Packing Heat

by Penny McCall

  “Aren’t you?”

  Nope. Cole knew exactly how the feds had found them. He’d underestimated Victor Treacher. Again. Treacher was slime, but he was slime with a brain. Treacher must’ve kept tabs on him, even in jail, which meant he knew when Cole had broken out. The two federal agents at Lewisburg must have come from Treacher as well, and not because Harmony’s paperwork had been sloppy. They’d managed to give Treacher’s goons the slip—until Cole went online last night.

  He could picture Treacher sitting in his big corner office, just waiting for Cole to open that back door he’d written into his software. And he’d walked right into the trap, eyes wide open. He’d given Treacher a starting point to narrow their location down to a neighborhood, and then he’d slept like a baby, allowing Treacher’s agents the time to set a trap. And almost catch him.

  Such a close call should leave him doubting his course of action. It only reaffirmed it. It was about revenge now. He’d be damned if he’d let Victor Treacher fuck him over twice. This time it was war. And it was his war, not Harmony’s. He probably ought to tell her the truth, but she wouldn’t take on one of the top dogs at the FBI, and he was afraid if she knew he planned to do it, she’d turn him in.

  “You were online last night,” Harmony said, reminding Cole that she might look like she had fluff for brains, but in her case looks were definitely deceiving.

  “Yeah,” he said, “I was online last night.”

  “That must be how they tracked us.”

  “I didn’t even get in. Every serious hacker in the world has tried to breach the FBI’s computer system. If they tracked down everyone who slammed up against their firewall, they’d never do anything else. Any chance they could have traced your phone yesterday?”

  “Maybe,” Harmony said, even though she didn’t believe it for a second. Officially, she was on vacation. There was no reason for the FBI to be watching her phone. She’d been tracking computer criminals for most of her time with the Bureau. She knew the feds had shown up because Cole had tried to breach the system. He knew it, too. She could see it on his face; he just wouldn’t admit it. The question was why? What was he hiding from her? And how did the FBI figure into that secret, because if she knew one thing, it was that something was going on at the Bureau, and whatever it was it involved Cole Hackett And there was only one way to find out what it was.

  She took out her second cell phone and held it up. “Yesterday I had to use my FBI phone so it would come up on caller ID. This one is prepaid. Untraceable.”

  “Calling your handler again?”

  “Got a better idea?”

  Cole heaved a sigh and went to the far end of the boat.

  Harmony punched in Mike’s number. “Remember when I told you I was on vacation?” she asked when he came on the line.

  “You’re not staying with your aunt in the Poconos.”

  “How did you know?”

  “You work for me, remember? At least you used to.”

  Harmony’s stomach rolled in sick waves. But she held her moral ground. “Somebody had to go after him, Mike.”

  “Maybe,” he grumbled sourly. “Somebody with experience.”

  “I don’t have experience because you wouldn’t put me in the field.”

  “You’re not ready. Not until you can keep your feelings out of your work.”

  “There’s nothing wrong with emotion.”

  “There is when it can get you killed.”

  “Is that why you sent agents after me?”

  Mike was silent for a beat, then he said, “Spill it.”

  Harmony told him everything. Mike couldn’t help her if he didn’t have all the facts. “Look, Mike, you have to call off the chase. I know those guys must be pretty ticked off, since I put them in a river, and a lake—”

  “Good for you,” Mike said, but absently, like his mind was working a mile a minute, which it probably was. Mike Kovaleski was one of the best handlers the FBI had, always one step ahead of his agents. This time he sounded several steps behind. “You had release papers for Hackett, right?”

  Harmony smiled a little. “You signed them.”

  “Yeah, we’ll talk about that another time. So everything looked kosher?”

  “Yes. I can’t figure out how the warden knew they were fake so fast.”

  “There’s something going on we don’t know about,” Mike said. “Someone we haven’t factored in.”

  Harmony’s eyes cut to Cole. “Definitely.”

