“Bob can take care of himself,” Mac said, obviously reading her face. “Used to be a cop. A damned good one. He’s aware there might be danger. But practically the entire police department is over here sometime during the day. There’s five cops in the other room as we speak.
Kirke darted a look at Jake. Had he told the two about Edna Caswell? Or had they learned in some other way?
Dane caught the look. “We backtracked you two to Virginia. It was all over the news there. Murder is not common in Williamsburg. It was easy enough to connect the address to the info you gave us on the Enigma.
“Find out anything else?”
“Dead ends. It’s like Dallas Haley tried to get lost. She was married to a spook. A friend in the CIA was able to discover that, but he couldn’t get any info on a settlement or her current address.
“Will anyone else find the same brick wall?”
“Depends on how high it goes.”
“High enough that I was neatly trapped,” Jake said. “That job had to be planned way in advance by Adams. I didn’t want him on the mission, and my superiors said the CIA insisted on it. Maybe he was just waiting for an opportunity, but I personally think he planned that mission for a long time. I doubt now whether there ever were any missiles.
“And you think this Dallas has information. Maybe even proof of what happened?”
“All I know is that Cox died trying to reach me, and he asked Kirke to tell me something about Dallas.”
Kirke listened as Jake told his friends all that had happened. In about ten terse sentences, starting with the hit-and-run, then the numbers, the sniper, the explosives in Kirke’s home, the attack at the truck stop, and finally the visit to Williamsburg.
When he finished, there was a silence. Then both looked at Kirke with new interest.
“A paramedic?” Cole asked.
She nodded. “But a journalist before that. I can’t seem to stop letting curiosity get the best of me.”
Jake broke in. “Kirke has some ideas about finding Dallas. She thinks that Dallas may have returned to Denton because she grew up there and possibly has family there. Also, there’s a strong possibility she might have gone to one of the colleges around Denton. If so, the name Haley may be on alumni lists as her married name, or we might try finding her photo in college yearbooks. If we can find her maiden name, maybe we can find family, then her. We can divide the tasks. You guys take the alumni lists. We’ll take the yearbooks.
“I can also search marriage licenses in Virginia and in Texas,” Cole said. “If she married a CIA agent, there’s a good chance the marriage took place in Virginia.
“Or in Texas,” Kirke said. “We don’t have her maiden name, but we have his name. Haley.”
“What’s his first name?”
“We don’t have that,” she admitted. “Her husband died twelve, thirteen years ago. The woman we talked to just knew Haley.”
“There has to be a godawful number of Haleys getting wed in both states,” Cole said. “And how are you going to get a photo of her?”
“Kirke’s reporter friend found an article in a local newspaper. Maybe there’s a photo. She can e-mail it to me if we have an address.”
“Reporter friend?” Cole interrupted.
“I used to work with her,” Kirke said. “She’s great with research. I asked her to try to find something about Dallas. She’s the one who came up with the right spelling of the last name, along with the Denton connection.”
Dane stood. “If she’s made queries, she might be in danger, too,” he said. “My contact says there’s been a flurry of interest there about Mitch Edwards and Dallas Haley. More than one query about the wife of a dead agent might ring some alarm bells.”
Kirke’s heart stopped. She’d thought that Robin’s search for a former bar manager innocuous. Could her queries have attracted the notice of Adams’s contact in the CIA? Her eyes met Jake’s.
Jake stood, a muscle in his throat throbbing. It was obvious that he, too, had not thought Robin’s queries would be noticed, much less tracked. And perhaps they weren’t, but after Edna …
“I have to call her,” she said. She looked at Jake. “That probably means alerting the FBI. She most certainly will call Ben.”
“Do it,” Jake said without blinking. He handed her the phone.
“Ben?” asked MacAllister.
“Her husband’s an FBI agent.”
“That gives us even less time to find Dallas,” Jake said, “but she has to know. She may not be on their radar, but I’m not willing to take that chance.”
Kirke used the new prepaid phone to call Robin. She could take risks for herself, but she wasn’t going to get another person killed. Especially not Robin.
“Robin, this is Kirke,” she said when Robin answered. “You might be in danger. A friend of … my friend said queries about Dallas Haley have been noticed in the CIA. There could be a bad guy there. I think you should join Ben if you can.”
“CIA? They don’t operate within this country.”
“They’re not supposed to, but there could be a maverick who’s helping a killer.”
“What is this all about?”
She looked at Jake. He was close enough to hear.
He nodded.
She quickly capsuled the recent events.
When she finished, there was a silence. “You’re convinced he’s innocent.”
“I wouldn’t be here if I wasn’t. Until I heard about the woman in Williamsburg, I didn’t think you were in danger. I’m not so sure now.”
“Why don’t you go to the police?”
“Jake is on parole. He violated it to come to Atlanta to meet this man. The army wants the matter closed, and unless he gets some evidence, they’ll put him back in prison. We think this Dallas Haley has information that can help him.”
“This is what you meant about a big story? Did your Jake agree to this call?” Robin asked.
