Nowhere Safe

CHAPTER 14



Sabrina waited for the hostess to mark her dinner reservation off the list. The trendy restaurant fit the upscale Alpharetta area north of Atlanta, but the drive for those who worked downtown had to be a bugger every morning.

“Your other party has not arrived yet,” the young lady said. “Would you prefer inside or the veranda?”

“Veranda.”

The hostess cringed slightly but started gathering up what she needed.

Sabrina had dressed in black jeans, a turtleneck sweater and leather jacket for sitting outside in chilly evening weather. And to conceal her weapon in an easily accessible place.

Temperatures hovering just below sixty would make sitting outside unpleasant for most people, and so, prevent civilian casualties if the meeting went bad.

Lifting menus, the hostess led Sabrina past tables covered in white linen and surrounded by people enjoying an early lunch.

With no other patrons on the veranda, Sabrina had her choice of tables, just as she’d planned. And just as she’d known, the outside tables offered an optimum location for a sniper shot. Before the shivering hostess left, Sabrina told her, “Please let the server know that once my guest arrives, we need some time to chat, and to give me at least fifteen minutes before coming to the table.”

“Absolutely.”

No point in ordering food that would very likely not be eaten.

Where was this snitch?

The only reason Sabrina had even considered this meeting was because Burton claimed the snitch had significant intel on her operation in Miami and he would only share it with her in person.

Burton, a DEA contact she’d known for close to ten years, had vouched for the snitch. But Burton would not give her a name. He said he’d given his word and she’d understand the reason he was being so cryptic once she’d met the man.

So, as far as she was concerned, Burton should understand the reason she had a sniper in position to take out any threat the instant she gave the signal.

She’d chosen this location because it was the only place that provided a clear shot without threat to civilians. She sat in the corner with her back to the brick wall, trying to figure out who might be her guest for lunch.

Then he appeared.

Her heart thumped loud in her ears.

She might kill Burton. If she survived.

Her guest came forward slowly. No sudden moves. She’d never considered him attractive so much as a forceful personality that had its own brand of magnetism. Nose too wide, square jaw, rugged mouth of a man who loved as hard as he lived. Coarse brown hair that barely touched his collar and the length changed often, just as his now clean-shaven face was sometimes covered with a beard. Not quite six feet, he carried his weight in attitude as much as the lean muscle she knew lurked beneath that camelhair sport coat.

The bronze-colored shirt had been an intentional choice.

She’d once told him that she liked him in autumn colors, liked how it brought out the gold in his hazel eyes. Silly words said late at night.

Stupid, stupid mistakes committed time and again over five years.

She’d spent the last two of those years planning ways to kill him.

So why was she allowing him to breathe her air for one more second?

The answer to that lay buried so deep in her chest she didn’t want to dig it up and crack open a door to emotions she could never trust again.

Gage Laughton stopped at the edge of her table. “Sabrina.”

She said nothing, staring up at him with hatred burning through her. All she had to do was touch her right earring, right now, and his head would explode in the next second.

That would ruin a few appetites for those sitting too close to the windows.

Gage pulled out a chair carefully, his eyes on her, clearly aware of his precarious position as he sat. Every movement was deliberate, and should be. “I wanted a chance to talk to you.”

She was glad for the turtleneck sweater that hid her involuntary swallow. Hurt and anger crashed around in her heart. When she knew she could speak without any hitch in her voice, she said very softly, “I warn you to take care with your words. The only reason you are still alive right now is because neither Dingo nor Josh has his finger on the trigger covering me. They wouldn’t wait for my signal to fire. Keep your hands where I can see them.”

“I understand, but this is important to both of us.”

Pissing her off always helped bring the situation into focus. “You flatter yourself to include me in anything significant to you.”

Her strike hit true. Pain grazed his eyes, but she refused to be touched by it. He’d played her once, sacrificed her and her team. To be honest, she didn’t want him dead. Yet. Not until she found out why he’d betrayed her trust in the most brutal way possible.

“I didn’t betray you,” he said as if he could hear her thoughts screaming at him. “We’ve been investigating–”

“For two years?”

“Yes.”

“Who picked up Len Rikker that night from Mendelson?”

“We don’t know. We’re still digging for answers and looking for Rikker. I want to know who burned you as much as you do.”

