by Misty Evans
“The car slowed as it went past, but didn’t stop. My car is behind the barn.”
“Is it safe for us?”
Crunching noises filtered through the phone. Grace walking along the gravel drive of the broken-down barn that sat on the backend of a giant farm. At that barn, Syd would turn Lauren-now-Kelly over to Grace. “I think so. I ran to the road and watched the taillights dim. I got a bad feeling about that car though. After this, we need to change our spot.”
“I agree.” Syd started the car. “We’ll see you in a few minutes.”
Syd backed the car to the road and drove the half mile to the driveway leading to the dilapidated barn. It was too bad they’d have to switch drop-off locations because this one served their purposes. Remote locations miles from surrounding homes weren’t exactly easy to find in the D.C. area.
They’d work it out. Somehow. Even if Syd had to drive an extra hour, she’d do it.
She parked in the driveway, cut the lights but kept the engine running. They wouldn’t be here long. Grace walked around the side of the barn, her stride as swift as a two hundred pound, fifty-year-old woman could make it. By morning, Lauren-now-Kelly and her daughter would be in another state with another handler. Hopefully, the start of a new life without a battering husband.
“Okay,” Syd said. “Let’s get your things.”
She grabbed her purse from behind her seat and dug for the white envelope. “Here, take this.”
Lauren stared at the envelope, shook her head. “What’s this? You gave me our new ID’s and social security cards already.”
“I know. This is some cash. It’s not a lot.”
All she had and part of next month’s rent, but it was worth it.
“No. I can’t take your money.”
Syd dropped the envelope in Lauren-now-Kelly’s lap. “You can and you will. It’s only money. I can make more. Besides, it’ll take you a while to get cash flow going. You’ll need it for your daughter.”
Whatever argument Lauren-now-Kelly had conjured evaporated at the mention of her daughter. She gripped the envelope. “Thank you. I’ll pay you back. I swear. You’ve done so much.”
“Blah, blah,” Syd said.
Never a fan of the emotional goodbye, she shoved her door open to retrieve the single suitcase from the trunk. Lauren-now-Kelly had walked away from her life with only one suitcase. All of her photos, mementos, a lifetime of memories—weddings, baby showers, the first day of school—erased because of a husband who, if she’d stayed, would someday cause her death.
Well, Syd wouldn’t allow it. Not for Lauren-now-Kelly or any other woman who had the spine to walk away from a bastard husband.
She lifted the suitcase from the trunk, handed it off to Grace while Lauren-now-Kelly gathered her daughter for the next leg of their journey.
“She okay?” Grace asked.
“Nervous. She’ll be fine though. She’s ready. He worked her over good last night. She’s all busted up.”
Grace nodded. “I’ll take care of it.”
“I know. I’ll be in touch.”
Grace strode back around the side of the barn to retrieve her car and Syd turned to Lauren-now-Kelly. “Grace will take care of you. Remember what we talked about. No calls, no letters, no emails to anyone. Not even your parents or sister. I’m sorry. I know it’s brutal, but it has to be this way.”
She nodded. “I know.”
And then out of nowhere, Lauren-now-Kelly stepped forward and threw her arms around Syd. Oh, crap. Syd raised her arms, thought about it, and dropped them again. No hugging. Too personal. Too connected. And in her line of work, too connected could earn her a beating from a pissed-off spouse. Self-defense training only took her so far when faced with an enraged bear.
She opened her mouth, took a small breath, but the air clogged in her throat. Nowhere to go. Crap, crap, crap. She slammed her eyes closed. Refused to give in to the emotional drama. What good would it do?
“You need to go.”
Lauren-now-Kelly gave her one last squeeze. “Thank you,” she said. “I’ll never forget you.”
Headlights from Grace’s minivan shined on them and Lauren-now-Kelly released Syd, grabbed her daughter’s hand, and headed for the next step in her new life. Syd waited for them to get settled in the car and then stood back, offering up a brief wave as they drove away.
I’ll never forget you either.
Chapter Three
People let their guard down when they thought no one was watching.