“Yes.”
A silence, then, “I’ll be careful, but they’re probably concentrating on you now. I think you should consider talking to Ben’s FBI friends.”
“I can’t. Not yet. We have to find Dallas before the bad guys do.”
“The FBI—”
“Could be stopped by national security concerns.”
An audible sigh came from the phone. “I’ll be withholding information about several murders,” Robin said. “So will you.”
“And you haven’t done that before?”
Silence. Then, “You think you can find her?”
“Yes.”
“If you don’t call in the next twenty-four hours, I’m going to tell Ben everything. He just finished his assignment and is due back day after tomorrow. I don’t keep secrets from him.”
Kirke didn’t say anything.
“Any longer,” Robin amended.
Still silence.
“Well, not many,” Robin amended again.
“Twenty-four hours,” Kirke finally said. “I’ll get back to you. Just be careful. Is there anyone you can stay with?”
“With a foul mouthed parrot and two cats?” A hint of a smile came through.
“Is he still whistling that song?”
“Incessantly.” Robin said. “But Ben made sure we have the best protection system available. And I have an attack parrot in residence.”
Despite Robin’s light words, Kirke heard the concern behind them.
One last question. “Did that article have a photo?”
“Yes.” Robin gave her the Web address where she’d found it.
“Thanks, Robin, for everything.” She paused. “Be careful.”
“I’m not sure I should be thanked. I should be running to Ben.”
“Just take care.” She hung up before Robin had second thoughts.
“We have twenty-four hours,” she said to the others in the room.
Ames Williamson, alias Gene Adams, landed at the Dallas International Airport at 3 p.m.
Everything
was falling apart. He’d received word from his contact in the CIA that queries had been made about Mitch Edwards, Jake Kelly, and himself, as well as Dallas Haley. Some questions had been raised only a few hours earlier.
He knew the latter name. He’d been in the Enigma when he’d been instructing recruits but thought it far too obvious for his taste. He’d disapproved. Anyone hearing the bar’s name would think of the CIA. People in that part of Virginia most certainly would.
But when one of his men said Williamsburg had been marked on the map stolen from Jake Kelly’s car, he remembered that Del Cox had mentioned the Enigma more than once. He’d even heard Cox talk to Kelly about it one night when he’d been listening in. Cox always talked too much.
A goddamn bar. Yet it was the only thing he associated with Cox and Williamsburg. He immediately sent a two-man team to check it out.
He was getting low on men. He’d recruited an army of ex-servicemen and paid them well enough to ensure some loyalty, but most of them were in Argentina. In any case, he never completely trusted mercenaries. Certainly none had shown much competence during the past week. Three had been sent home since they’d allowed themselves to be seen.
He could fly back to Argentina. But then he risked leaving behind evidence that would keep him on the run forever. It certainly would dry up his current business. He’d been selling old information for six years. He didn’t have that much left, and his CIA contact was sidling away from him. If his names, both former and present, became known, he would become radioactive. His mansion would go. His women. His power.
Damn Cox. The man had kept more than a few secrets from him. He wished Cox had died in a more painful way. And Kelly was slippery as an eel. That had surprised him. He’d considered Kelly just another grunt.
He walked out of the restricted area of the airport and saw a driver holding a sign for a Mr. W. Williams. He nodded to him, and the driver rushed up to take his carry-on. Ames followed him to a limousine. “I don’t want that,” he said. “I specifically asked for a nondescript car.”
“But I was told—”
“I don’t care what you were told. I want a standard sedan, one that won’t be noticed.”
“It’ll take a few moments.”
“I don’t care how long it takes,” Ames said.
The man disappeared. Ames found a public phone and used an untraceable credit card to call his contact at the CIA. The contact didn’t answer, but he didn’t have to. Ames simply left a message, “An old friend from the neighborhood is in town.” Caldwell would find a safe phone and call back within an hour.
The man who’d met him reappeared. “I have a new car. It will be here in ten minutes.”
“A rental agency?”
“No. Someone who specializes in providing special needs for discriminating clients. The registry is untraceable.”
Which was a way of charging more. Still, though he hated to admit it, he had little choice at the moment. The longer this lasted, the more he risked, not to mention the money pouring out of his bank account.
The man who’d greeted him drove him to a hotel he’d selected and handed him the keys. “I’m Temple,” he said. “I can stay with you or be at your call.”
“I’ll call you,” Ames said.
Temple gave him a card, and he glanced at it. No name. No address. Only a phone number. Ames suspected that number changed frequently.
He’d just reached his room when his cell phone rang.
He listened to a tirade about the risks incurred by being called at his office, then interrupted his caller, “I don’t give a shit about the risk to you. Remember, I know about all that money you haven’t reported. An anonymous call will send you straight to jail.”
The man on the other end of the line swore, then said, “This is getting too damn hot for me. Leave me alone.”
“Forget about that. You’re in this as deep as I am. You help set up the South American mission. You’ve been getting money all these years. Don’t forget I have the account numbers. Now, I want everything you can find on a woman named Dallas Haley. I don’t know if Dallas is a legal name or not, but she was a hostess or manager at the Enigma, a bar in Williamsburg.”
