CARRIE'S PROTECTOR

by Rebecca York

  To her relief, Wyatt returned with the key in under five minutes and directed her to a room around back. One room. She didn’t love that arrangement, but she understood why he’d done it.

  Inside, the accommodations were pretty standard, with two queen-size beds and enough room so that they could keep out of each other’s way.

  Wyatt pulled back the spread on one of the beds, kicked off his shoes and lay down heavily.

  “I’m going to call my father,” she said.

  “Go ahead.”

  She dug her phone out of her purse and clicked it on. It beeped immediately.

  “There are messages for me.”

  “Call your father first,” he said as he leaned back against the pillow and closed his eyes.

  “Right.” She clicked the automatic-dial button for her father’s house. The call was answered on the first ring, not by Douglas Mitchell. It was Patrick Harrison, her father’s chief of staff. His mother had been a maid in their house, and she’d died in an automobile accident twenty-five years earlier. Since there had been no relatives willing to take the three-year-old boy, her father had unofficially adopted Patrick, and he’d been a member of the household ever since. He’d gone to college at Ohio State, then come back home to work for the senior Mitchell.

  “Carrie, thank God,” he said. “I’ve been trying to call you, but there was no answer.” He sounded near hysterical.

  She kept her own voice calm as she answered, “Wyatt told me to turn off my phone so they couldn’t use it to pinpoint our location.”

  “Are you all right?”

  “Yes. But the men at the safe house are dead.” She gulped. “All except Wyatt. We were going back there, but it was an ambush. Like at the Federal Building.”

  “Thank God you’re all right,” he said again.

  Something in the tone of his voice told her he wasn’t just worried about her.

  “What happened?” she asked, praying that her father hadn’t had a heart attack or a stroke.

  “There’s no easy way to say this.”

  “Then spit it out!”

  “Your father’s been kidnapped.”

  “Lord, no!”

  At the sound of her raised voice, Wyatt surged off the bed. Crossing to her, he took the phone out of her hand.

  “What did you just tell Carrie?” he demanded, clicking on the speaker so that they could both hear.

  “Her father’s been kidnapped.”

  “How? Where?”

  “Two men came to the house.”

  “Are you all right?” Carrie interjected.

  “One of them hit me with the butt of his gun, but I’m okay. They’re demanding that Carrie turn herself in, or they’ll kill Douglas. And they said they’ll kill him if I call the police.”

  Carrie gasped, hardly able to believe what she’d just heard.

  “Are you sure it’s the terrorists?” Wyatt demanded.

  “I...guess. I don’t know for sure. Who else would they be?”

  “What did they look like?”

  “They were wearing ski masks.”

  “Is there anything else you can tell me?”

  “I was on the floor, hanging on to consciousness by my fingernails.”

  Carrie made a low sound. “I’m so sorry.”

  “It’s okay. I mean, I’m still here. Maybe so I could give you the message about your father.”

  “Yeah,” Wyatt agreed.

  Patrick switched subjects. “Where are you?”

  “Somewhere safe,” Wyatt answered.

  “We have to go home,” Carrie said.

  “No.” Wyatt fixed his gaze on her. “Patrick just said that men broke in and took your father, but they want you. They’ll keep him alive as long as they don’t have you. If you turn yourself in, you’re dead, and so is he.”

  Carrie stared at Wyatt. A few minutes ago he had seemed as if he needed a good night’s rest before he would be fully functional. Now he looked like the agent in charge again. “I want to know what happened, but I’m not going to take that information now, in case this call is being traced.”

  “By whom?” Patrick asked.

  “The terrorists. I’ll call you back soon.”

  “But—”

  Wyatt clicked off.

  * * *

  ON THE OTHER end of the line, Patrick Harrison cursed. Slamming down the phone, he stood for a moment, struggling to control his temper as he reminded himself to breathe in and out slowly. Hawk had said he would call back. When, exactly?

  Patrick had just been through a terrible ordeal, and now he didn’t like the way Wyatt Hawk was handling the situation. No, for starters, he didn’t like it that Hawk was on the case at all.

  Patrick had come up with the initial list of bodyguards. Then he’d found something questionable in the guy’s background. He’d told Douglas not to hire Hawk, but the man had always had a mind of his own. He might listen to advice, then do the exact opposite because he was sure he knew better. In this case, he’d decided to go ahead with the former CIA operative, even though the man had messed up on his last job.

  Patrick had lived with Douglas Mitchell’s arbitrary decisions for years. Since he’d come back from college to work for the old man, he’d thought more than once that he should have struck out on his own. But he’d been comfortable here, and when Douglas had made him a good offer, he’d known that the man wanted him to stay—and valued his work ethic.

  But he’d found out soon enough that working for Douglas could be an exercise in frustration. Never more than at this moment. He’d have liked to have Carrie home at the family compound so he’d know exactly where she was. But Hawk had her stashed Lord knew where. It could be somewhere close. Or they could be in the next state by now.

