by Diane Capri
The music on the radio stopped. The host came back on with the news. Her Oxford accent sounded like an old-time BBC announcer. Hadlow turned up the volume.
“Reports are coming in of a multiple shooting in Zorita. Details are hazy, but initial reports indicate one gunman chased people from an apartment near the center of the city. One of the gunmen was shot and is now in custody. It also appears that one or more hostages were taken by another gunman.”
“That would be me.” Jess raised her hand.
“Must be me.” Hadlow laughed. “Because you’re the one holding the gun.”
Ms. Oxford accent finished the report. “Police are establishing roadblocks around Zorita. We will keep you updated as this story unfolds.”
Another song started on the radio and Hadlow turned the volume down to a murmur. “No deaths reported. Hopefully, that means Cantor is okay.”
“I hope so.” Jess turned the phone over in her hands. “You’ve been following him, too.”
He shrugged.
Cantor’s phone rang again. Grupo Lopez appeared on the display again.
“Don’t answer it,” he said.
“They’ll just keep calling. Besides, we need all the information we can get.” She pointed to a freeway exit. “Let’s find out who it is, at least. Pull over and stop the car.”
CHAPTER FIFTY-ONE
Friday, August 19
8:15 p.m. CET
Zorita, Spain
Hadlow angled off the freeway and pulled into a rest area.
Jess cleared her throat, and answered the phone. “Hello?”
“Felipe?” said a young man’s voice.
She opened her mouth to ask the man his name, and stopped.
“Felipe?” the young man said. “That you?”
“Sorry. Felipe left his phone at my place last night. I thought it might be him calling.”
The man umm’d and err’d. “Debora?”
“No, it’s Alice. Felipe’s girlfriend,” she said. “Who’s Debora?”
Hadlow frowned at her. She shrugged.
The young man’s voice tightened. “Girlfriend?”
“Who’s Debora?” Jess said.
“I… I—”
“I’m sure he’ll come back soon. Can I have him call you?”
“Sí. Tell him security came by.”
“Came by? At work? Is he in trouble?”
“Tell him it was like with Camilo.”
“What happened with Camilo?”
“He’ll know. They emptied Felipe’s desk and took his computer. Just now.”
“Do they want to talk to him?”
“They didn’t even talk to me, and I’ve got the desk next to his. So, tell him. Tell him it’s serious. Make sure Felipe knows. Okay? Like Camilo.”
“Okay. What’s your name?”
Jess heard other voices on the line. “I must go,” the young man said. The line went dead.
Jess leaned back in her seat. “Wow.”
“So, tell me,” Hadlow said.
“Felipe Cantor’s desk has been cleared out at work. Grupo Lopez’s security took his computer, too. They’re looking for him. The guy said it was just like Camilo.”
He nodded slowly. “Who’s Camilo?”
“He wouldn’t say.” She scowled. “Why would Grupo Lopez security clear out Cantor’s desk? The timing seems like it might be related to me, doesn’t it?”
“That would be my guess. They expected the sniper to kill him and were preparing for the inevitable police inquiry by eliminating everything. If I had to guess, I’d say something similar happened to Camilo. I’ll ask my desk jockey boss to check it out.” He glanced toward her. “Besides his association with Elden and now you, Cantor’s not been up to anything that would get him erased like that.”
Jess shook her head. She might be an outsider. She might have stirred things up. Investigations always did. Maybe it was wishful thinking, but the timeline felt wrong.
“You said you saw a gun pointing at Cantor’s apartment before you came busting into the place.”
He didn’t reply.
“You were following me.”
“So?”
“The shooter wasn’t following me.” She cocked her head and talked it through. “I didn’t plan to go to Cantor’s apartment at that specific time. It was a spur of the moment thing. When I made the decision, the only person I told was Garza. And I only mentioned it on my way out of the police station. If the shooter had some way of overhearing my plans, he still didn’t have time to get there ahead of me and get set up in his nest before you came along and saw me walking into the building.”
Hadlow nodded, frowning.
“So, the shooter was already on the third floor opposite when I arrived. He’d brought his rifle. He was already set up.” She paused for a breath. “He was there for Felipe.”
Hadlow’s frown deepened. “Perhaps.”
“The caller said they didn’t ask for Cantor before they cleared out his desk. They already knew he wasn’t coming back.”
His eyes scanned the almost deserted rest area. “We need to keep moving.”
“Grupo Lopez tried to kill off one of their employees.”
He pulled out of the rest area and merged onto the freeway.
When they were once again up to speed, she asked, “Why would they do that?”
“Rafa Lopez is fighting for control of Grupo Lopez. He has his own secret organization running inside the company.” He glanced across the cabin. “Rafa is a ruthless son of a bitch. I believe he’ll do just about anything, including deep-sixing employees.”
“That’s what you’re doing, isn’t it? Something about Rafa Lopez.”
He glanced at the clock on the dashboard. “We’ll be in Gibraltar in an hour and a half.”
She found her phone and checked the signal strength. She dialed her editor and long time friend, Carter Pierce.
“Who are you calling?” Hadlow said.
