Secret Hideout

by Paula Graves

  Chapter Seventeen

  The bus station in Maybridge was little more than a hole in the wall on Main Street, not far from the post office. Most of the business that moved through the station was shipping; passengers were more likely to drive over to the bigger city of Borland in the next county over, a bus line hub. However, the small Maybridge office did offer storage lockers for the few passengers who caught buses as they came through town.

  But there was no locker number 112.

  Isabel muttered a soft curse, drawing a chuckle from her brother Wade, who’d insisted on joining her search mission.

  “You never used to cuss before you joined the FBI.”

  “You were a Marine and you have the nerve to complain about my salty language?” she retorted before she realized that any mention of his former military service tended to make her brother melancholy.

  He sighed. “Point taken.”

  She hooked her arm through his as they walked out into the unseasonably warm April sunshine. His limp was noticeable, and probably always would be. But Isabel remembered the hours he spent in agonizing limbo during and after the emergency surgery to replace his shattered knee. The round from the Kaziri rebel’s Kalashnikov had destroyed his kneecap and broken all three bones in his right leg. Doctors later told the family that Wade was damned lucky they’d been able to save the leg at all.

  “What’s next—the station in Borland?”

  “Gossamer Ridge is closer.” As she slid behind the wheel of her Toyota FJ Cruiser, her BlackBerry made a soft beep. She checked her email and saw she had a new message from an M. Shipley. It took a second to remember that Mark Shipley had been Scanlon’s cover identity.

  She opened the mail. The message was terse. “Think I’ve found the lock for your key. Meet me at the drop, 11:00 am. Come alone—under extra scrutiny. Don’t reply—shutting down now and can’t check back.”

  “Something wrong?” Wade was looking at her with the same worried gaze that all her siblings seemed to share these days, ever since her return home.

  “No,” she said, opting not to tell him about the message. No way would anyone in her family let her go meet Scanlon alone, as he’d asked. They’d try to come up with some elaborate commando mission—and probably find a good excuse to leave her back home under 24-hour protection.

  To keep Wade from getting suspicious, she went along with him to the Gossamer Ridge bus station. After Scanlon’s email, she wasn’t too surprised when there was no locker number 112. Was Scanlon right? Had he found the lock that fit the key?

  She wished she could email him back for more information. Was it strange that he’d told her not to? Of course, he’d told her he probably wouldn’t want to contact her by email often.

  A finger of unease played over the back of her neck as she silently considered the possibilities. When she’d left Scanlon in Bolen Bluff, his cover had still been solid. In fact, he’d been closer than ever to breaking through the wall separating him from the Swain drug operation.

  Maybe the Swains had finally brought him into the business.

  “On to Borland?” Wade asked when they returned to the SUV.

  She glanced at the dashboard clock. Nine-fifteen—if she wanted to make it to Bolen Bluff before eleven, she had to leave soon. “No, let’s take a break. I want to go over the files again to see if I missed any clues.” Scanlon had arranged for Brand to overnight copies of the FBI’s Swain-family-related files to Isabel. They’d arrived first thing that morning and were locked in the safe at her house.

  She dropped Wade off at the Cooper Security office and headed back home to the pretty little farmhouse she’d bought a few months earlier. She didn’t bother with the files in the safe, however. After dressing in a pair of olive drab jeans and a camouflage T-shirt she’d permanently borrowed from her brother Jesse, she grabbed a lightweight backpack and shoved a couple of boxes of .38 and 9 mm ammunition inside, one for her Beretta and one for the Smith & Wesson .38 she strapped to her ankle as a backup weapon. At the last minute, she added a compact boot knife to her other ankle.

  Just in case.

  Rain was forecast for the midmorning, thunderstorms for the afternoon, along with a drop in temperatures, so she grabbed a jacket, as well. If she and Scanlon were lucky, they’d find what they were looking for long before the storms rolled in.

  And if they were very lucky, the key in the locket around her neck would unlock enough damning evidence against the Swain family to put them all away for a long time.