  He banged his fist against the rosewood desk, then struggled for calm again. Hawk had said he’d call back. Then Patrick would get more information. Or not, depending on Hawk’s mood.

  He cursed again, more softly this time. Wyatt Hawk was turning out to be the biggest mistake he could imagine making.

  * * *

  CARRIE’S STOMACH ROILED as she stood in the middle of the room, clutching her cell phone. “My father—”

  “—is a hostage.”

  “Which is my fault. And the men who snatched him hurt Patrick.”

  “Carrie, none of this is your fault. You were just doing your duty as a citizen. What were you going to do, let them blow up the U.S. Capitol and pretend you hadn’t heard anything?”

  When she started to protest, Wyatt reached for her and pulled her close, pressing her face to his shoulder. “We have two jobs here. The first one is to keep you safe. The second is to get your dad back.”

  “What if I think that’s the wrong order?” she asked in a strained voice.

  “It’s not. And we will get him back.”

  “How?”

  His tone was soothing as he rubbed her back. “We don’t do it by running off without a plan. We’ve got to consider all the angles and proceed carefully.”

  He kept his arms around her, rubbing her neck and shoulders, and she leaned into his strength as she thought back over the awful conversation with Patrick. Thank goodness she hadn’t been alone. If Wyatt hadn’t stopped her, she would probably have told Patrick where she was, and the terrorists could be on their way to the motel already if they’d been listening.

  “They can’t find us through the phone?” she murmured.

  “We didn’t speak long enough for them to trace the call. But I want to get rid of both our phones so they can’t use the GPS.”

  She nodded against his shoulder.

  “Are you feeling better?” he asked.

  “Shouldn’t that be my line?”

  H
e managed a low laugh. “I’m fine.”

  “You were shot a little while ago. You were resting when I got ahold of Patrick.”

  “I’ve been hurt before, a lot worse than this.”

  “That scar on your chest.”

  “Yes.”

  “And you were in the hospital, right?”

  “I said it was worse than this.” He eased away from her. “We need to get a couple of prepaid phones so we can use them and throw them away.”

  “Okay.”

  He gave Carrie a direct look. “You trust Patrick?”

  “Of course!”

  “Who else is at your house?”

  She thought for a moment. “There’s Inez, our maid.”

  “How long has she been with you?”

  “Fifteen years.”

  “Does she need money?”

  “Everybody needs money.”

  He nodded. “Who else could have heard you talking to your father about your plans to hide out?”

  She felt as if she was being interrogated, but she knew he needed to know the answers. “There’s a gardening crew that comes by a couple of times a week. They could have been eavesdropping.”

  “Anyone else?”

  “Not on a regular basis.”

  His eyes narrowed, and she could see he was considering contingencies. “I don’t want to leave you here, and I don’t want to take you to the store, but I think that sticking together is better at the moment.”

  She nodded, assuming he was probably afraid she’d call Patrick if he left her.

  He carried the cell phones to the bathroom and crushed them under his heel, then stuffed the pieces into his pocket.

  She winced, thinking about the contacts and the pictures he’d just destroyed.

  He glanced at her, apparently reading her expression. “You can get a new one later.”

  “Right.”

  “I’m going out first.” He opened the door and looked out, then crossed to the car and motioned for her to follow.

  As she got in the car, she asked, “They couldn’t have found us here already, could they?”

  “Probably not, but I didn’t think they would show up at the safe house before we got back there. It appears that this operation is bigger and better organized than we assumed initially.”

  “Oh, great.”

  Minutes after they’d entered the motel room, they were back on the road.

  This time, Wyatt took the driver’s side. She wanted to protest that he should be resting, but she was pretty sure he wouldn’t pay any attention to the suggestion. Obviously he was the kind of man who wasn’t going to let a woman drive him unless he was incapacitated.

  As he drove, he tossed away the pieces of the phones, then turned to her. “I have Patrick’s bio. He’s been with you for twenty-five years, right?”

  “Yes.”

  “And does he have any reasons to dislike your family?”

  “Why would he? My father did everything for him. He treated him like a son, actually. He had a bedroom down the hall from me. He ate all his meals with us. My father sent him to the same private school I went to. He paid his tuition at Ohio State.”

  “So he was a good student?”

  “Yes.”

  “Did he ever give your father any trouble?”

  “You mean like rebelling?”

  “Yes.”

  “He and I did a couple of stupid things—like borrow my dad’s car when we were both fifteen.”

  “What happened when your dad found out?”

  “He didn’t. We covered for each other.”

  “You like him?”

  “He was as close to me as a brother.” Memories flooded her. “We hung out together, because Dad was usually busy. You could say he was the kind of father who didn’t have a lot of time for his kids, but I knew he loved me.”

  “We were talking about Patrick, not your dad.”

