Chapter Four --

 

A second head appeared in the doorway.

“Put your hands on top of your head and slowly come out here,” said a female voice. I felt hands steer me. “I’m going to pat you down, so just relax. Okay?”

I nodded. My knees were cramped from my effort to camouflage myself in the restroom and I was afraid I wouldn’t be able to remain upright much longer. I could feel my heart pound inside my chest as I stood with my fingers locked together on top of my head. Hands moved over every inch of my body. It felt like I had little mice crawling on me, and when those hands reached my crotch, I involuntarily twitched.

“Relax,” a deep voice demanded. Easier said than done. I looked up and realized I was surrounded by what appeared to be an army of Ninjas, and they were all carrying very large weapons. “Kelsey Dunham?”

I tried to say something, but my voice wasn’t working.

“Are you Kelsey Dunham?” the figure in black asked me again. This time I nodded. “Come with me.”

I was led down the corridor and through the next three passenger trains. Some people were chattering loudly, excitedly. A few were quietly sobbing. A handful of children were standing on their seats to catch a glimpse of the uniformed force. I felt myself propelled along by a fist in my back.

“Just keep moving!” I had little choice but to obey. There were lots of people standing around the train. Some had vests that said “Homeland Security.” There were also uniformed Virginia state troopers and a couple of representatives from local police forces.

“We’re exiting the train,” said another voice. “Be careful when you step down, okay?”

A couple more ninjas stood on the ground and reached up for me. I found myself standing beside the tracks in the middle of nowhere, with a group of people dressed in black. All I could think of was that I was about to be carted off, never to be seen again. And this idea seemed to bear fruit when an all-terrain vehicle scooted through the brush and arrived in rush.

“This her?” said the driver to one of his colleagues.

“Yes,” said the female.

“Hop on,” the driver demanded. I froze in my tracks. There was no way I was going to voluntarily get on the back of that thing. “Hurry up!”

Hands shoved me, pulled me, pushed me into place as I struggled.

“Hold on,” the driver told me as he took off in a spray of gravel. “Cover your face!”

The next thing I knew, we were flying through the brush. I could feel the prickers slapping against my skin as we went. It was pure torture. For the next five minutes, I buried my face in a stranger’s back, my arms wrapped tightly around his firm, muscular waist. The ATV bounced all over the rough track like a gasoline-powered bronco driven by a modern-day cowboy. At last we came to a clearing, and there stood a caravan of military-looking vehicles. A group of people in street clothes were waiting for us. As the ATV rolled to a stop, an older man stepped forward.

“Ms. Dunham, I’m Special Agent-in-Charge Dirk Devry of the DEA. Sorry for all this subterfuge. We have a serious situation. Come with me and we’ll get you some medical attention.”

A couple of people in street clothes helped me get off the ATM. As I found my legs again and tried to remember how to walk, the driver took off his mask and ran a hand through his brown, shaggy hair. I looked up to see the palest pair of blue eyes I had ever seen. They were almost the color of frost on a window and they were staring at me. I was mesmerized as I stood there.

“You two want to get a room or can we get on with this?” a voice behind me asked. A scowl came over the face of the ATV driver and those eyes disappeared from view as he turned his attention to his machine.

“Shut up, Chen,” he growled. “The lady’s just been through hell.”

“Sir Lancelot to the rescue,” laughed a good-looking Asian man. He seemed to be enjoying the opportunity to rile up his colleague.

“Knock it off, you animals,” said their leader. “You’ll have to excuse those two, Ms. Dunham. They were separated at birth. Their mother was a wolverine. God only knows who the father was.”

There was an ambulance waiting nearby. Chen led me over and introduced me as the victim of the attack on the train last night. The attendants sat me down on a bench in the back of the emergency vehicle to examine my injuries. Careful fingers probed. I winced as they located a tiny shard of glass stuck in my knee and then another.

“We’ve got embedded glass, but it looks superficial. Slight concussion, probably from last night. Lots of scratches. She’ll live.”

“Why do you know my name?” I asked Agent Devry. Not how, but why. I couldn’t imagine any reason for the DEA to care about me. I’m a law-abiding citizen, a real stand-up kind of girl. The fact that I was surrounded by government agents charged with fighting a war on illicit drugs made me extremely nervous and not just a little determined to know what made them so interested in me. Agent Devry’s eyes widened as he watched my reaction and then he seemed to nod his approval.

“I can see you’re quick on your feet, Ms. Dunham. You remember that gecko you bought at the art gallery.”

“Yes.” I waited, curious about what that had to do with what happened on the auto train.

“The store employee gave you the wrong package. Or rather, he gave you a package, but not the one containing your gecko.”

“I don’t understand,” I replied.

“There was another man in the gallery at the time, a Mr. Cañizo. Do you remember him?”

“Yes. Why?”

“He was in the shop to collect a package also, and the shop employee happened to be one of our undercover people. Diego put Mr. Cañizo’s heroin into your package, and your gecko into his, before he fled. It didn’t take Mr. Cañizo long to figure out what happened. He actually thinks you and Diego are working in cahoots and that your purchase of the gecko was just a ruse. He sent his men to follow you on the auto train and to get the heroin back. He also plans to kill Diego when he finds him.”

“That can’t be good.” Even as I uttered those words, I knew how dumb they sounded. But I was still in shock from the discovery that I had gotten mixed up in a drug battle.

“But why did Diego put the package containing heroin in my car?”