  “It doesn’t matter. If you come in, I’ll salvage what I can of your career—and mine, since I’m in charge of you, and my ass is on the line, too. Stay out in the cold, and I can’t guarantee anything.”

  Her stomach rolled again, and her career flashed before her eyes. Along with Richard’s dead body. “You know I can’t do that, Mike.”

  “Then I guess I’ll sit here and wait for a call from some morgue.”

  “It won’t come to that,” Harmony insisted. “I have a plan—”

  “Let me guess, you’re going to have the geek hack into the frozen accounts and transfer the money, but just enough to make the kidnappers think you’re cooperating while you get a bead on where they’re holding Swendahl.”

  It wasn’t a question, it was a pretty accurate statement of her intentions, and Harmony felt no need to reply.

  Mike clearly wasn’t expecting her to. “Problem one,” he continued, “you can’t control Hackett.”

  Harmony’s eyes cut to the man in question. “I have so far. He agreed to help.”

  Mike snorted. “I looked him up. He wasn’t dangerous before he went into jail, and I’m willing to bet he’s still not or he’d have knocked you over the head and taken off by now. But he’s no dummy, either. He’s working an angle. The minute he gets whatever it is he wants, he’s gone and you’re screwed.”

  Harmony sat down hard, feeling stupid. If her plan was that transparent, would the kidnappers figure it out, too? And would she even get the chance to find out?

  “Look,” Mike said, sounding like he was at the end of his patience, “just sit tight, let me wrap my head around this, and I’ll get back to you.”

  “Don’t worry about me, Mike. I have all the training.”

  “There’s more than training to being in the field. Intuition, experience, and a little cynicism wouldn’t hurt. You can’t afford to think the best of everyone. Think the worst, and if you’re proven wrong, it’ll be a pleasant surprise.”

  “Just get those agents off our backs,” Harmony said. “Oh, and if you hear about charges against a guy named Juan Esposito in Cleveland, can you get them dropped? All he did was give us a place to crash for the night.”

  Mike sighed. “I’ll handle it. Let me talk to Hackett.”

  That surprised her. She looked at the phone, then at Cole.

  “What?” Cole said. “He wants to talk to me?”

  She shrugged and handed him the phone. Cole took it back to the other end of the boat. He and Mike had a short conversation, which consisted of nothing more than a couple of “uh-huhs” from Cole’s side of the conversation, then Cole said something Harmony couldn’t hear—but she could guess at, from the tone of his voice and the way he snapped the phone shut before he tossed it to her.

  “What did Mike want?”

  Cole didn’t answer, just walked away, gathered her duffel and laptop, and jumped over the side of the boat. He didn’t seem to care that he landed in a couple inches of water. Harmony was surprised it didn’t steam.

  She didn’t have a clue what Mike had said to Cole, but whatever it was, it had put her back to square one with him.

  chapter 11

  HARMONY HAD GROUNDED THE BOAT IN A MARSHY area, waves lapping gently at the stems of weeds and shallow-water plants growing higher than Cole was tall, anchored by two inches of muck.

  He stomped through water and mud, not caring that he looked like a three-year-old having a temper tantrum at the beach. He was entitled to sulk for a little while,
he told himself, slapping cattails aside, fuming and wondering how he kept getting the shaft. Fucking FBI, that was how.

  Last time he’d been a naïve kid who wanted to help his country and make his mark in the world of computer security. His reward had been a jail cell. He should have learned something from that, but along came a beautiful blonde with a get-out-of-jail-free card and he’d followed along like a dog on a leash. He could have lived with that, as long as furthering Harmony’s cause meant his own agenda got served. Instead, here he was with his nuts in the wringer again.

  Victor Treacher was headed for a comeuppance; Harmony he could handle. The guy on the phone just now had been scary. If anything happened to Harmony, Mike Whatsis had said, there wouldn’t be anywhere to hide. He’d make it his mission in life to hunt Cole down and toss him in the deepest, darkest hole he could find. It was a promise, not a threat, one that would be kept if things didn’t turn out well for Harmony Swift.

