Perilous Trust

by Barbara Freethy

  "This is Special Agent Wyatt Tanner," Karen said. "Agent Parker brought Agent Tanner into the Venturi investigation ten months ago. He's been working undercover in construction for the Venturis' real-estate development firm. A CI has informed us that Agent Tanner's cover is blown and that there's a hit out on his life. He missed his last meet, and he is not answering emergency protocols." Karen paused, her cool demeanor cracking just a little. "We need to find Agent Tanner, as well as Agent Wolfe and Sophie Parker, as soon as possible. If any of you have any knowledge of their whereabouts, please come and talk to me or Peter immediately. It could be the difference between life and death. We cannot have one more person going out on his or her own. The stakes are too high. We are a team, and we will be better if we work together."

  Bree felt as if Karen was looking directly at her as she finished her statement.

  She didn't flinch or waver under Karen's pointed gaze. There was no way she was giving Damon or Wyatt up, and she had no intention of releasing their secret communication protocol, either. Right now, it was the only lifeline Damon and Wyatt had. And she didn't understand why Karen had told the group that Wyatt wasn't responding to emergency protocols when Wyatt had had a different story.

  Before he had fallen asleep on her couch the night before, he'd told her that he'd initiated the protocols as soon as he'd escaped from his attacker on Monday, which was two days before Alan died. Had Alan ignored Wyatt's urgent need for a meet? Or had Karen or someone else intercepted the message?

  She'd wanted to press Wyatt for more information, but he'd been exhausted. So, she'd given him a meal as well as a blanket and a pillow for her couch and told him to get some rest. When she'd gotten up for work a little past seven, he'd been gone, and she hadn't heard from him since. She had left him a burner phone to use, and he'd taken it with him, but he hadn't answered her call or text. She really hoped he was all right.

  "What about the storage unit?" Seth Hanford asked. Seth was another agent in Karen and Alan's division, and he seemed to be jockeying a bit with Karen for more power.

  Bree made a mental note to look into his background a bit more.

  "Who rented the unit?" Seth asked. "Do we know what Agent Wolfe and Ms. Parker were doing there? And does anyone know what was in the case Wolfe was carrying?"

  Peter Hunt stepped forward to take the questions. "The unit was rented by Justin Lawrence fifteen years ago. It now appears that Lawrence was another alias for Alan Parker. We have no idea what was in the suitcase, but it was obviously important enough for Agent Wolfe and Sophie Parker to go after it."

  It suddenly all made sense. Alan had left something in the unit for his daughter…or for Damon—something that was in that silver suitcase.

  But what didn’t make sense was why Alan had rented the unit under an alias fifteen years ago, and no one had known about it, including his good friend Peter Hunt.

  Unless Hunt had known about it.

  Had Peter staked out the storage center? Had he sent someone to wait for Damon and Sophie to show up? Had he done the same thing at the cabin? Was Peter the one relaying information to the Venturis?

  "That's it for now," Peter said. "Let's get back to work."

  Since she was closest to the door, she was one of the first ones out of the conference room, but she'd barely taken three steps down the hallway when Peter Hunt called her name.

  "Agent Adams," he said.

  "Yes?" she asked, turning back to face him.

  "I understand you are friends with Agents Wolfe and Tanner."

  "We were at Quantico together."

  "And you were all recruited by Alan for this office."

  "Yes. But, as you know, I didn't work for him."

  "I am aware of that." His sharp gaze raked her face. "Are you in contact with Damon or Wyatt?"

  "No," she said, keeping her expression neutral. "I wish I was. I'm extremely concerned for them, especially in light of this new information."

  "If you hear from them, you need to let me know."

  "Of course. But there is something I'm curious about."

  "Walk with me to the elevator," he said. "I have a meeting outside the office."

  "All right."

  Once inside in the elevator, Peter pushed the button for the lobby level. But before they'd gone two floors, he hit the stop button and the elevator came to a lurching stop.

