California Schemin' (16 page)

“I need to take her in,” Madison said.

“You don’t need to do that. Leave her with
me, call your boss, tell him where she is and what you know so far.
He can act on that information.”

“Is the boss FBI? Because I was kidnapped and
transported across state lines.”

“You weren’t actually kidnapped. You were
relocated for your own protection.”

“Relocated? I was knocked unconscious for
almost twenty-four hours.”

Madison and Hammie exchanged glances. I could
see them realigning allegiances.
Think, Bree, who’s the only one
who isn’t a cop?
I turned and ran.

I had about a three-second start. I sprinted
to the mall, yanked open the huge glass door, and ran for the
largest department store in the place. The only trouble was that
the largest store was also the farthest away. I risked a glance
over my shoulder. No one was following me. I stopped in my tracks.
Why wouldn’t they be chasing me? I jogged past shops, glancing over
my shoulder every couple of seconds. They didn’t appear.

I sat on a bench, the bag with the blue dress
in my lap. What possible reason could they have for not following
me? I wasn’t that important? That I could believe. I didn’t really
know anything. Hammie was right earlier when he said I was a waste
of time. Other than the pictures Fogel had taken off my camera I
was a no-go as a witness. I hadn’t seen anything except blurry
images in a photograph.

The problem was that I was now on my own,
which was good, except I didn’t have any ID, money, or
transportation. I toyed with stealing Madison’s car. She wouldn’t
be stranded, because Hammie could give her a ride.
How could I
manage it?
I set the thought aside as too risky. I’d need the
keys and didn’t want to get close enough to whatever kind of agents
they were to get them.

I leaned my elbows on my knees and dropped my
head in my hands. It wasn’t an impossible situation, was it? I got
up off the bench and walked aimlessly down the mall, away from the
doors I’d come in.

My neck was throbbing. The physical therapist
wasn’t going to be happy with me. Everything I’d done since
injuring it was guaranteed to aggravate it. I looked around me for
a store that carried one of those electric chair massagers. The
thought of sinking into a chair and letting the heat and vibration
lull me to sleep was overwhelming. Tears pricked the backs of my
eyes, but I blinked them back. Time to get proactive.

As much as I loved the new jacket, it was the
one thing I had that I could exchange for money. I picked up the
pace and power-walked down the mall to the store where we’d bought
the coat. Madison had paid cash for my stuff, and while she’d
pocketed the receipt for the other stuff, she’d been distracted
when we’d paid for the jacket, and the clerk had put the receipt in
the bag.

I avoided the clerk who had waited on us and
walked to the customer service counter at the back of the store.
The clerk took the jacket, and I got Madison’s money.
Well, it’s
really the FBI’s money, which is funded by my taxes, so it’s my
money. Right?
I went in search of a pay phone.

As I left the store I heard someone call out
to me.

“Yes?” I turned to see the young man who had
taken the coat.

“You forgot your lipstick. It dropped out of
your other bag.” He handed me a bullet-shaped tube, silver with a
passion pink lid.

“Not mine.” I frowned and tried to hand it
back to him.

“No. It’s yours. I saw it fall out of the bag
you’re carrying.”

I didn’t even wear lipstick. I shoved the
thing in my pocket and focused on finding a phone.

I looked for the public restrooms and hit the
jackpot. The trouble was that it was the kind of pay phone that
required a calling card to call long distance. Great.

I walked back down the mall until I found a
Walgreens, where I bought a long distance card from the check out
and waited while they activated it. I turned to go back to the
phone bank and nearly ran smack into the back of Hammie and
Madison. They were facing away from me, still arguing. I backed
away, turned and ran. I took the escalator stairs two at a time and
looked over the railing to check on them. They were walking down to
the lower level looking at something Hammie held in his hand.

I backed away from the rail and jogged down
to the upper floor restrooms, also sporting a bank of phones. But
no phone books. I dialed information and got the number for the
Placer County Sheriff’s Department. I was punching in the number
when I caught a glimpse of pink from the corner of my eye as
Madison came around the corner. I dropped the phone and hightailed
it out the opposite end of the bathroom corridor. I turned right,
spotted Hammie coming, did a quick u-turn and ran smack into
Moose’s arms.