  Shit.

  He could already see the writing on the wall. Somehow she’d come out of this smelling like a rose, and he’d end up in an even worse place than Lewisburg. Like a grave.

  Cole sent her a sidelong glare, wading through the marsh a short distance away.

  She huffed out a breath. “All right, what did Mike say to you?”

  He hunched his shoulders, not wanting to replay it again. Of course she couldn’t let it go.

  “Let me guess, something about you watching out for me, along with a dire threat about what he’ll do if I get hurt.”

  “Dire?” he ground out with a puff of disgusted laughter. Dire didn’t even begin to cover it.

  “We made a deal,” Harmony said, “which is all that matters.”

  “And what if you’re dead?”

  She shrugged, but she looked pretty grim, staring through the weeds at the little road they’d come to. “If I’m dead, you’ll still be free, and you can get lost in the world just like you said you could.”

  Except he’d have every local, state, and federal law enforcement agency on his ass, not to mention Harmony’s personal guard dog, who had all the weight of the FBI behind him.

  “Nothing has changed,” she said. “We have a deal and I’m holding you to it.”

  And he was all in, Cole thought, Mike’s threat notwithstanding. He stood more of a chance of getting what he wanted as long as he had someone on the inside running interference.

  “So, where we going, Captain Bligh?” he said.

  “Don’t call me that,” she said, looking like a woman who carried two guns and was thinking about using one of them on him.

  “We have an agreement, remember? Shooting me wasn’t part of it.”

  She nodded, and let it go at that. “We can hole up for the night or we can find something to drive. A good-sized city works best either way. Toledo is the closest.”

  “Do you think we lost the Russians?”

  “Even if they tailed us to Juan’s, I don’t see how they could have stayed with us this morning.”

  “We won’t be that hard to track if they ask the right questions. I think we should put some more distance between us and Cleveland.”

  “Then we need transportation.”

  “How?”

  “Boats aren’t the only things I can hot-wire.”

  Cole heaved a sigh. If—when—if the feds caught up to him this time, at least they wouldn’t need a frame.

  IT HADN’T TAKEN HARMONY LONG TO FIGURE OUT they were in a state park, signs for boating, swimming, and hiking cropping up fairly regularly as they walked. The roads were narrow, trees and underbrush crowding right up to the paved edge, which kept them out of the blistering Indian summer sun but left them in biting and stinging insect territory. She didn’t appreciate the trade-off. And being out of the sun hadn’t helped her temperature a whole lot, not with Cole staring at her backside. At least it felt like he was staring at her backside. She’d glanced behind her a couple of times, and he’d been looking off into the trees, or down the road over her head, but when she faced forward again, it felt like his eyes were glued to her butt.

  She slapped at a mosquito, amazed it hadn’t burst into flame just by landing on her arm. Her clothes felt constricting, her throat was dry, and there was a constant hum running through her, like a low-grade electrical current that settled in the obvious places and left her . . .

  A car whooshed by, sporting a Honk If You’re Horny bumper sticker complete with a picture of an antlered deer. She burst out laughing.

  “What’s so funny?” Cole wanted to know, sounding as cranky as she’d been a moment ago, which set her to thinking things she shouldn’t have been thinking. Like how he’d been in jail for eight years, and he’d made it clear that sex topped his list of “making up for lost time.”

  Dangerous thought to have. She’d been simmering for two days—not that she was on the verge of ripping her clothes off and shouting, “Take me,” or anything—but the . . . awareness of Cole had been there since the moment she’d first seen him. In that little room at Lewisburg. Taking his clothes off. And remembering him stripping down wasn’t helping her predicament. Even toting up all the ramifications of getting physically involved with Cole didn’t help, especially since most of them weren’t true any more because something had changed.

  Yesterday he’d been going through the motions, on board, but poised to jump ship the minute things went south. Being in ex-con safe territory hadn’t helped. Juan would have helped Cole ditch her in a heartbeat, and no way could she have taken on half the Hispanic population of Cleveland, headed by a guy who had committed two murders, if she believed his body art.

