Worthy of Trust and Confidence

by Kara A. McLeod

  “What did you just call it?”

  When it became clear Austin wasn’t going to interject, I huffed. “The Sin Bin. So, if we could just—”

  “Why did you call it that?”

  “It’s what the detail calls it, okay? I need you to—”

  “Why?” PJ pressed.

  “PJ! Focus! Forget about the CP. I need you two to go to the train station and try to catch up with him when he arrives. I’ll email you the exact train number as soon as I get it from DC. I’m waiting for a secure fax now. Call me the second you have eyes on him, but don’t try to forcibly detain him. Especially not there. He’ll make a scene, and Penn Station definitely isn’t a place we want him doing that. See if you can catch him outside and try to take him to dinner or something. So far, he hasn’t technically done anything wrong so we can’t pick him up, but I do think we need to have a chat with him.”

  Walker making it a point to travel back up here had set off all sorts of alarm bells in the back of my head, and I wasn’t eager to see how this would all play out. Not when I had to be so closely involved.

  “How?” PJ frowned slightly. “I mean, if he’s this fired up to get to Hurricane, what can we possibly say that’ll slow him down?”

  “I don’t know,” I snapped. “Think of something. Tell him I’m on my way and want to talk to him. I don’t care. Just stall him. I need time to get there to intercept.”

  “Will that help?” PJ asked, apparently not even remotely fazed by my ire. “Telling him you want to see him, I mean.”

  “Maybe. Could push him over the edge the other way and make him more determined. It’s hard for me to tell, not having spoken to him. I’m not sure where in his cycle he is at the moment or how long he’s been off his meds. Hell, I’m not even positive exactly how long he’s been out. I’ll call DC back and see whether they can get me a good number for him. A cell or something. If I can talk to him, I’ll have a better idea what we’re up against.”

  “What are you going to do?” Austin wanted to know. “While we’re waiting for him at the train station?”

  I took a deep breath. “I’m going to personally inform the detail that this is headed their way. And then I’m going to figure out how to take care of Walker.”

  “Any ideas?” PJ asked, clearly dubious.

  “Not yet. Walker and I go back a long time. He was one of my first cases when I transferred to the squad. I dealt with him for the better part of a year. I know him pretty well. I ought to. I lost track of how many phone calls I got because of him. I spent easily half my time working on his case. Maybe I can talk him down or something. I’ll put Bellevue on notice that we’ll most likely be bringing him in.”

  “Do you think we’ll need the mobile crisis unit?” Austin asked.

  “God, I hope not,” I muttered. “But I’ll see who’s running tonight and maybe let them know to keep an ear open in case we need help.”

  Austin clapped PJ on the shoulder and made a jerking motion with his head, clearly urging the kid to get a move on. “We’ll call you when we hit the train station.”

  “You remember what he looks like?”

  Austin nodded. “Sure do. I interviewed him with you enough times. I’m not likely to forget.”

  “Okay, well, an updated pic in the file should be on its way from DC. I’ll send it over to you as soon as I get it. Okay?”

  “Sure thing, Ryan,” Austin said, heading toward his desk with PJ trailing close behind asking him to explain the CP’s nickname to him.

  I took a long moment to try to control my reeling thoughts, attempting to force my mind to just stop for a second so I could get my bearings. Of all the things I didn’t need right now, Walker’s reappearance had been so outside the realm of possibility it would never have occurred to me to even put it on the list.

  Shaking my head, I headed toward my own office to grab my keys, stopping by the secure fax as I did so to retrieve the file DC sent up. I was so completely wrapped up in scanning its contents I didn’t notice I wasn’t alone until I’d turned the corner and stumbled upon someone at my desk.

  Gasping in surprise, I jerked, startled. Mark Jennings was standing behind my desk frozen in place, his face a mask of astonishment that was probably an exact mirror of my own. My eyes flicked down to see he had one hand in my bottom desk drawer where I kept all my old case files and timekeeping paperwork. I frowned, and when I glanced back up to meet his eyes, I thought he looked more than a little guilty.

