“I have two forensic accountants on vacation in a small town not far from where you are. Apparently, they’ve fallen into a bit of a situation.” Porter didn’t waste time, detailing the situation in as succinct terms as possible. “I’ve done a bit of research. There’s a quaint bed and breakfast in that small town. We just have to come up with a plausible reason for you to be there.”
“So, you just want me to babysit your bean counters? I guess I can manage that. What’s the name of this vacation destination for forensic accountants?”
“A town about an hour west of Waco called Lusty.”
Porter wondered at the silence on the end of the line. “You’re sending me to Lusty, Texas?” There was no denying the incredulity in Quest’s tone.
“Is that a problem?”
“Problem? No, I just marvel at the vagaries of fate, that’s all.”
Porter narrowed his eyes, something he knew he always did when rifling through the enormous amount of data in his brain. It took him only about thirty seconds.
“The FBI agent who served as SAC overlapping your last assignment. Joe Grant. He’s got ties to Lusty.”
“Ties? You could say that. About three-quarters of the town is his family, in one way or another.”
“Can you use that connection to him as your reason to visit?”
“I can use anything. Just leave everything up to me. I’ll let you know when I’m in place and have had a chance to assess the situation.”
Porter kept his gaze on the telephone receiver, resting innocuously on the switch hook. And he wondered if the slight unease that came over him had to do with the general turn this investigation had taken or the very real possibility that Damion Quest knew something he, himself, did not.
Chapter Seven
Logan came back into the kitchen after having been gone for nearly fifteen minutes. Out of the corner of her eye, Bailey noticed that he gave a slight nod to his brother. This wasn’t the first time she’d gotten the impression that they could communicate without words. Were they telepathic? She’d heard that sometimes twins had a special bond that would allow for just such a thing. When Bailey hung the dishtowel on the stove handle and turned around, both men gave her big, beaming smiles. Something about those smiles made her nervous.
“Let’s go sit down in the living room for a bit, shall we?”
Chance’s suggestion was seconded by Logan. She noticed that she had a brother on either side of her as they walked with her into the front room. The previously delicious supper began to sink like lead in the bottom of her stomach. She tried to set aside the feeling that a boom was about to fall on her head. She’d lived long enough to understand that just because she felt a certain way didn’t mean that feeling was based on reality.
Bailey picked her spot, sitting on the middle cushion of the sofa, not at all surprised when Chance took the seat on her right while Logan plopped himself down on her left.
Bailey might not have much experience with men. All right, basically she had no experience with men. But she’d prided herself on being an observer of people all her life and knew that she was often very intuitive when it came to facial expressions and body language.
Based on what she was seeing, Bailey braced herself for news she just knew she wasn’t going to like.
“So…we’ve asked you a lot of questions since the first moment we laid eyes on you, and you’ve been very patient with us. Probably because you understand that, being accountants, we’re more than a little anal.” Chance had turned slightly toward her. Logan had done the same so that she felt well and truly book-ended by the men.
“I don’t know how patient I really was that first day,” Bailey said. She decided to keep to herself having wondered at the time if she was being interrogated.
“You were. Even today, you’ve been patient with us. We feel a little guilty because we’ve more or less dominated the direction of the conversation, making you answer all our questions. That so far, the interaction between us has been all take and no give.” Logan had picked up their narrative. “So, we were thinking that, before we go any further, now would be a good time for us to tell you about…well, about us. To be as open with you as we’ve asked you to be with us.”
Bailey began to doubt her so-called intuition. She looked from Chance to Logan. She offered them a smile, acknowledging to herself that her smile might be somewhat lacking in strength and dazzle. “Okay, that sounds fair.” Hell, even her words sounded tenuous. Those words would seem to dispute the strange sense of things being off that had seized her only moments before. She inhaled deeply and then relaxed against the back of the sofa.
Bailey really would like to get to know these men better.
Chance also inhaled deeply, and she wondered if he felt as tenuous as she did and, if so, why.
“Right. So, you know we have our own business. Did we tell you we’re forensic accountants?”
Bailey couldn’t actually recall what details they may have given her. She decided to err on the side of being completely honest. “I’m sorry, I don’t know if you did, or not.”
Her confession didn’t seem to bother either of the men. “Well, we are, both of us. I don’t mean any insult by asking…but you understand what forensic accounting is, right? A lot of people don’t, which is why I am asking.” Logan must have realized his smiles were less than reassuring because he gave up the attempt. Instead he met her gaze directly and waited.
“I think I do. Forensic accounting has to do with the kind of in-depth work that auditors perform, doesn’t it? Like investigating and proving the veracity of the books in question.”
“Yes,” Chance said. “But for us, it’s more than that. Generally, we’re accountants who are called in to investigate where financial crimes of one form or another are suspected to have been committed—and often as a step in building an actual legal case using financial records as evidence against a person who is the target of an investigation.”
“So, you’re…what? Cops?”
