Bridal Armor (3 page)

In the side mirror he caught the flash of a gun muzzle and braced for impact, but the bullets went high and wide.

They were alone as she turned the corner and revved the engine to make the next light. Finally they were back on the Interstate and going westbound this time. They were headed into the storm, but maybe conditions would improve as they worked their way up the mountain while the storm rolled east and out over Denver.

Chapter Four

5:55 p.m.

Jason wasn’t the first on the scene of the explosion, but he was the first who had any idea what he was looking at. He flashed his badge and picked up what clues were available to the trained observer. The few people in the area of the explosion didn’t have much useful information. One man noticed a cab leaving the row at about the same time. He thought the backseat had been empty.

No one saw a man or woman leaving the scene, but Jason knew Director Casey wouldn’t have advertised his escape. And the snowfall, while melted away by the heat of the explosion, was coming down fast enough to blur any footprints leading away from the area.

Jason searched anyway. He looked at several empty spaces, making notes of the locations in case he could get a look at the video surveillance.

Studying the lot, he turned a full circle. Whoever had parked the car had done so with careful thought to the cameras and shuttle stops. That smacked of someone organized like DeRossi.

He found the license plate a couple rows away where it was still warm enough to melt the snow trying to cover it. He didn’t touch it, just placed a call to the Mission Recovery analyst on duty and asked her to run the information. Within moments he learned the car was registered to a rental car agency and had been rented in Director Casey’s name. Two days ago.

DeRossi.

Director Casey might have made the reservation, but no way he’d picked it up. Two days ago, the director had been in D.C. Unsure how Agent DeRossi had managed this with him on her tail, he made a note to ask her as soon as he had her cornered. And he would get her cornered.

Holt was going to hang him out to dry when word got back that Jason had misplaced the director. He was alive, that much was clear, but for how long? Out of options and with the wail of more sirens closing in, Jason stalked back to his car.

He opened the door and was about to slide behind the wheel when another flash of color caught his eye. Distinctive red hair was swept back into a high bun. She might have been another traveler distracted by the commotion, but something in the way she was looking over the scene put his instincts on alert.

When she looked his way, he recognized her as the woman Holt asked him to watch out for. Even without the heads up, he would have known she was involved. It was the sly, satisfied tilt of her mouth that didn’t match the shock of the innocent bystanders. Was she the bomb builder? The trigger man—woman? He resisted the urge to walk over and confront her directly.

Instead, he went back and exchanged information with the officers on scene, giving her a chance to make an exit so he could follow her. It was a long shot, but if she didn’t lead him to DeRossi, maybe she’d lead him to the people behind the plan to blow up Director Casey’s car.

Without a cap or scarf, she obviously wasn’t trying to blend in. Hair like hers would be memorable to the dullest of eyewitnesses. He was grateful for her confidence, as that striking hair made it easy to keep her in his periphery with the rest of the world muted by blowing snow. Did she know, as he did, that Casey and DeRossi had escaped the trap?

When he saw her striding away, he quickly returned to his car, prepared to follow her until he had some answers. Choosing the lane closest to the building, he paid the parking fee and pulled through the gate, then stopped just behind the small building to wait.

It didn’t take long and once again her bold overconfidence made it easy. Alone in a boxy Jeep decades past its prime, she drove right by him.

He groaned when he spotted the temporary license plate and his hopes for a name and registration evaporated.

A little voice in his head told him this was too easy, she was practically daring him to follow. But she was a breadcrumb, and possibly the last good lead he’d get today. There was nothing to do but stay on her tail as she took the ramp and joined the sparse traffic traveling toward the mountains.

Fortunately her vehicle was distinctive enough he could fall back to the limits of visibility and still follow. There were several places she might be headed, but this was the most direct route to the area where Director Casey was supposed to be.

Observe and report might be his orders, but he reviewed his tactical options anyway as they inched along. He kept the radio on, listening for any update on the explosion at the airport. A report of a traffic tie-up on the east side of Denver distracted him. The reporter announced a hit-and-run combined with unconfirmed reports of gunfire.

Jason didn’t know the city well enough to attribute that event to his assignment or more localized violence. The roads were treacherous and even driving cautiously he could feel the tires sliding over patches of ice. Using the voice control on his phone, he contacted the analyst again to ask about the traffic report.

He heard the soft tap of fingers on a keyboard before the voice filled the car. “Traffic cameras confirm the report of a collision and it looks to me like there’s a muzzle flash.”

