Play Nice

by Gemma Halliday

  So she’d found a way to use real accounts, connected to real people who had nothing to do with her. She never used a number for more than one transaction. And no one had any way of knowing which number she’d use next.

  As soon as she had her card set with ample funds to fly as far as the East Coast, Anna ditched the rental phone, then made a gut decision and quickly jumped into line to purchase a ticket on the next flight to Chicago.

  * * *

  “Good afternoon…” Dade looked down at the name badge on the fortyish woman behind the ticket counter “… Glenda.” He shot her a smile with lots of teeth. Friendly, bordering on flirty, but only just bordering.

  As he’d hoped, Glenda smiled back, slight wrinkles forming at the corners of her eyes. “Good afternoon, sir. Can I help you?”

  “Oh, I sure hope so, Glenda.”

  She was slim and toned enough that the gym was obviously on her daily schedule. Her blond hair was cut in a short shag and shot through with platinum highlights. Her makeup was tasteful, her diamond earrings fake, but most importantly, her left finger was naked, making her a much better choice for his attentions than the young guy behind the ticket counter next door.

  As soon as Dade had seen Anya driving away in his car, he’d know she was long gone. Considering she didn’t even officially exist before, his chances of tracking her down now were slim, bordering on downright impossible. He’d briefly contemplated calling his employer, but considering the mess this job had become, he scrapped that idea. At least until he had a better handle on just what this job had become. Instead, he’d decided to take the easy route to finding Anya … find the people following her.

  Namely, Shelli.

  He’d started by calling San Francisco Animal Care & Control to lodge a complaint against a woman named Shelli at their Golden Gate facility. After several minutes of ranting on the nonexistent customer service, he’d been able to pry from the flustered woman on the other end that Shelli’s last name was Cooper, and that an official complaint would be filed against her on his behalf.

  Armed with a last name—at least the one she’d been going under for the last few months—he’d quickly switched gears, calling the police precinct for the sunset area, asking to speak with his daughter, Shelli Cooper, whose place of work he’d just learned had been victimized that morning. After being transferred to a series of different desks, he finally ascertained that no witness named Shelli Cooper had been involved in the shooting at all.

  It was all the confirmation Dade needed that he was on the right track. Shelli hadn’t stuck around to talk to the police any more than he had. That didn’t speak to her innocence in the matter.

  Dade then logged onto the NCIC, the National Crime Information Center, database on his phone, typing in Shelli’s name, location, and approximate age. While NCIC was usually reserved for police use, one of the skills Dade had learned in the military was that every computer program—from U.S. law enforcement sites to Afghani schematics databases—had a backdoor. And Dade had become skilled at finding them. Depending on the program, some doors where hidden more cleverly than others, but he’d found that, by and large, Fortune 500 companies could afford state-of-the-art digital security, while government entities could not.

  Making NCIC a piece of cake.

  Unfortunately, no records came back with Shelli’s name. Which could either mean she was a professional who had the good sense not to be caught or that she’d only been “Shelli Cooper” for a short time. He scanned through several other databases including hospitals, DMV, credit. He finally hit pay dirt with a bank account linked to her name, opened just before Anya said she’d started at the shelter. Most of the charges were expected enough—rent, electrical, groceries. However one recurring charge caught his eye. An auto pay from her checking to the Clipper website. Clipper was a prepaid transportation card, good on any of the City’s Muni busses, trolleys, trains, or the Bay Area Rapid Transit, known locally as BART. After slipping into Clipper’s system backdoor, he ascertained that the bar code of her particular card had been last scanned half an hour ago at the SFO BART station.

  Shelli was on her way out of town.

  And now, so was Dade.

  “I would be happy to help you purchase tickets, sir,” Glenda told him, pulling up a screen on her computer behind the desk. “Where are you traveling today?”

  “Boston,” he said, taking a guess.

  “Boston it is,” Glenda said, turning to the computer screen. She typed a few keys, pulling up the flight info.

  “We have a couple seats left on a flight departing in half an hour.”