  She’d slept like a rock after the party, exhaustion—and booze—finally catching up with her. Cole should have been gone this morning, but when she woke up there he’d been. Heck, he’d led the escape from their FBI welcome-to-Cleveland party, which didn’t mean anything on the surface since the feds would put him back in jail if they caught him. And even though he could have easily ditched her at the marina, he’d gone along with her willingly when she’d insisted on taking the big wooden boat.

  Yep, something had changed, and while her brain worked to fit it into the bigger picture, her body was taking his cooperation as a green light. Good thing they were in the middle of a forest, probably carpeted with poison ivy and inhabited with fire ants. What deterrents she’d find when they landed somewhere with a bed she didn’t know. Maybe the urge would go away by then. And maybe pigs would fly.

  Cars slowed as they passed, a couple of drivers seeming like they’d be willing to offer assistance. Harmony waved them on. Cole didn’t object. Neither of them wanted to chance a repeat of their encounter with Irene and Leo. It wasn’t a good idea to take a ride from strangers, either. Drivers passing them on the shoulder would only remember seeing a man and woman. If they spent time in the backseat of somebody’s vehicle, their identity could be confirmed. Another low probability, sure, but one she wasn’t willing to risk.

  “I thought you were going to hot-wire something,” Cole said, still irritable.

  Harmony rolled her eyes and shook her head. “And you call yourself a criminal.”

  “The FBI gave me that distinction.”

  “Didn’t you learn anything in jail?”

  “Not a lot of opportunity to steal cars in jail. My hosts preferred to limit travel opportunities.”

  And he’d been a geek before that. A law-abiding geek. For the most part. “A car gets reported stolen around here, the cops will find the boat.”

  “Doesn’t mean the feds or the Russians will find out.” Cole held up a hand. “I know, we can’t take that chance. I’m just antsy.”

  “I get it,” Harmony said. “I didn’t expect to be on the run so much, either.”

  “Lot easier to be on the run in a car.”

  “Jeez, will you give it up about the car already?”

  “You could always threaten to shoot me if I don’t shut up.”

  Harmony kept covering
ground, one foot in front of the other, not thinking about Cole’s eyes and where they might be looking. “Shooting you would definitely solve some problems.”

  “For both of us,” Cole retorted, “but you’d also sign your friend’s death warrant.”

  “I could get the money without you,” Harmony said.

  “Then why did you break me out of jail?”

  Harmony whipped around, went toe-to-toe with him. “I’m wondering that myself,” she said, drilling a finger into his chest. “I’m trying to remember why I went to all this trouble, just so I could be saddled with a whiny,” poke, “obnoxious,” poke, “cranky ex-con hacker who hasn’t got the sense not to mess with the f—”

  Before she could finish the acronym, or poke him in the chest again, Cole caught her by the wrist, gave her a quick, hard tug, and jerked her against him.

  “The FBI asked me to mess with them,” he ground out, “and you broke me out of jail.”

  And he kissed her, a rough kiss at first, angry and full of frustration. Then his mouth gentled on hers, his tongue swept inside, and Harmony lost herself to the heat and taste and scent of him, to all that rock-hard muscle pressed against all the places her body ached to feel him. Okay, not all the places. She moved into him, sank into the kiss, let the simmer turn into a full-out boil—

  Brakes screech, they jumped apart, Cole trying to sweep her behind him.

  “I’m the one with the gun,” Harmony said, refusing to be swept.

  Besides which it was just an old RV, eighties’ brown-and-tan paint job, rusted around the wheel wells, piloted by retirees if the white-haired guy behind the wheel was any indication. He slid the driver’s window open, trying to get a better look, judging by the sparkle in his eye and the “Carry on” he tossed out the window.

  “Ron!” a voice shouted from the depths of the RV. “What are we stopping for this time? Oh.” A woman with short salt-and-pepper curls came up beside Ron, leaning over to peer out the window at them. “You youngsters need a ride?”