| |
––––––––
Alina was crossing the back yard when the sound of tires on gravel made her reach behind her for her gun. She pulled it out of the holster and moved into the shadows at the side of the deck, waiting. When a black F150 pulled around the house, she exhaled softly and slid the .45 back into the holster. She watched as the truck passed her and rolled to a stop outside the detached garage. The driver's door opened and a tall man climbed out.
“Just in the neighborhood and decided to drop by?” Alina called, moving out of the shadows.
Michael O'Reilly looked across the drive as he pulled an overnight bag out from behind his seat. The Secret Service agent lived three hours south, in the nation's capital. While he had been known to make the drive for the sole purpose of checking in on her, Alina was skeptical that that was his intention now. He'd just been here last week.
“Hardly. Is it ok if I stay here tonight? I'm heading to my folks in the morning.”
Alina nodded.
“Of course. You know you're always welcome.” She turned to go onto the deck, glancing back at him. “Everything alright?”
Michael nodded, striding across the lawn and following her up the steps.
“My dad needs help with some work around the house. He's still recovering from the hip surgery,” he told her. “I'm going up for the day, and I figured I'd stop here and check in with you on the way.”
Alina opened the sliding door to the house and stepped aside, motioning him in.
“Making sure I'm still alive?” she asked, a touch of humor threaded through her voice. “Or did Damon put you up to this again?”
“Not guilty this time,” he said, crossing the threshold into the house. “I haven't heard from him since last week. I take it he's not here this time?”
She followed him and slid the door closed, casting a quick, sharp glance around the back yard before she did so.
“No.”
Alina turned and went into the kitchen, switching on the light. Michael raised an eyebrow at her short answer and dropped his bag onto the floor next to the granite-topped bar.
“Have you eaten?” she asked over her shoulder.
“I grabbed something on the way up, but I'll take a beer if you have any.”
She nodded and went over to the stainless steel refrigerator.
“How's work?” she asked, pulling out a bottle of Yuengling. “Any progress on Mr. X?”
Michael made a face and came around the bar to take the beer from her. A couple of weeks ago, she had asked him to run a discreet background investigation. She'd been very blunt when she told him that doing so could get him killed. Being the Marine that he was, he had agreed.
“So far, the man is as clean as they come,” he told her, twisting off the cap. “Are you sure there's something there?”
He encountered an expressionless look from dark, unreadable eyes.
“I'm becoming more and more sure of it every day,” she said, surprising him.
He took a long drink, his eyes never leaving her face.
“Are you going to tell me what's going on?” he finally asked.
Alina's lips curved humorously.
“No.”
“I didn't think so.” Michael turned to leave the kitchen, heading for the comfort of the living room. “Senator Carmichael is dead,” he said over his shoulder.
“I know. I saw it in the news earlier this week.” She followed him and settled herself in the recliner as he sank onto the couch. “Did you get a chance to talk to him before he was killed?”
Michael shook his head and leaned his head back on the couch tiredly.
“No. He was stabbed the night before I was supposed to meet him.” He sipped his beer and lifted his head to look at her. “One of my poker buddies is in Metro PD and he’s working the case. Joe Landeki. He's going to keep me posted on the investigation.”
Alina raised her eyebrow inquiringly.
“What does he know so far?”
Michael shrugged.
“Not much. Carmichael was stabbed at his house while he was taking out the trash. His family didn't hear a thing. Watch and wallet were still there, so it wasn't a robbery, not that I ever thought it was.”
“No.” Alina was quiet for a moment. “You said before you left last week that he’d called and wanted to turn state's evidence. Any idea why?”
“What other choice did he have? He was between a rock and a hard place. All his plans to discredit Blake had failed, and we knew he was behind it all. I'd found a direct link between him and Dominic DiBarcoli, proving he was involved with the attempted terrorist attack on Palm Sunday. It was only a matter of time before his career was destroyed.”
“How is Blake?” Alina asked suddenly, looking up.
Blake Hanover was an FBI agent in DC, and a close friend of Michael's from their days in the Marines. Alina had become acquainted with him last year when their paths crossed in Washington. Since then, Blake had become something of a fixture in Stephanie's life, drawing Alina's attention even more.
