by Alice Sharpe
Hannah did her best not to shudder.
CHECKING IN AT THE GARAGE TOOK no time at all and soon they were on their way to Fort Bragg. The road traveled up the hills out of Allota, following the coastline south. Jack drove Mimi’s small white car expertly, manipulating it around the hair-raising curves with ease.
“The road reminds me of some of those in Tierra Montañosa,” he said.
“Curvy and steep,” she said, agreeing.
They stopped at Jack’s motel first and she waited in the car while he collected his things and settled the bill. When he walked back across the parking lot, he carried just a leather backpack slung over one broad shoulder and a leather jacket looped through his arm. The wind was blowing again—it just about always blew in the late spring—whipping his long, dark hair around his face. He’d changed into a clean dark shirt and black jeans and as his gaze swept the parking lot for who knew what, she thought he looked dangerous. He was dangerous.
As he got back into the car, she whispered, “How did you escape the GTM?”
“It’s not a pretty story,” he said, glancing at her and away. “Nothing you want to hear.”
“Yes, I do,” she said. “Of course I do.”
He kind of grunted a response.
“Jack, please. I want to know.”
He took a deep breath and stared out the windshield. Just when she’d about given up expecting a response, he started talking, his voice intense. “I realized one night they’d made camp relatively close to civilization.” A knot appeared and disappeared in his jaw. “I’d buddied up to one of the guards. He’d grown kind of careless around me, so that night when he came to take away the food bowl, I took advantage of that situation and turned his weapon on him.” Again he fell into silence.
Hannah took a deep breath. It was obvious that using the guard’s trust to overthrow him had been hard for Jack, that it had struck him as a dishonorable thing to do and that surprised her.
Before she could respond, he slid her a piercing look, daring her to comment. She held her tongue. What did she know of these kinds of decisions?
He finally said, “I killed anyone who tried to stop me. I don’t know how many men died, it all happened in a blur.” Again he glanced at her as he added, “It was either me or them.” His eyes didn’t look as though he believed his own words.
“Jack, you don’t have to continue—”
“I spent days hiding so close to them they almost tripped over me. Eventually they gave up and moved on. I was lucky enough to find an old man who had lost a son to the GTM. Through him, I managed to contact a friend who helped me get out of Tierra Montañosa into Ecuador without alerting the government. I didn’t want anyone to know I was coming. I wanted everyone to think I was dead.
“Anyway, it’s over now, I can’t change the way things happened, I just have to live with it.”
She heard pain in his voice. Regrets. Her fingers flexed in her lap. She wanted to touch him but she didn’t.
“So, that’s the story. It’s over and done with. We’d better get going.”
She stared at him a second. It was clear nothing he’d experienced in the last year was really over and done with, but if he wanted to change the subject, she understood.
“What are you going to do while I go into work?” she asked him.
“I’m pretty self-sufficient, Hannah. Is it located here in town?”
“No, it’s about five miles inland. Turn at the second light you come to and go straight. I’ll tell you when to turn again.”
Traffic was minimal. Jack turned at the light and then followed the twists and turns of the shortcut Hannah used each day to get through town the fastest way.
“Tell me about the foundation,” he said as they rumbled over the train tracks.
She brushed her hair away from her eyes. “Santi Correa was born in Peru but spent his youth in several South American countries, including Tierra Montañosa. After college in the States, he taught at a university for a while, got tired of being poor and took a job in the private sector where he was amazingly successful. When he got tired of making money, he started a nonprofit organization to develop schools all through South America.”
“You’re giving me the stuff in the foundation brochure,” Jack said as he pulled the car over on a wide spot. From that vantage point, the vista of the small valley included the complex that comprised the foundation’s headquarters.
“Santi didn’t believe in investing money in appearances when it could be put to good use building schools elsewhere,” she added. “Under his direction, things got a little run-down, but since Hugo took over, maintenance has improved.” It was true—the buildings now sparkled with a new coat of white paint.
“Of course, part of this is in preparation for the foundation’s thirtieth anniversary open house,” she continued. “The governor is coming and a congressman or two. As Hugo Correa points out, the more prosperous an enterprise appears, the bigger the donations.”
“So, Santi Correa handed over the reins to his son after the incident at Costa del Rio,” Jack mused, his thoughts apparently running along the same lines as hers.
“Hugo’s abduction and ransom completely gutted poor old Santi. You can’t imagine what it was like the day of the ambush. Hugo had insisted Santi skip the morning festivities because Santi had spent a troubled night with his stomach, so the poor old guy felt guilty he hadn’t been there. It was just him and me left at the hotel—everyone else had disappeared into oblivion or so it seemed. He stepped down when Hugo and Harrison were returned, and the board voted Hugo in. Santi seemed to age ten years.”
“I just met him briefly, but he has to be getting on, doesn’t he? Hugo looks like he’s in his fifties.”
“I think Santi is almost eighty. I know he’s failing. Poor Hugo must be broken up about it.”
Jack nodded without speaking.
“Why do you look like that?” she demanded.
“Like what?”
