Chapter Thirteen

H e’d spent most of the day out and about and reacclimated himself to the city of Seattle after his time away, and it was enough to settle him and restore his sense of familiarity. The adjustment gave Savage the confidence that he was capable of taking on the task he was there to accomplish. Anja might as well have been a superhero based on her abilities behind a keyboard, and as long as he was able to fulfill the physical demands of the mission, he would be able to resolve the whole situation if he was called upon to do so.

A trace of hope remained alive in his mind that there was nothing to worry about. At times, he almost convinced himself Banks had accessed his file only to know what he was up against at Carlson’s behest. The hope that the ex-CEO had learned the very pointed lesson he’d been taught when they met face to face in the plane remained obstinately alive. After all, he’d left a bullet in the man’s knee to ensure he would not forget it.

On the whole, though, common sense retained supremacy and he didn’t feel overly hopeful. Carlson did seem like the kind of man who thought the rules that governed the actions of the rest of the world didn’t apply to him. He would try again and even believe he could be smart enough to get away with it too.

He hated that kind of person. In his less calm and rational moments, he wondered if he should have simply put a bullet through Carlson’s neck and another in his head, just to be sure, and left the FBI out of it. Frontier justice had a strong appeal.

But Monroe and Anderson had insisted, and Anja listened to them more than she listened to him. That had left him with only a warning shot and the cops. Now, the bastard had targeted his family too—his instincts told him he could be sure of this. He had already made up his mind that he wouldn’t let them call the shots on the field if his inner certainty proved correct.

He drove past Andy’s practice first. Andrew Devers, Esq, was the name on the plaque outside the office. The car Anja had identified as his was parked outside in one of the reserved parking spots, and after about fifteen minutes, the man appeared and talked to one of the receptionists who had stepped out with him.

His gaze focused and intent, he studied him carefully, looking for any indication of stress or nervousness. He appeared to be his usual confident self, and there was no sign of surveillance or any indication that things weren’t exactly as they should be. Satisfied, Savage drove to where Jules worked. She wasn’t in the real estate business anymore. It had merely been a job to pay for her college education.

Now that she had her business degree, she had been hired to help organize the finances of a marketing company. It was small but seemed to make significant waves in the industry by the looks of it. According to Anja, they could anticipate a very profitable year, which could result in a couple of buy-outs next year. He didn’t know much about how all that played out, but she seemed to know what she was talking about.

Things were going well for his ex-wife, and that was good enough for him. Unfortunately, her offices were on the fifth floor of a building with solid security, so he wasn’t able to manage a visual. After Anja ran a couple of checks to make sure nothing hinky was happening around the building, he headed off.

He took a long lunch at a nearby shopping mall’s food court to get himself a burger while the hacker updated him. Terry and Sam had already relocated to New York, where they had eyes on a certain Mason Banks. Anja had run facial recognition software and found cameras around Jenkins’ office that placed the lawyer there a day or so before the leak happened. So far, everything confirmed the story the congressman had sold him.

Which was a relief. Savage doubted that reaching Jenkins a second time would be as easy as the first. You couldn’t necessarily trust a man who talked with a gun to his head, so it was good to know that so far, the story he’d been given stood up under scrutiny. His teammates ran surveillance on the lawyer for the moment and Anja kept track of his online activity, which had registered the files arriving in his work email.

It seemed as though he hadn’t even anticipated that anyone would come looking for answers. There were hints that he’d passed the data on to third parties, but thus far, the Russian had a little difficulty in tracking the possible contacts.

All in all, it had been a productive day of stalking for the crew. Anderson had stayed home from work with his family to keep an eye on them with Terry and Sam away on their mission. Monroe was still out in the Zoo and appeared happy to delegate the day-to-day running of Pegasus and the challenge to whip it into shape to Anderson and Coleman.

Savage was Anderson’s delegate. He was very clear on that, and the operative saw no reason to complain.

After lunch, he had made his way to the school where Abby was supposed to have soccer practice. It was a good school—a private school, the kind a lawyer could afford these days.

“Interesting,” Anja said as he pulled up at the gated entrance. “The security is essentially as good as you can find out here without being military grade.”

“Many rich or even simply well-off people send their darling heirs here to be educated,” he pointed out and displayed a police badge to get through the security checkpoint. The guard manning the gate ran a quick check with the Seattle PD to confirm that they did, in fact, have a Detective Brian Jackson working in their department. Thanks to Anja’s intervention, the department was able to vouch for him and he was waved through quickly.

