“So maybe the kid radicalized after his father’s death.”
“Or before,” Heller said bleakly.
“So, is it just me, or does it still seem pretty unlikely that Khalid Mazir would bother putting out a hit on a woman he tortured three years ago?”
“Actually,” Heller said, “I’d say it’s pretty damn likely, when you consider what the man is doing these days.”
“Which is what?”
Heller met Rick’s gaze, his slate-blue eyes dark with concern. “Running for president of Kaziristan.”
“I CONTACTED SALVATORE BECKETT and told him I knew where to find you.” Damon North drove up the winding mountain road, taking the turns at scary speeds.
Amanda clutched the dashboard and held on, her heart thudding wildly in her chest. “How’s this going to work? Is Quinn sending backup for us?”
Damon darted a glance her way but didn’t answer.
Her stomach dipped. “Tell me we’re not up against an army of mercs alone.”
“We can’t drag an army of our own into the woods. They’ll see us coming and all hell will break loose.”
“We’re supposed to take on the whole crew ourselves?”
“Sort of.”
“Stop the car.”
He looked over at her. “Don’t be stupid.”
“You’re talking about a suicide mission—but I’m guessing you’re not the one who’ll be in the crosshairs, am I right?”
“I’m not going to put you anywhere near the crosshairs.” Damon sounded sincere, but Amanda’s trust was stretched past the breaking point.
“Just tell me what you’re planning.”
“I need you to back me up.”
She frowned. “I don’t understand.”
“I’m going to meet them. I’m going to tell them that the Coopers double-crossed me and that they’ve hidden you away somewhere. I’m going to convince them that I’m the only chance they have of finding you.”
“This isn’t about getting them off my back at all, is it?” She stared at him in disbelief. “This is about getting you back in with MacLear.”
“Not for real. This is about finishing the job Quinn and I started a few years ago.”
“How the hell am I supposed to know what’s real or not?” She shook her head, furious at herself for putting herself in such a dangerous position.
“Didn’t Quinn tell you to go with me?”
“Yes, but I don’t know what his agenda is. He’s a professional liar, and he’s put agents in the line of fire before if he thought the risk was worth it.”
“Just please—trust me. It’s important that we don’t take this group down yet. There’s someone bigger involved. Quinn and I are both convinced of it, especially the way things are going in the Barton Reid investigation. Someone’s pulling strings, and we’re about to lose everything we’ve worked for.”
Amanda’s lips thinned with annoyance. “Not my problem.”
“Damned well
is
your problem. As long as the SSU operatives are still out there, gunning for hire, then people like you will always be in the line of fire. Quinn told me you weren’t the kind of agent who worried only about her own skin.”
“I’m not an agent anymore,” she said blackly. “And I have other people to worry about.”
“Yeah, well, this way, you’re keeping the Coopers out of the battle zone. Isn’t that what you want?”
It was—of course it was. And there was a part of her that knew Damon was right—catching a small portion of the mercenaries today wasn’t nearly as valuable as infiltrating the whole group and strategically weakening them from the inside out so that the whole group might one day topple all at once.
But Damon’s plan wouldn’t do a damn thing to end the limbo her own life was in at the moment.
In the back of her head, she heard Alexander Quinn’s voice, low and intense.
Do the job. Everything else is secondary.
She just wasn’t sure she believed that anymore.
RICK TRIED CALLING ISABEL’S house from his car, but nobody answered. He had ID blocking on his cell phone, which would prevent Amanda from being able to tell who was calling, even if she knew his number. He wasn’t really surprised that she let the call go to voice mail.
He called Jesse and caught him up on what he’d learned from Maddox Heller. “He seems pretty sure that the man in the sketch is Mazir. Which could definitely explain why there’s a hit squad after her.”
Jesse spat out a profanity that made Rick’s eyebrows arch. His brother was usually unflappable. “From what I’ve read, Mazir is running as a democratic reformer.”
“I seem to recall a few dictators who claimed to be representing the people before they rose to power and showed their real faces,” Rick growled. “If Amanda were to tell the press what Mazir did to her, the kind of torture and treachery he’s capable of—”
“Whatever he’s planning for Kaziristan would be in jeopardy,” Jesse finished for him, his voice grim.
“Exactly. I’m heading to Isabel’s—”
“I’ll meet you there.” Jesse hung up.
Jesse wasn’t the only Cooper at Isabel’s house when Rick arrived. The whole gang was there, and they didn’t look happy.
“Where’s Amanda?” he asked as he looked around Isabel’s living room and didn’t see her.
“We’re not sure,” Isabel answered. She was sitting at the small desk in the living room, her laptop computer open in front of her. “I checked the bedroom when I got here about ten minutes ago and found a note from her saying she went for a walk by the creek. But I’ve been up and down the creek and didn’t see any sign of her. Not even footprints.”