Grey stared into his Burris spotting scope, magnifying Sydney’s body as he watched her through the floor-to-ceiling window of the former church building. She’d swept her long hair, still wet from her morning shower, into a high ponytail, the ends brushing her shoulders as she stood over her desk rifling through a stack of folders.
Sydney’s office at the Saint Agnes Fresh Start shelter for women in lower D.C. was the size of a broom closet.
“St. Agnes, the saint of chastity.” Grey snorted and recalled his mother’s fascination with all the female saints. “The founder of Fresh Start must have had one serious dose of wishful thinking to name it after her.”
Through the scope, Grey ignored the way Sydney’s cleavage yelled look at me over the top of her black tank. Instead, he zoomed in on her face, her lips. Smooth skin, a smattering of freckles, tendrils of hair teasing her neck where they’d escaped the ponytail.
So young.
Not so innocent.
She was twenty-five, but could have passed for eighteen. Young, pretty, smart…the all-American poster girl for the other women who populated the charity. Sydney sent the unspoken message that even if life screwed you over, you could still make something out of yourself.
Hell, different place, different sitch, he would’ve hit her up for a date. Two screw-ups taking on the world…or at least each other. Great for a short-term fling. Not so much for a real relationship.
She picked up the phone on her desk, tucked the receiver between her shoulder and ear and continued shuffling through folders, seeming to look for one in particular. Finally, she dragged a sheet of paper from one of them. Grey shifted the scope to read the words on the sheet she held as she talked.
The Burris provided four times the magnification of a rifle scope, creating the ultimate intimacy with his suspect even though he was across the street in an abandoned apartment above a pizza joint. He could see the mole on the side of Sydney’s neck, catch the slight grimace she made as she listened to the caller.
Her brows drew down, as she appeared to argue with the caller. Her ringless fingers tightened on the receiver and her body tensed. Grey’s body responded in kind.
“Bad news, Syd?” The soft-spoken words fell on an empty pizza box and soda can lying on the floor at his feet. “Ian just lay the news on you about the murder of one of your girls?”
A surge of familiarity, as intimate as the view the scope gave him, flooded his mind. He’d only been surveilling Sydney for two days, but he knew pretty much all there was to know about the woman. She didn’t just run a shelter. She talked to herself in the mirror hanging alongside the single coat hook in her office. She opened the window of her closet sized office for a few minutes every afternoon, even on cold, blustery days. She didn’t use her computer to surf TMZ or YouTube on her lunch break. Instead, she combed self-help sites for Ten Tips to Prevent Being a Victim or Five Ways To Help A Rape Victim.
And, to Grey’s way of thinking, she was into something illegal. Something involving the shelter and women disappearing.
He just couldn’t prove it.
But if he could flip her and ace this off-the-books job for the Bureau, the Bureau that fired him for insubordination, he might just get his badge back. His entire future rested on the shoulders of the woman in the Burris scope’s sight. All because Grey and Donaldson had been at the Panthera the night an escort had been killed. The same night the man Grey had tirelessly investigated and knew—knew—was a murderer had also
been in attendance.
As Grey watched, Sydney sat at her desk, propped her elbows and leaned her forehead into her hands. In her short lifetime, she’d seen as much of the dangerous side of humankind as he had while flying helicopters for the Army and working violent crimes for the FBI’s criminal investigation division.
Hang on. Was she crying? Over Amanda’s death?
“Shit.” A weird feeling took hold in Grey’s chest. For half a freaky second, he wanted to reach through the scope and lay a hand on her shoulder, comfort her. Tell her Amanda would be the last one. No one else would get hurt on his watch.
Total bullshit of course. Not just because he’d let a killer get past him once before, costing someone dear her life, but also the fact he couldn’t stop this killer singlehandedly. The only way to stop The Lion was to send in a woman who could take him on, catch him in the act.
After following her through farm country the other night, witnessing her evasion skills and sneaking that woman off to who knew where, he had no doubt Sydney was that woman. All he had to do was convince her.