“Why?”
“She must know something about what happened that day in the jungle. Maybe where the remainder of the diamonds went. There’s a connection between Del Cox and her. I have to get to her before Kelly does, and I want to know what Kelly is doing.”
“We can’t operate in the U.S.”
“Tell me another joke,” Ames said. “I’ll be in touch.” He hung up.
The cell phone rang again. He answered it.
“We have something,” one of his men said. He was the best hacker that money could buy.
“What?”
“A credit card Kelly is using. It’s a prepaid one, but now we have the number, I should be able to follow any use he makes of it.”
“Right.” He hung up and smiled. Jake and the damn interfering woman were his.
CHAPTER 27
They checked into a hotel near the barbecue restaurant.
Jake was even more of a stranger since they’d heard about Edna Caswell. He hadn’t touched her, not the slightest pat, or even his hand brushing hers. Everything had been about finding Dallas.
She was having her own attack of conscience. Maybe she should have asked Robin to call her husband. Maybe they should alert local authorities to the danger to Dallas.
Then all the reasons why she shouldn’t do any of those things crowded out those thoughts. They had little information and even less proof. They had the word of a convicted thief and possible traitor and seven numbers. They had a dead body, but given everything else, Jake might well be charged with that as well. He’d been inside the restaurant. She was an accomplice in helping a fugitive. Their credibility would be nil.
Meanwhile, the bad guys could get to Dallas.
Did Jake feel that way as well? Was that why he seemed to be withdrawing from her?
Or was it something more? Was he not telling her something? He’d said little about his life. He said he was divorced but little about why or when or where. He seemed to have an endless source of money, and his explanation of a inheritance was, well, convenient.
All those warnings ran through her head, even though she felt no fear of him, at least not physically. Emotionally was another matter altogether. Her reactions to him frightened her. She had plunged into this journey wholeheartedly. To right a wrong. And, to be honest, to save herself. But she feared she was falling in love. That would be disastrous with someone like him. Even if he was cleared, he was a warrior. She was a healer, or close to one. He was the wandering type, and she just wanted a home of her own, preferably with a house full of pets and children.
She said none of these things as he requested a double room. They were both exhausted, but she would dearly love to have his body next to hers. That idea was scotched when he asked which bed she preferred.
“The left,” she said for lack of a better answer.
“Why don’t you take the first shower,” he suggested.
She wasn’t sure she would survive one without falling on her face. She’d napped a little in the car, but she’d not really slept. Yet she really needed a shower. Her washing for two days had been quick splashes of water on her face.
She headed for the bathroom, discarded her clothes on the floor, found little soap bars, shampoo, and conditioner, and turned on the water until it was as hot as she could stand.
She reveled in the flow of hot water. Still, exhaustion slowed her movements as she washed her hair, then rinsed it and just stood there letting the water wash off layers of grime and internal doubts. Finally she forced herself to turn the water off.
She dried herself, then wrapped another towel around her and stepped out.
Jake was standing at the window again. He could be so still. No movement and yet she sensed the energy raging inside him. How had he ever survived prison?
&n
bsp; She wanted to go to him, to touch his face, his hair. She wanted to fit her body into his.
Instead she went to the bed. He’d placed the bag containing her few possessions on top of it. One clean T-shirt left. She pulled it on. If they were going to the college tomorrow, she would need some clean clothes.
That was the last thought she had as she closed her eyes.
Jake spent more time than he needed in the bathroom. Another cold shower was mandated, though he didn’t feel he needed to stay awake tonight. Cole was on one side of their room, Mac on the other. The rooms had been reserved by Barbecue Bob. No worry that any of the names he’d used would be on record.
Kirke was dead on her feet. Her eyes were red from exhaustion, and her movements lacked that vitality that was so much a part of her.
He didn’t want to be tempted by her, and God help him, her just being alive tempted him. Even if he did clear himself—and the chances were getting slimmer that he would—he had damned little. His career with Special Forces was over. Not only had he led his team into a trap, but he’d lost seven years of training. Seven years for a special ops officer was a lifetime. He might get back pay, but in the past few weeks, he’d run through a fortune in forged documents.
He toweled off, slipped his jeans on, and returned to the room. She was asleep. One hand stretched out as if asking him to join her.
It took everything in him not to take it and slip into bed with her.
Her hair was still damp and curled around her face. Her long legs were outlined under the thin sheet. He pulled the spread over her.
He would give nearly anything if he’d met her ten years ago. But then he’d been married. Not happily, but married.
He stepped away from her and quietly went to the door. He opened it softly, exited, then closed it gently behind him. He went next door to Cole’s room. It opened immediately when he knocked.
“I didn’t think you would get here,” Cole said.
“She took a shower, then I did.”
He caught the question in Cole’s eyes.
“Alone,” he said.
Cole’s eyes met his. “She’s smart. And pretty.”
“She’s too damned curious,” he said gruffly.
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