Eric (In the Company of Snipers Book 15)

by Irish Winters

  Come on! Sasha has to be home!

  Nearly a full year ago, Shea had linked up with Sasha Kennedy. It happened after her encounter with Bagani. Afraid for her life and hiding out in a cheap hotel room, she and Sasha had played the latest, greatest computer game, Vengeance and Hell, version 2.0, for months before they’d hooked up in an online chat room about the flaws in the game. They’d collaborated on a better version of V&H to link gamers all over the world while enhancing action and rewards.

  But talk about it being a small world. Shea knew instantly whom she’d accidentally bumped into: Mother, the genius who worked for Alex Stewart. Possibly the only man in the world who could locate a missing ex-wife.

  Goose bumps lifted over her body the moment she’d realized who she was chatting with, but Sasha had never let on. Still, Shea kept a watchful ear. If Sasha had ever suspected, she was good at hiding it.

  On the fifth ring, Shea gave up and dialed her friend’s work number.

  Please, please be there!

  “The TEAM, Sasha Kennedy speaking. Finn? Is this you?”

  “Yes!” Relief leapt off Shea’s tongue. “Gordie’s dead!”

  “I know. It’s on all the news channels. Where are you?”

  “I’m at the airport in Amsterdam. Is Eric coming? I can’t stay here any longer!” She wiped her sweaty palms on the baggy pants of her fake persona. Right then and there, she resembled a three-hundred-pound guy with red hair and an eating compulsion. Her fake buckteeth were in her sloppy coat pocket along with more spirit gum if any facial appliances decided to move. Like her over-sized nose. Her furry eyebrows. The wart on her chin.

  “Yes, he’s on his way to you right now. Where are you travelling to?”

  “England. Flight number sixteen twenty—” A bump from behind interrupted her, pushing Shea’s angst into overdrive.

  She whirled on her attacker, but the elderly man in wire-rimmed glasses who’d stuck the pointed end of his umbrella in her left butt cheek didn’t look so dangerous. His nose crinkled under craggy, white brows. A cute smile lit up his wrinkled face. “Sorry, young man,” he said with a perfect British clip. “I’m afraid my bumbershoot got away from me. I didn’t hurt you, did I?”

  Her gut clenched. This sweet gentleman might not have a mean bone in his body, but that other guy, the man in the black robe, couldn’t be far behind. She couldn’t help the creepy sensation that he lurked in every shadow, watching and waiting. That he could get to her whenever he wanted.

  Stifling her terror, she muttered in her deepest Finn-voice, “No problem.”

  Her cellphone screamed, “Finn! Speak to me, damn it!”

  Shea turned her back on the gentleman, every last speck of saliva gone from her tongue and throat. “Sorry. I thought... I mean, I thought I saw... Never mind. W-what did you want?”

  “I asked where you’re going?”

  “England. I’m, ahh...”

  Oh, hell on earth. A tall swarthy man in a long flowing robe strode toward her in the crowd of passengers disembarking a just arrived flight into Amsterdam. It’s him.

  Three women in veils followed him, and the robe was cream-colored, not black, but there was no mistaking the grim fire in his eye.

  Her phone clattered to the floor.

  Eric called Mother the minute he hit the sidewalk outside Powers’ flat. “Where the hell is he?”

  Sirens approached from the south, so he and Jordan headed north away from the murder scene, their weapons concealed, their gloves off, and no idea where their remaining quarry was.

  “I’m not sure. He was at the Amsterdam airport and he mentioned flight number sixteen twenty-seven. England. If he actually made the connection. He hung up on me before he said.”

  Eric tipped his cellphone from his ear to check the local time, a chilly inkling of premonition tiptoeing up his spine. A successful op didn’t run on maybes. The precious forty-eight hours of this wild goose chase were slipping away, and he hated being one lousy step behind the man he was supposed to be saving. “When?”

  “It departs in thirty minutes.” Mother sounded edgy. She should.

  “Call him back. Tell him to stay at the airport.” So we can catch up with his dumb ass. “We’re on our way now, but there’s no way we’ll make it in thirty minutes.” Eric pocketed his cell, that annoying premonition poking him to move faster or risk losing another client to the bloodthirsty killer on the loose. Fifty percent was one helluva loss rate for any op. Alex had to be as pissed as Eric.