She rose from her chair and marched out of her office. Adjusting the lens on the camera, Grey took a deep breath and brought her office window into focus once more. Where had she disappeared to?
He waited a few minutes. Must be a bathroom break. To kill time he fiddled with the scope, took a swig of soda. Five minutes turned into ten. He checked the parking lot just to make sure she hadn’t snuck by him and left. Nope. Her beater car still sat listlessly in the same place. “Come on, Syd. Where are you?”
Behind him, the slightest squeak of a floorboard alerted Grey to a visitor. He froze as cold metal pressed against the back of his skull.
“See anything interesting?” The young female voice was full of snark.
He’d never heard Sydney’s voice, but it had to be her. Soft on the surface with a hard edge underneath, it told him that whatever weapon she held to his head wasn’t just for show. She’d had years of self-defense training and she provided classes for the women at the shelter. She might just be able to kick his ass.
Grey raised his hands. “My name is Justice Greystone. I’m head of a Special Mission Unit for the...” He couldn’t mention the FBI specifically, that was the deal. “…government.”
A Special Mission Unit at the moment that consisted of one man. He turned slowly, inch by slow inch, finally looking a pissed-off Sydney in the eye.
Her weapon? The drab green stapler from her desk.
Boy, Monroe would have given him never-ending hell if his ex-partner had seen this.
In his defense, the stapler had to be from the 1960s and probably weighed enough to give him a concussion.
She glanced at his camera, back to his face. “The government, huh? Which branch?”
How much to tell her? She wouldn’t buy a shitty lie. He reached for his Army training. He’d been SMU, the 1st Special Forces Operational Detachment. A.K.A. Delta Force. Or The Unit. What he was doing now wasn’t so different. “A covert branch that carries out high-risk operations.”
“Like the CIA?”
He didn’t answer, let her think what she wanted. There were worse things than being labeled a spook. Traitor came to mind.
Sydney shook her head. “The CIA isn’t allowed to spy on American citizens inside the U.S. So you must be…FBI, right? Where’s your badge?” She eyeballed him. “And why exactly is the Federal Bureau of Intimidation stalking me?”
The speech was in his head, ready to go, but all he could do when he looked in her pretty blue eyes—was that a hint of fear or anger clouding them to a stormy gray?—was tell her the gut truth. “Sydney, I need your help to stop a killer.”
Sydney lowered the stapler, her mind reeling with all the ways this guy could be playing her. “A killer? What the hell are you talking about?”
For a federal agent, his dark hair was a few inches too long, even curling on the ends. His eyes, brown as her coffee, were hard and testified to the fact he’d seen the rough side of life. And lived through it. She could relate.
“Fresh Start,” he said. “The girls. We need to talk about what happens to those who leave here and end up in an escort ring catering to politicians and diplomats. Three of the girls are dead.”
Her shoulders seized into knots. Dead? “They’re not girls. They’re women. And what’s this crap about an escort ring? We run a legit shelter.”
Grey glanced out the window then back to Sydney. “Can we talk about this in your office?”
This guy was plain crazy if he thought she’d take him into the shelter. Wearing that suit, even if he had skipped the tie, he had Fed written all over him and would send some of the more emotionally fragile women into a psychotic break.
“We’ll talk here. Unless I need a lawyer. Then we don’t talk at all.”
He shifted his weight, fingered the camera in his hands. “You’re not under arrest, just so we’re clear.”
“We’re clear. But I’ve been screwed by enough men in my life to have learned when to call in reinforcements. Particularly when I drive through the alley behind this building every morning and I’m suddenly seeing a car I don’t recognize.”
A Challenger that may or may not have been following me two nights ago. “You could easily be a disgruntled husband looking to take a nine iron to your wife’s skull. Now, either talk or I’m outta here.”
Something changed in his eyes as he studied her, a slight smile touching his lips. “You always carry a stapler as a weapon?”
And oh-my-god this guy was good. Total charmer. Then again, she was criminally bad at judging men. That gene had been passed on by her mother and, like her mother, she always got screwed.