  “Hey, Mark.” I managed to keep my tone even as I cocked my head to one side and deliberately dropped my stare back to his hand. I felt more than heard Allison move up behind me but didn’t turn to acknowledge her.

  Mark hastily withdrew the offending appendage and stood up to his full height, straightening the lapels of his suit jacket, though whether it was out of necessity, habit, or nervousness, I couldn’t have said for certain.

  “Ryan,” Mark said quickly. “Hey, I was just looking for you.”

  “In my desk?” I transferred the sheaf of papers I was holding to one hand and walked around to retrieve my bag. The move trapped him behind the desk, and his gaze flickered toward the door, though I couldn’t tell whether he was looking at Allison or merely glancing to his only escape route.

  “Of course not. I meant I came to your office looking for you, and when you weren’t here I decided to leave you a note. I was looking for paper.”

  I doubted that was even remotely true. I suspected he was actually searching for ammunition with which to get me fired. Like I didn’t have enough headaches at the moment. Without taking my eyes from his, I took a couple steps forward and picked up a Post-it notepad from the top of my now-pristine desk. The silence between us was heavy as I held it out to him.

  “And a pen,” Mark said.

  At that, I extended my arm and plucked out the pen I could see peeking over the top edge of his breast pocket. I held it up so he could see it. The uncomfortable moment seemed to stretch on into eternity as we stared at one another. I knew he wasn’t looking for writing implements. He knew that I knew. And obviously neither of us was going to talk about it.

  “What did you want to tell me, Mark?”

  There was a long pause, and his eyes flickered to Allison’s direction again. “You have a secure fax coming in from DC.”

  “I know.” I held up the papers as evidence before carefully placing them in my shoulder bag. I grabbed my car keys out of the little wooden bowl they rested in when I was in the office and moved to the door, pointedly pausing when I reached it so I could turn to look at him. My hand was poised over the light switch. I liked to think my meaning was clear. “Thank you for telling me.”

  Mark seemed to deflate slightly, and something strange flickered behind his eyes as they raked over my desk one last time as he departed, making me wonder idly what it was he’d been searching for so diligently. Exchanging a puzzled glance with Allison, I turned off the lights and made sure the door was locked behind us as we left.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  A quick check of Hurricane’s schedule before I left the office revealed she was hosting a private party at her residence. I sighed in relief when I read that. It’d be much easier for her detail to contain any possible situations that might arise if they were on their home turf, so to speak. I’d have been much happier if the entire detail had been out of district, but you took what hands you were dealt, I supposed.

  I called Rico while I was on my way over to share the joy of our new assignment with him. Naturally, he made a smart-assed remark about how I really needed to come up with better excuses to see him. I told him I expected him and his annoying partner on site within the hour before I hung up on him in protest.

  I then received a call from Austin and PJ. They estimated they’d arrive at Penn Station in another few minutes or so and planned to contact the on-duty Port Authority sergeant and then start looking for Walker immediately. After extracting several unneeded promises from them to call me the
second they spotted him, I took a deep breath and got out of the car.

  As soon as my feet hit the pavement, the hair on the back of my neck snapped to attention, and a shiver flowed down my spine and chilled my extremities. I clenched one hand on the edge of the car where the door met the roof and warily looked up. I scoured every window I could see as quickly as I could, but it was dark, and would I really be able to tell if a sniper was lurking in any of them, waiting to end me? I doubted it. And that knowledge made my blood run as cold and fast as the Colorado River in January.

  I let out a shaky breath and pushed off the car, all the while chanting over and over to myself that it was going to be fine, that neither Allison nor I was about to die, that no one was waiting to shoot me on this street corner because no one had any way of knowing I was here. Except no one should’ve known the president of Iran was at that meeting, which meant no one should’ve known to take the shot then, but they had. I still hadn’t figured out how that’d worked.

  Forcibly ignoring the roaring pressure swirling around inside my chest, I made myself walk—not run—toward Hurricane’s building. A big, black Suburban sat idling at the curb with the silhouettes of two people visible inside. Recognizing the larger of the two, I grinned at Allison, held one finger to my lips to tell her to keep quiet, and crept stealthily over to the driver’s side door. I was pleased to note the window was down a bit despite the chill in the night air.