“He was desperate. We’ve spent the last two years trying to take down Mr. Cañizo’s organization. He needed to buy time, so he deliberately screwed up the packages. As soon as he got back to the shop, he told his boss, Raul, that he had made a mistake. But Cañizo already knew the packages had been switched, and he tried to kill Diego, who got away. We brought him in for safekeeping, but now Cañizo thinks you and Diego are looking to hook up and sell that heroin. He sent his men to the train to collect it. We stopped the train with the intention of interrupting their plan. The passengers think this was a possible terror attack and that we’re part of a response by Homeland Security, since it happened on Amtrak. We’d prefer to let them believe that’s true.”

“So, when I was attacked last night, that was all because they thought I was working with Diego?”

“I’m afraid so. This thing has started to take on a life of its own, Ms. Dunham, and if we let you go now, with the way things stand, they’ll continue to believe you’re a part of the plot to steal their heroin. Don’t forget they have your credit card information, so they can show up on your doorstep. We need to convince them that not only are you just an innocent art patron, but also that Diego was just a kid who made a mistake.”

“What does that mean?”

“We’re going to put you back on the train, but we’re going to also leave the package with the heroin in your car and let them steal it. First we have to convince them that you got the wrong package,” said Agent Devry. ‘They won’t move in if they think this is a DEA operation. If they think they triggered a terror alert, they’re much more likely to pick up the trail once you’re off the train and snatch the drugs back, only this time our people are ready. We’ll add a tracking device to your shoe, so we can follow you.”

“Wouldn’t it just be easier to arrest them?” I asked. After all, Warren was going to fire me if I wasn’t back in time. I really didn’t want to lose my job.

“We’re not ready to arrest them,” Chen announced. “We need more information on the network.”

“But I could get killed!” I pointed out, my voice rising with the level of my panic. “How many other people already got killed here today?”

“Actually?” Chen looked at me with a smirk. “None.”

“But all that shooting! And the explosions!”

“We arranged all that.”

“I don’t understand.” I was baffled by the turn of events. “You let them shoot up the train?”

“No. We drew their attention by letting them think we were Homeland Security and not some competing organization,” Agent Devry explained. “It was enough to make them back off on killing you. We bought ourselves some time, so we can control the operation once we get to Lorton.”

“This is crazy!” I decided. “It’s utter madness.”

“Hey,” said the guy with the ice blue eyes, striding up to me. “We made sure you stayed alive. If it wasn’t for us, you’d be dead now, Princess. You were transporting a quarter of a million dollars in heroin in that package.”

“Oh, lordy.” I sank back down on the seat of the ambulance. “This can’t be happening.”

“Here’s the problem, Ms. Dunham,” Agent Devry told me as he sat beside me. “This cartel has made inroads in recent months. They have a new way of bringing in their merchandise through the Florida Keys. Until we know how they do it, we can’t find a solution to block them.”

“But why can’t you do it without me?”

“Because you walked in that art gallery. Because these people are ruthless and they know who you are. We need to convince them you’re not a threat,” Agent Devry reminded me yet again. “When you were attacked last night, the conductor called Amtrak security, to let him know that something was going on. He and his fellow employees were concerned when you were attacked and your purse was taken, but then returned. When it turned out your keys were missing, folks were worried this was a little more than just a crime of opportunity, especially when they found someone deliberately shut off the electrical power on the train. That automatically kicks off a terror alert. That gave us a chance to coordinate with Homeland Security. The media has been told this was potential terror attack that was thwarted. We want those guys to believe it.”

I looked at all the faces of the government agents as they crowded around me. A big part of me wanted to get into Uncle Jack’s car, drive off the auto train and keep going to St. Michaels, without ever looking back. But another part of me realized that it wouldn’t be that hard for Raul and Mr. Cañizo to wait a week or so to come calling on me in the middle of the night. I had security at my new Arlington condo, but I was pretty sure the staff wasn’t prepared for an armed attack from determined drug traffickers. I was about to say yes when Mr. Blue Eyes went and spoiled it.

“Forget it, sir. She’s too important to help us out. I say cut her loose and throw her to the sharks.”

“What’s the matter, Jacobsen? Did she turn you down and now you want to punish her?” Chen gave his colleague a big, self-satisfied grin. “If you ask me, she’s making a good decision not to work with the likes of you!”

“Oh, let me guess. All of a sudden you want the assignment?”

“I’d do a hell of a lot better with it than you would!” Chen claimed.

“Like the Austin assignment? That was a great job you did there, buddy!” Jacobsen shook his head in disgust. It was time for me to break up this battle of the testosterone.

“Wow,” I sighed. “I was going to say I’d help, but you boys really know how to talk a girl out of that. No way am I going to trust my life to a couple of goofballs who can’t see straight.”

“What?” Mr. Blue Eyes was incensed. I could see the flaring of his nostrils as he reamed me out. “You have a hell of a nerve! I’ll have you know I’ve been a DEA agent for fourteen years, Missy!”

“Then act like it,” I snapped back. “You sound like a teenager with overactive hormones! Very unprofessional, my friend.”

“Let me guess,” he sneered. “You were a cheerleader and you spent a lot of time in the locker room with the football team!”

“How dare you!” I sputtered.

“Holy cow,” Chen groaned. “Even I’m not that much of a jerk. Scale it back, buddy!”

“Oh, shut up!” Jacobsen snarled.

“Well, this is going well,” said Agent Devry. “I can see we’re going to get along swimmingly. Now, on the count of three, I’m calling a truce, and the next person who violates it is going down the rapids without a paddle. Are we clear on that?”

“Yes, sir,” said Mr. Blue Eyes, glowering at me.

“Yes, sir,” Chen agreed, a slight smirk on his face. The group turned to me expectantly.

“What?” I snapped.

“Ms. Dunham, are you on board or not?”