  “I was trying to explain why Patrick and I were so close.”

  “And he loved Patrick?”

  She hesitated. “That might be too strong a word. I know he’s fond of him. And he’s certainly come to rely on him.” Again she paused before continuing. “Patrick didn’t have to come back and work for Dad, but he did that on his own.”

  “Okay.” Wyatt checked the rearview mirror. “What about your mother?”

  “Dad never talks about her.”

  “When’s the last time you saw her?”

  She thought for a moment. “When I was maybe six. I went into her room, and she was packing.” The pain and confusion of that long-ago moment came zinging back to her again. “She said she loved me, but she needed to leave. She said she’d be back to see me, but she never came back.”

  “Why?”

  “At the time I thought she’d abandoned me. Now I think my dad kept her away. I heard him and his lawyer talking once. Dad said that he’d given her a lot of money, and he wasn’t springing for any more.”

  “Why do you think she left?”

  “I think Dad was more wound up with his work than he was with her.”

  “Like with you and Patrick?”

  “Yes.”

  “Could she be holding a grudge? Could she be angry enough to...try to hurt him?”

  Carrie turned her head toward Wyatt. “Wait a minute. What are you trying to say? That my father wasn’t kidnapped because of a terrorist plot?”

  “I’m trying to look at every angle. Were you ever romantically involved with Patrick?” he asked.

  The question startled her. “What business is that of yours?”

  “I’m trying to understand the family dynamics.”

  “Patrick and I were never close that way,” she clipped out, hoping he’d drop the subject, but apparently, he wasn’t ready to do that.

  “Did he ever try anything—and you rebuffed him?”

  She sat perfectly still, remembering.

  “From the look on your face, I take it the answer is yes.”

  “Once, at the pool, he came up behind me and put his arms around me.”

  “What did you do?”

  “I swam away.”

  “How did he take that?”

  “He never...tried again.”

  “How old were you?”

  “We were teenagers. Would you drop it now?”

  “Okay,” he said, although she gathered from the tone of his voice that he wanted to keep interrogating her.

  * * *

  THIRTY MILES AWAY, things were unraveling for a key player in the unfolding drama.

  The phone rang. And the caller ID said the number was unpublished.

  Just let it ring, an interior voice advised. But that could turn out to be worse than picking it up.

  Still, the hand that lifted the receiver wasn’t quite steady.

  “Hello?”

  “You know who this is?”

  “Yes.”

  “You’re late on your payment.”

  “I’ll have it in a few days.”

  “That’s what you said last time.”

  “I swear I’ll have it.”

  “You can’t keep relying on our goodwill.”

  The line went dead, and the hand that replaced the receiver was shaking so hard that the instrument rattled.

  Was there any way out of this? There had to be.

  Chapter Five

  “Tell me why someone else besides the terrorists could have kidnapped my father,” Carrie said.

  She watched Wyatt heave in a sigh and let it out before answering.

  “It’s all over the news. Someone could have taken advantage of the plot to go after him when he’s vulnerable.”


  “Why?”

  “That’s what I’m trying to figure out. What do you know about his enemies?”

  She didn’t like the way he’d put that. He’d flat-out assumed that there were people who wanted to hurt her father.

  “He didn’t talk to me a lot about his business.”

  “But you do know something.”

  “He and a guy named Quincy Sumner had a pretty public fight over a piece of land they both wanted.”

  “And your father won.”

  “Yes.”

  “We’ll put Sumner on our list. Where does he live?”

  “Fairfax, Virginia.”

  They had arrived at the drugstore. This time they went in together. After buying four cell phones, Wyatt took Carrie on a quick run through the cosmetics and toiletries departments, where they bought some of the basics that they’d been forced to abandon at the safe house. He also bought her a sun hat. When he’d removed the tag, he put it on her head, pulling it down firmly to cover part of her face.

  As they returned to the parking lot, he turned to her. “I’m going to call Patrick back, but I want to do the talking.”

  “What if I want to talk to him?”

  “Let me deal with him. I’ll put on the speaker so you can hear.”

  She gave a little nod. She didn’t like it, but it was probably the best course, given the state of her emotions.

  On the prepaid phone Wyatt dialed the Mitchell house.

  Patrick picked up immediately.

  “Where the hell have you been?” he demanded.

  “Getting phones. Tell us what happened.”

  “Is Carrie there?”

  “Yes,” she answered, then forgot all about letting Wyatt handle the call. “When did you find out I was in trouble?”

  “Your dad got a computer alert about a shoot-out in the Federal Building. He turned on the television, and we were both watching, so we didn’t hear anything until armed men appeared in his office and threatened to kill him.”

  Carrie moaned. “Was he all right?”

  He repeated what he’d said earlier. “I told you I was on the floor at the time. I couldn’t see much, but he walked out under his own power. They said they’d exchange him for you.”

  “Surrendering to them would be foolish,” Wyatt snapped.