Kellen’s phone rang. She unbuttoned her pants pocket and pulled it out, hoping it was Max and Rae, calling to say the goodbye she had forgotten.
But no, it was a Washington, DC, number, and that meant only one person—Nils Brooks, head of the MFAA, dedicated to halting the flow of purloined artifacts into the US and always willing to put her life on the line to do it. She answered, “Adams here.”
Nils didn’t take the hint. “Kellen, it’s Nils. I have a text that you’ve been picked up and are on your way to the airport.”
“That’s right.”
“Did Max tell you anything about the job?”
“That me and Horst from Richart Movers are picking up a mummy’s head at the airport and transporting it to some guy who’s going to restore it, he’s somewhere in the Olympics, and there’s going to be a hike.”
Horst shot her an inquiring look.
She smiled at Horst and shrugged.
Nils said, “Sort of. This piece is rare, one of those artifacts that’s going settle fights among the experts and start fights among thieves.”
“Valuable.”
“Priceless.”
Priceless. She never liked to hear that word.
Nils continued, “My courier was supposed to take it on the plane with him, never let it out of his sight.”
She could almost hear the drumbeat of doom. “And?”
“He died. In the airport. The official report said he was knocked down as he was checking in at the machine. He hit his head. Current medical diagnosis is that it was a brain hemorrhage.”
Kellen closed her eyes and rubbed her forehead. “Probably not, huh?”
“Probably not, since he went against orders and checked the bag through to Portland, knowing full well it couldn’t easily be retrieved from the hold of the plane.” Nils waited for a response.
She thought through all the possible scenarios. “So Horst and I could face some...challenges?”
“Possible challenges. Yes.”
“Nils.”
“Probable. I don’t believe in coincidence.”
“No kidding.” She ladled on the sarcasm. “What does this restorer guy have to say?”
“Not much. He’s only got a wireless up there—”
“What? Is he living in World War II?”
“And he didn’t respond when I called.”
She took a moment to let that soak in. She and Horst were taking a priceless antique head into the Olympic Mountains and hiking it up to a weird recluse expert...and the guy didn’t know they were coming? “Nils...”
“How well do you trust Horst?” Nils asked.
“Good question.”
“You don’t want to say too much.”
“Not now!” Not with Horst sitting next to her.
“I told the boss at Richart Movers we needed someone trustworthy, and he said he’d do the best he could on such short notice.”
“Oh, dear.” The short notice thing was not promising.
Horst glanced at her as if trying to follow the conversation, but he seemed uncertain.
That worked for her. “Why the late update?”
“If I’d told Max all this, he wouldn’t have passed the message on.”
“So you men fixed things up between the two of you, and this is the result?” She hadn’t packed everything she would need, like her body armor and her extra weapons. She rode in a van with firearms that looked good but which she had not tested, with some guy she hoped had had proper security training. She was acquiring a head that Nils Brooks called priceless. Great. Just great.
And...her adrenaline kicked up to enjoyable levels.
Yes, she had missed this.
“It’s not that bad,” Nils said. “I’ve dealt with Richart Movers before. They’re a young company, but the owner is reputable and—”
Kellen hung up on the pompous self-satisfied chauvinist asshole, smiled tightly at Horst and said, “Just getting the details of the operation.”
“Anything I should know?”
“Men are jerks.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
Smart guy, this Horst. He didn’t argue with her. He might be okay; just because Max and Nils were jerks, that was no use thinking Horst was going to grab the mummy’s head and run with it.
“What challenges are we going to face?” he asked.
“Hmm?”
“You said, ‘So Horst and I could face some...challenges?’”
“How much do you know about this operation?” Kellen asked.
He shrugged. “We have to retrieve the head from the airport because it’s an important artifact that needs to be studied. Somebody dropped it off at the airport back east. We pick it up from baggage claim and head toward the mountains to deliver this thing to, um, this guy.”
“The Restorer? Is that his name? His title?”