She angled the gun toward his torso. “My office.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know what alphabet soup organization you work for, but I’m sure as hell not going to be deep-sixed. For all I know, you could be one of Rafa Lopez’s men. Someone needs to know where I am.”
“Jess?” Carter’s voice was groggy because it was three in the morning in Denver, but he snapped the word like he was awake enough.
“Listen to me. I’m in a car with a Brit calling himself Gary Hadlow who is investigating Rafa Lopez but is desperate to stay away from the local police.”
“Jess—”
“His people may come there to—”
Carter groaned. “They’ve already been and gone.”
“What?”
“You’ve stumbled into something, Jess. Whatever it is, it’s got people alerted. They promised me Hadlow would get you safely out of Spain. So I agreed.”
“You agreed to what?”
“To drop your Kelso Products bombing story in return for getting you back safely.”
What the hell? Jess’s mouth hung open. In all the years she’d worked with Taboo, Carter had never undermined her like this. Not once. Exactly the opposite. He’d always been her staunchest supporter.
“They came to my house a few hours ago,” Carter said. “I knew one of them.”
“What do you mean you knew them?”
“This has happened before, Jess. Sometimes, we have to play the game. I hate it, too. Maybe we can get the story out afterward. Whatever it is.”
Her nostrils flared. “And what about Alex Cole? He could be executed, Carter. Can you live with that?”
“Let it go for now, Jess.”
“What about all the people who got killed in that explosion? And Debora Elden? She’s at the center of all this. I know it like I know you’re not really agreeing to this, Carter.”
“Jess. Please. We don’t know what’s going on and we could screw this up and put other lives at risk. Not only your life, Jess. There are more
innocents to consider here. Go with Hadlow. He’ll get you out of Spain. We can discuss the rest when you get back.”
“What did they say to you?”
“This is bigger than any one person, Jess.” Carter’s sigh sounded old all of a sudden. “Do it for me, will you? Just this once. I promise I’ll never ask you again.”
She looked across at Hadlow. “Of course. This is bigger than any one person. I think you’re right.”
She hung up.
CHAPTER FIFTY-TWO
Friday, August 19
8:30 p.m. CET
Zorita, Spain
Hadlow continued with the flow of traffic, keeping to the inside lane.
“Congratulations,” she said sourly. “You’ve persuaded my boss. I’ve been called back. I’ve got to face a woman I really admire and tell her I’ve failed. An innocent man will go to prison forever and the terrorists responsible for the Kelso Products bombing will get away with murder. You can be very proud of what you’ve accomplished.”
“Sarcasm now? Look, I don’t steer the ship. I’m only chained to an oar. Besides that, a lot of people are working damn hard on this case, putting our lives on the line, if you hadn’t noticed.” He shrugged and his tone was more than a little edgy. “How does your FBI boyfriend deal with your low opinion of us professionals?”
“You know that’s crap.” She scowled right back at him.
They held the silence for quite a while. Finally, he asked, “Why is all this so important to you? Why can’t you wait until we get the situation handled?”
“Because no one seems to care about Alex Cole except me. He’s being framed. I know it as well as I know your name isn’t really Gary Hadlow.” Jess sighed and ran both hands through her hair. “Now that I’m leaving, don’t you owe me some answers, at the very least? What exactly do you think is happening at Grupo Lopez?”
Hadlow shook his head.
“Well, what do you think happened to Debora Elden?”
He seemed tempted to answer, but the moment passed.
“Are you going back to find Cantor? Try to keep him alive, at least?”
He gave an exasperated sigh. “Will you give it a rest? I’ve got enough to deal with as it is.”
“Driving along the expressway doesn’t seem all that difficult to me.”
“I have to get us through to Gibraltar.” He gave her the side eye. “We can’t just turn up and sip tea with our pinkies in the air to prove we’re British, if that’s what you were thinking.”
Hadlow slowed at the next junction, and stopped at a public payphone. He spent a while on a call and then returned to the car.
“You’re cleared to fly from Gibraltar,” he said, as if that had been her desire all along.
“And you’re going back to Zorita?”
He rejoined the freeway without answering.
Jess sighed. “So let’s recap.”
“Please. Let’s don’t.” Hadlow frowned. “There is nothing you can rephrase or attack from another angle that I can answer. Don’t you get that?”
His phone buzzed and he glanced at the display. “I’m sorry. I know you’re trying to help your friend. I wish I was at liberty to say more. But I’m not.”
“Damn right I’m trying to help my friend. But that’s not all. I’ve been shot at and pushed in front of a train by whoever is behind all this.” She paused with a big dose of exasperation of her own.
He grinned. “Next you’re going to tell me you were abducted at gunpoint by a mysterious stranger who made you jump off a roof.”
She renewed her grip on the gun. “You’re making fun of me.”
“Actually not.” He sounded a little surprised. He cocked his head and his eyes narrowed. “It’s refreshing to find a civilian who can take care of herself and think under pressure.”
She glowered at him. “Tell me the truth. If you were in my shoes, would you simply accept all this and go home without a fight?”