“He's fine. He and Stephanie are working together right now. She's helping him with the Casa Reinos Cartel.”
“Really?”
“She didn't mention it?”
“I haven't seen her,” Alina murmured, her voice deceptively calm. “I've been...busy.”
Michael looked at her sharply.
“Anything I need to be worried about?”
She laughed dryly. “You should always be worried.”
He watched her for a moment.
“How's Damon? When I left he was barely recovered from that gut shot, and he was nursing a cracked rib.”
“He's about the same.” Alina sat back in the recliner and rested her head on the back. “He's not letting it stop him.”
“And you?”
“I'm fine. Why?”
“Oh, I don't know. Maybe because last week someone shot up a church trying to kill you.”
Alina waved a hand impatiently.
“Oh, he's been taken care of,” she said matter-of-factly. “He's not a threat anymore.”
Michael stared at her.
“He's been...you mean, you know who it was?” he demanded. “And what do you mean, 'he's been taken care of?'”
Alina stared back at him, a patently amused look in her eyes.
“What do you think I mean?”
“For the love of— you can't just go around killing people!” Michael exploded.
“Sure I can. It's what I get paid to do.”
Alina grinned at the look on his face. She supposed she shouldn't be baiting him, but the man really did make it too easy.
“Don't remind me,” he muttered, finishing his beer. “Who was he?”
“A mercenary out of Singapore.”
Michael ran a hand over his short hair.
“And he was the same assassin who killed John?”
“Yes.”
“Who paid him?”
“He didn't know.” Alina sighed and got up, taking the empty beer bottle from him and heading into the kitchen. “I shouldn't be telling you any of this,” she said over her shoulder. “The more you know...”
“The more dangerous it is for me,” Michael finished. “Yeah, you've said that before. My answer remains the same.”
She chuckled and set the empty bottle in the sink before turning to the fridge to get him another. Alina pulled out two this time and went back into the living room, handing one to him and carrying the other to her chair.
“When John’s apartment was torched, I had already taken his laptop. I thought that was all that was left.”
Michael opened his beer and took a sip.
“It wasn't?”
“No. He had a safe deposit box.”
“Wait, Blake mentioned something about that,” Michael said, his forehead wrinkling in a frown. “He said Stephanie left everything in her car, and it was broken into. Something was stolen.”
Alina was silent, a fresh wave of anger rolling through her. It seemed like everyone had known about the safe deposit box, except her. She opened her beer and took a long drink, forcing the emotion down.
“An external hard drive,” she said after a moment, her voice even. “Kyle, the assassin who shot up the church, was the one who stole it.”
He whistled. “Do you know where it is?”
“I'm working on it. He didn't exactly tell me where it was.”
“You didn't ask?”
“It wouldn't have done much good. By the time I found out about it, he was already dead,” she said dryly. “It seems like I was the last one to know about it.”
“What do you mean? Stephanie didn't tell you?”
“No.”
Michael blinked.
“What? Why not?”
Alina shrugged. “You'll have to ask her that.”
“Lina, what the hell is going on?” Michael asked, sitting forward and pinning her with a searching look from his hazel eyes. “Why did John have an external hard drive in a safe deposit box? Why did someone send an assassin to kill him? Why do you have me investigating a war hero entrenched in Washington?”
She studied him for a moment.
“You need to understand what you're asking,” she said softly. “If I tell you, you'll be in the same boat I'm in, and that boat is taking on water and sinking fast. This is your last chance to avoid going down the rabbit hole.”
“Does Damon know?”
“Yes.”
“Anyone else?”
“No.”
Michael sat back with a sigh.
“Tell me.”
“When I took John's laptop, I was expecting to find his notes on Tito's street racers, and possibly some connection to the Cartel,” she said slowly. “Instead, I found a hidden partition with letters from Dave.”
Michael's jaw dropped open.
“What?”
“They were emails, sent to John twelve years ago from Iraq.”
“Twelve years...” Michael's voice trailed off and she nodded.
