Kirsten was shaking, her hand clamped over her mouth to keep from coughing. I pulled her into the bathroom and pressed a moist towel from my shower over her mouth. When her need to cough subsided, I pulled her toward the windows. We squatted so that anyone outside couldn’t see us clearly when I pulled the curtain aside. Thankfully, there didn’t appear to be anyone on this side of the house. That was a mistake on their part.
The window was fairly new, well oiled. It slid open easily without making a sound. I climbed out first just in case someone was there and I hadn’t seen them. I fell to the ground, the grass muffling my movements. I turned back and pulled Kirsten through, noticing only after she was halfway out the window that the smoke from the living room had made it to the bedroom and was billowing out the window. Someone was going to see that.
I grabbed her hand and ran, throwing caution away. Our advantage of secrecy was gone now. Someone called out to us from the backyard just as we rounded the side of the house. A figure in a heavy jacket and ski mask was waiting, gun raised.
I pushed Kirsten behind me and swung, hitting the person’s gun hand just below the wrist. The gun flew out of the hand, landing silently in the grass somewhere to my left. Another blow landed perfectly on the person’s jaw, followed by another strike to the groin with my foot. Whoever it was clearly hadn’t been expecting an attack. He or she fell hard to the ground, groaning.
I reached for Kirsten and found her crouched in the grass, searching for the gun.
“Leave it,” I hissed at her.
“If they’re armed, shouldn’t we be, too?”
“Fuck me,” I whispered as I grabbed her arm and tugged her to her feet. She cried out in something like joy, holding up the gun just as someone came charging around the side of the house. I knew this person would be more prepared for a confrontation and decided flight was better at this point.
I pulled Kirsten around in front of me and pushed, sending her across the lawn and out into the spotlight of the afternoon sun. If she was where someone could see her, maybe our pursuer would stop. I followed, pounding the ground as I caught up with her, grabbed her hand, and fled into the street.
Pain flashed against my arm, followed by the dim hiss of a gun fired with a silencer in place. I cursed again, dragging Kirsten up onto the sidewalk where the neighbors’ cars offered a small amount of cover. And continued to run.
Somehow we managed to make it out of the cul-de-sac, but I could already hear the pounding of someone in pursuit. We needed to get off the street.
There was a house somewhere near her that had a For Sale sign out front. Maybe … I spotted it just as another hiss of the fired gun filled the air. Where the hell were all the neighbors? They couldn’t all be at work! I pulled Kirsten up onto the lawn and through the side gate, searching the windows for any sign of occupancy. The curtains were all drawn. If it was nighttime, lights might have helped, but the sun was still high in the sky. I heard the back gate crash against the wall as we approached the back porch. We had about two seconds before we would become perfect targets.
The back door was a sliding glass door like the one at my mom and dad’s house. I could already see that there was a bar in the track blocking it from opening. I slammed my hand against the glass, cursing again. I was about to turn and tell Kirsten to run for it when a light suddenly turned on. An elderly man came to the door, a scowl on his face as he studied us through his back door.
“What the fuck?” he asked as he slid the door open.
Kirsten quickly slid the gun into the waistband at the back of her pants, trying to control her breathing as she turned to face this stranger.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “We were just in the neighborhood and saw the For Sale sign. We were trying to get a glimpse inside.”
“You should have just knocked. A For Sale sign isn’t an invitation to trespass.”
“I know. I apologize. But since we’ve already disturbed you, would you mind showing us around?”
I could hear grass crunching behind us. The man seemed to hear it too because he stepped out onto the porch and strained to see around us.
“You bring someone with you?”
“No, sir.”
He frowned, but he gestured toward the open door. “Come inside. But I can only show you the downstairs. My wife is ill and she’s resting upstairs.”
“I understand.”
Kirsten slid her hand into mine, glancing behind us as the man closed the sliding door.
That was damn close!
***
The man was Wallace Phelps and he turned out to be one of the nicest people I’d ever met. His wife of forty years, Agnes, was dying of cancer. They were selling their house to pay for her treatments. Despite nursing her there in the house, he took the time to not only show us around the entire house, but to serve us a lovely tea in his warm, well-used kitchen.
I felt like an ass for not actually being in the market to buy a house.
We left more than an hour later, not stepping foot outside the front door until the Uber we’d called arrived. Even then we were careful to make sure the driver was who he said he was and to watch the street for our mystery pursuer.
“Who the hell was that?” Kirsten whispered to me as we sat low in the backseat of the Uber.
“I don’t know.”
“How did they know where we were?”
“I don’t know.”
“Were they even after us? Maybe your company put someone else in that house recently and they thought that person was still there.”
I shook my head. “That safe house hasn’t been used in months.”
That didn’t make her feel any better. Her hand was shaking when she slipped the gun out of her pants and handed it to me.
“I don’t want it.”
I wished I had thought to grab the cellphone when we fled the house. I needed to figure out where we went from here. I needed to call Dragon and find out which of the other safe houses was prepared for occupancy. And then I realized that I couldn’t call Dragon.