“No,” Logan said. “We’re forensic accountants. We do sometimes work for the police or a district attorney. But our major client, the one we do the most work for, is the NSA.”
Bailey felt as if she’d stepped into some kind of alternate reality. “So…you’re like spies, then?”
“No, baby, we’re forensic accountants.” Chance picked up her right hand, and Logan took hold of her left. “We take assignments from the NSA when they’re investigating people or organizations suspected of being a threat to our national security. The subgroup we work with is a special unit, working to nail down specific threats at the source and also tasked with digging out financial structures created to aid and abet threats against our national security. Believe it or not, there are entities in this country who try to financially help our enemies.”
“So, you sort of go after the people financially backing terrorist organizations?”
“Yes, that’s part of it! Actually, that’s most of it. And we’re able to isolate evidence, through our investigations and through dissecting the so-called ledgers these people or organizations have and by tracing their financial transactions. Then we document the evidence and hand it over either to a prosecutor or our contact within the agency.”
“That sounds pretty exciting.” Bailey figured if she likened what they did to being detectives they’d assert they were only accountants. But really, they were detectives, solving mysteries. Others might not find that exciting, but for a numbers geek like herself, it certainly was. “How did you get into that?”
Logan shrugged. “We were approached while we were still at college. I’m not sure what drew us to Porter Wells’s attention.”
“He’s our supervisor, and he made us a good offer,” Chance said. “We thought that after graduation we’d have to work a few years as junior staff with a busy firm before we could open our own business. Instead, we began working on assignments as independent consultants as soon as we were accredited to do so.”
“We can work from anywhere, as long as when we’re online, we hook our laptops up to the secure server that the agency uses—one that is not available to just anyone. We can do that remotely.”
“Is that like a top-secret version of the internet?” Bailey let go the last of her trepidation. Apparently, her people-sense was way off. They really did just want to tell her about themselves. She didn’t find it the least bit strange that they spoke only about work. Until recently, she’d had only work in her life, too.
“That’s one way of looking at it. The reason we’re telling you all this is…well, it’s because of coincidence, I guess you could say.” Chance grinned.
“I think kismet has a nicer ring to it,” Logan said.
“Kismet does sound better.” Chance nodded.
“What coincidence?” She was right back to being confused and wary.
Chance shook his head in an isn’t-this-just-the-darnedest-thing kind of shake. “Not two days before we met you that first day at Lusty Appetites, we’d gone online through the secure server to open the assignment that had landed in our inboxes before our convention in Dallas. We didn’t really get into it, you understand, we just read the introduction.”
“That’s kind of an interesting part about each assignment. The introduction is like a story, telling the tale of the person, business, or entity under investigation, revealing how they came into existence and why they’re at the center of the investigation in the first place.” Logan grinned at her. “Yes, it definitely was kismet. What are the odds that there could have been another Bailey James from New York whose boss was named Dirk Townsend, other than the one we’d just met at Lusty Appetites?”
* * * *
No one had ever accused Logan—or Chance, for that matter—of having a surfeit of tact and diplomacy. It didn’t take more than a heartbeat for Chance to realize that Logan’s words had just dug them into a deep, deep hole.
“The NSA is investigating me?” Bailey jumped to her feet and wasted no time putting distance between them. “Why? I haven’t done anything wrong! What the hell? You two were sent to spy on me?”
“No!” Chance put his hands up in front of him and moved slowly. He couldn’t blame her for being upset. “No, sweetheart. The NSA is not investigating you, and we weren’t sent here at all. We really are here just to connect with family we didn’t know we had.”
“It’s your boss the NSA is investigating, had been, in fact, for a couple of months before he managed to get himself killed—a detail, by the way, our boss neglected to include in the case file.” Logan had stood, as well, and Chance could see his brother was as panicked as he felt. “When Porter Wells sent us the financial information, it was the information they’d gathered before Mr. Townsend’s death.”
“We didn’t know your boss had been murdered until you told us.” Chance stopped moving when he was a foot in front of her. “The reason Logan went upstairs was to call our boss and ask him why the hell he hadn’t told us that.”
“But…the police said it was a local loan shark who killed Dirk!” Her voice trailed off and she looked from Chase to Logan. “It wasn’t a loan shark at all, was it? So, who killed him? And why?”
Logan answered for them both. “No, our boss doesn’t think it was a loan shark. As to who and why, he doesn’t know that yet, either. Or at the very least, he hasn’t said if he has any suspicions.”
Bailey’s eyes widened. “But…the man who called my old cell phone, he threatened me. He wanted money, and I got scared because I don’t have any money that wasn’t my own…I assumed it was the murderer who called me. That’s why I got so scared!”
“What did the man who called say to you, exactly?” Logan asked.
Bailey was looking at Chance and his brother as if they’d both grown extra heads…or as if she thought they were out to get her, and not in a good way.
“Sweetheart, you’re not in any kind of trouble, I swear to you. We just want to help you. Please, it’s important. That fact the killer called you is alarming.”