  “Perfect.”

  “How many passengers?” she asked.

  “Just one,” he said, flashing her a smile again.

  “Wonderful.” He watched her pull up the screen. “Do you prefer aisle or window?”

  “Actually,” he said, leaning in. “My fiancée is already booked on the flight. I didn’t think I was going to be able to join her, but my plans changed at the last minute, and I’m hoping to surprise her. I was wondering if you could sit me next to her?”

  The woman’s eyes held a flicker of hesitation, but another bright, warm flash of teeth from Dade pushed her over the edge. “That’s very sweet of you,” she said. She pulled up a new screen on her monitor. “Do you know where your fiancée is seated?”

  He shook his head. “No. But her name’s Cooper. Shelli Cooper.”

  “Shelli Cooper,” the woman repeated, looking through her roster. Dade watched as her eyes scanned down the list. Then a small frown settled between her eyebrows. “I’m sorry, I don’t see a Miss Cooper listed on our flight. Is it possible you have the wrong day?”

  Day? No. City? Absolutely.

  He let a small frown settle between his brows. “Okay, I feel like an idiot here, but between you and me, Glenda, I might not have been listening too carefully when she told me which city she was heading to.” Dade leaned in, putting his elbows on the counter. “The Giants were playing, they were down by two, and my fiancée picked then to give me her travel itinerary.” He did a sheepish shrug.

  Glenda chuckled. “Oh, I know how that goes.”

  “Yeah, well, as you can imagine, that conversation ended in an argument about how I never listen. Which, this time, was totally true. But now I really want to make it up to her. Is there any way you could check the other flights you have leaving today to see which one she’s on?”

  Glenda hesitated. She looked to her left where a coworker, a large African American woman, was helping customers at the next counter. “We’re really not supposed to give out that information.”

  “Please, Glenda.” Dade clasped his hands in front of him in a begging motion. “You’d be saving my hide. Big time.”

  She sucked in her cheeks, shot a second look at her coworker. Then she pursed her lips and pulled up a new screen on her computer.

  “We’re really not supposed to do this,” she repeated, her voice low.

  “I won’t tell if you don’t.” Dade shot her a quick wink.

  A small smile tugged the corner of her lips upward. It might be that she wasn’t supposed to do this, but he could tell she was enjoying breaking the rules a little.

  “Okay. Flight two-thirty-five,” she finally said, looking up from the screen. “It leaves from gate sixty-three in forty minutes for Chicago. That’s where your fiancée is booked.”

  Dade grinned. “You are a lifesaver, Glenda. Seriously, without you, there might not have been a wedding at all.”

  After paying for his ticket, and praising Glenda’s skills several more times, Dade made his way through security without incident, calmly giving up his ID and ticket as he stepped through the scanners like every other passenger. Once on the other side, the main thoroughfare of the airport spanned before him. Souvenir shops, magazine stands, coffee shops, and bars lined the walkway on one side, while rows of plastic chairs took up residence on the other, creating wide-open waiting areas. Dade slowly walked
toward gate sixty-three, scanning the faces of each person he passed for the redhead from the shelter. While her hair would make her stand out like a sore thumb, there was no guarantee she hadn’t taken the time to dye it, cut it, or simply smash it into a hat.

  He found his gate, made a slow sweep of the plastic chairs, quickly filling with waiting passengers to Chicago. Once he was satisfied that none were the girl from the shelter, he took up vigil in the bar across the walkway to wait for her.

  He ordered a draft beer and fiddled with the glass on the table in front of him as he kept his eyes glued to the waiting area.

  An older couple entered, a pair of carry-on suitcases on wheels pulled behind them. A woman with a small dog in a lap bag was next, though she had fifty pounds and twenty years on his girl. Two Asian men in business suits speaking Mandarin took up residence by the windows. No one that could pass for Shelli.

  Dade lifted his glass to his lips. As much as he could use the drink right now, he forced himself to sip at it. The last thing he could afford were dulled reflexes.