  Jordan had recovered his professional demeanor if not his stomach. The poor guy’s eyes still resembled two pieces of coal on a stark white face, but he was operational. He flagged a cab, but busy rush hour traffic reduced their fifteen-minute ride back to the airport to a slow crawl. People were everywhere. On foot. In taxis and boats. Bicycles and putt-putt scooters flooded the streets and alleyways.

  Eric stared at the mad dash home, one he could relate to. He used to be that way, ready to run to Shea at the first opportunity, and… Don’t go there. He bowed his forehead to his clenched fist and forced his mind from the ghosts of his past. Thinking about them took too much out of his soul, and now wasn’t the time for past regrets. He needed to be on his A-game. For Finn Powers, not—Shea.

  Truth be known, he didn’t relish another flight so soon after the first. There’d been no sleeping on the flight over. Forty winks might see him through the rest of this op—if he ever got the chance. Finding Powers alive wouldn’t hurt either.

  He and Jordan arrived back at the Amsterdam airport fifty-five minutes later, and one more time, they hit the ground running. If Powers was semi-smart, and if he exercised a half-ounce of common sense, he’d be hiding inside the terminal, waiting for them to show. He’d contact Mother and let her know where he was. The airport was big enough. There ought to be a dozen or more places to hide.

  But if he were really smart, he’d come looking for them. Eric doubted a civilian on the run had that much sense though. Once fear and adrenaline kicked in, anything could happen. This op was like herding cats.

  After a quick talk with airport security and showing their U.S. federal credentials, Eric and Jordan were allowed access to the departure gates for outgoing flights to London. No luck. Flight number sixteen twenty-seven had already taxied away from the gate. First in line for takeoff might as well be on the moon.

  They scanned the other departure gates for every dumpy, ill-dressed man in sight. Plenty fit the bill, but none were the man they were looking for.

  Eric rang Mother, that eerie sense of foreboding ramping into a full-blown migraine. “Where is he? Do you know? Have you heard from him?”

  “He’s not there?”

  “I wouldn’t be calling if he was, would I?”

  “I’ll bet he’s already left then.”

  No shit! “Didn’t you tell him to stay put like I asked?”

  “I couldn’t get in touch with him. He’s running for his life. He must’ve gone onto England.”

  Eric rolled the cramp out of his neck. This disastrous op hadn’t let up since Alex’s staff meeting. The long flight, the missed contacts, and Mother weren’t helping. “Call him back. We need to know where he’ll be when we hit Heathrow. I’m not chasing his dumb ass around London just because he’s scared, damn it.”

  “I will. I promise. I’ll monitor the flight, and the minute I know anything, I’ll send you a text. Umm, Eric?”

  “Yes?” he asked with extreme patience. Mother always meant well, but chasing a chicken with its head cut off didn’t bode well for Mr. Powers.

  “He asked for you by name again. He wanted to know if you were coming. I told him yes.”

  Great. Just damned great. High expectations for a stranger he didn’t know from Adam.

  “Can you at least try to be nice to him?”

  That sparked Eric’s temper. “When haven’t I been? I haven’t even met the guy yet.”

  “It’s just that he might be gay. I know Phoenix and Gordie were
, and, umm, I don’t know how you feel about the whole issue.”

  He could hear her cringe all the way across the Atlantic. The whole gay issue was such a non-player in his opinion. People were people, damn it, and this one was scared witless. Gay or straight didn’t mean squat. “Listen up, Mother. I don’t give a shit if he’s transsexual, bisexual, or if he sports a third eye in the middle of his forehead. Tell him to keep his ass out of sight until we get to Heathrow. I can’t save him if I can’t find him!”

  Eric hung up before she threw another problem his way. Scowling at Jordan, he wondered why Mother had thought he’d treat Powers any different than everyone else. I’m a nice guy, damn it. Most of the time. Aren’t I?

  “Get in line,” he barked at Jordan. “We’re going to London.”

  Shea all but ran out of the main terminal once she arrived at Heathrow, sure she’d stumble on her big Finn-feet if she peered over her shoulder one more time. She needed to catch a cab without being seen. She needed a safe place to hide until Eric showed, but even then, she didn’t know what she’d do when he did.