“Ya think?”
Chance was relieved to see that spot of temper, even if it was wrapped in sarcasm. He held his hand out to Bailey and met her gaze. He hoped she could see his sincerity.
Slowly, an inch at a time, she reached out and placed her hand in his. Chance tugged gently until she was in his arms. Then Logan edged closer until he was with them, sharing a moment, a hug, with Bailey in the middle of them, between them and a part of them, exactly where she belonged.
“Come and sit down again, baby,” Logan said. “We really do want to help you. Can you tell us the exact words the man who called you said?”
Bailey resumed her seat on the sofa. Chance took her right hand and used his thumb to stroke the back of it in a soft, slow way. He could feel her tension and knew she was still upset. He didn’t know what he could say to repair the damage they’d done with their ham-handed disclosures.
Perhaps only time and tenderness, care and consideration, could do that.
“His voice was odd—half whispered, half raspy, and not one I recognized at all.” Bailey licked her lips. Logan picked up her left hand, copying Chance’s gestures. When he felt the barest shiver, Chance moved closer to her.
“He said…he said ‘Townsend failed to deliver. Now it’s up to you. Give me what I’m owed, what’s mine. You have three days. You’d better give it to me, or else. Do I have to spell out the or else for you’?”
“That’s definitely threatening,” Logan agreed.
“I thought he was going to give me three days, but he called the next day and basically said the same thing all over again, as well as reminding me I only had two days left.” Bailey swallowed. “After the first call, I convinced myself it was some sort of prank. You hear about it happening, you know? When people die, there are those who sometimes target family or friends or associates, trying to con them out of money. But after the second call?” Bailey shook her head. “That’s when I went to the police. They told me that it might be a good idea to get out of town for a while. I was the one who decided to take it a step further and just relocate permanently. There was nothing there for me anymore, anyway. So, I contacted a real estate agent and signed a contract. I put what I wanted to keep but not bring with me into storage and packed my bags. The agent was to sort through what was left, donate what would be of benefit to others, trash the rest, then clean and show the home. I had no idea there was such a service in the first place, but what a lifesaver! I know it was kind of a cop-out for me to just dump all that on someone else and run but…”
“Not at all,” Logan said. “It’s a valid service. You handled the situation by delegating. That’s not a cop-out.”
“I left the area really quickly. I didn’t know if the man who had my phone number could trace it and find me. I gave my cell phone to the police, grabbed a new one at the mall—one that couldn’t be traced to me—and left.”
“How are your friends contacting you?” Chance asked.
“I don’t have any friends. My life pretty much was taking care of my mother and working. After—well, after mom died, that turned into just working. Working and reading kept me busy enough.”
It was all Chance could do not to let her see how her confession affected him. Instead, he looked at Logan.
“What else did Porter have to say?”
“He’s going to have someone on the ground in New York who will draw together the two police departments involved so far, someone who will look at the entire situation. This person will be a trained investigator who will know what to look for—as opposed to the local PD who went to your house and filed what happened under a normal break-in.”
“You were careful, though, right?” Chance didn’t want to screw up
his wording the way Logan had earlier. “You didn’t leave a forwarding address? And since you drove from New York to here, you didn’t leave any airport schedules or ticket stubs lying around?” Then his eyes widened. “What about your credit cards? You paid for gas and lodging during your drive. Someone who’s plugged in could likely trace your movements that way.”
Bailey blushed, and Chance wondered what she could have to be embarrassed about.
“By the time I actually left town, I’d pretty much saturated my imagination with paranoia. So, I stopped at the bank and withdrew enough cash to get me through. I did use my credit card. I think the last time was when I checked into that motel outside of Waco. Since then, I’ve just lived on cash. Pretty sad, huh?”
He looked at his brother and wondered how to say what needed to be said without scaring her overly much—and decided that instilling at least some fear in her was pretty unavoidable, under the circumstances.
“Bailey, the fact that man called you meant he’s after something that likely isn’t money. Whatever it is, he’s convinced you have it. Unfortunately, he’s likely not the type to let the fact that you’ve ‘disappeared’ stop him. If anything, he’ll take that to mean you do indeed have whatever it is he’s looking for. And he’ll probably stop at nothing to find you.” Then he reached over and cupped her face. “But we’re not going to let anything happen to you. You can damn well count on that.”
Chapter Eight
“I…” Bailey didn’t know what to say in response to that fervent promise. Her emotions were in total chaos, somehow completely short-circuiting her usually very logical brain. Should she say “thank you”? She should probably ask how, exactly, they planned to keep her safe. But she couldn’t do either of those very logical things.
She looked from Chance to Logan, and she wasn’t certain what expression she wore that made their expressions turn from serious to seriously hungry…and maybe that was just as well.
Love Under Two Accountants [The Lusty, Texas Collection] (Siren Publishing Ménage Everlasting) Page 7