“Like you don’t agree with me. You don’t still think Hugo was involved—”
Jack interrupted her with one of his casual shrugs. “Maybe he wasn’t, cariño. On the other hand, he’s the big shot here now, right? And because of him, his father wasn’t involved in any danger.”
She sighed. “You don’t give up, do you?”
“I gave up thinking you were a bad guy,” he said, eyes glittering.
“You do realize you’re all over the map, don’t you?”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, let’s see. First you thought I set up the ambush. Then you thought there was something or someone corrupt within the Staar Foundation. Now you’re suggesting Hugo set up the ambush to get himself kidnapped so that his father would turn over the foundation.”
“Makes me sound a little schizoid, doesn’t it?” he said agreeably. “Yes.”
“If Hugo sympathizes with the GTM, then getting control of the foundation makes sense, doesn’t it? If he knows about the schools? If he’s diverting funds?”
“I don’t know,” she said wearily, but she simply couldn’t accept Hugo as a bad guy of that magnitude. Besides, Jack didn’t know about David. She needed to grow a backbone and tell him about that, but not before she looked inside the gym bag hidden away in her file cabinet.
Anyway, Jack hadn’t seen Hugo lying all broken up in the hospital after the ambush….
“So what now?” she added. “You just going to go in there and start poking around?”
“Of course not. Most of the people who work here don’t know my face, but Hugo and Harrison Plumber do. If one of them is the inside guy, he might have heard from the rebels that I escaped, but he won’t expect me to show up here. I’ll save that for a good occasion. For now, I just wanted to get a feel for the place. It’s bigger than I imagined.”
“It sprawls. And since it’s often foggy on the coast, the airstrip here provides a buffer against the weather.”
“I thought the Staar Foundation
was nonprofit.”
“It is.”
“It looks pretty posh.”
Hannah looked down at the complex and tried to see it through Jack’s eyes. From a distance and viewed from above, it did look impressive. Up closer he would see the signs of age, but all and all, he was right, it was a well-run and -managed organization. “The land belonged to the heiress Santi married fifty-five years ago. She donated most of it to the foundation for their headquarters. There’s a small adjoining parcel with a family residence on it that stayed in the family. Since Santi moved to the San Francisco area, Hugo took over the house.”
“So Santi Correa is a wealthy man.”
“More or less. That’s another reason why you’re wrong about Hugo. He has family money.”
“For one thing, that’s his father’s money, not his,” Jack said. “And for another, I didn’t say Hugo was in it for money.”
“Then what?”
“Like I said before, maybe he sympathizes with the guerillas. How many people work here?”
“It changes. Right now, fifty-one, including me. I’m in charge of public relations and event coordination and then we have positions in fundraising, technology, plus there are classrooms for training seminars and teaching programs as well as office staff and accountants. One of those buildings is a guest dorm. Then there’s a cafeteria/lunchroom and a garage for foundation vehicles and the mechanic and maintenance crew that oversees things. They’re all good people, Jack.”
“And a pilot?”
“Yes, but that’s a part-time position as the pilot isn’t needed every day. The corporate jet is kept here and when someone needs to use it, they call the pilot.”
“Who used to be David. Helicopter, right?”
“Helicopter at first, then he got his pilot’s license.”
“And that road we just traveled. Is that the road he rode his bike on when he came to work?”
“And the road he was killed on, yes. He’d been called in that morning to take Harrison Plumber down to the city for a meeting concerning the upcoming trip.”
“So how did Harrison get to his meeting?”
She opened her mouth and then closed it. “I guess I don’t know. Maybe he canceled. Why?”
“Just curious. And the accident happened almost a month before the trip where you and I met—”
“Yes,” she said.
“What about the hostages who were killed? Were they all local?”
“Just one. The others were employees from the two schools we’d already opened down there.”
“Las personas gastables,” Jack said softly.
“What does that mean?”
“The expendable people. The ones not covered by the insurance policy.”
“Hostage insurance is extremely expensive in places like Colombia and Tierra Montañosa. It’s not unusual for corporations to insure just the top layer. And you shouldn’t think anyone was satisfied with the outcome.”
He made a sound in his throat. She could practically hear him thinking that someone was because someone had helped plan it. “Are you sure you don’t want to go inside?” she added. “Fran Baker is the head of human resources. She’s been here twelve years and knows everything. I don’t have to use your real name.”
“I’ll leave her to you. Correa and Plumber must have seen me on the marches between camps. I know I saw them.” With mention of his captivity, he seemed to grow restless, turning away from the sight of the foundation.
“If you’re still here in a week, you could try attending the Founder’s Day open house with a disguise or something.”
“Maybe,” he said.
“After you drop me off in the parking lot, drive back up here and you’ll be out of sight. I’ll leave my cell phone and call when I’m ready for you to come get me.”
“If I’m right, someone in that building threw a rock through your window last night. That means someone is very aware of you and your actions.” He got out of the car and so did she. They met halfway around.
Gripping her arms, he leaned close. “I know why you’re going in today, it’s written all over your face. If you want to ask questions, go for it, but don’t assume anyone is innocent, okay?”
“Jack—”
“You keep the car and your phone. I’ll stay up here, I’ll watch for you. Just behave normally.”