He asked for, and received an accurate description of the vehicles involved. “Did the police take anyone into custody?”

“Negative. Cameras show the SUV leaving the scene and two men exiting the disabled sedan.”

“Anything odd reported?”

“The two men in the sedan left the weapons behind. I can check with the lab about fingerprints, but it won’t be the priority with no victims.”

“Any chance of facial recognition on anyone from the traffic cams? License plates or registrations?”

“Possibly the driver of the SUV.” The soft sound of fingers on the keyboard was all he heard for a moment. “The rest were camera-shy and I don’t have enough to go on. Both vehicles are rentals and I can call you back when the records come through.”

“Do that. Please,” he added. “Is the SUV driver a man or woman?”

“Woman.”

DeRossi.
“Any GPS signal on the SUV?”

“No.”

Jason stifled his exasperation. “The director didn’t happen to call in about this same accident, did he?”

“No word from him since he landed safely in Denver.”

Jason muttered an oath and thanked the analyst. “Let me know when you get a match on the driver.”

“Will do.”

“One more thing.” Jason gave the temporary tag on the Jeep. “I don’t expect the information to be accurate, so dig deeper than the first name that shows up.”

“You got it.”

When the call disconnected, he pounded his palm against the steering wheel. Of all the times to slip up. Losing DeRossi was the biggest mistake he’d made since becoming a Specialist.

He urged his car closer to the battered Jeep, determined to confirm how the sexy redhead fit in with DeRossi and the director, or if his instincts were all wrong and he was out here chasing wild geese through a blizzard.

Chapter Five

Clutching the steering wheel, Jo’s knuckles were as white as the snow outside and, despite the heat blasting from the vents, probably as cold.

She merged with the westbound traffic, praying they would make it to the cabin she’d rented before the police caught up with them. Living in a wired society made it difficult to operate under the radar. Training helped, as did the ultimate clearance level she’d earned by working oversight for the most covert government agencies.

After driving for a few miles encountering nothing more exciting than a snow plow, she tried to relax a fraction and sort out their options. When she trusted her voice again, she asked Thomas who and what he’d seen in the other car.

“A silencer.”

“Really?” Not much reason for a silencer in a car chase.

“It doesn’t make sense to me either.”

“Unless they planned to take you down at the airport.”

“I thought that was your job.”

She flexed her hands on the wheel, anything to ease the tension. “Is the wedding important to you?”

“You know it is.”

“Think what a crushing blow it would be for the bride if her uncle couldn’t make it because he was dead.”

She felt his hard stare. “When did Initiative launch an assassination division?”

“It’s not like we don’t have the resources,” she said, completely irritated with the bitterness she heard in his voice.

“I’m holding a gun and a sedative, Johara.”

“And I’m in the driver’s seat of a perfectly effective weapon, too, Thomas.” She jumped at his sudden bark of laughter. “How is that funny?”

“Not funny. Absurd.” He made a show of lowering the weapon, but she wasn’t sure where he’d hidden the sedative disk. “Whatever this is about, I can’t believe you’re ready to sacrifice yourself. Just level with me. I am completely out of patience.”

It was her turn to laugh. “As if you ever had any. You’ve never been anything less than ironclad.”

At one time she’d thought there’d been something underneath all that stoic determination and razor-sharp intelligence. Something closer to personal concern and compassion—maybe even something that could turn into love—but she’d been wrong.

Still, they had a history and more than that, her professional respect for him had never faltered. This investigation was nothing more than an elaborate attempt to discredit him. It had to be. He’d made some impossibly difficult choices in his career, but she would never believe he was a traitor. No matter what the anonymous informant said, if Thomas was here to sell a deadly virus, there would be a legal, big-picture reason for it.

“Seems to me you’re holding up well enough. You eliminated that threat quickly enough.”

“I’ll take that as a compliment and not as some insinuation that I staged a road rage incident.” She reached into her purse and withdrew a map. One of the first things she’d done after renting this car was disable the GPS so the rental agency couldn’t track her down. She wasn’t about to use a computerized navigation system that logged her progress turn by turn.

“Would you navigate please?” She handed the map to him. “I’d like to get off the main roads.”

“The side roads will be in worse condition.”

“I’m aware of that. But they’re less likely to be monitored. Our destination is circled in red.”

“Mmm-hmm. And you circled Glenstone Ski Lodge in blue. Why is that?”

“Good skiing.”

“You’re not making it any easier to trust you.”

“I’ve saved your life a couple times over in the last hour.”