“Crap, crap, crap.” I struggled to get free
of Moose’s embrace, but I wasn’t strong enough. I went to stomp on
Moose’s instep, but he lifted me off the ground, effectively
disarming me.

Madison appeared beside us, reached into her
handbag and pulled out a set of metal cuffs, one of which she
slapped on my wrist. She went to put the other on her wrist, but
Hammie reached out to stop her.

“Cuff her to me. You’re not heavy enough to
control her if she gets out of hand.”

“I’ve got a gun. She won’t get out of hand.”
She clicked the cuff on her wrist.

“Gosh,” I said. “Madison must be a real cop.
She’s got real metal cuffs and a gun. She’s not using those
el
cheapo
nylon things.”

“I’ve got nylon cuffs, I just think it’s
easier to cuff two people together with metal ones.”

I contemplated throwing a fit and causing a
scene but discarded it as an option because it was probably
fruitless. Madison had me out-gunned and out-badged, and it wasn’t
likely that anyone would take me seriously. I didn’t know what
Moose or Hammie had, but it didn’t matter. I was screwed.

“Come on.” Madison tugged on the cuff, and
Moose released me to the ground. I wanted to kick him in the ankle,
but he’d been nice to me before, so I didn’t. We walked three
abreast with me in the middle and Hammie right behind me.

“Is Moose FBI, too?”

“Moose and Hambecker go way back. They’re
practically joined at the hip. Were in the service together. May
even have gone to high school together. Wallace hired Moose as a
driver on Richard’s recommendation.”

“I don’t understand why Hammie pulled me off
that plane like a fugitive when he could have just explained the
situation to Fogel. What was that all about?”

“Would you stop talking about me like I’m not
here? I didn’t want to blow my cover. Did you notice that no one
made a serious attempt to go after you? There were people in the
know at a higher level.”

“Seems theatrical,” I said.

“Hambecker has a penchant for dramatics. It
suits his personality.”

“Humph.”

They walked me back to where we’d left the
car.

“We’ll stay here,” Hambecker said. “Moose, go
get the limo.”

Moose jogged away down the row of cars, and
Hammie faced Madison again.

“I need to take her back to Wallace. He
trusts me. If Ms. MacGowan is gone when he gets back I’ll have lost
my effectiveness.”

“She’s not safe with Wallace. What if he
decides she’s a liability and puts a bullet in her head like he did
Lily?”

“Ms. MacGowan was out in public with the
Senator, so he won’t risk killing her. First his wife and then some
woman he was seen with are found shot to death? The publicity would
kill his career.”

“Which is the thing he’s trying to save.”
Madison furrowed her eyebrows. “I still don’t like it. She’s my
assignment, and I can’t keep an eye on her if she’s at Wallace’s
place.”

“Moose and I can both keep an eye on her
there.”

“But not as your primary objective. Your
attention will be on your assignment, not mine.”

“There are two of us, and I thought we’d
already established that she’ll be safer there than not.”

Madison relented and uncuffed me.

Moose pulled the limo alongside of us, and I
got in the back, silently cursing the FBI and any other covert
agency I could think of.

The trip back to the house was short. We
parked in the garage, and I walked through the house and out the
back to sit by the pool. I took off my shoes, pulled up the legs of
my jeans and stuck my feet in the water. We’d been right there at
the mall, and I still hadn’t gotten a bathing suit.

The sound of water lapping woke me. I was
lying curled in a chaise lounge, and a breeze was blowing around
me, making me shiver. Clouds covered the sky, and the air was damp.
It felt like rain.

I rolled off the lounge and got to my feet. I
was stiff, and my neck was throbbing. I went in search of Hammie
and found Moose in the kitchen eating chips. I dropped into the
chair across from him, and he passed over the bowl.

“Want some? You slept through lunch.”

“Where’s Hammie?”

Moose couldn’t keep the smile from his
face.

“You have got to stop calling him that, it
undermines his authority.”

“You should stop encouraging me, then. You
can’t even keep a straight face when you’re telling me I’m
undermining him. Look, I’m supposed to be seeing a physical
therapist. Hammie needs to take me to the doctor or something. I
can’t even turn my neck.”