  She stumbled and had to brace her hand against the wall. "Why did you do that?" she asked, suddenly alarmed by the isolation and the possibility that Peter Hunt could be the FBI mole.

  "Because you want to ask me something that I don't think anyone else needs to hear," he said, steel in his hard, dark eyes.

  She didn't know Agent Hunt. He was way above her pay grade, but he had a good reputation for being extremely perceptive and very dedicated to the job. Now, he seemed almost…menacing. But she wasn't going to let him intimidate her. Alan Parker had trained her to be tough, and she'd only gotten tougher since she'd left Quantico.

  "So, ask," he ordered.

  "You were friends with Alan Parker for more than twenty years, but you didn't know about his cabin in the Adirondacks or the storage unit in New Haven. That seems odd."

  "Does it? Alan went to great lengths to hide his interest in those properties."

  "But the lake—Sophie and her dad went there with the Rowlands. How did you not know that? Even I knew that."

  "You knew about the lake house?" he asked quickly. "Why didn't you say anything?"

  "I didn't know there was a house, but I knew the Rowlands held a wake at the lake for their son Jamie a few years back and that Sophie attended it."

  A gleam came into his eyes. "That must have been how Agent Wolfe knew where to find her. Yet, he didn't say anything when I spoke to him."

  She ignored the comment about Damon. "Did you speak to Vincent Rowland? I would assume he would have been one of the first people you would contact, since he and Alan were friends. Surely, he would have told you about the house."

  "I have not been able to connect with Vincent. And while I knew Alan and Vincent sometimes vacationed together, I wasn't aware there was a particular place they went. I wasn't a part of that. I certainly didn't know Alan had bought a cabin there under an assumed name."

  She might be able to believe that, but pleading ignorance about one location was one thing—two locations felt suspect. "The storage unit in New Haven is close to Yale, the school you and Alan attended. You didn't know about that, either?" she challenged.

  She was taking a huge risk with her career right now, speaking so impulsively and boldly to a man who could get her fired, but if Hunt was the mole, then she needed to shake him up enough to take action, to possibly make a mistake. That might be their only chance to catch him.

  "Why don't you say what you want to say, Agent Adams?" he suggested.

  "I believe someone at the FBI might be leaking information to the Venturis. Wherever Damon and Sophie go, someone else seems to show up, and not too far behind."

  "And you believe that someone is me?"

  She stared back at him. "I hope not. I'm also disturbed that Agent Leigh put Agent Tanner's picture up on the monitor. If there's a leak at the Bureau, she just put Wyatt in more danger."

  "Agent Tanner's cover has been blown. Given his work relationship to Alan, and the fact that he's been unreachable since before Alan's death, it's possible he's no longer alive."

  She sucked in a breath at his chilling words. She knew Wyatt was alive, but she needed to pretend she didn't. "How can you say that so coldly? He's one of us."

  "And we're doing our best to find him. If you have proof there's a leak, by all means bring it to me. But I've got three people missing—all of them extremely important—and my first priority is finding them." He paused, as he pushed the start button. "You've got more guts than brains, Agent Adams. I know now why Alan recruited you. He liked that combination. He liked agents who tested the boundaries, but I do not. I like agents who follow the rules, bec
ause those rules will keep all of us alive and build cases that will not get thrown out of court. You might not be wrong about a leak, but unless you have a name and some evidence to back it up, it's just a theory, and I don't deal in theories; I don't have time."

  When they reached the ground floor, Peter exited the elevator and strode toward the exterior doors. She thought about going back upstairs to her desk, but she couldn't help wondering where Peter was headed. He'd said he had a meeting outside the office. With who? About what?

  Using more of her guts than her brain, she impulsively headed out the door after him. It might be a stupid move, but two people she cared about were in trouble, and she wasn't going to stand by and do nothing. She just hoped she wouldn't make things worse.

