the base of the mountains. “This is…odd.”
“What?” Luke stood up next to her and frowned down at the map. Where had they taken Amelia? It was a damn big state. Was this how his brothers had felt when their women disappeared? Except Amelia wasn’t his woman, he reminded himself, and he should start calling her Prudence. Or Miss Knight. They were the same, weren’t they? He just wished he knew where the Amelia persona had sprung from? The same set of keys that had opened her car had also had a key that opened Amelia Hart’s apartment. Could she have created an alternate identity for herself? And if she had, why? She’d said something about feeling lighter and relieved. Was that the explanation? She’d been someone trying to find a little room to be herself? Everything he’d heard about John Knight made him sound like someone you’d want to get away from as quickly as possible.
It made more sense than that she was involved in something dishonest. Granted he only had his instincts to rely on that she had been truthful with him. Did he trust them? They hadn’t let him down in the past, but in the past his hormones hadn’t been in the mix. Didn’t seem to matter how often he told his libido to stop it. He hated feeling like this. Hated feeling out of control. Hated feeling helpless. It brought back all the feelings he’d wrestled with when Rosemary was dying. He’d promised himself he’d never feel like that again. Hell of a time to find out it wasn’t something he could control.
“We’re also investigating the Colorado Irregulars,” Bryn was saying when Luke tuned back in. “Their camp is right here, near the mountains. They’re open to the public on the weekends. You can pay to get hit with paint balls and gripe about the government.”
Matt and Dewey both bent over the map, too. Dewey looked aggrieved. “You were investigating them without me?”
Bryn flicked him a look that was straight out of the olden days. “It was need to know.”
Luke was happy for the distraction. His thoughts were giving him a headache.
“Odd that two such opposite groups should be working in the same general area,” he said. “I’d like to check them out. No question a paramilitary group would want Shield. If they were behind this, they sure mobilized a pack of hounds. They had our route covered faster than a fart. And they looked more like right wingers than lefties.”
He was going to say more, when he noticed that Dewey was still staring at the map with a peculiar look on his face.
“What?” Luke asked.
“Huh?” Dewey looked up, his gaze unfocused for a moment before it sharpened.
“You have an idea?”
Bryn and Matt were now looking at him, too.
“Do you know who I’m meeting?”
Luke shrugged. “Green.”
“His handle is ‘Forest for the Trees,’” Dewey said.
Luke stared at him. “Forest for the Trees?”
“That’s right.”
“As in, you can’t see the forest for the trees?”
“Yup.”
“Damn. Are you thinking what I’m thinking?” Luke asked.
“No, I think you’re thinking what I’m thinking,” Dewey said. “I thought it first.”
“Damn it,” Bryn said. “I should have been thinking it a long time ago. I could tell the guy had a…quirky sense of humor. Do you really think—”
She stopped, as if she couldn’t bring herself to say it.
“Well,” Luke stared at nothing as his thoughts raced. It was so bizarre, but in a weird way, made sense. “I can’t think of a better place to hide a radical environmental movement than a right-wing paramilitary outfit’s camp.”
Bryn didn’t look amused. “This could easily turn into another Waco—if we can even get the proof we need to go in.” She frowned as the three men watched her quietly. “You know who we need?”
Matt looked wary. “Who?”
“Donovan Kincaid.”
“He’s gone to ground, hasn’t he?” Dewey pointed out.
“Yes, he has. But I’ll bet he has his phone with him.”
Luke found his thoughts moving in another direction. If Green was behind this move on Merryweather, they’d have needed someone on the inside. They’d need to know how the technology was progressing, access to Knight to administer the digitalis, and someone to tell them Prudence Knight’s movements, when and how to make the grab. Someone had jumped the gun. Or chosen to sabotage it? Someone who wanted to screw his father, say?
One thing he’d been right about. He was in the wrong place. His job was the murder. There was a threat to Amelia here, too, and he needed to find it. At least it was something to do while they waited.
“There are some things I need to check. Let me know when you head south for Dewey’s date. I want to go with you,” he said.
Matt looked up, his gaze sharp. Finally he nodded. He got up and went with Luke to the door. “You all right?”
Luke rubbed the back of his neck, then shrugged. “Sure.”
“We’ll find her,” Matt said. “With the three of us together, we can’t fail.” He slapped Luke on the back. “Keep your phone on.”