  The drive to Bolen Bluff seemed to drag forever, though she reached the bottom of Dogwood Ridge an hour early. She eased her SUV into the abandoned barn where she’d met the extraction team last night. The drop site was empty and still.

  Taking care, she eased out of the Toyota and scanned the dim interior of the barn, using the flashlight on her key chain to examine all the gloomy corners. She saw nothing that looked like a booby trap or an ambush waiting to happen.

  So why was every instinct she possessed screaming for her to get the hell out of there?

  * * *

  “YOU KNOW THERE’S AT LEAST A SEVENTY PERCENT CHANCE I’m going to be shot dead before I can explain a damned thing, right?” Scanlon tucked the satellite phone under his chin and checked the clip of his Kel-Tec P-11 before he tucked it into the holster strapped at his ankle.

  “You’ve lived through worse odds,” Brand reminded him.

  “Once.”

  “I can extract you now, if that’s what you want.”

  Scanlon dropped his leg to the floor and slumped in the kitchen chair. Extraction was probably the smart option. The sane one. But if he got out now, he might never have another chance this good to find out who shot his father.

  “It’s not what I want,” he growled.

  Brand was silent on the other end of the line. Scanlon knew he had to be wondering, by now, why his formerly cautious agent had suddenly become gung-ho about dangerous undercover work. The SAC finally spoke in a low, careful tone. “Let’s just keep it simple. Go to Addie—she’s got the final word, and she’s not going to feel as personally affronted by the lies as her boys will. Plus, she’s not as hotheaded, either.”

  “Getting her alone could be the problem.”

  “You could call ahead.”

  “And give them time to set up an ambush? No.”

  “She’s most likely at the feed store.”

  “That’s what I figure, too.” Scanlon shrugged on a denim jacket, even though he suspected he’d be sweating like a pig in a sauna after a few minutes in the humid heat outside. The jacket made him feel a little less vulnerable, as if the denim was an added layer of armor. It was ludicrous, of course—the jacket only added an extra layer of potential shrapnel that would blow through him if someone sent a bullet flying his way, but if he thought he was less vulnerable, maybe he’d behave that way.

  It was going to take a show of bravado to pull this particular scam on Addie Tolliver.

  The feed store didn’t open on Sundays, officially, but Scanlon knew that was where Addie would be. She spent most days there, tending to the small shop as if it were her child. He suspected Leamon would agree—he’d been on the receiving end of more than one public dressing-down since Scanlon returned to Bolen Bluff. Nothing Leamon Tolliver did was ever good enough for his mother.

  Leamon had seemed, at first, a promising choice for a double agent. But Scanlon had figured out, early on, that most of Addie Tolliver’s complaints about her son were true. He was lazy and venal, and Scanlon was sure he’d be just as unreliable and uncontrollable an ally for the FBI as Addie found him to be for her own operation.

  Scanlon tried the front door of the shop. Locked. Not necessarily a deterrent, though his lock-picking skills weren’t quite up to his partner’s. But first, he went around to the back and simply knocked, hoping Addie would answer.

  Addie came to the door, peering out into the morning sunshine with a look of irritation on her square face. “Mr. Shipley. I re
ckon I wasn’t exactly expecting you.”

  He could tell from the emphasis she put on his undercover name that she knew who he really was. “I suppose you weren’t. But I think maybe we need to do a little talking.”

  Her leathery face cracked with a smile. “I reckon you’re at a disadvantage, aren’t you, G-man? Not much to offer me that I’d be in the market to buy.”

  “You haven’t seen anywhere near all I have to offer,” Scanlon shot back with a show of confidence, quelling the fear swelling in his gut. “May I come in?”

  Addie stepped back, the smile on her face broadening.

  Scanlon tamped down a flood of raw fear and entered the back of the store.

  He wasn’t all the way inside before a half dozen pairs of hands were on him, driving him facedown to the floor.

  * * *

  OVERHEAD, STORM CLOUDS SMUDGED the sky. Isabel crouched low behind a kudzu-smothered shrub and tugged her camouflage jacket more tightly around her, glad she’d listened to the weather report and anticipated the dropping temperatures.