“But we did find tire tracks in the dirt at the edge of the driveway.” Wade pulled out his cell phone and showed Rick an image on the small display screen. “They don’t match any of our vehicles. But we think it may match Damon North’s vehicle.”
“And you said the surveillance cameras on the visitor parking lot were too intrusive,” Jesse said to Rick, his smile grim. “I’ve got Branson in security pulling the surveillance shots of North’s vehicle. He’ll be emailing them to Isabel any minute.”
“I’ve already emailed her this picture for comparison,” Wade said. “If we have a good shot of the tire treads, we should be able to figure out if it’s Damon’s Subaru.”
“Email’s here,” Isabel said. “Let’s see what we’ve got.”
They crowded around the laptop as Isabel brought up the images on the email from the office. There were three shots from different angles. The third shot, taken from almost eye level, seemed the best chance of getting a good look at the tires. Isabel increased the image size, and the distinctive crosshatch tread came into view.
She pulled up the track Wade had shot with his phone.
“Same tread,” Shannon murmured, looking at Rick.
The rest of his siblings turned to look at him, as well.
An ache started forming deep in his gut. “Maybe he made the track when you brought him by here last night.”
Jesse shook his head. “I drove. The Subaru stayed parked at the office.”
“I think we need to conclude she’s with Damon,” Megan said. “The question is, did she go willingly?”
“Where’s the note she left?” Rick asked Isabel.
“Over here.” Shannon crossed to the coffee table and picked up a folded sheet of paper. She handed it to Rick.
He read over the simple note.
Cabin fever setting in. Taking a walk by the creek. Don’t worry, I’m armed.
She had signed it with her initial.
“She went willingly,” he said aloud.
“How do you know?” Shannon asked.
“She signed the note with her initial. We had a signal, back in Kaziristan, when we were seeing each other. Amanda and I agreed that if something happened to one of us and we had a chance to leave a note, the signal that we were in danger would be signing our full names. If everything was fine, we’d sign with the initial. She wants me to think everything’s fine.”
“Which means Damon convinced her it would be better for her to go alone, without your interference.” Megan stepped closer, putting her hand on his shoulder. “She knew you didn’t want her to put her neck on the chopping block.”
“She should have trusted me.”
Isabel turned away from the laptop. “She didn’t want to argue and she didn’t want to see you get hurt.”
“She didn’t have the right to make that choice for me.”
“And you didn’t have the right to tell her she couldn’t put her life on the line for something she thought was worth doing.”
Rick narrowed his eyes, wondering how much of his sister’s passionate defense of Amanda’s choice was wrapped up in her own issues regarding her partner’s death. According to Isabel, Scanlon had deliberately left her in the dark about the call he’d received luring him to a warehouse in Virginia that, it turned out, had been rigged to explode.
Telling her that Scanlon had saved her life by leaving her out of the investigation didn’t seem to appease Isabel’s feelings of betrayal any more than telling him that Amanda was trying to protect him made him feel any better about her decision to go with Damon by herself.
“Where would he take her?” he asked. “What’s his agenda?”
“The plan was to use her for bait.” Megan turned to Jesse. “Did Damon tell you anything about his plan?”
Jesse shook his head. “I thought he’d discuss the details once Amanda decided what she wanted to do, and I didn’t want to spook him by asking too many probing questions.”
Rick looked at his brother. Since when did Jesse have a problem asking probing questions?
“I’m not keeping any secrets here,” Jesse said.
“That’s new,” Rick shot back.
“Enough, already!” Megan stepped into the space between them. “Why don’t we table the family squabble until we find Amanda and make sure she’s safe?”
“How are we going to do that?” Shannon asked. “We don’t know where he’d have taken her.” She looked at Rick. “Does she have a cell phone?”
“I don’t know,” he admitted. “If she does, I don’t have the number. Have any of you looked through her things?”
“No—we thought we’d wait and see if you knew where she might be,” Shannon answered.
He moved past them and entered the guest room, stopping inside the door to look around. Closing his eyes, he tried to remember how they’d left the room. They’d slept late, not getting up until Isabel had already left for work. Amanda had taken care to remake the bed that morning after they rose, putting the used sheets in the laundry.
Her duffel bag was on the floor where she’d left it. He unzipped the canvas bag and looked around the interior. He knew she’d had three weapons—a Walther, a Smith & Wesson and a SIG Sauer. The Smith & Wesson was still there. The other two pistols were gone. So were at least three boxes of ammunition. She was armed, at least.
Near the bottom of the duffel bag, he found a small slip of paper, wrinkled from where it had been folded into a small square. On the paper was a phone number, written in bold, masculine strokes. Rick pulled his cell phone from his pocket and dialed the number.