“Or you’ve perfectly executed an intricate setup.”

“Hardly.” He wouldn’t say that if he’d known about the lingerie she’d added to her suitcase at the last minute...just in case they managed to find time to indulge in another sexy rendezvous. She was tempted to tell him about the sheer black lace just to test his reaction, but she kept her mouth shut because she didn’t trust her response. This torch she carried for him should have burned out by now and it bothered her knowing she couldn’t seem to get over him, though the lingering affection was clearly one-sided.

“Take this exit and turn left at the end of the ramp.”

She followed his instructions, wondering if he would mislead her and try to escape. Best to nix that now. “The fact of the matter is you have the gun and the sedative because I want you to have them.”

His doubt came through loud and clear and he didn’t have to say a word.

Her statement might not be entirely true as it applied to the sedative, but she refused to back down. “I need you to trust me, even if you don’t trust the committee.”

“
You
are synonymous with the committee.”

“Are you still bitter about that inquiry last year?”

Again, his silence was answer enough.

“That wasn’t my idea. It was a supply audit, for Pete’s sake. Nobody was going to reprimand you for having one too many sniper scopes.” His department had been the only one to show a balanced inventory sheet, but she wasn’t inclined to share that detail with him.

“Whose idea was it?”

“The audit?” She caught his affirmative nod out of the corner of her eye. “It’s random. The computer spits out a list periodically and we follow through.”

“Then there are fewer shadow agencies than I suspected.”

She wasn’t about to take that bait. “What do you mean?”

“That was our second supply audit in as many years. At the time I assumed your committee had lost something valuable and didn’t know where else to look.”

For the first time since she’d intercepted him at the airport, she felt like she’d made the right call. He was making her think about the situation from other angles.

“What ‘something valuable’ would the Initiative have to lose?” she ventured. Besides operatives. Burnout was a frequent problem for agents in her position. It wasn’t easy being the pariah of the intelligence community. Even when no one in the public sector knew you existed. Being known to and despised by your peers posed a definite challenge and very few people dealt with it well.

“You’d know that answer better than I would, Jo.”

She opted to explore a different theory. “Tell me how Mission Recovery handles discipline problems.”

“Why?”

“Humor me. We’ve got hours ahead of us at this pace.” The storm was playing havoc with her timeline. Snails could tour entire gardens in the time it took them to reach the next turnoff as they drove west toward the mountains.

“We select our agents specifically to avoid discipline problems.”

“That’s a nice party line, Director. I’m completely sold. Now tell me what you do when a good agent screws up.”

“You’re the oversight genius. You know the routine.”

“Actually, I don’t. There isn’t a single shred of information about how you handle problem children.”

“Because we haven’t had any,” he insisted. “If you’re after a specific person or case, just say so.”

“Fine.” She was after the needle in the haystack and hoping maybe a disgruntled candidate who’d been turned down for a spot on the elite team might be causing trouble for Thomas. “I’m fishing here, there’s no specific person I can point to and say ‘he or she started this.’”

“Which leaves a specific case.”

Naturally, Thomas would hear the details she’d left out.

“Possibly.” But her mind was turning over the audit wrinkle. Two supply-specific audits in the same number of years didn’t feel random. Annual reports were usually verified by an accountant and approved, unless there was a significant discrepancy. “Did the same person oversee both of your audits?”

“Don’t you know the answer to that?”

She didn’t want to admit only the most recent audit was on the system. Another reason she’d been surprised. “Contrary to popular belief, I have other things on my daily agenda beyond the shadowy workings of Mission Recovery.”

“I’m so relieved.”

She resisted the urge to snap at him. Keeping her voice light, she repeated her question about the auditors.

“Two different people, neither of whom I’ve seen before or since.”

And he would have been looking. She didn’t believe people who inconvenienced Thomas would ever be welcome in his offices and state-of-the-art training facility without his express permission. On the plus side, there weren’t that many people with the committee’s authority. It should be easy enough to track down those records and examine the personnel jackets of the auditors involved.

“I think we should stop soon,” Thomas said. “You’re nearly out of gas.”

She glanced down and frowned at the gauge. “The tank was full when I parked it at the airport.”

“Roll down your window,” he said, powering down his own.

The moment she did the strong smell of gas came in with the blowing snow and wind. “Damn it. A lucky bullet left them a trail.” She had a terrible action-movie image of someone tossing a match into the trickle of gas they were leaking and succeeding in blowing them up this time.