“How would they get security like this, though?” she wondered aloud as he guided his Audi to the parking lot in view of the soccer fields. He could already see a team outside, starting practice.

“Well, these parents probably don’t mind paying a little extra so the school can afford enough security that Mommy and Daddy don’t have to worry about their kids. It must be a relief to them while they’re off doing whatever it is they do to earn the money to pay for it in the first place.” His tone sounded more than a little snarky but he ignored his slight resentment, donned a pair of sunglasses, and ruffled his hair a little. He didn’t think Abby would recognize him, mostly because she wouldn’t look for her dead father at soccer practice, but there was no point in taking chances. If she saw him—even if he managed to get away before she could actually confirm it—she would probably tell Jules about it. That would open all kinds of worm cans he wanted to leave unopened.

“So, what are we looking at here?” Anja asked and drew him away from that unpleasant thought.

“Middle school league soccer.” He moved in close enough to see the activity on the field. “It’s merely the first step in athleticism where various middle schools are probably already scouting talent that can be turned over to the high schools and then college. You’ll find the school system in the US is actually something of an assembly line for all kinds of sports, from baseball, basketball, hockey, football, Olympic sports and, in more recent years, even soccer. That last one is thanks to Beckham showing up and making the sport somewhat popular in this country.”

Savage located his gum in his pocket and popped a strip into his mouth as he watched the practice with little enthusiasm. He wasn’t keen on the sport itself, but thanks to Abby’s interest, he’d acquainted himself with the rules and the more famous characters of the sport. He hadn’t managed to keep up with her for long, but the lessons seemed to stick. From what he remembered, he could deduce that the kids on the team—which was co-ed, probably due to the low interest in the sport—played what looked like a game. Half wore red vests and the other half wore blue. They all raced around with the ball, except for two who were dressed in individual uniforms with longer sleeves and gloves. The goalkeepers, if he remembered correctly.

There was no mistaking Abby, though. She wore one of the blue vests and was the only kid on the field with bright red hair. As always, it was long—the way Jules insisted on despite his protests—and held in a ponytail. Of course, he hadn’t been Jeremiah Savage in those days and had the time to complain about a little girl’s hair length.

And damned if she wasn’t good at the game too, he thought with a small smile. She streaked across the side of the field and handled the ball deftly until she reached the chalk marking of the big area in front of the goal. Still in motion, she cut one of the kids away from the ball, and as the goalkeeper rushed out to try to take it from her, she darted back and chipped it over the taller, burlier opponent’s head to nestle it in the back of the net. The other kids cheered as she celebrated what was apparently a very nice goal.

“Now there’s a part of you that I’m not used to seeing,” Anja said with a chuckle.

He looked around hastily and wondered how she could see him but also realized there was a silly grin plastered across his face that he couldn’t seem to remove.

“Like I said,” she responded and seemed amused at his effort to see how she had a visual on him, “these people are ridiculously paranoid about their security, ironically enough. Most of the school is covered by cameras.”

Savage nodded. “Do you think you can take a look around to make sure there’s nothing to indicate that someone of Carlson’s ilk is stalking the grounds?”

“Like I said, I have eyes all around the damn school, Jer,” she retorted briskly. “I already have a couple of searches running and I’ll let you know if I find anything. You know, for a place with this much digital security, you’d think that they’d want to keep it off the grid. But no, simply plug into the Wi-Fi, and voilà, I have access to all the damn security cameras. Someone needs to rethink this place.”

“After we’re gone,” he quipped and drew back a couple of steps into a small grove of trees when the soccer coach blew a whistle, which brought both teams to a halt. They didn’t look like they were finished with the game, so maybe it was halftime. He didn’t know and couldn’t tell, at this point.

He kept his eye on Abby as she rushed over to the water fountain, shouldered and elbowed her way past some of the other kids to get there first, and gulped the icy water like it owed her money. She walked away and wiped her mouth with the back of her arm.

Savage narrowed his eyes as the goalie she had scored against marched over to her. The kid had about ten pounds and a few inches on her, although Savage couldn’t tell if it was a boy or a girl. They were all kids, none of them older than ten, and this one had long, wavy hair.

“It’s nice that you can play like that with your feet, Devers,” the kid said and sounded distinctly masculine despite the distance of about thirty yards the operative maintained between them. “I guess you have something to rely on since your brains and hands don’t work right.”

Savage narrowed his eyes. Devers? Since when did fiancés get to add their name to the kids of their spouses?

“Shove off, Walo,” Abby retorted and attempted to circle him, but he moved faster, grabbed her by the shoulders, and shoved her hard onto the ground.

