In Sheep’s Clothing
A Sydney Rye Mystery, Book 9
Emily Kimelman
Copyright © 2017 by Emily Kimelman
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
Heading illustration by Autumn Whitehurst
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Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-one
Chapter Twenty-two
Chapter Twenty-three
Chapter Twenty-four
Chapter Twenty-five
Chapter Twenty-six
Chapter Twenty-seven
Chapter Twenty-eight
Chapter Twenty-nine
Chapter Thirty
Chapter Thirty-one
Chapter Thirty-two
Chapter Thirty-three
Chapter Thirty-four
Chapter Thirty-five
Chapter Thirty-six
Chapter Thirty-seven
Chapter Thirty-eight
Flock of Wolves
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A Note From Emily
About the Author
Want More?
For Donald Kimelman,
a wonderful father whose meticulous editing makes me a better writer. Thanks, Da. I love you.
Ultimately, blind faith is the only kind.
-Mason Cooley
Chapter One
Sydney Rye
Exquisite, slippery red pulsed, the color shifting with each wave of pain. Metal dug around in my side. I couldn't move to stop it. Couldn't even beg. And I would have.
My mind didn't form sentences or thoughts, only witnessed the color and experienced the pain.
Then Blue, his whimper close, his tongue on my cheek.
A breeze, the scent of wet stone joining the colors of pain.
Lightning cracked through the color. Voices in the distance…no not voices, bells.
The rocking motion lulled me back to sleep.
I waited in a sea of blue, slipping up and down waves, the sky above me swirling with storm clouds.
Lightning struck, and everything went white.
Chapter Two
Robert
Animals had gotten to the corpse, tearing the flesh off the skeleton and exposing the bone. The man standing over the body, his green-blue gaze the same shade as Caribbean waters if they ever froze, stared into the empty eye sockets of his former employee. Bloody, torn flesh, ribboned by some bird, hung down the dead man's cheeks.
Softness is the first thing eaten.
A breeze stirred the pine trees, their needles tapping against each other, whispering in a private conversation. Robert Maxim scanned the ground again, his gaze tracing the fight.
Blood was splattered in the dirt. A lot of it. Phillip had died slowly. He'd tried to pull the knife free, but the black, blood crusted handle still protruded from the dead man's throat. Philip's left forearm appeared particularly ravaged, probably from Sydney Rye's dog, Blue.
The sharpshooter's weapons were gone, unless you counted that knife in his neck.
Next to Philip, a depression in the dirt—the outline of a medium-sized woman punctuated with pools of blood—kept pulling Robert's attention.
Sydney Rye plunged the knife home and then fell over, succumbing to her own wounds. Which, judging by the amount of blood on the ground, were grave.
Robert turned slowly, observing every rock, stick, scuff and depression in the dirt.
Deep scratches marked where Blue leapt, his nails digging into the dirt as his back legs propelled him into the air. There were other dog prints, too. Not as large as Blue's, but far bigger than the common dogs found in this area, the contested territory along the Syrian-Iraqi border.
A tuft of white fur fluttered on a low branch. Bobby approached it slowly, carefully placing his booted feet where no clues lay. The fur was softer than Sydney's mutt's rough, wolf-like coat. Bobby pulled the white fluff off the branch and slipped it into his pocket.
Footsteps approached, soft thuds cushioned by pine needles. "Stay back." The intensity of Robert's emotions roughened his voice into a dangerous growl.
"That's our man there. Gotta pack him up, get him out of here. Animals are already getting to him," Conner said. Another sharpshooter who'd worked with Philip for years, Conner's bald head and scarred face made him look dangerous. And he was. Had Conner known that Philip took money to try to kill Sydney Rye?
"I need more time."
Conner disappeared, silent and patient.
Robert crouched down and looked at the dirt. Goats. Goats had come through here after the fight.
Sydney Rye didn't get up and walk away. Someone carried her, and they managed not to leave a trail of blood. The bald tread of a homemade boot wound through the forest, the goat hooves obscuring all but the smallest trace.
Either a small man or tall woman, traveling with a dog and a herd of goats, had carried Sydney Rye away. Why?
Herders passed through here on their way from one village to another. The person must be under Daesh protection…or desperate. Why take a bleeding woman? That injured, she'd be useless, the amount of work to patch her up hardly worth the price.
Unless, of course, this herder knew who Sydney Rye was.
Robert Maxim would pay any price to get her back. But few people knew that, let alone a random goat herder.
Conner appeared again, his silent figure a reminder that time was tight and the location not fully secured. "You can take him away." Robert did not look up. Conner disappeared back into the trees, going to get the stretcher and other men to help carry Philip.