She scoffed. “No, you don’t, because if you did you would send every assassin in your arsenal after him. You’re two steps from the top of the CIA and you want me to believe that you don’t know who was dealing with Mendelson and where Rikker went? Has it not occurred to you that I might be less gullible than I was before?”

He leaned back, chagrined. “I never thought of you as gullible and I did not screw you over, Sabrina.”

She remembered that voice, the one so coated heavily in honesty that it had finally broken through her barriers once. Not again. “I have no intention of eating with someone I find disgusting. So if you have no intel, I will permit you to walk away alive this one time as long as you never try to speak to me again.”

Misery lined his eyes and the grim tilt of his mouth, but to his benefit he recognized a lost cause even if he didn’t accept it. “I do have intel. And don’t blame Burton for this.”

“I don’t, but if you gave a rat’s ass about US teenagers, or the shipment of Spa Zing Burton’s people are trying to stop, you would have handed over what intel you have to him.”

“I wouldn’t have kept it from him if you’d refused the meeting,” he admitted. “That’s why I asked him, as a favor, to not tell you it was me. I knew you wouldn’t meet with me otherwise.”

“That’s easy to claim now that you’re here.”

“I know. I’m hoping what I have to tell you will show that I’m trying to help you.”

She didn’t respond. Wouldn’t give him an ounce of understanding.

Taking a deep breath, he started explaining. “I know you have a team in the Miami task force, but you may need to send more agents.”

She snorted at that. “You think I’m stupid enough to give you a second shot at my people?”

A muscle pulsed in his neck, the only sign his patience had a limit. Too bad. She had less.

“Hear me out, Sabrina. Then do as you will. Burton’s people are focused on High Vision’s designer drug shipments, not the real danger coming to south Florida.”

“And that would be?”

“We don’t know yet.”

“Then what makes you think there’s more going on than drug running?”

“Because Len Rikker is down there.”

She’d been toying with her keys and only years of control kept her from clenching the key ring. “We know.”

That surprised him. No physical twitch gave him away. It was the way he looked up calmly at her. This was a man whose control could not be broken easily.

She knew. She’d enjoyed wrecking it at one time.

Nodding slightly, he continued, but did not ask how she knew about Rikker. “We just found out that he’s stateside and I believe the mole Burton is after is in contact with Rikker.”

Lifting an indifferent shoulder, she said, “Still nothing new.”

“But the code name for Rikker’s contact might be.”

Ask him or not? She wanted to throw his words back in his face, but the mission had always come first. Josh and Ryder needed any intel she could find no matter the means. “Yes, I’d like to know that.”

“The contact is called Chessmaster.”

Gage hadn’t tried to negotiate. Just gave up the name. She’d think on that later. “Male or female?”

“Don’t know. We cooperate with other agencies, but we all horde information.”

“Especially spooks.” She should have kept that in mind two years ago.

“Guilty as charged...but I did not hold back on the UK,” he argued.

“We’re not here to discuss that.”

He nodded again, keeping his fury contained. “We have to find Rikker.”

Every muscle in her body tightened at his easy use of “we,” as if there were still a we.

Barely lifting his fingers off the tabletop to stall her reply, he explained, “Rikker’s presence is the reason we know there’s more going on than contraband shipments. Burton believes the FBI has had recent breaches in classified information similar to what’s happening in the south Florida DEA. He and I both think there’s a cancer seeping into the agencies. Your team is the only neutral player in all this.”

She absorbed the significance of that. If it was true. “What do you think Rikker’s presence means?”

“I’m going to share classified information with you that I have to trust you to not pass along, even to your own people. Burton doesn’t know this.”

This was a first.

She’d always had to report back to Gage, every detail on an operation, any intel, but he had maintained limits on what he would share with her.

He watched her with eyes searching for an opening, some small crevice he might ease into. The silence grew and expanded as he waited to see if she would give her word, something she’d taught him she did not give lightly.

She’d grown up on the streets where a person’s word was currency. Hers came with a titanium rating.

This man didn’t deserve her vow of honor, but she had to put her team first. They couldn’t miss this chance to find Rikker. “You have my word.”

“Thank you.”