  Run to him?

  Run from him?

  Either scenario had its merits.

  Would he recognize her? Not in this get up. Fingering the unibrow that until now, had kept her safely hidden from her past, she waited patiently in the queue to catch a cab. She couldn’t stay inside the terminal. Eric would have to understand that eyes were everywhere. She could feel them on the back of her neck just as surely as if a bulls-eye was painted there.

  At last it was her turn, but as she took a step to the cab, a hand clamped onto her sleeve, paralyzing her heart. It had finally happened. Her whole body cringed. She stumbled, scared to turn around for fear Phoenix and Gordie’s killer had followed her to London. He’d caught her, and now she’d be killed, just like—

  “Excuse me, sir, but you dropped this.” Standing there with her airline ticket stub was a businessman dressed in a three-piece suit. A Caucasian businessman. In a red tie.

  How un-Mideastern of him.

  Relief shivered up her spine. She snatched the stub from his fingertips with a hurried, “Th-thank you.”

  He lifted a perturbed brow and continued on his way.

  Professor Grover’s brow used to lift like that, often at the speed with which the Lucky Stars problem solved. Her heart ached for him. For Phoenix and Gordie. She could barely catch a full breath. Karma seemed determined she pay for past mistakes. She’d lost everyone. Again…

  The need to see Professor Grover filled her with an inexplicable longing. He’d often spoken of Dungarvin Bay in Ireland, his home away from home. And Ireland was just a hop, skip, and a jump across the water. Maybe that was where he’d gone. Maybe he’d know who killed Phoenix and Gordie. At least, he’d give her safe refuge until they reasoned it out together. If he’s there.

  It was worth a try. Shea waved the cabbie off, determined to unravel the mess she’d created. Stiffening her resolve and her spine, she left the cab behind and marched back into Heathrow. She was going to Ireland.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Eric knew the moment the jet touched down at Heathrow. Finn isn’t in jolly Olde England, either. Before the Jetway engaged with the British Airways Airbus, he had Mother on his phone.

  “Oh, I’m so glad you called. Guess what?”

  God, he hated that question.

  “Finn isn’t in England anymore.”

  “Where is he then?” Whatever else this Powers creep might be, he’d been nothing but a royal pain in the ass since this operation started. A genius maybe, but he was obviously one of those quirky guys without a lick of sense to back up their brilliance. The kind who never showered and didn’t know how to tie their own shoelaces. That kind.

  Jordan hunched over the back of Eric’s airline seat. They’d travelled in typical military-style this flight, dead last in the rear of the aircraft with their seats against the galley wall, no option to recline or stretch their long legs. “You’re kidding me, right? He’s not here?”

  Eric stilled so he could hear Mother over Jordan’s question. “He’s gone to Ireland to find his professor, Morell Grover, but I’ve got an address. Finn won’t run this time. He promised.”

  Eric simmered. And I’m supposed to believe that why?

  This continual game of cat and mouse had grown thin. He’d been awake for over thirty-five hours straight. No sleep. No decent food. And no Finn.

  The forty-eight-hour window was blown. One more round of hide-and-go-seek, and Operation Find Finn could go to hell. He and Jordan would head back to Virginia where they belonged, and Finn could cover his own sorry ass.

  “Where in Ireland?” he bit out more sharply than he intended.

  Mother provided the address in southern Ireland, but before she could get another word in, he ended the call. He’d run out of patience for the idiot on the run. Her, too.

  “Where next, Bro?” Jordan asked, his easy-going demeanor intact once more. Why not? He’d slept those fifteen hours over the Atlantic to Amsterdam, on this puddle-jumper flight, too.

  Eric pushed back in his chair, bone-tired with nothing to show for the day but another flight he didn’t want to take. “Dungarvin, Ireland.”

  Jordan took the seat across the aisle while the flight attendants assisted the last passengers. “Powers is in Ireland? Why the hell?”

  “Mother thinks he’s hooking up with his professor, Morell Grover. Don’t ask why because I don’t know much more than you do.”

  “Doesn’t sound very Irish to me. Morell Grover. Does it to you?”