Robert didn't think of Philip as a traitor. What was he committing treason against? A corporation? His personal relationship with Robert Maxim? His loyalty to the other men on his team?
None of that really mattered. Working for a defense company like Fortress Global International or Dog Fight Investigations wasn't the same as being a member of the United States Armed Forces.
Robert never served his nation, but the rest of his team were all veterans. Like Robert, these men now fought not for honor and glory, but for money. Philip had accepted money to try to kill a member of his team. Albeit, a recent member.
This was the first time Philip had even met Sydney Rye. He didn't know anything about her. Didn't have to, in order to try to kill her. However, knowing she was almost impossible to kill would've kept him alive.
Philip widowed his wife and left his kid without a father.
Robert shook his head at the man's stupidity before taking one more look at the scene— Phillip's prone body, the spattering of blood, the marks in the dirt outlining the fight—before turning and leaving.
He walked through the trees, ducking under low branches and pushing others aside. The rich scent of sap in his nose blotted out the metallic tang of blood.
It wasn't normal for Robert Maxim to feel emotions. He'd spent a lifetime controlling and containing them—only allowing what was
useful to surface to his consciousness. But as he walked through those trees, his feet sinking into the soft earth, his heart clenched with fear.
Fear was the worst of all the emotions. The one that Robert Maxim had done the best at conquering. But that was the problem with Rye, wasn't it? She made him feel things; she made him do things—she controlled him without even trying.
Robert reached the helicopter and climbed in next to the pilot. Deacon, originally from Texas, had an easy smile and covert ops military experience. His gaze drifted over to Robert, but he didn't say anything.
Did his men know?
Robert checked his face, making sure it was arranged into a hard, cold mask of indifference and calculation.
The men returned with Philip's body and loaded it into the back of the helicopter. Robert gave the word, and the bird lifted off. They rose up above the trees and tilted to the north, passing over the narrow road still littered with bodies and broken vehicles.
Whoever took Sydney didn't have much of a head start. Robert directed Deacon to do a quick scan of the area. They flew low and fast over the trees in the direction of the goat's hoof prints. The elevation dropped off steeply, the mountain craggy and rife with caves, bare of anything but the hardiest vegetation.
The thwap of the helicopter blades and the static of the radio coming through Robert's headphones couldn't cover up the rapid beat of his heart in his ears. Robert's eyes raked over the desolate landscape, looking for any kind of movement on the ground. A herd of goats, two dogs, a badly injured woman and another person couldn't have gotten far…but there were so many places to hide.
After thirty minutes, Robert nodded his head, a small gesture to indicate that they should head back to the base. The chopper left the mountains and flew over the desert plains, a wide and empty space devoid of human activity.
They returned to the army base in Turkish territory and Robert headed toward the low-slung building with its tinted reflective doors that housed the offices and barracks. It looked like a hundred other bases he'd visited. But this was different.
Robert Maxim was having feelings. He tried to wrestle them under control and smooth them away as he opened the door.
Martha's assistant picked up the phone to announce him. Robert strode to the door and opened it, not waiting for permission.
The CIA director sat behind her desk, hands folded on her stomach. In her late fifties, Martha Emerson had a helmet of blonde hair streaked with silver and green eyes the color of golf course grass, and just as flat.
"You brought back the bodies?"
The skin around Robert's eyes tightened. She said bodies, plural.
"Just one body."
Martha raised her eyebrows, recognizing her mistake. She hadn't expected Philip to survive his assault on Sydney, but figured he'd manage to kill her nonetheless.
Everyone underestimated Sydney Rye.
"What happened?" Martha pushed on, not verbalizing the tension in the room—they both knew she'd ordered the hit. But that was the way of this world, of Robert's world. Never admit what's really happening; always play the game.
Except Sydney never did.
Her face filled his mind's eye: mercury gray eyes, black hair with thick bangs tickling at her lashes, those scars around her left eye, faded but still tightening the skin, still a reminder of her fierceness—if her hard gaze, taut lips, harsh words and tight body weren't enough. As if anyone who saw her could doubt for a moment that she would kill them…or save them, depending on her point of view.
"It seems that Philip and Sydney had a fight. Philip died."
Martha frowned. "And your girl? Is she okay?"
Robert let a twitch of a smile curl his lip before answering. "She's not my girl."
"She's your business partner?"
"As a woman in a man's world, I'd think you'd be more sensitive to sexist stereotypes. Referring to her as my girl, diminishes her, doesn't it?"
Martha cocked her head, her eyes lighting—she'd caught a tone in his voice, a clue. "She's alive?
"I don't know." Emotion gurgled in his chest, and his mind fought to banish it, keep it out of his gaze, where it could do irreparable harm.