Why had he said that? So unnecessary and it gave the impression he’d extended an olive branch that she’d accepted. “Your time is almost up. Don’t confuse cooperation with trust.”

A feral turbulence built in his gaze, but in a blink the steel shutters slammed into place. “Rikker was not in the UK to uncover a terrorist plot against the US or Ireland two years ago. That’s why no bombing ever happened in either country after Rikker went missing. He was tracking an organization called The Orion Hunters. A bunch of people who believe that five rare artifacts will predict the final world war that destroys world powers.”

She’d almost lost Josh for that bullshit?

If Josh were here right now, he’d rip Gage’s head off his shoulders. Chelsea had died to protect two countries and to save a CIA agent. None of which had been necessary. “You sent me and my team on a fool’s run? Put my people in jeopardy for some ridiculous group looking for artifacts?” She was leaning forward, hands gripping the arms of her chair.

“No, dammit,” Gage bit out low and sharp, hunched forward, too. “I had no idea either until I started ripping people apart to get answers. I couldn’t find you, couldn’t find word of any of you for months.” He looked away, staring off for long seconds then back at her. “You vanished. I thought...I thought you were dead.”

His voice remained steady, but her ear was tuned to catch the moment of emotion that broke through.

She didn’t want to hear that or give credit to the anguish gripping his words. Forcing herself to calm down and sit back, she took several breaths while her gaze roamed over the empty veranda. On the other side of the windows looking into the restaurant, friends chatted and laughed.

No idea that two cold-blooded killers sat so close to them.

“Sabrina.”

One word said with so much emotion she had to take an extra moment before she brought her gaze back to him. Stick to business. “So what are you telling me?”

His gaze dropped first. He gave another of his little nods, pulling his control in with tight fists, then his game face returned. “The Orion Hunters have been around for a very long time, but then so have a hundred other groups anchored in conspiratorial myth. It took me most of the past two years to piece together enough to figure out that Mendelson had captured someone he believed was connected to these Orion Hunters. He had no idea just what he’d caught.”

“A double agent?”

“Possibly. That’s the simplest explanation, but nothing is simple about any of this. As far as I’m concerned, Rikker’s been a traitor for a long time, but we have proof now. Digging for any lead on him turned up a deadly pattern. He’s been in the area of multiple terrorist events prior to major attacks. We established his presence at each one, but the thing that makes no sense is that the outcome of every attack benefited a different faction, some that were vicious enemies of the ones who’d benefited from the last attack. It’s like he’s freelancing for any group who picks a victim of the week.”

The picture came clear in her mind. “You think he’s involved in terrorist activity in Miami.”

“We have evidence of at least three occasions when he was on site for six to twelve weeks prior to an attack. Hundreds killed and maimed in a subway attack and an apartment building bombing. Sixteen young missionaries died in a bus sitting next to a building in Dublin. The building had a suspicious massive electrical overload and exploded.”

“How do you know he was involved in each of these?”

“We have surveillance footage showing him on site every time, but we never get the evidence until after he’s gone. He has to be found.”

“My people will find him and his contact the Chessmaster.”

“That’s why I want to work with you.” Gage paused, then added, “I’ve got intel and I’m willing to share.”

No pleading. Gage didn’t plead, but that last part about sharing had come out with a tinge of hope that pinched her heart. An organ she’d disconnected from her brain two years ago.

Gage added, “I just want him alive.”

That killed the moment.

She stood up. “You wanted him alive the last time and we put everything on the line to deliver.”

“My people didn’t screw you.”

“Someone in your agency did and you were my handler. That makes you responsible.”

Gage played the card he’d clearly been holding back. “No one has bothered you or your new company because I’m keeping the agency off your back. But I can only do so much, Sabrina. Fail to turn Rikker over and you’ll be considered an enemy of the state.”

She leaned down, placing a hand on the white tablecloth and kept her voice soft. “I’m not working with anyone but my own people. When we find Rikker, and we will, the only questions he’s answering are mine. Stay out of my way, because anyone who crosses me will be considered an enemy of my team and a threat to our existence.” Sabrina stood straight. “Sit very still with your hands on the table for five minutes. You so much as twitch a finger and they’ll carry you out of here.” Sabrina stepped around the table and headed out of the restaurant.