  She’d moved the FJ Cruiser from the barn the minute her danger radar started pinging, parking it a half mile away behind a canopy of kudzu. Backtracking, she’d settled in to wait, hoping her instincts were wrong.

  Hoping it would be Scanlon who next appeared on the dirt road leading up the mountain to his cabin.

  She couldn’t see much beyond her hiding place. She could hear, however. A vehicle was moving up the road toward her.

  Unfortunately, it wasn’t Scanlon’s old Ford pickup. The engine noise was a purr, not a rattle.

  The car stopped just before it moved into the narrow gap between bushes that would have afforded Isabel a clear view. She eased back deeper into cover and waited for the new arrival to make himself known.

  Footsteps, quick and light, moved across the hardened dirt track. A woman, Isabel realized, just before her prey finally came into view. She bit back a gasp of surprise.

  Dahlia McCoy.

  The slender blonde checked her watch. Isabel took a quick peek at her own watch. Ten forty-five. She looked back up to see Dahlia slip inside the barn. Lying in wait for her arrival?

  She would be exposed, briefly, if she crossed the road, but she needed to get closer, to peek through the gaps between the rotting boards of the barn to see what Dahlia was up to.

  She took the chance and edged out of her hiding place, sticking close to the underbrush to take advantage of her camouflage clothing. Angling toward the corner of the barn, where it would be hardest for anyone inside to spot her movements, she moved silently across the dirt road and flattened herself against the weathered clapboard.

  Inside, she heard movement. She dared a quick glance through a nearby gap in the wood siding, but the interior of the barn was too dark for her to make out anything. And now, out in the open, she was too exposed, in case Dahlia had any backup coming. But she didn’t want to go back to the bushes and wait for something else to happen.

  She needed to draw Dahlia out into the open.

  But what if Scanlon were coming here to meet her? Dahlia’s presence didn’t mean the email was a hoax. Maybe Dahlia had somehow gotten wind of his plan to meet with Isabel and had decided to catch him in the act of cheating on her. Scanlon had seemed pretty sure that Dahlia had no connection to the Swain drug operation, so wasn’t it more likely that her motives for snooping around were personal?

  The sound of footsteps clicking across the hard dirt floor inside the rickety structure made Isabel press herself flatter against the side of the barn. She eased her hand onto the Beretta holstered at her side and readied herself.

  Dahlia emerged from the barn in a sudden rush, heading straight for Isabel. She held a rusty shovel in her hands and charged at her, swinging for her head.

  Isabel dodged the blow, but the edge of the shovel caught the wrist of her gun hand as she brought the Beretta up to protect herself, slicing through the flesh and rattling the bones. The Beretta slipped from her numb fingers and hit the ground with a soft thud.

  Isabel ignored the pain and reset herself, throwing out her leg to catch Dahlia as she tried to right herself to take another strike with the shovel. Dahlia sprawled forward, face-first, and Isabel threw herself on the woman’s back, pinning her on the ground.

  Dahlia’s hands scrabbled forward toward the fallen Beretta, but Isabel caught her by the hair, jerking her head back. She pulled the Smith & Wesson from her ankle holster and pressed the barrel against the side of Dahlia’s head. “Don’t think I won’t use this.”

  Dahlia drew her hand back, her breath coming in short, rapid gasps. “What are you going to do, kill me?”

  “Why are you here?” she asked.

  “Just walking through the woods,” Dahlia said between ragged breaths. “I saw someone with a gun outside the barn, so I struck.”

  Isabel could tell the woman was lying. For one thing, she’d parked here deliberately at the drop site, a few minutes before the time indicated in the email purportedly from Scanlon. And there was a smug tone to her voice, as if she couldn’t quite keep herself from letting Isabel know that she was aware of just who Isabel was.

  But did she have any idea who Scanlon was?

  Isabel was almost positive the Swains had targeted her because of the locket. That was how they’d identified her—Isabel Cooper, Annie Pritchard’s friend and the girl to whom Trey had given the locket. Not Isabel Cooper, the FBI agent who’d been investigating the bombings that might be connected to the Swains. It was possible the Swains didn’t even realize, yet, that the FBI had any interest in their operation.