“I’ve got this all wrong,” I said, dread mixed with a little fear washing over me like cold water poured over my head.
“What do you mean?”
I sat up and got the driver’s attention. “Change of plans. Take us to the bus station.”
The driver just nodded. The bus station or the airport. It was all the same to him.
“Kevin?”
“Tina’s daughter. Elizabeth?”
“Yeah.”
“Do you remember her coming to the house a couple of summers when we were kids? I was like eleven or twelve and you were ten?”
“No, not really.”
“She did. Tina would bring her to the house when she was working on days when her day camp was closed or something like that.”
“After the divorce?” Kirsten leaned forward and buried her face in her hands for a long second. Then she sighed, nodding. “I remember. She always wanted to be in control of whatever game we were playing, always bossing everyone around.”
“You sent her away one afternoon. I remember because she was under the front porch, crying. I crawled under there to talk to her and she talked about how much she missed her dad and how hard the divorce was on her. I held her while she cried. After that, she followed me around like we were suddenly best pals.”
Kirsten turned her head and studied my face. “I remember. You were always doing stuff like that, then you didn’t know what to do with that sort of attention.”
She smiled softly at the memory, her smile wiping the fear and worry from her eyes for a brief second.
“I forgot that I’d known her when I saw her at your house.”
“I did too.”
I dragged my hands over my skull, kicking myself for not seeing it sooner.
That summer wasn’t the only time Elizabeth had come around. There was another time, too.
“You and your girlfriend …”
“Janelle.”
�
�You’re exclusive?”
I shrugged, my eighteen-year-old hormones making my hands itch and my cock stiffen. She was a beautiful girl and I was currently a single man. No one knew it, but Janelle and I had broken up a week ago because she found the enlistment papers in my locker. She was pissed that I’d decided to go to the Marines instead of following her to Baylor in the fall.
“How long are you here, Lizzie?”
“All summer. Momma doesn’t want me hanging out at the house alone. She says I’m too likely to get into trouble.”
I pushed a lock of hair out of her eyes. “I can’t imagine that.”
She blushed a little. “Last summer the neighbors didn’t appreciate the parties I threw on my mom’s late afternoons here. So this year she’s treating me like I’m two years old.”
“That sucks.”
“I bet your parents would never do that to you.”
I respected my parents too much to put them in that sort of situation. Besides, our house wasn’t exactly ideal for a party considering all my friends had parents whose bank accounts had six figures. It was occasionally a disadvantage having your father’s wealthy employer pay for you to attend the same private school his daughter attended.
Liz touched my chest, her fingers playing with the buttons on my shirt. I moved closer to her, trapping her between the gate of the stall and my body. There was hay in her hair from the chores Trevor had had her doing all morning. I picked it out, letting my fingers graze her cheek. She was a beautiful girl, about as different from Kirsten as any girl could be. She was blonde, her skin like porcelain. But there was something about her that reminded me of Kirsten.
And that was like a wet blanket.
I backed up a little.
“Where are you going?” she asked, her bottom lip pushed out in a pout. “I thought we were having a lovely conversation.”
“I should go back out to the pasture. My dad’s probably wondering where I wandered off to.”
“Aren’t you eighteen now? Do you really have to jump when your father tells you to?”
“Kirsten might wander in here.”
“Kirsten is a bitch who doesn’t need to put her nose in our business.”
That made my brow furrow. How immature was this girl, anyway? She was beginning to irritate the crap out of me.
“I’ve got to go.”
I turned to leave and she screeched, a scream that probably caused every dog on the ranch to howl. I turned back to her and pressed my hand over her mouth, trying to shut her up. She started to laugh, so I removed my hand.
“You are so easy. I could tell everyone you tried to rape me and they’d so believe me!”
“You’re a little devil.”
“And you’re going to do whatever I tell you or I’ll do it.”
I stared at her for a long moment. “Do whatever you like. Do you really think they’d take your word over mine?”
“You were hot for me a minute ago. What is it? Is it your girlfriend? Or is it Kirsten?”
I didn’t respond, but she knew. She called after me, her voice just short of hysteria.
“Kirsten doesn’t give a shit about you, you know. You’re too fucking poor for the likes of that rich bitch!”
I don’t know how I could have forgotten that encounter, but I had. A week later I graduated high school and went off to basic training. Never once did I look back.
I should have.
“What does any of this have to do with Elizabeth?” Kirsten asked.
“I think she was in Miami. I think she followed us down there and that she’s behind all of this.”
“Why?” Kirsten sat up straighter. “Why would she do this to me?”
“Because she’s jealous. She grew up watching her mother serve your family, watching her mom treat you and your sister—even me and Trevor—like her children while she was barely home for her own daughter. She saw you get everything you could ever possibly want while she went without. She hates you because she’s not you.”