Something clicked in Savage and he started to take a step forward, spurred on by the sudden need to feed the boy a few of his own teeth. He stepped out from under the trees and started to make his way over to where some of the kids began to gather to watch the show.

Abby pushed herself up, her face red.

“What’s the matter, Devers?” Her tormentor laughed. “Are you going to cry? Do you need Coach to get your daddy for you again?”

Abby wiped her forearm across her cheek again and brushed the dirt off her freckled cheeks. “No, Walo. My dad—my real dad—always told me I should never start a fight, but I should make sure I end one.”

Walo looked a little confused for a second as she advanced on him, her clenched fists at her sides. Her father had been in enough fights to know what was coming, even when it was little kids who did it.

She ducked under a heavy haymaker from her adversary and pounded her fist into his gut. When he doubled over, she took a step back and stamped her cleated foot on his instep. He gasped and tried to back away but doubled over as he was, she had time to step in and punch him firmly in the jaw, which tumbled him effectively into an awkward heap. The kids around them cheered and jeered as she stepped closer. Savage began to wonder if he would have to keep her from killing the kid.

“Savage, remember what you said?” Anja reminded him. “You know, about not letting your kid see you?”

In that moment, he simply didn’t care. He couldn’t stand around while his baby was involved in a fight.

But Abby didn’t continue her attack. She looked at Walo, who still struggled to regain his breath as he rolled and groaned dramatically.

“You shouldn’t have said anything about my father, Walo,” she said, closer now because he had moved from his previous position. “You should be glad he wasn’t here to hear you. He’d make sure you didn’t talk for a month.”

Well, maybe not a month, Savage thought and backed slowly toward the trees again. He hadn’t thought clearly at all. Hell, he’d been about to charge in there and drag her away from a bully she apparently had dealt with for a while. Understandably, his first instinct was to be there with her and for her, but there were serious implications to his precipitous response. It wasn’t the wisest move to reveal to a ten-year-old kid that her assumedly dead father was alive and well and had appeared from nowhere to rescue her from a fight. That would take more time and therapy to heal than the altercation would.

He couldn’t help a smirk, though, as he watched the teams run onto the field. They looked like they were having fun. All except Walo, of course, who still hadn’t found his feet. He wiped dirt from his knees and scowled when Abby seemed to forget all about him and rushed away to start the game again. The players switched sides and formed up. Everyone seemed to have forgotten about the boy until the coach noticed he had a goalie missing as the game started again. He turned to see the kid still on the ground outside the chalk lines of the field and jogged over to see what had happened.

Walo shook his head. For whatever reason, he refused to snitch on Abby, but the coach appeared to know they had some kind of feud as he turned to look where she waited for the ball to be passed to her.

Savage jogged over to him as he put the whistle to his lips. He dragged him around to face him and conveniently pulled the taller, more corpulent man between him and where Abby stood.

“Hey,” he said with a grin.

“What the f…fudge do you think you’re doing here, pal?” the coach snapped and took a step forward. He didn’t bother to give the man the satisfaction of taking a step back like he was intimidated.

“I know what you’re about to do, but I think you should give the kid a break, don’t you?” he said with his most charming smile.

“You know…what…who the f— Who are you?” he demanded and looked and sounded flustered as Walo rushed past them and jogged to where his goal stood open. The players continued with the game.

“Oh, did I forget to say?” Savage asked and chuckled. “That’s my bad.” He pulled his fake badge from inside his coat pocket and flipped it open for the coach to see the bronze shield as well as the nametag that showed him to be a member of the local police force. “Detective Jackson. I’m actually here to see Abigail Devers’ father. I don’t suppose you’d know when he’s coming to pick her up, would you?”

The sight of the badge apparently calmed the coach down a little, although he took it to inspect it more closely. It was all for show, of course, as he doubted the man knew what to look for to identify a fake badge. It was an excellent fake anyway, so would have passed more stringent scrutiny. After a moment, he handed the badge back.

“Oh… Right. The practice goes on for another half hour,” he said with a firm nod and looked around instinctively for a higher authority. “If you like, you can wait inside the school building until he comes. I can tell him you’re looking for him, Detective…”

“Jackson,” Savage said with a smile and patted the larger man on the shoulder. “Brian Jackson. You do that. I’ll be waiting inside…where, exactly?”

“There’s a visitor’s room,” the coach said. “Ask the people at reception and they’ll show you where.”

“I appreciate it, Coach,” he said, patted the man’s shoulder once more for good measure, and turned to head quickly to the building before any of the players noticed his presence.