  So which Isabel Cooper had Dahlia come here to look for?

  “I can’t breathe,” Dahlia groaned.

  Isabel eased off the woman’s back, but kept the barrel of the gun pressed against her head. She kicked the shovel aside, out of Dahlia’s reach, and circled to retrieve the Beretta. Her hand was slick with blood, almost losing its grip on the weapon, but the shovel edge seemed to have missed any major blood vessels, for the blood flow had slowed and was already starting to clot.

  “If you were just walking through the woods,” Isabel said, glancing at the three-inch heels of Dahlia’s brown leather pumps, “why the stilettos?”

  “They make my calves look fabulous,” Dahlia shot back, turning her head to glare at Isabel, ignoring the gun to her head. “You’re not going to shoot me. You’re one of the good guys, right?”

  “How would you know that?”

  Dahlia forced the issue, pulling away from the gun and sitting up so she could look at Isabel. “Let’s not pretend we don’t both know what’s going on.”

  “What’s going on?”

  Dahlia smiled. “I want that locket.”

  Isabel arched an eyebrow at the direct approach. “Why?”

  “I need the key inside.”

  “What makes you think I haven’t used it already?” Isabel saw no point in pretending she didn’t know what Dahlia was talking about.

  “You’d know the email was fake—that Ben Scanlon couldn’t have found the lock the key belongs to,” Dahlia answered flatly. “You would have found a different way to contact him.”

  Isabel felt her blood chill. “Who?”

  Dahlia laughed. “Oh, that’s nothing, hon. I know his real name. Bennett Allen Jr.” Her eyes glittered with bitter mirth. “Old Sheriff Allen’s boy.”

  How had she found out? Had someone here in Bolen Bluff managed to recognize him, despite the changes in his appearance?

  “I guess you’re wondering how I know that.”

  Isabel didn’t answer, keeping a watchful eye on the other woman, worried by how little anxiety she seemed to be showing, given that she was looking down the barrel of a Beretta.

  “The Swains are practically Luddites, the way they live. Most of them wouldn’t have cell phones if you paid them to carry one. The feed store doesn’t even have a security camera—did you know that?”

  “What are you getting at?”
/>
  “I own a cell phone. I own a PDA, a MacBook Pro and an iPad.” Dahlia smiled. “I’m not afraid of technology.”

  “You planted a listening device at the cabin,” Isabel murmured. “Or was it a camera?”

  Dahlia made a show of shuddering. “Not a camera. Listening to the two of you go at it like sex-starved teenagers was bad enough.”

  Isabel felt queasy. “Why are you telling me this?”

  “I’m not the only one who knows who Mark Shipley really is, you know.” Dahlia made a show of checking her watch. “I reckon the Swains have had him for a half hour now.” She met Isabel’s horrified gaze, a smile playing over her pretty lips. “Wonder how long they’ll toy with him before they get tired of playing and put a bullet in his head?”

  * * *

  SCANLON’S PULSE POUNDED a cadence of regret, drowning out even the soul-sucking fear of impending death.

  He was no longer in the feed store, but the cotton coffee bean sack fastened to his head with duct tape kept him from discerning where his captors had taken him.

  He had been in a vehicle for a while, the smell of exhaust mixed with the heady aroma of coffee beans making for a nauseating ride. Rough hands had moved him to the place where he sat now, strapped to a hard chair by more duct tape.

  He had flexed his hands as they’d strapped him in, trying to afford himself some wiggle room to get free. So far, they hadn’t found the penknife tucked into the hidden pouch he’d sewn into every pair of jeans he’d brought with him to Bolen Bluff. The knife wouldn’t do him much good in a fight, but it would free him of his bonds in a heartbeat if he could get one hand free.

  The silence that filled the space around him was oppressive, giving his racing mind more time for self-recriminations. He should have opted out the second he’d discovered he’d been made. To hell with the truth about what happened to his father—would his father have wanted him to take on a suicide mission just to find the truth?