  “Yo. I need to get uptown in a hurry.” I made it a point to hit the stereotypical New York accent hard and barely managed to restrain my laugh as I spoke. “There’s a twenty in it for you if you step on it.”

  The man in the driver’s seat whirled around at the sound of my voice, his face a comical mask of mixed surprise and irritation. “I’m not a cab driver—” His eyes widened. “Ryan?”

  My laugh bubbled over and broke free. “Hey, Tuck. What’s shakin’?”

  Tucker Doyle, a longtime member of Hurricane’s protective detail and a former New Yorker, rolled the window down all the way and grinned back at me. “What the hell are you doing here?”

  “Testing your perimeter defenses. Bad news. You failed.” Allison scoffed at that and shook her head.

  Tuck snorted. “Failed, my ass.”

  “You’re getting soft in your old age. I was going to ask why you’re down here on motorcade duty instead of one of the junior guys, but now I know. You need the practice.”

  Tuck cast a sharp glare at his companion when she snickered and then returned his attention to me. He looked me up and down appraisingly. If it’d been anyone else, I probably would’ve bristled, but I’d known Tuck for years. I wasn’t positive what he was looking for, but I did know there wasn’t anything sexual or suggestive in the inspection.

  “How are you?” Tuck’s voice was soft, his tone concerned.

  I glanced at Allison out of the corner of my eye and then began the pretense of picking nonexistent lint off the front of my suit jacket. I probably should’ve expected the question and the not-so-hidden nuances his tone implied, but I hadn’t. I’d been too focused on my reason for being there to have even considered it.

  “I’m good. How are you? It’s been a long time.”

  The look in Tuck’s eyes told me he didn’t believe me. “Yeah. You’ve been busy.”

  “No busier than anyone else.” I extended my arm in through the window across Tuck’s body and held my hand out to his partner, barely containing the wince at the tug in the muscles of my injured right shoulder. “I’m Ryan, by the way.” I shot Tuck a disapproving look for not introducing me. “And this is Allison Reynolds. You probably know her. She’s on Harbinger’s detail.”

  Allison nodded at them in silent greeting as the woman in the car took my hand firmly. “Marissa St. John.”

  “Oh, yeah. You’re from Nashville, right? I think we worked together during UNGA once.”

  Marissa nodded. “That’s right. Three years ago. Lesotho. Good memory.”

  “Nice to see you again. Welcome to New York. Sorry you have to put up with this guy. I’ll submit your name for a cash award for your trouble.”

  Marissa’s eyes slid over to Tuck’s face, and I saw the briefest hint of tenderness there before she shut it down and a wry expression overcame her features. “He can be trying.”

  Tuck raised one eyebrow at me but chose to let it go. “What brings you over here to our neck of the woods?”

  “I have some info I need to pass. Who’s the on-duty supe?”

  Tuck rubbed his chin with the heel of his hand. “Doctore’s upstairs.”

  I blinked at him. “Uh…Doctore?” I had no idea who that was or what the hell he was talking about. I’d never heard of an agent by that name, and that was definitely something that would’ve caught my attention. It was probably some sort of nickname or inside joke. This detail always had struck me as a sort of insular, march-to-the-beat-of-their-own-drummer kind of group. I glanced to Allison for a hint, but she just shrugged, so I waited for Tuck to elaborate.

  “Yeah. Doctore. Valenti.”

  “Hannah Valenti?”

  The corner of Tuck’s mouth twitched. “Who else?”

  “Why do you call her Doctore?”

  “Because she whips us. Regularly and with great enthusiasm. Just like the guy in charge of the gladiator school in Spartacus.”

  I ignored the labored comparison. “Hannah’s the shift whip? Seriously?”

  Tuck grinned. “Yup. And she won’t let any of us forget it, either.”