“But Jason—”
“She would have met him at the house when he came to meet you. You said he rarely left the house during his visit. Surely she worked at least one of those days. Didn’t you say she served dinner that night?”
“I did.”
“Then he would have known her. Maybe they had a flirtation going at the house. Or maybe she convinced him to let her into his hotel room because of her connection to you and Dallas. Maybe she even knew about his scheme and wanted in on it.”
“You think she took my gun from my bag and killed Jason? But why?”
“I don’t know.”
“And the people at the safe house? Who were they?”
“I don’t know. Maybe it was all part of some bigger scam. Or maybe those people were the ones in on things with Jason and they think you killed him. I don’t know. There are still so many holes, but this makes sense.”
The car stopped and I realized we’d arrived at our destination. I stepped out and pulled Kirsten to my side, looking carefully around before I led the way into the bus station. It was a large place, filled with dozens of people waiting for a ride to whatever destination they were hoping for. No one noticed us, not even with the bulge the gun made in the small of my back. I went to one of the counters and bought a ticket to Oklahoma City with the card Dragon provided for me, aware that it would show up instantly on Dragon’s computers. Then I quickly turned and pulled Kirsten back out the door and stepped onto a city bus that was headed downtown.
“What are we doing?”
“Sending a message to Hayden.”
“What message?”
I glanced at her. “The only people who knew we were at that safe house were the people at Dragon. Someone either gave that information away, or our systems have been compromised. Either way, it’s not safe to contact Dragon again. Hayden needs to know we’re safe, but going radio silent.”
“Buying a ticket at the bus station will tell him that?”
“Yes. And, hopefully, it’ll knock whoever that was at the house off our track.”
She stared out the window a moment, processing what I’d just told her. Then she glanced at me. “Where are we going?”
“Home.”
Chapter 20
Waverly
“John,” I breathed into the phone when the other end of the line was finally picked up. “I can’t tell you what a relief it is to finally hear your voice.”
“I always knew you had a crush on me.”
I laughed. “Always.”
“What can I do for you, Waverly?”
“Do you remember the case I called you about a few days ago, the guy with connections to El Hombre?”
“Sure. Jason Winston.”
“Yes. We have reason to believe that Winston isn’t his real name.”
“Is that right?”
“He was found dead in a hotel room in Miami, but when the coroner put his dental records in the computer—”
“He proved to be someone else?”
“Exactly.”
“That’s probably because Jason Winston is currently sitting in the county jail.”
“Since when?”
“Since late Thursday night. I thought that’s why you called Friday.”
I twisted my chair around and stared at the wall, my thoughts a bit of a jumble. “You knew he was in jail that day and you didn’t feel the need to mention it?”
“Like I said, I thought that was why you called. In fact, you were like the third person to call about him that day.”
“Who else called?”
There was the sound of shuffling paper, then John said, “A detective from Chicago and another from Dallas.”
“Why so much interest in this one guy?”
“I guess he was wanted for a car theft in Dallas. Not sure why the Chicago guy called.”
“Thanks, John. I appreciate your help.”
“Any time, Waverly. Next time I’m in Houston …”
&nb
sp; “Sure. I always welcome a visit from an old friend.” I started to say goodbye, but then realized I still had one bit of information he might be able help with. “Hey, you wouldn’t happen to know anyone named Clark Marshall, would you?”
There was a long silence on the other end of the line.
“John?”
“I’m just sending you this file. If Clark Marshall is part of your case, you need to see this.”
My computer beeped a second later, indicating a new email. I pulled it up, a string of curses slipping from my lips as I read what he sent.
“I owe you big, John.”
“Like I said, next time I’m in Houston.”
“Anything you want.”
Chapter 21
Kirsten
We got off the bus at a stop not far from Rice University and began to walk. And walk. And walk. I was beginning to think we were never going to reach a destination. I thought we were just going to walk for the rest of our natural lives. But then we came to a line of condos on a residential street. Kevin leaned back against a brick wall and moved me in front of him, studying the condos as he pretended to be deep in conversation with me.
“Is this where you live?”
“Yeah.”
“Is it really a good idea to be here? Won’t they be watching it?”
“They are. The dark car across the street.”
I started to turn to look, but he jerked me back around.
“You can’t look. They’ll notice us.”
“Then what do we do? Just stand here?”
Kevin caressed the side of my face gently, leaning forward to kiss my forehead.
“There’s a service entrance at the back of the building that has access to two of the condos, mine included,” he said. “I’m going around there. You stay here and wait for me.”
“What if you don’t come back?”
“I will.” But then he slipped the gun out of his waistband and pressed it into my hands. “Stay here and wait. If I’m not back in twenty minutes—”
“You said—”
“I’ll be back. But it never hurts to be prepared.” He kissed me again. “If I’m not back in twenty minutes, walk back to that main thoroughfare and take a cab to Dragon’s headquarters. Okay?”
DRAGON SECURITY: Volume 2: The Complete 6 Books Series Page 45