And not in a good way.
“Start talking, Fed Boy.”
He smirked. “How about we start with the gir—women. I’ll tell you what I know about them and you can fill in the blanks.”
“Give me some names. If I know anything, I’ll tell you. But if I think this is going bad for me, we’re done.”
The smirk stayed in place as if he knew the answer before he asked, “And why would our chat go bad for you?”
Half of what she did for women at the shelter was illegal, but she wasn’t about to feel guilt. If getting women the hell out of Dodge saved their lives, she’d live with bending laws. But if this guy’s Challenger was the same one that was following her the other night, he knew her deal.
Might as well lay it out there. She sighed. “If you’re any good at your job, you’ll have figured out that there are women who come into the shelter and don’t stay very long. I help them with that.”
“With what exactly?”
“I help them survive their asshole husbands and boyfriends who get off on using their fists to make a point.”
He withdrew a set of photos from his jacket and held them in front of her face. Three women stared at her. “Are these women ones you helped survive?”
Syd studied the faces of Amanda, LaToya and Kaitlin and her throat constricted. Damn. “No. But they were here and I helped them get jobs.” She glanced up at him. “They’re dead? All of them?”
“Murdered. Three women—” he looked Sydney in the eye, his smile gone, “—that you recruited.”
Chapter Four
“And what? You think I killed them?”
The tougher the girl—woman—the more he liked her. And Sydney was one tough woman.
Tough, pretty, smart and dangerous with a stapler. She was going to make an excellent undercover operative.
If he could talk her into it.
He knew what it was like to have the world shit on you. To wipe your eyes and keep going. His father, the army, the Bureau…they’d all handed him his ass on a platter, but he kept going. Kept doing what was right, rules and laws be damned. Sydney was the same. If nothing else, he admired her gumption. Another thing they had in common.
He’d seen the flicker of panic, brief as it was, in her eyes. No surprise, considering who he was
and what he was laying on her. But behind the panic was the desire to find out the facts and fix the problem. Sydney Banfield didn’t run from a fight. Another admirable trait.
First step, keep her talking. “I didn’t say you murdered them. I’m here because I need info about Amanda, LaToya and Kaitlin.”
She nodded, and being the smart woman she was, took a second to organize her thoughts. “Amanda was sweet. Tough life though. A runaway who came to us after she’d been raped by her boyfriend. LaToya I didn’t know as well. She stayed with us about six weeks and then moved on to an internship in a Senator’s office. Kaitlin was young. Too young to be on the streets.”
“Did Ian Goldberg have any interaction with these women while they were at Fresh Start?”
“Ian? Our lawyer? The only thing he ever does with the women is offer legal counseling if they want it. You think Ian killed them?”
Before Grey could say anything in defense, she pointed the stapler at him. “You federal boys are unbelievable. The man gave me a job when I needed one, a meaningful job that helps women who have seen the worst that life offers. They have no money, no homes, no families. Of course you think he’s a murderer. Typical.”
Grey held up his hand. “I’m looking for information. Ian Goldberg helped Amanda, LaToya and Kaitlin get jobs with The Smoking Gun escort service under false names.”
“I don’t believe it.”
Of course she didn’t. “Believe what you want, but bottom line, I’m going to stop this killer, Sydney. The first step is to figure out who’s recruiting the girls. All three passed through Fresh Start before entering a life of stretch limos, personal bodyguards and power-hungry politicians. They passed through your shelter. Either you recruited them or someone else did. The question is, are you going to help me nail this killer or continue to let the person responsible poach girls from under your nose?”
Her lips thinned but she lowered the stapler. She chewed the inside of her cheek for a few seconds. Didn’t answer.
She needed time to process the info and decide. Fine. “You filled out the paperwork, ran the background checks and set up the meetings to handle their relocations and job placements. The girls thought they were getting internships with prominent senators. Instead, they ended up as high-priced call girls for The Smoking Gun Escort Service. A few months later, they’re dead. Brutally murdered.”