“I dunno. I think he’s this eccentric guy who lives in the boonies and is the go-to for figuring out if an artifact is real. No one told me he had a name.”
“So he’s...the Restorer.”
“Whatever.”
“That’s all?”
“Pretty much. I’ve worked for Richart Movers for almost a year, and we’ve moved some pretty important expensive stuff for some pretty important expensive people. When I signed on, I was hoping for a little action, but so far, nothing’s happened. It’s been all driving and carrying and thanking people for the tips. Don’t worry.” He patted her knee.
She didn’t knock his block off, but only because he was driving and she was thinking. Apparently, he didn’t know about the courier’s death, or even that there had been a courier charged with bringing the head to the Restorer. Why hadn’t Horst been told? It seemed that kind of information should have been passed on to heighten preparedness. Unless Nils had kept the information to himself and only passed it on to her. Nils was paranoid and suspicious, and she was the one person on this assignment he knew without a doubt he could trust.
She asked Horst, “When did this call come in?”
“A couple of hours ago. I happened to come in after a few days off, so the boss grabbed me and told me we had an emergency job. He sent me to pick you up and go to the airport.” The van reached the freeway entrance; Horst put his foot on the accelerator and they merged to the honking of furious drivers. “Lucky for me. Mostly I work with guys, and they aren’t pretty like you.”
Yeah, he was full of bullshit and ill-deserved confidence.
He pegged the van at ninety miles per hour and wove in and out of traffic, inciting honks and well-deserved hand gestures. In a way, that was good—while she was terrified for her life, she had no time to worry about her lousy parenting skills or the future of their mission.
Horst chatted as he drove, about the military, his parents’ home in Florida, speculation about the mummy’s head and gossip about the Restorer who he said was some weird whacked-out hermit.
So he did know some things about this mission.
Luckily for her, she didn’t have to lie any more about her military and security experience. He never, not once, indicated by query or comment, that he was interested in anything she had to say. Instead, she made engrossed noises, agreement noises. Or possibly they were exclamations of muffled terror as he changed lanes with inches to spare.
Her sounds encouraged him to tell her that he’d joined the military when he was nineteen because he had been caught picking pockets at Disney World. His father had blown a gasket and threatened to cut off his funds unless he joined up.
That captured her interest, and she looked Horst over again. Nothing about him shouted urban pickpocket. Mostly he seemed like a well-built guy who liked to impress women one way or another, and maybe since she’d been in the Army he was playing the bad-boy card to impress her.
When they pulled into a parking place at Portland Airport, she sagged in the seat and hoped her high blood pressure hadn’t ripped opened the still red scar on her hip.
Horst unsnapped his seat belt and checked his phone. “Let’s go. Luggage is arriving now.” He hoofed it for baggage claim so fast, Kellen ran to keep up with him, and she rejoiced as he kept up a monologue about how this head was an antiquity of great importance and if he didn’t manage to grab it on its first swing around the carousel, someone would confiscate it and it would disappear into some rich guy’s collection of illegal goods, and the archeological world would never have the time to study its origins and legends.
Kellen admired the sentiments and wondered if she should put Horst back on the good-guy list. In her mind, he was changing from bad to good to bad pretty quickly.
“Also, my boss would kill me.”
That sounded more like it. “What kind of bag is it in?”
“Small black rolling bag.”
She moaned.
He laughed. “Yeah. But it has a lime-green yarn puffball attached to the handle.”
“I guess...that’s a good idea. Who would think a mummy’s head would be marked like that?”
“The bad guys,” he said. “If there really are any, and if they’re on this end of the continent. Personally, I’ll bet this is all a lot of hooey about nothing. I’m telling you, these jobs are never exciting.”
“Hope you’re right.”
They arrived at baggage carousel eight as the first bags were tumbling down the chute. Kellen was pleased to note that Horst was out of breath, and she was not. A few weeks off for injury and she was still in good shape.
