Exit Strategy

I let the sentence fade, and picked up my toothpaste. Before I could slip into the bathroom, he grabbed my hand.

“Dee? Whatever I saw? There could be a few explanations, and I have no intention of trying to figure out which one is right.”

“Thanks.”

“How about a trade-off?” He smiled. “One question. Ask me anything.”

When I shook my head, his smile faltered.

“Sure. Okay. I mean, maybe there’s nothing you want-”

“Your eyes,” I said, managing a small smile. “What color are your eyes?”

His grin returned full wattage. “Sure. I can do that-better than that.” He dropped his head forward, reached up and took out his contacts. “There.”

He looked at me. His eyes were light green, the color of new grass.

Qui

The door banged open and we both jumped back.

“Evelyn told me,” Jack said, by way of introduction. He started crossing the room, then met Qui

“Christ’s sake,” Jack muttered. “Show-and-tell? This isn’t kindergarten.”

“He was just-” I began.

“Leaving,” Jack said. “I need to talk to Dee.”

“It wasn’t Qui

“Fault. Yeah. I heard.” He jerked his thumb at the door. “Go call your sources. Dubois doesn’t respond by noon? We call it off.”

Qui

“There was no need to talk to him that way,” I said. “He didn’t do anything wrong.”

“Besides taking out his contacts?”

“He felt bad, and he wanted to reciprocate-”

“Yeah. He wants to reciprocate. Middle of a fucking job. Starts playing ‘I’ll show you mine.’”

“Actually, I think I showed him mine first.”

“Not on purpose.” Jack moved closer, the edge leaving his voice. “You okay? Evelyn said he saw you. Saw your shirt.”

“Which I should have never brought with me. A dumb move, but it…helps me sleep, and sometimes that’s more important than being careful.”

“I’ve seen the shirt. Had a problem with it? Would have said so. Back to the question. You okay?”

“I’m shaken, but I guess it’s a good lesson for me to be careful all the time, and not relax my guard when I’m with just you and Evelyn.”

“Yeah. Gotta be careful with Evelyn.”

A small smile. “But not you?”

“Not unless I open my mouth. Then I’m dangerous.” He paused. “About yesterday-”

The door swung open.

“Jack? Dee?” Evelyn called. “Dubois bit. He’s in.”

“Now the fun begins,” I murmured.

We’d arranged for our point person to meet Dubois at eleven thirty. Just because he’d agreed to speak to us didn’t mean he’d agree to our plan, but we couldn’t wait to find out. We had too much prep work.

“I ordered the radios yesterday,” Felix said as we ate a late breakfast in our hotel room. “I called this morning and rerouted delivery to a plaza outside town. Qui

“Will do.”

“Need a safe house,” Jack said. “Motel would work. Prefer a house.”

“Easily done,” Felix said. “We’ll locate several for rent, with immediate possession, scout locations, and select one.”

“Hole up in a place for rent?” I said. “Sounds good, but there’s a risk factor, isn’t there? If someone decides to show the place-”

“We’ll rent it,” Felix said. “Cash for a month.”

“Is that-?”

“Safe?” He smiled, and switched to an upper-class British accent. “Hello, I’m Dr. Patterson, and I have a rather…odd request to make. I’m visiting your university and, well, I must admit, I loathe public housing. I believe you have a lovely little place for rent on Main Street? If it wouldn’t be too much of an inconvenience, I’d like to let it for the week. I’ll pay you for the entire month, of course, in advance.”

“Works for me,” I said.

“And it has worked for me more times than I can count.”

“Let’s get moving on that,” Jack said. “Dubois comes through? I want keys within the hour. Need time for a thorough examination. No surprises.”

Dubois

Martin Dubois stirred his coffee, tasted it, then added another sweetener. As he lifted the cup to his lips, he looked over the rim at the clock. Eleven twenty-nine. He’d wait until eleven thirty-five, no longer. Maybe eleven forty, but only if he didn’t finish his coffee before that. He drank slower.

The message had come in last night. An e-mail, sent to his personal account.

Missing a witness? We have her but I think you’d rather have the man who tried to kill her. If so, we can deliver. This is a private transaction. You’ll get your man and all the credit, and we’ll ask for very little in return.

If you wish to discuss this further, please respond to the e-mail address at the bottom with a time and place.

Attached to the e-mail was a photo of a bloodied garrote wire. No one knew that’s what the killer had tried to use. The kids thought he’d been strangling her with a rope, which hadn’t explained her bloodied hands. The wire looked like the same gauge used on the Lee woman. That made sense.

He’d tried to trace the e-mail, of course-using what resources he could without arousing suspicion-but the trail ended at a dead account. So he’d done the only thing he could: responded with a time and place. Here and now.

They’d expected him to come alone. He hadn’t, of course. He was ambitious-not crazy. But he’d told the young agent accompanying him only that he was meeting a witness in a public place and wanted backup, then positioned him across the room, where he could watch for trouble, but couldn’t overhear the conversation.

Had it been any other case, there would have been a team of agents with him, ready to take into custody whoever showed up. But this was the case of a lifetime, one that every agent dreamed of-a dream that was fast turning into a nightmare.

They hadn’t blamed him for the Chicago killing. That had been his free swing. Then he’d had his entire team on a train to California…and the killer took a victim in Nebraska. Strike one. So he’d pulled them back into the investigation, and sent a skeleton crew to organize security at the West Virginia parade. And the killer had not only shown up in West Virginia, but left an eyewitness who just up and walked away. Strike two. He had twenty-four hours to produce that witness. If not…strike three.

Now he had a shot at getting her. That would redeem him, for a while. But if he could go all the way? Bring down the Helter Skelter killer? That would hit the ball out of the park, home run, bases loaded…safe forever. He could ride the wave for a few more years in the bureau, retire with full pension, maybe even tour the lecture circuit.

The bell over the café door tinkled. He glanced up. In walked an older woman. White-haired, elegantly groomed, the country club type. He was about to look away when she caught his gaze…and headed straight for him.

Goddamn it. She’d recognized him. And now she was coming over to tell him what a horrible job he was doing, and someone had to catch this criminal and, in her day, by God, they would have nabbed him after the first murder, if not before-

The woman dropped something onto the table. The garrote wire. He looked up at her, his mouth open, but nothing coming out. She took the seat opposite his and shrugged out of her coat.

He looked down at the wire.

“It’s clean,” he said, because he couldn’t think of anything else to say.

“Yes, the boys wanted to leave the blood on it for you, but if you get blood in a silk pocket, it just never comes out.” She met his gaze. “You didn’t really think we’d leave our girl’s DNA all over it, did you?”

“Your girl?”