Moose pushed back his chair and walked to a
console on the wall by the door. He pushed a button and spoke.

“Richard, we need you in the kitchen.” Moose
released the button.

“Right, I’ll be down in a sec.” Hammie’s
voice came from the wall.

“He was in the weight room.” Moose plopped
back down in his chair. “Working off his frustration.”

Hambecker came into the room, wiping the
sweat from his face with a hand towel. He had on sweats cut off at
the knee and a sleeveless tee-shirt showing the muscles in his
shoulders and chest. I pulled my eyes away.

“What’s up?”

“The princess here needs to see a doctor.”
Moose nodded to me.

“I am not a princess. I injured my neck, and
the ER doc told me to see a physical therapist, and then you
abducted me. It hurts. I can’t turn my head. See? I need PT.”

“You can’t turn your head. You can lead us on
a wild goose chase through the biggest damn shopping mall in
Sacramento County, but you can’t turn your head. Right. Fine. I’ll
get you PT.” He left the kitchen shaking his head.

“You’re not an easy keeper, you know.”

“I’m not an easy keeper?”

“Yeah, you know, you need a lot of upkeep.”
Moose was standing with his back to the sink, leaning on the
counter.

“I own a farm, city boy. I know what an easy
keeper is.”

“I’m not a city boy, and don’t get all worked
up with me for telling you the truth.”

“Listen, egghead. You wouldn’t be an easy
keeper either if you were in my shoes, so lighten up.”

“Egghead? I thought an egghead was a smart
guy. Oh, I get it; you’re calling me a smart aleck. Yeah?”

“Yeah. Smart Aleck. That’s it. You got
me.”

I grabbed a handful of chips and headed for
the little library. I doubted anyone would bother me there.

I was well into a mystery when Moose came in
with his hands full.

“Here,” he said, “a hot pack for your neck.
Lean forward.”

I sat up and leaned forward so he could drape
a warm towel around my neck.

“Be careful. They stay hot, and you probably
need to keep the towel between the pack and your skin so you don’t
get burned.”

“Thanks, Moose. That feels great.”

He pulled a bottle from his back pocket.

“Ibuprofen,” he said. “It’ll help keep the
inflammation down. Richard will get you a physical therapist, but
it might take a day or two.” He smiled at me. “I’m sorry I said you
weren’t an easy keeper.”

He left. I felt the heat sink into the
muscles in my neck and relaxed into it. He was a decent guy.

A day or two? How long did they plan on
keeping me here? If I identified the two criminals, wouldn’t that
be the end of it? I started to think about Fogel. Was he looking
for me? How was the senator going to explain my presence in his
house? Was Fogel in on the whole thing?

The possibilities made my head hurt. I missed
Meg and my dogs and Beau. An image of Beau laid up with a broken
leg worrying but not being able to do anything ran through my mind.
I wondered if he had Beans with him or if the Chihuahua was still
at home with my dogs. I didn’t think Tank would eat him, but I
wasn’t positive, and it made me nervous to think of it.

I looked out the window, past the pool and
the palms, out to the empty valley leading to the foothills. I’d
never be able to escape that way. Agent Truefellow was watching the
front of the house. The only thing for me to do was to tell the
senator I’d identify his criminals.

I got up, feeling a tiny bit less sore, and
searched the room for a phone. None. I went to the kitchen, now
empty of Hambecker and Moose. No phone here either. I opened the
broom closet, no phone in there, and moved on to the living room,
then game room. The house was devoid of telephones.

The sight of the stairs made me pause, but
stiff or not, the senator’s office was the most likely place for a
phone. Although I didn’t remember one. I climbed the stairs and
took a left at the second floor landing. I stepped into the office
and closed the door behind me, searching the room with my eyes. No
phone. Crap, the senator had obviously embraced the
get-rid-of-the-landline craze that was sweeping the country, and
here I was without my cell phone. Great.

I stomped back downstairs, out through the
French doors and along the cement path to the rear of the property.
There was a distinct change at the edge of the property. Ferns,
palms and manicured lawn gave way to a fifteen foot swath of mowed
meadow grass on the downhill slope, which turned into uncut meadow
half way down the hill.