  As he watched passengers filter down the walkway, Dade vaguely wondered how many miles Anna had put between them at this point. The perfume had been a dirty trick. One he had to admire. She was good at using whatever means were at her disposal, he’d give her that.

  He wasn’t sure how much time passed, but his glass was almost empty by the time a voice came over the loudspeaker announcing that flight two-thirty-five to Chicago would now begin preboarding. And he’d seen no sign of Shelli.

  Dade stood and crossed the walkway, leaning against a column near the first row of plastic chairs. The second the flight had been announced, most of the seats had suddenly vacated, passengers lining up like cattle at the gate to board. Dade slowly let his eyes scan the waiting line, just in case Shelli had somehow slipped past him.

  By the time he’d passed over the last person in line twice, Dade was positive Shelli was not among them.

  But just to cover all bases, he approached the flight attendant at a desk to the right of the boarding gate.

  “Excuse me, Diana,” he said, reading the woman’s nametag, and making deliberately familiar use of her name.

  The woman with a brunette bob looked up and flashed him a smile. “Yes?”

  “I’m sorry to bother you, but I’ve got a bit of situation here.”

  Her smile faltered for a second, obviously not enamored with the idea of dealing with a customer “situation” today. “I’m sorry to hear that, sir. What can I do for you?”

  “My fiancée and I kind of lost each other in the terminal, and now she’s not answering her cell. We’re both supposed to be on this flight. I was just wondering if you could tell me if she’s checked in yet or not?”

  She paused, about, he could tell, to recite some company policy to him.

  But before she could, he jumped in with, “Please, Diana? If she’s held up somewhere in the terminal, I don’t want to get on the plane and end up in Chicago without her, you know?”

  Diana paused.

  Dade shot her a smile. “You’d really be saving me here.”

  “Well, I guess I can at least tell you if she’s checked in,” she finally relented. “Can you tell me which seat she was in?”

  He passed his ticket across the desk to her. “Right next to mine.”

  She nodded, checked the flight info, then clicked a few more buttons. She nodded. “Yep, she checked in forty minutes ago, but she hasn’t boarded yet.”

  Which meant she was still in the airport somewhere.

  “Would you like me to page her?” Diana asked.

  “No, that’s okay,” he said, quickly taking his ticket back from her. “I’ll just wait for her here. She’s a little nervous about flying, so she’s probably just holed up in the ladies’ room or something. I’m sure she’ll be along.”

  He shot Diana another grin, then went back to his spot at the column where he had a clear view of the now packed waiting area.

  An announcement came over the speakers saying that general boarding was now in progress. People began walking through the gate, one small boarding group at a time. A few stragglers joined the waiting line, dragging their carry-ons behind them at breakneck speeds. The gate next to theirs, sixty-four, started filling up, passengers waiting for the flight to Tampa mingling unhelpfully with his Chicago crowd.

  He scanned each face, wishing people would just sit still and quit jockeying for a better spot in line. People were crossing in front of him, moving to the other side of the gate, jostling their luggage, and making it hard to keep track of who he’d seen already and who was new.

  So much so, that he almost didn’t see the slim woman in jeans and a heavy, shapeless hooded sweatshirt walk out of the ladies’ room. The sweatshirt disguised her body type, adding a boxy shape and at least ten pounds to her frame. She wore a backpack over one shoulder, looking to all the world like any other college student flying home for a summer visit. Her hair was a jet black, cropped short in a choppy cut that he could only guess had been done moments before in the ladies’ restroom. Because as she turned her face toward him, he recognized her instantly, despite the absence of the long red hair she’d worn that afternoon.

  Shelli.

  CHAPTER 8

  Dade took a step forward, making an effort not to move too quickly and scare her off. He watched as she got in line behind the other passengers waiting to board the plane, shifting her backpack to the other shoulder, keeping her head down.

  She hadn’t spotted him.

  She had the hood of her sweatshirt bunched around her neck to obscure her profile. Her shoulders were slumped forward, her body language saying she was doing everything she knew to seem small and inconspicuous.