“In better conditions maybe,” he said. “I never thought I’d be thankful for nasty weather. The snow will blur our trail, but I don’t see how we’ll make it to wherever this is,” he said, tapping the red circle on the map.

“With a leaking gas tank I don’t see how we’ll make it much of anywhere,” she grumbled.

“Just roll into the next convenience store and I’ll see what I can do.”

“I’m fresh out of duct tape.” There were few things in life she hated more than looking incompetent. Looking incompetent in front of Thomas Casey was one of them. Spotting the faint glow of neon signs up ahead, she prayed for a way to salvage the situation.

“Good thing you’ve got me then,” he remarked without glancing her way. “Park over there.” He pointed to a spot away from the security camera aimed at the main door. “Got a flashlight?”

She shook her head. “I’ll go buy one.”

“Let me go in and ask. You stay with the car and sit tight.”

Tight was easy to manage with her current stress level. It made sense not to leave the vehicle unattended, despite the low risk of someone managing to track them through the storm, but she couldn’t sit here and do nothing. She got out of the car, wrapped in Thomas’s overcoat once more. Underneath the lingering acrid stench of the explosives, she caught the woodsy scent of his cologne. It was almost as good as being in his embrace.

Foolish, but she took comfort in it anyway. When they’d worked in Germany, she’d been his contact and part of his cover. He’d been her rock, her anchor. At the time, she thought she’d done well enough to have been a steadying force for him, too. But the moment they’d returned to the States and debriefed the mission, he’d disappeared from her life.

She hadn’t seen him again until official business between the Initiative committee and his Mission Recovery division put them in the same small conference room deep inside the Pentagon one day. That had been more than two years ago and, fool that she was, she’d expected him to call.

Walking around the car, looking for damage, she pushed those sweet memories aside and searched for more pertinent details on the current predicament. Starting with his coat. She patted pockets inside and out, but came up empty. If he was here to sell a vial of a deadly virus, surely he’d keep it on him.

Whoever was tailing them had the skill and audacity to act quickly. It eroded her peace of mind, created a level of doubt that would swell into full-blown panic if she let it. As careful as she’d been, she’d only spotted Specialist Grant in the days preceding Thomas’s arrival in Denver.

Nothing in his personnel record indicated dissatisfaction to the point of blowing up the director, but she was fresh out of other theories. It was hard to imagine another team watching her closely enough to take that kind of action and yet hide so effectively that she missed them. And why wouldn’t a team targeting both of them wait a few more seconds until they were both in the car? And why didn’t the enemy just shoot them when the bomb missed?

There were no easy answers. There wouldn’t be until she could get Thomas to trust her enough to cooperate. This whole investigation had felt off since she first got wind of it back in D.C. As uncomfortable as it would be, as vulnerable as it would make her and the committee, it was time to tell Thomas everything. She didn’t see another way to determine which of them was the real target and which was convenient collateral damage.

As she came around the back end of the car, she shivered. Not from cold. From the realization someone had marked her rental. No way the small hole drilled into the taillight was a mistake or the result of her evasive maneuvers. Too clean for a bullet, the precise hole in the red plastic brake light made the SUV easy to spot from a distance.

Damn. She should have noticed this at the airport. She might have if her ears and the rest of her senses hadn’t been overloaded by the near-miss explosion and desperation to get to safety.

And the sounds and scents of having
him
so close.

Where the hell was he? The idea that he could be in there making a call...deciding he couldn’t trust her—

“You shouldn’t be out here in heels,” Thomas said, joining her. “You’ll break an ankle.”

She appreciated the concern, but the shoes were trashed anyway and the heels were the only thing keeping her feet out of the deepening snow. There must be two fresh inches on the ground already. “I’ll change in a minute.”

“Change?”

“I put a backup kit in both cars,” she admitted. She just didn’t feel inclined to tell him where the other car was.

He rolled his eyes and she knew he was thinking about what the authorities would find when they combed through the wreckage of the car bomb.

“But no snow boots?”

“Cut me some slack. The weathermen didn’t even see this coming. It’s October. Cold is one thing, a foot of snow is another.”

“I know, I know.” He waved the flashlight. “Let me see what this gas leak looks like.” He knelt down, peering under the car to examine the damaged gas tank.

She thought she should help him somehow, but her knowledge and experience were lacking when a problem was more involved than checking the oil or changing a tire. Give her any sort of weapon and she was good. Analyzing or repairing a vehicle, not so much. Still, she tried, scanning for damage on the body in the vicinity of the fuel tank.