  Hannah Valenti and I had gone through the academy together and had actually gotten along extremely well despite the fact that we were almost complete polar opposites. Our easy camaraderie had been a relief, as she’d been the only other female in the half of the class whose last names began with the letters M through Z, and we’d spent a great deal of time partnered up for various training scenarios and control-tactics drills by default.

  Hannah had been a very solemn, extremely determined, almost freakily intense recruit—I fondly recalled I’d spent easily half my time trying to get her to crack a smile or lighten up—and somehow I wasn’t surprised to learn she was whipping the shift tonight. She’d definitely take her duties very seriously. I grinned at the prospect of seeing her in action.

  “Well, this’ll be more fun than I thought. I’ll catch you later, Tuck.” I turned to head inside, but the telltale movement of Tuck lifting his wrist mike to his mouth caused me to stop. I put a restraining hand on his arm. “No. Don’t.”

  “Still testing our security?” Tuck’s eyes twinkled with obvious amusement.

  That was a silly question, considering the cameras in the CP were most likely trained on the Suburban even now as Tuck and I talked. His allowing us to pass would be clue enough to the guys upstairs we were good to go. And if that didn’t do it for them, my lapel pin should be identification enough. That’s assuming the guys we ran into didn’t know us by sight, which the majority of them should. Many of the guys on the detail were former New Yorkers we both knew personally. The ones who weren’t had probably seen us around; me when I’d supported the detail in a PI capacity when Hurricane had attended public events and Allison when Hurricane attended joint events with her father. No, in reality, I’d stopped Tuck from calling out over the air because I hadn’t wanted him to let Hannah know I was coming. I wanted to surprise her.

  “You know me. I’m nothing if not thorough.”

  Tuck chuckled. “Go easy on them. Okay, O’Connor?”

  “No promises.” I turned to head toward the entrance to Hurricane’s building.

  “Wait. Wasn’t she just shot?” I heard Marissa ask as I walked away.

  “Shhh!” Tuck hissed.

  I cringed but resolutely kept going, taking minimal comfort from the slight pressure of Allison’s hand on the small of my back. Marissa was very nice, but I wasn’t in the mood for Twenty Questions or gaping stares at the moment. Or ever, if I was going to be completely honest.

  I waved ove
r my shoulder as I ambled toward the door of the building. Would Tuck actually let us go in unannounced, or would he warn his team we were coming? Of course, he could always tell them to give us a hard time. That notion made me grin, and I listened intently but didn’t hear anything go out over the radio through the earpiece nestled snugly in my left ear.

  The agent standing post in the lobby raised an eyebrow at us as we approached. His handsome face was completely impassive, which made it impossible for me to determine whether he’d recognized us as fellow agents.

  “Agent O’Connor.” He nodded slightly in greeting and then nodded at Allison. “Agent Reynolds.”

  Guess that answered that question. I held out my right hand. “Ryan. Please. Nice to meet you.”

  He took my hand in his, and as he did, his eyes flitted to my right shoulder as though he could see my newly acquired bullet hole through my suit jacket. I reassessed his reaction to my arrival and wasn’t surprised when my face blazed and my chest suddenly felt tight. I told myself my annoyance was unjustified. I mean, it wasn’t every day an agent got shot multiple times in the line of duty. It was only natural people would become curious. Perhaps. But that rationale did nothing to ease my tension.

  “Isaac Artaega.” His handshake was just shy of vigorous, and it caused a faint throb in the area of my injured shoulder that I tried bravely to conceal. “And if I may say, it’s an honor.”

  I froze, utterly flabbergasted and not a little panicked. An honor? To meet me? Hardly. I opened my mouth to make some sort of trademark smart-assed remark but stopped. I really was no good in these situations. What the hell did one say to something like that?

  “Uh…Thanks. Is Hannah Valenti around?” My skin crawled and itched under the intensity of his attention, and I just wanted to get upstairs, pass my info, and get back out on the street before Walker arrived. I really didn’t have a lot of time to be engaging in these sorts of conversations.

  “Doctore’s upstairs.” He handed me a key card and nodded in the direction of the elevator. “Top floor. Just swipe that against the pad before you press the floor to gain access.”