* * * *
The sun shone fiercely, as if to atone for letting the recent storm blot it out, but it was too far away in the winter sky to be felt. All its power turned the deep, mostly unbroken layer of snow diamond bright. Made it hard to hide tracks, even wearing camouflage appropriate to the conditions. What Donovan needed was camouflage that could lift him above the snow. Since he didn’t have the capability, he’d had to work his way carefully down the mountainside toward the Colorado Irregular’s camp.
On the upside, if anyone down there were to catch a glint of his binoculars, they’d write it off as the sun’s reflection. He’d been observing the camp for about an hour, but there hadn’t been much to see, though what he had seen convinced him he was on the right track. The weather was keeping the casual inside. Interesting that they’d posted guards when there didn’t seem to be anything going on or anything to hide. It had taken him a while to find them. Like him, they were in camo and dug in. It had taken patience and a little luck to spot them. One was about three hundred yards below him. He’d picked him up when his radio sounded. Now he was waiting to see if it would go off at the same time. He needed to know when they checked in, when they changed and how. They hadn’t left any tracks in the snow either.
As soon as it went off, he had turned on his scanner and picked up their frequency. They were no dummies, but they were also bored. He got enough from their exchanges to locate most of the guard posts he hoped. Once you knew where to look and you knew what you were looking for, they were as obvious as hookers in a red light district. Perception was the key, even in war.
Despite his worry about his daughter, it felt good to be back in the field. This was where he belonged, pitting his brains and his brawn against the enemies of the weak. And the fear, the worry, would keep him sharp. He couldn’t afford to lose this one. Too much was riding on it. With Knight out of the picture, he could talk to Pru, maybe tell her who he was, what her mother meant to him. From what he could tell, she didn’t know a lot about her mother. She had the spirit, the will to live her life better than that. He could show her how.
The vibration of his satellite phone interrupted his thoughts. He’d set it to vibrate, since he couldn’t afford to be out of touch, if Pru’s kidnapper called again. He’d also set it up for hands free. In fact, he was so wired, it’s a wonder he wasn’t conductive. He wasn’t worried about being overheard, but he still kept his voice low.
“You ready to talk, Kincaid?” a digital voice asked him.
“I’ve been ready the whole time,” Donovan said. “Which makes me wonder why you haven’t been? And to wonder if you even have Miss Knight.�
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“If you need proof, I can send you one of her fingers. Or an ear,” the voice said.
“Talking to her is so much less messy. And quicker,” Donavan said, trying to keep his cool. If this was Grady, he was a dead man.
“Well, she’s a little unconscious. I think an ear. Or you earn the right to talk to her.”
“And how do I do that?”
“Easy. Prove to me you can follow orders.”
“Orders?” Donovan said.
“Didn’t I mention that you work for me now? Well, you do. If you want to keep Miss Knight ten-fingered, two-eared, and in the land of the breathing, you’ll do exactly what I say.”
“And what do you say?”
“Well, no big surprise, no cops or feds. We keep this just between us.”
“Not original or surprising,” Donovan said. He braced for what came next.
“How are your sniping skills?”
He hadn’t been expecting this. It had been so long since he’d used them.
“I can still hit my man.” One bullet. One kill.
“Good. Leslie Merryweather. If I hear of his unfortunate demise on the news, you earn a few words with Miss Knight.”
Merryweather? “Why him?”
“Okay, let’s try this again. Because I say so.”
“Fine.”
“You aren’t going to argue with me?” He sounded genuinely surprised.
“Why should I? Guy’s a waste of space.”
“I think we’re going to get along just fine. I’ll be in touch.”
And he was gone. Leaving Donovan with a lot to think about. He had gone to a lot of trouble to bump off an easy target like Leslie Merryweather, so he couldn’t be the real target. This was what he’d said, a way to see if he’d jump when told. By now, Bryn probably had a good idea of who the real target was, but he wasn’t sure he wanted to know. Didn’t want to have to choose between that person and his daughter.
What also puzzled Donovan was why it had taken so long to reach this point. Had that first call been a fishing expedition? Now O’Brien sounded confident, though he still wouldn’t let Donovan talk to Pru. She could be unconscious. Or she could still be in transit.
The Lonesome Lawmen Trilogy Page 78