  He slowly made his way forward, walking the long way around the crowd now spilling into the walkway to avoid her eyeline. He had to grab her before she boarded. A confrontation in the airport would be bad enough. He wasn’t taking this on a crowded, enclosed plane. He moved along the line of waiting travelers, sliding between the Asian businessmen, past the older couple. He was two people behind Shelli, almost close enough to reach out and grab the backpack off her shoulder, when he passed by the woman with the lap dog. The animal must have smelled Anya’s dog on him, because it immediately went into a frenzy in its little cage, barking like it was the end of the world.

  Several passengers spun around to see the noise.

  Including Shelli.

  Her eyes immediately locked onto Dade’s, surprise registering before she could hide it. Unfortunately, her initial reaction was followed quickly by trained instincts.

  She jumped out of line, shoving the rolling suitcase of the man behind her in Dade’s path before taking off at a dead run in the opposite direction of the gate.

  Dade swore under his breath, navigating around the woman with the damned noisy dog, and took off after her.

  The airport was crowded at this time of day, with vacationers as well as long-distance commuters, people rolling luggage behind them, texting as they walked, creating a sea of human obstacles blocking his pursuit. A family of four with a blond toddler got between them, and Dade nearly tripped over the kid, trying to avoid a head-on collision. He lost Shelli for a moment, frantically scanning the walkway in front of him, eyes darting from the back of one head to the next. A blond woman in a turtleneck, an older lady in a hat, a teenager wearing braids. Finally he caught sight of the navy sweatshirt, the hood now pulled up over her head. She was a few feet ahead of him, ducking behind a magazine rack displaying the latest issues of People and Us Weekly.

  Dade surged forward, eyes glued to the spot at the front of a shop. He got within a couple feet before Shelli jumped out from behind the magazines, shoving the stand as hard as she could, sending it careening forward, right toward Dade.

  Instinctively he put his hands up, catching the metal shelving before it brained him on the head. By the time he’d thrown it to the ground, Shelli was gone again, dashing toward the baggag
e claim area.

  Where his height and longer legs might usually have been an asset, here Shelli’s smaller size had her slipping between travelers with an ease he couldn’t emulate. He knocked into shoulders, bounced off irate passengers, each one slowing him down. Dade could hear them protesting but didn’t register it, his entire person focused on Shelli, sprinting at a full run now through the terminal.

  As she raced past the security checkpoint—going the opposite direction from the scanners—a portly security guard in an ill-fitting uniform shouted at her to slow down. Which, of course, she completely ignored. The guard grabbed a walkie-talkie from his belt shouting a series of numbers into it. Dade consciously slowed his pace, still keeping one eye on the hooded figure ahead as he slipped past the checkpoint.

  Shelli hit the escalator to the lower-level baggage area, knocking a guy in a backwards baseball cap off the last three steps. Dade followed, gaining ground as she rounded the first baggage carousel.

  And she knew it, too. She glanced over her shoulder, running into an overweight woman with a cart full of bags. The bags toppled over, and Dade quickly leapt over them, narrowly avoiding the woman himself as he ran after Shelli.

  The passengers were thick here, standing two and three deep as an alarm blared over the next carousel, signaling that bags were about to be loaded in. The belt started moving, people crowding forward, barring Shelli’s progress.

  Unfortunately, they also barred Dade’s. He pushed between two guys in suits, keeping one eye on the back of Shelli’s head as he pressed forward. He was close, and she was out of places to run. He positioned himself between her and the wall of glass doors to the outside where taxis and hotel shuttles sat waiting at the curb. If she was going to leave, she had to go through him.

  Her eyes darted left and right, realizing she was trapped. She paused a moment, contemplating options. Then she pulled herself up onto the carousel, stepping out onto the conveyer belt.

  Several passengers yelled in protest as she ran in a large circle with the belt’s momentum. A security guard appeared from nowhere, tracking her progress, yelling, “Hey! Get down!”