“Good grief, Jack. What are you going to do up here in the weeds for an hour?”
“Cariño,” he said, brushing his lips across her forehead. “It’s nice to know you care.” And then he seemed to fade into the undergrowth.
“Don’t flatter yourself,” she called, but he was gone.
Chapter Five
The Staar Foundation logo, a big seven-pointed star made of copper, bright gold and polished stainless steel, dominated the foyer. A young male secretary sat at a crescent-shaped desk placed under the star. Recognizing Hannah, he waved her through right as the phone at his elbow rang.
She passed through double doors into a long hallway that led past three offices before her own. Her goal was to avoid seeing anyone—she wanted to get in and out. Jack’s words had unnerved her, which annoyed the hell out of her. She’d been working here for six years and this was the first time walking down the hall seemed dangerous and risky and scary and it was Jack’s fault. “Hannah?”
She started even as she recognized the voice and turned to look into Fran Baker’s office. As the head of human resources, Fran kept track of everyone and now she screwed up her elfin face. “You don’t work today. Everything okay?”
“Yes, yes,” Hannah said. “Everything is good.”
“Don’t lie to me, Hannah Marks,” Fran said, smiling. A second later, when her famous radar went into action, she searched Hannah’s face and her smile faded. She put down the pen she’d been writing with and stood up.
Fran was five or six years older than Hannah, tiny and compact, always dressed perfectly in clothes that looked as though they’d walked off a runway.
“Did you get another flat on the way home?” Fran said, coming around her desk. The top of her bleached and perfectly coiffed head reached Hannah’s shoulder. After looking up at Jack all morning, looking down at the diminutive Fran took a little getting used to. “I knew I should have followed you,” Fran continued. “I knew I shouldn’t have let you drive off with the spare on the car and no backup. It’s dangerous enough being a woman alone nowadays. They still haven’t caught the creep who killed those two gals and for all we know, he flattened their tires and followed them home and shot them—”
“Calm down,” Hannah said. “There’s never been any mention of flat tires in the newspaper articles. I didn’t get another flat and no mass murderer bothered me. I just had a mishap. Some kids put a little bomb in the back of my car and—”
“What!”
It took ten minutes to lead Fran through a blow-by-blow account of the car bomb. No way was Hannah going to take the time to start explaining about the shattered window.
“I have to make some copies of papers I lost because of the bomb and then I have to get home to Aubrielle. My grandmother has plans. I’ll see you later, Fran.”
Fran waved her off though it was obvious she would have loved further details. Hannah traveled the rest of the hallway without incident, but that feeling of being watched was back and she turned once to check behind her. The hall was empty except for the receptionist, who waved as he entered Fran’s office with a note in his hand.
“Jack Starling,” Hannah muttered under her breath, “I have you to blame for this.”
In her office, she closed the door. The key to the bottom drawer of the file cabinet was on the ring with her other work keys, and she dug them out of her purse. The drawer opened silently. The edge of the blue gym bag showed from under a stack of manuals for the new printer and fax machines. Once she had it, she looked inside. As she’d vaguely recalled, there was nothing there but one small piece of paper.
She took it out and as she
did so, the outer door opened, causing Hannah to jerk and drop the paper.
Harrison Plumber stood there, watching the scrap flutter to the pristine surface of Hannah’s desk. “Oh. I didn’t know you came in today,” he said, tearing his eyes away from the paper.
Hannah slipped the gym bag under her desk, very aware that Harrison watched her every move. She ignored the paper. “Just for a minute or two. Can I help you, Mr. Plumber?”
Harrison Plumber always struck Hannah as one of those men who seemed lost in an adult-sized body. Since his capture and subsequent release by the GTM, he’d become even more awkward. The intestinal illness he’d returned with had knocked him off his feet and put him in the hospital for weeks.
“I need an envelope,” he said, “and my secretary is out. I don’t know where to find anything around here. Isn’t that pathetic?”
Hannah laughed politely as Harrison shook his balding head. “What size do you need?”
“Legal size. Do you have any of those with the foundation’s embossed address?”
She opened a desk drawer and took out a half dozen. “Sure, here.”
He stepped closer and took them, stared at her desktop for a second, then abruptly left.
Hannah looked down to see what, if anything, was written on the paper and if it was facing up. Sure enough, it was, the handwriting clearly visible in black ink. 9D 125 1-2. The numbers and single letter made no sense to Hannah. They hadn’t a year before and they didn’t now. She scooped up the paper and tucked it in her pocket, relocked the drawer, and with Jack’s cautionary words echoing in her head, took the time to go down the hall and use the copy machine. Then she hurried out of the office, called a hearty goodbye to Fran and drove away, her gut in a giant knot she couldn’t explain.
Wait—oh, yes she could.
Jack.
AS HANNAH CLICKED OFF HER cell phone from her second call to her grandmother to check on her baby, Jack set the basket of fish and chips he’d just retrieved from the take-out counter on the table in front of her. She’d directed him here, to Noyo Harbor, claiming he had to be hungry after a breakfast of burned toast. He knew she was stalling, and he was willing to play along to a certain point because she was right, he was hungry.