He couldn't keep Sydney Rye out of his mind.
Lord knows, he tried.
"What do you mean?" An edge of annoyance sharpened Martha's tone, as if being cagey was offensive to her. What a joke coming from a director at the CIA.
"She's gone. Philip's body was there, lots of blood, clearly a scuffle." He made it all sound so casual. "But she's missing. Possibly captured."
"That's not good." The lines around Martha's mouth deepened. "She could be used as leverage with Zerzan. Do you think they will try to make a trade for Abu Mohammad al-Baghdadi?"
"I don't know."
Taking Abu Mohammad al-Baghdadi prisoner was important for the CIA's plan to destabilize the Islamic State's caliphate—and selling weapons to Zerzan and her Kurdish fighting group was key in Robert's plan to get even richer. But Robert only cared about getting Sydney back.
Daesh soldiers believed in the divine providence of their state and Abu Mohammad al-Baghdadi was one of the strongest voices, the most sanguine arguers, on behalf of the caliphate, the nation prophesied—and some believed mandated—in the Quran.
Known for his violent videos, his stark philosophical arguments, and scarred face, Abu Mohammad's capture by Zerzan was a powerful blow to the Daesh leadership. While the American government officially had nothing to do with the Peshmerga fighting force that seized him, Martha had provided the intel that left Abu Mohammad al-Baghdadi in Zerzan's grip.
"She got away, at least." Martha referred to Zerzan's escape. Robert had left Sydney behind to get her and Abu Mohammad al-Baghdadi out. He had then dropped Zerzan and her captive off in Kurdish territory, where her troops met her with a convoy of trucks and a tank…recently provided by Robert's new company, Dog Fight Investigations, and paid for by the US government—funds Congress approved but never saw line items for.
Those multimillions helped to ease the suffering in Robert. At least he had money. Money. Money.
"I don't think that Zerzan would risk her cause for a single life." Robert shrugged.
Martha held his gaze, and her pupils dilated. She knew. She knew how much he cared. Robert refused to look away, forcing coldness into his gaze, extinguishing the fire scalding his inside with pure icy will.
Expose nothing.
His whole life he'd practiced his poker face. It couldn't fail him now.
At sixteen he’d left his parents’ house and became a professional gambler. With a fake ID and an unparalleled ability to count cards, he made enough money to set himself up in business. The cocaine business.
In Miami, in that era, cocaine ruled. And Robert Maxim set his sights on the top of the pyramid. At twenty-one, he believed that he had one of the best poker faces in the world—until he went down to Columbia to try to negotiate taking over from his distributor.
Instead, he found himself a prisoner.
Spending a year in a cage in the Colombian jungle, a ransom for the FARC, reinforced the vital lesson to hide everything except what Robert wanted his opponent to see.
He needed to leave before he gave anything else away to Martha.
Robert stood and turned to go, but Martha stopped him with a question. "We're still good? It's not as if we needed Sydney for this, right?"
"We're fine." Robert looked back at her—the truth of his statement in his gaze. Of course, he didn't need Sydney to run this business, to make this fortune, to do these deals.
He needed her to be happy. To be able to sleep. To feel like life was worth living.
To quench this goddamn fire roasting his insides.
Martha could see none of that in his gaze now, though. He shoved it right down there to his toes. The scent of the Colombian mud in his nose, the wailing of the insects at night in his ears, reminded his body and brain of the dangers that loose emotions wrought. His breath came i
n even, deep drafts. His fingers relaxed, shoulder blades on his back, abs tight and supportive.
Martha nodded and broke the eye contact first.
Robert kept his hands loose, his stride steady, as he traversed the airfield, headed back toward his quarters. He needed a shower; the mission had left him sweaty and dusty.
Outside his windows, the distant mountains were black spears against a sky sparkling with stars, and the air-conditioning hummed its electronic tune. He turned on the TV and went into the bathroom. The shower running, its thrumming rhythm blocking any listening devices in his space, Robert climbed in under the spray. He slid down the wall, crouching in the corner and rested his face into his hands.
Hands that had killed, caressed, grabbed, but always played to win.
He gave himself ten minutes in that white noise, under that hot spray, before turning off the shower and returning to his room. Pulling the secure phone from his safe, Robert began to dial.
He'd find Sydney Rye, but he couldn't do it alone.
Chapter Three
Mulberry
She couldn't be dead. It was impossible.
What if he was wrong?
Anxiety swelled, broadening Mulberry's chest and pushing his shoulders back. He pulled his passport from his breast pocket and handed it to the custom's officer. Her hazel eyes scanned the document.
In Sheep's Clothing Page 1