  * * *

  "I'm surprised, Damon." Sophie set her fork next to her empty plate and rested her arms on the kitchen table. She felt so much better now. She'd showered, washed her hair and had found black leggings and a T-shirt in Cassie's old bedroom. She'd been extremely happy to shed the clothes she'd put on before going to work on Wednesday, before her entire life had gone to hell. It was difficult to believe that was only three days ago.

  Damon finished off the last spoonful of rice. "Is there really anything left to be surprised about?" he asked dryly.

  "Yes. You can cook. And you're not just average—you're good."

  "After everything that has happened the past few days, that made the shock meter?"

  "It did. You took a box of rice, olive oil, stewed tomatoes, canned peas and made a delicious meal. Not to mention the chicken noodle soup appetizer with the shredded crackers on top. I am impressed."

  "I made do with what we had. It wasn't a big deal."

  "Where did you learn to cook? Your parents?"

  "Definitely not from my parents. I had a nanny who was from El Salvador. She also cooked for the family, and she could make magic out of anything. Not that she had to make magic in my parents' pantry, because they truly had every ingredient imaginable, but she used to tell me stories about growing her own food and feeding her kids on next to nothing. Sometimes, while she was making dinner, she'd give me three ingredients and tell me I had to come up with something."

  "That sounds fun."

  "It was fun, until my mother came in and looked at my tomato and avocado toast and yelled at the nanny for not making me a real meal."

  "Tomato and avocado toast sounds amazing, especially with a little olive oil on it."

  "And black pepper. I was always allowed to use salt and pepper for seasoning my three ingredients."

  She smiled at the proud gleam in his eyes. "You do like to win, don't you?"

  "Can't deny that."

  "I'm sorry to say that your mom does not sound that great."

  "She was hard on the help," he conceded. "Not really that hard on me. She didn't want to risk me telling some judge I'd rather live with my father, so I usually got whatever I wanted, unless she was in some mood and wanted to pretend she was a disciplinarian. It didn't really matter. Whatever punishment she threw out was forgotten five minutes later."

  "Did you play that for all it was worth?"

  "Sometimes, especially when I got older, when I realized the power I had."

  "I have a hunch you could have been a lot worse if you'd wanted to be. But you have a strong sense of what is right and what is wrong. I wonder where you got that from."

  "I can't imagine. Neither one of my parents has ever met a rule they thought applied to them. They were always the exception."

  "But not you. You always followed the rules."

  "I wouldn't say always, but growing up the way I did, I liked structure. It felt good to know what the boundaries were. That's why I liked the military. It was straightforward. No games. No manipulation of emotions. I knew what my job was, and I did it."

  "The FBI has a lot of rules, too."

  "Not as many as the military, but, yes, it does."

  She tilted her head as she studied him. "I get why you would like structure because your childhood was so unpredictable, but I have to say, Damon, that you've done nothing but break the rules since you heard my father was dead. Why didn't you tell anyone that you thought I might be at the lake? Why did you come alone? Really?"

  "I already told you; I was worried about you. I didn't know if you were there. It was a long drive to find out."

  "But you still could have told Karen or Peter where you were going, even if you thought it was a wild-goose chase. It would have made sense to let them know."

  "I had met with my undercover friend right before I found out about your father, about the search for you. He'd put some doubts into my head as to who I could trust. I don't know Peter beyond the one short conversation I had with him before I left."

  "What was that about?"

  "He asked me if I knew you or your friends. I said I didn't. He had some questions about what Alan had brought me in to do, but I couldn't give him much information on that, either."

  "Why did you say you didn't know me?"

  "You know why. You never told anyone about that night, and neither did I. It was between us—that's it."

  She nodded, appreciating his words. "Yes, it was just between us."

  "I've had very little contact with Karen since I arrived and barely know the team," he added. "They weren't exactly inviting me into the inner circle. I decided I'd check out the lake and if you were there, I'd figure out the rest later."