“Just before he died.” Alina sipped her beer. “Dave stumbled across something and began sending John emails with attachments. He instructed him not to open them, but to keep them safe until Dave knew what to do. There were six letters in all, but none of the attachments were on the laptop. John kept them separate.”
“On the hard drive?”
“That's my guess.”
“What did the letters say?”
“In a nutshell, some insurgents ended up with a couple of crates that were supposedly destroyed when one of our convoys was attacked. Dave thought someone was double dealing and aiding the enemy. He was in the process of gathering information when he was killed.”
Michael ran a hand over his face and got up, clearly shaken.
“He never breathed a word to me,” he said, moving around the coffee table restlessly. “Why didn't he tell me?”
“He was afraid you'd do something stupid and get yourself killed,” said Alina. “He also wanted to be sure he was right.”
“I'd say a bullet in his head was compelling proof that he was right,” he muttered. “I always wondered how an insurgent could have made that shot.”
“So did I,” she admitted. “When I was in the Navy, I pulled his file and read the report. That was no ordinary insurgent.”
Michael looked at her in surprise.
“You pulled his file?” he repeated. “What made you do that?”
“I wanted to know what happened. It's one thing to be told that he died, but I wanted to know exactly what happened.”
“I guess I can understand that,” he said after a moment of thought. “Damn. So Dave thought he’d found a traitor smuggling supplies to the enemy? And it got him killed?”
“I told you it was a rabbit hole.”
They were silent for a long moment while Michael tried to absorb what he'd just been told. Alina sipped her beer, watching his jaw clench and his lips tighten as he pieced everything together in his head. She knew he probably had most of it worked out already, and when he finished, he would be furious.
Just as she had been.
He broke the silence a few minutes later. “How did Kyle know John had all the information?”
“He didn't. He found it later, when he came after me.”
Michael shot her a look.
“This all happened twelve years ago. Why go after John now?”
“Because he was digging into the past. I don't think he did anything over the years except sit on all the information. Last year, for whatever reason, he began investigating everything. One thing about John was that he’d turned into a damn good investigator. He was asking all the right questions, unfortunately.”
“And someone realized he knew more than he should,” Michael finished. “Son of a bitch. So they sent someone to kill him.”
“I don't think he was supposed to survive the accident. When he did, they went to plan B, which included torching his apartment to make sure everything he had was destroyed.”
“Except it wasn't.” Michael leaned against the mantel and sipped his beer. “We need that hard drive.”
“I'm working on it. As I said, I've narrowed it down.”
“That's why you asked me about Jordan Murphy!” Michael suddenly exclaimed, lifting his head, his eyes widening in comprehension. “He was our interpreter. Dave started spending a lot of time with him before he...was killed.”
Alina nodded.
“He mentioned Jordan in the letters. There's more, though. Kyle used Jordan's name as an alias when he had reconstructive surgery in Madrid. It rang all kinds of bells because Jordan died a year after discharging from the Marines.”
“How?”
“Drunk driving.”
Michael stared at her.
“No way,” he said, adamantly shaking his head. “He didn't drink. Never touched the stuff.”
“That's what his sister said. His blood alcohol was way over the limit when he died in a car accident, though. She claimed he'd been murdered.”
“Why would someone murder...” he stopped short, his eyes widening. “Of course! How could I have forgotten? He was taken prisoner by the insurgents.”
She nodded. “Exactly.”
Michael paced impatiently around the coffee table again before dropping back down onto the couch.
“This is unreal. Everyone who knew anything about what happened twelve years ago is dead!”
“There's more.”
He looked at her warily.
“Of course there is. What?”
“Jordan's sister died in the hospital after a routine surgery. She’d just spoken to John a few days earlier.”
Michael shook his head.
“Well, that's fantastic,” he said sarcastically. “Everyone who even looks at this ends up dead.”
“Pretty much. Are you regretting jumping down that hole yet?”
Michael raised his eyes to hers. Oh yes. He was just as furious as she was.
“No. What I'll regret is if this bastard gets away with it.”
Viper smiled and Michael visibly shivered.
“He won't.”