They both watched, poised to leap at the first black bag with an attached lime-green yarn fuzz ball. As time wore on, the waiting grew tense and worried, and Kellen scanned the crowd, looking for someone who fit the physical profile of a thief and killer. Foolish, that; last winter she had learned the hard way that killers hid in plain sight. Still, she watched for suspicious behavior.
She saw a large family having a rambunctious reunion...how easy to steal a bag and pass it from one person to another.
She saw a businessman standing right in front of the chute and staring hard, intent on grabbing his bag even before it slammed against the carousel’s bumper.
She saw a woman watching her and smiling, as if they were acquaintances. With a shock, Kellen realized they were; last December, that woman had vacationed at Yearning Sands Resort with her girlfriend and their children. That was the trouble with having worked for a well-known Washington resort—a lot of people knew Kellen Adams.
Kellen waved, and Horst elbowed her. “She your special friend?” He had that smarmy tone people get when asking personal questions that are none of their business.
“No.”
“You have a special friend?”
Kellen didn’t want him to develop any ideas, so she said, “Yes. Max Di Luca. He found me this job.”
“Sounds like your special friend wants you to scram.”
Kellen smiled with chilling precision. “Maybe. But mostly, he knows I can take care of myself.”
“There it is!” Horst dived for the small black bag with the fluorescent green yarn fuzzy.
Kellen stood back and observed, ready to spring after him if he ran with the bag.
He didn’t. He pulled the handle out full-length, walked it over to her and handed it over. “You take it. That yarn poof makes me feel like an idiot.”
Leaning down, she unwound the yarn ball and tossed it in the garbage. “Let’s go.” She headed for the exit.
“Wait a minute.” He started toward the men’s room. “I need to take a leak.”
She kept walking. “You should have thought of that before.”
“I wasn’t allowed to leave you alone to pick up the bag by yourself!”
“You’re not supposed to leave me alone with the bag at all.”
“I’m going to pee.” He took more steps toward the men’s room, as if that would make her halt.
“Meet you at the van,” she said.
He stopped and said, “I’ve got the keys!”
She stopped and viewed the spoiled, frustrated man. “Do you really imagine I can’t break into that van and start it?” She turned and headed out of the terminal.
He joined her on the sidewalk, puffing like a steam engine. “What am I supposed to do? Hold it all the way into the mountains?”
“When we get to a rest stop, you can visit the little boys’ room. In the meantime, we’re a sitting target at the airport.” The parking garage was dark and cool, and she observed every person who passed, listened to every footstep behind them.
“Let’s go back to the airport so I can pee. Who’s going to grab the bag with all these people around?”
“Someone who has the proper ID to match the bag. Which we don’t.” She reached the back of the van.
He unlocked the doors.
She flung the bag into the back. It was heavy, forty or fifty pounds.
Mummy’s head, indeed. No mummy’s head would weigh so much.
“Here!” Horst tossed something at her.
She snapped to attention and caught it. The keys.
“You drive,” he said.
Hmm. Unusual behavior for a macho man, allowing the female to control speed, route, stops. Really unusual behavior for a man who claimed he had a pressing bladder situation. That, combined with his determination to stop in the airport and leave her alone with the bag, gave her reasonable grounds for doubt. Horst Teagarten was now officially on her List of Suspicious Characters.
“Sure.” She stuck the keys in her pocket and pulled off her jacket. Her T-shirt fit snugly, showing off her toned arms and clearly proving she had no pistol or holster hidden around her narrow waist.
His eyes widened and she would swear she saw his brain empty.
Yep. Distraction of the female form plus reaffirmation of her vulnerability. Maybe he was going to try to steal the mummy’s head, maybe he wasn’t, but she had nailed him right in the stupidity.
She slammed the back doors closed. “Where am I driving?”
“The map’s inside.”
She walked around to the driver’s side, and as she slid into the seat, she smoothly pulled the loop at her waistband, bringing the nylon holster up and putting the pistol grip high on her left hip, where she could reach it...just in case. “Let’s see the map,” she said.