  "Well, I'm glad you came to find me. I might not have made it out of the cabin alive. It's weird to think I wouldn't have known about the suitcase of cash or the fake passports or anything if I'd died there." She sighed. "Maybe in some ways that would have been better."

  "Not for a second. You have a lot of life left to live, Sophie. A lot of archaeological digging to be done, discoveries to be made."

  "My job has really been my whole life the last few years," she admitted. "Now I don't know when I'll get back to it or if I ever will."

  "You will."

  "I hope so." She paused. "When I was upstairs changing, I looked around a bit more, and I did notice that Jamie had left some clothes in his closet, if you feel like wearing something new. It felt good to me to get out of the clothes I've been living in."

  "That's great news. I would love to change."

  "Go ahead. I'll clean up."

  He nodded but then made no move to get to his feet. "Sophie, we need to talk about the money."

  Her gaze strayed to the suitcase on the floor. "I know. My dad must have drained his bank accounts. Or maybe he borrowed some money. Or he sold something and was paid in cash."

  Damon's gaze settled on her face. "Is that really what you think?" he asked quietly.

  "My dad is dead; he can't defend himself. I have to defend him."

  "So, that's not really what you think."

  "No, it's not what I think," she said in annoyance. "It looks like someone paid him off or he stole the money. I don't want to believe that either of those things could have happened, but I keep remembering how he started out his voicemail to me with an apology, only he never said how he'd gotten into trouble or what exactly he'd done. Why didn't he just say? Obviously, he was sending me to get the money. Why didn't he just tell me what he'd done?"

  "Perhaps he couldn't bring himself to say the words. I think the last thing Alan wanted to do was disappoint you."

  "I never thought that could happen. We had our fights as daughters and fathers do, but they were petty, small arguments about nothing. In my heart, I believed my father was the best person in the world. I loved him so much, Damon. He was my rock. He held me when my mom died. He was in the front row at every graduation. He took me to get ice cream when I got my heart broken. He even let me dress him up as a pumpkin on the first Halloween after my mom died, because I was so sad. Does a bad person do that kind of stuff?"

  Damon didn't answer, which was good, because she didn't want him to say anything yet. She had to get her thoughts out.

&nb
sp; "I was proud of my dad," she continued. "He put terrible people in jail. He made the world safer. I don't want him to turn into someone else now that he's gone. I want to keep believing in the man who taught me how to ride a bike and encouraged me to go for everything I wanted." She took an emotional breath. "But I'm not stupid, Damon. I know my father was not making that kind of money as an agent. I just want there to be a good reason behind him having that money. Like maybe he stole it from a criminal. Or maybe he was going to use it for leverage or evidence or something…"

  "It's possible," Damon said slowly.

  She gave him a grateful smile. "Thanks for saying that, even though you don't believe it. Your logical brain has already come up with a different equation."

  "I respected him, too, Sophie, and I would like to prove his innocence. I don't know if that will be possible, but we don't have the whole story yet. Until we do, I'm keeping an open mind." He pushed back his chair. "I'm going to take a shower."

  "Okay. Don't take too long," she said impulsively. "I kind of like having you nearby."

  "I'll be back before you know it, but in the meantime." He tipped his head to the gun he'd placed on the counter. "Keep that close. And don't open the door, no matter what."

  Fifteen

  Bree followed Peter Hunt to a bar in Midtown about a mile away from the office. Peter hadn’t seemed to notice her on his tail, walking at a brisk pace and making several calls along the way. He only glanced once over his shoulder at an intersection, but she was able to duck out of sight.

  He stopped in front of a bar called the Golden Goose to finish whatever conversation he was having. By his body language, he appeared to be angry. Apparently, she wasn't the only one pissing him off these days.

  As he returned his phone back to the pocket of his gray slacks, a black Escalade double-parked in front of the restaurant.

  She took out her own phone, pretending to be listening to something as she hid in the doorway of an office building. Peter moved toward the curb as the car door opened.