He said nothing.
“Exactly as I thought,” she said, nodding. “So you want me to do what you, yourself, would not.”
He kept quiet for a mile or so before he took a deep breath, having made some sort of decision. “I saw Debora Elden board the Grupo Lopez company jet this morning at 4 a.m. We didn’t know her destination at that point. The jet made two stops. No one deplaned at the first stop. The second was Quatro de Fevereiro Airport.” He held up his phone. “I just got notification.”
“Where is that?”
“Africa. Angola, actually. Luanda, the capital.”
“That’s a big place.”
“Yes, it is.”
She searched on her phone. “Grupo Lopez doesn’t have any facilities near there.”
“We’re trying to get further intel.”
“Are you going there?”
“Why would I be going there?”
“Why would you be watching her get on the company jet at four in the morning, and why would you be trying to get more intel otherwise?”
He sighed.
A road sign indicated another thirty miles to Gibraltar.
He took the next exit, and pulled into a large gas station with a mini-mart. He filled up the car while Jess stretched her legs and used the restroom.
When she came back, he took his wallet out, and pointed to the car. “Stay here, I’m going to pay.”
He disappeared into the mini-mart. A minute later he returned with two bottles of water and a magazine.
He gave one of the water bottles to Jess and they headed back onto the freeway. “I talked to my boss. As I suspected, the mysterious Camilo worked at Grupo Lopez in the same department as Cantor. He died a couple of months ago. Car crash.”
“Yeah, right.” She glanced at the magazine. He picked it up, and shook it over her lap. Two British passports dropped out. One with Hadlow’s picture, the other with hers. She read the names. “Harry and Julia Beaumont?”
He grinned. “And you’re British. Just like that.”
“As long as I don’t open my mouth and ruin the cover.”
“Haven’t you heard? Lots of Brits marry Americans these days.”
Her eyes widened. “We’re married?”
“Oh, thanks,” he said with mock indignation.
She laughed. “I still have a boyfriend. Maybe I should let him know.”
“Trust me, it’s a marriage of convenience.”
“At least we agree on something.”
“At the very least, someone on the Spanish side of the border will have our pictures from the incident at Cantor’s apartment,” he explained. “The photos will be traced to the names and passports we used coming into the country. It might have already happened.”
“Won’t these new passports be suspicious then?”
“If they were new passports they’d be suspicious as hell.”
She read the text next to her picture. “It’s dated two years ago.”
“Wonderful things, computers,” he said with a grin.
Cantor’s phone chimed with a text message. Unlike answering a phone call, the messages could only be accessed by unlocking it with a fingerprint or a PIN number. She had neither, but she read through the snippet of message on the display. “Booking reference BQC90P. Southern Europe Airways.”
“I can get someone to look that up,” Hadlow said.
Jess brought up the Southern Europe Airways website and typed in the booking reference. The website asked for the surname. She used Cantor and the site promptly gave her the flight details. “He’s going to Tangier, then Luanda, then Kitande.”
His eyebrows popped up. “I’m familiar with the other two, but where’s Kitande?”
She looked up Kitande. “Small place. Five hundred miles south. Borders Namibia. Inland by about a hundred miles.” She zoomed in on the map. “Doesn’t look like there’s much industry there. Doesn’t look like much of anything, actually.”
She ran a couple more searches. “Step on it and we could make the 9:43 p.m. to Casab
lanca with a connection to Luanda and Kitande. Twenty-four-hour trip, and we’d be two hours after him.” She whistled. “Like you said. Big place, Africa.”
She turned off her phone.
They passed a sign that announced they were entering the town of La Línea de la Concepción.
Hadlow navigated the town’s streets like a local. He hadn’t even objected to her use of the word “we.” Which she should have realized was suspicious on its own.
What was he planning?
They reached a series of low modern buildings. Signs pointed to Gibraltar.
The famous rock rose up behind the buildings. It was smaller than she’d expected, but there was no mistaking it from the flat land around it.
Hadlow took a right turn, and the border post was in front of them. It had an arch and three small lines of cars. Hadlow chose the lane marked British Passport Holders.
A guard with a British accent asked for their passports, checked them with a scanner, and waved them through.
Moments later she was on British soil without so much as opening her mouth to answer a single question and reveal her Midwest accent in all its glory.
“Wonderful things, computers.” Hadlow grinned. “Welcome to Gibraltar, Mrs. Beaumont.”
CHAPTER FIFTY-THREE
Friday, August 19
9:00 p.m. CET
Gibraltar, Iberian Peninsula
On the other side of border control, Hadlow stopped at an intersection behind a barrier and flashing lights similar to the train crossing back in Zorita.
“Remind you of anything?” he said with a grin.
“I’d rather not be reminded, thanks.” She peered through the windshield. In front of them was a massive open area. “Is that what I think it is?”
“Unlike Africa, Gibraltar is a small place. There’s no land to waste.” He gestured out of the windshield. “That’s the runway.”
As if to make his point, a twin propeller aircraft thundered by.
The lights stopped flashing and the barrier rose automatically after the plane passed.