  Eric couldn’t answer. He stared, his brain starved for sleep he couldn’t allow. Not yet. Once he gave in to the overwhelming urge it’d be all she wrote. He drew in a deep breath, needing to move before he lost the battle. Summoning the image of those two dead young men did the trick. Berglund and Mikkelson deserved justice.

  Mentally kicking his own butt, Eric heaved up and out of his seat. Operation Find Finn was back on. Fortunately, they had their pick of flights into Cork. They ended up in the back of the bus again. The Airbus. Touchdown went as smooth as silk, probably because Eric couldn’t have cared less by then. It was an interesting way to cure one’s fear of air travel: fly until jetlag numbed your brain.

  While the other passengers disembarked, he dragged his backpack out of the overhead compartment one last time, prepared for another search, and hopefully a quick in-and-out extraction.

  Jordan clapped his back, urging him on. They opted for a rental with GPS instead of a cab. Jordan drove. Might have been a mistake. A nap during the drive would’ve been nice, but Jordan needed a navigator to get them out of all those blasted Irish roundabouts and onto the correct exits. And to keep him on the left side of the road. For some reason, the guy from Alaska thought driving in Ireland would be a breeze. It wasn’t. Besides acclimating himself to the controls being on the wrong side of the car, he kept hanging a right when he should’ve been turning left.

  After a circuitous ride through winding roads that resembled one-lane sheep trails and more roundabouts than Eric realized existed in the world, they arrived at the address Mother had relayed. Eric stepped out of the car, his jacket once again concealing two loaded firearms and one beat-to-hell body. The destination Powers gave Mother ended at a well-kept, white clapboard home with a green-shingled roof that lapped the drip line, creating a homey cottage effect. The matching green shutters, white picket fence instead of stone, with bushes and trees in bloom added to the courtyard. Roses. The flowery scent of roses—lots of roses—mingled with the fresh salt air lifting off the Irish Sea to the south.

  The hour was late, well after twenty hundred, eight pm Ireland time. He’d already made reservations at a local hotel chain, in the event they actually caught up with Powers this time.

  Eric forged ahead, his senses on high alert. Despite its genteel appearance, evil could still be afoot even at this quaint Irish cottage. His covert training came back to him as easy as turning a corner
. Hyper-vigilance had its place in the world.

  Knocking on the front door rewarded him with a prompt response by a plump, dark-haired, middle-aged woman, her tresses streaked with gray and twisted into a bun at the top of her head.

  “May I help you?” she asked with a definite Irish lilt and an unabashedly cheery smile. The white apron covering her blue dress and the fuzzy strands dangling down her neck declared she’d been busy in her kitchen, and what did he want at this late hour?

  “Excuse us, ma’am, but we were told to meet Finn Powers at this location. Is he here?”

  She cast an appraising glance up and down Jordan. Then did the same with Eric. Her smile widened. “He did say visitors would be along the bye, but he didn’t say they’d be as charming as the likes of you two young men. Please come in.” She stood aside and beckoned them to enter.

  A delightful sensory overload hit Eric’s nose and stomach the second he set foot inside. Fresh baked bread. Soup or stew, definitely beef stock. Onions for sure. The blend of aromas elicited a rumble from his empty stomach.

  “Are you hungry?” she asked as if she already knew the answer.

  “Yes,” Jordan answered with emphasis. When wasn’t he hungry?

  “No,” Eric corrected instantly, intent on maintaining a professional distance from this kindly woman. “Thank you for your offer, ma’am, but we’re not here to bother you. We came for Powers, and we need to leave as soon as possible.”

  Jordan’s grumble at his six didn’t go unnoticed by their pleasant hostess. She interlocked her fingers over her rounded stomach, a definite twinkle in her eye. “I’ll have you know I’m Rosie O’Banner, and this is the ‘Edge of O’Banner’, the finest bed and breakfast on the far side of the Isle. Your friend left the minute he arrived. He said you’re not to leave ’til he returns. And for your information, it’s no inconvenience to care for the weary and tired, nor the hungry, young man. You’re welcome to wait, and if you need a place to stay while you’re here, I have two empty rooms waiting for you. Meals are included, and there’s no charge for the hospitality nor the welcome.”