Operation Zulu Redemption--Complete Season 1 (38 page)

But leaving them to their own efforts was not an option. Sprigs of weeds and tufts of grass thrust upward between the sidewalk cracks as she made her way past a building with only two walls. Chunks of brick and mortar littered the path, making the trek both dangerous and frustrating. Crumbling sentries standing guard over broken people.

Ahead, Nuala laughed as she twirled with a multicolored scarf tied around her waist. Three dark-skinned women, adorned with bangles, necklaces, and scarves, danced to a song plucked out by an aged man.

Téya’s heart climbed into her throat—gypsies!

Quickening her steps to match her heartbeat, Téya rushed their way. “Sister,” she said, breathing relief and exasperation into her voice. “Where have you been? We must go!”

A man emerged from between two thick, old rugs. “She stay with us.”

Téya met the man’s gaze, working out whether she should be stern or laugh. “She is a favorite with her pretty pale eyes and her dark hair, but our father is marrying her to a rich prince. If she didn’t come home, they would raze this whole area.”

With a speculative gaze, the man considered her words, a hint of fear in his hesitation. Finally, he waved a hand.

Téya caught Nuala’s elbow. “Walk. Fast.” They wove in and out of alleys, Téya aware of the danger.

“They knew something,” Nuala finally managed. “One of the girls—she went inside their wagon—”

“What wagon?”

“There was a wagon behind the soiled tapestries.” Nuala shook a hand. “Anyway, she said she saw twins, new to the area.”

“That’s all?”

Nuala shot her a look. “It’s more than we had before, and it’s hope that we aren’t putting up with this foul odor for nothing.”

They walked the dirty streets that were piled with bags of trash. As they stepped off what remained of a curb, Téya felt something brush against her leg. When she first glanced down, she thought a kitten moved next to her.

Nuala screamed.

That’s when Téya saw the pink, segmented tail twitching. A jolt of disgust ripped Téya straight. “Ugh!”

Nuala clapped a hand over her mouth, fighting a giggle as they both rushed away from the large rat.

“Food! Do you have food for me?” a little boy with dark eyes and dark hair ran up to them and grabbed onto them, clinging as if his life depended on it. “Please, I am hungry. You are rich. Give me money!”

“No,” Téya said firmly, prying him off. “I don’t. I’m sorry.” She nudged him in the other direction, but he simply rolled against her push and flung himself at Nuala this time.

“Tenacious, aren’t you?” Nuala said, her voice trembling.

A shout went up at the other end of the street. And when Téya glanced in that direction, she saw it wasn’t a street but an alley. A chill scampered down her neck.

“
Not
reassuring.”

Téya turned to her friend, ready to yank the boy off her. But he was gone. “Where’d he go?”

“Away, which is probably where we should go if that scared him.”

“Probably,” Téya said. The sky had not darkened yet, but it wasn’t far off. The words of the pregnant teen echoed in her mind. “I guess it’s—”

“Téya.” Nuala’s voice was filled with quiet dread and warning, pulling Téya around. Her face had gone white as she stared down the alley.

“What?” Téya shrugged, glancing between Nuala and the alley. “I don’t see—” But then she did. And panic ripped through as what she’d taken for shadows and darkness coalesced into a thick band of scraggly men.

Téya started backing up. “Nice and slow,” she said, catching Nuala’s hand.

But the crowd rushed them.

In seconds, they were surrounded. Men pushed at them. Taunted them. Touched them.

Hand tightening around Téya’s, Nuala punched one of the men. Fifteen against two. Not fair. Boone—where was Boone?

Though terrifying, Téya’s mind registered that the men weren’t
hurting
them. Who cared! They were jostling them. Forcing them to move away from their intended course. A frenzy of excitement, shouts, and trilled yells suffocated her ability to think.

Someone grabbed her hand. Téya jerked it back and tried to nail the perpetrator with a glare, but there were too many. She wasn’t sure who touched her. Who grunted in her ear. Who pushed between her shoulder blades.

White-hot fire seared the top of her right hand.

A man caught a fist-hold of her hair.

Téya yelped as he yanked hard. She clamped a hand over his then jabbed her elbow into his gut. Kneed his groin. She couldn’t even see Nuala for all the chaos. Her feet tangled and she went to a knee, hand protecting her skull against the wild insanity.

Shouts went up.

A hushed gasp fell over the crowd.

In a split second, the men were gone. Sprinting down the narrow alley.

“Let’s go,” Téya said, catching Nuala’s hand again and running in the general direction of the way they’d entered.

“Think Boone scared them off?”

“How? He isn’t here.” Her scalp and hand still burned. Téya shook out her hand against the burning that mirrored the one in her scalp.

Nuala sucked in a hard breath and stopped short. She took hold of Téya’s wrist. “
What
is that?”

“Two, Six!” Boone’s voice boomed through Roma slums.

“Thank You, God,” Téya muttered, searching for their protector, but Nuala wagged Téya’s wrist she was holding.

“Téya, look!”

“Hey!” Boone grunted as he jogged up to them. “What are you waiting for? Move!”

Scowling, she tugged free, her irritation from the day’s events getting the better of her. She flicked her hand, the stinging as fresh as the moment—and she saw it. Saw the burn on her hand. Not just any burn. The contents of her stomach threatened to free themselves from her stomach. The star-crescent.

Sam

Manson, Washington

31 May – 1330 Hours

He hadn’t been in the cottage in over a month. The night they’d shared a plate of nachos and watched a marathon of the science fiction flick
Firefly
. She sat on the sofa, legs crossed and a pillow in her lap, insisting he was out of his mind to watch a show about space cowboys and demented cannibals. But she stayed, laughed, and cheered the characters on. That was the thing about Ashland—she’d give anything a chance.

Even me
.

“Can you grab the glasses?” his sister, Carolyn, asked as she carried a box of linens to the back bedroom. “I want to give them to Goodwill and get a new set for the tenants.”

Lifting a glass from the cabinet, Sam frowned and looked toward the hall. “Tenants?”

His sister reappeared, her sandy-blond hair pulled into a ponytail. She winced and hunched. “Yeah…meant to tell you. I agreed to a six-month lease for a writer who wants to come up and get his next novel written.”

“You rented the place?”

“Look, I know for you, Ashland is coming back.”

“We don’t know otherwise.”

“Sam, I know you liked her. And I know you’re trying to find her, but Paul and I must have someone paying the bills on this place. Things are too tight for us.” She touched his shoulder. “I’m sorry. We are within our legal rights to do this.”

“What if I pay?”

Carolyn sniffed, then she must’ve noticed his expression. “You’re serious.”

The thought of anyone else living here…

“Sammy, that’s…” She tucked some hair behind her ear. “What if you can’t find her? It could be months or longer. I can’t let you do that. I know you mean well, and I know you want to find her.”

“Why would she leave me?” Had those words come from his mouth? Sam pivoted and reached for another glass in the upper cabinet, knocking the one in his hand to the ground. Glass shattered across the floor.

Carolyn jumped backward.

“Crap.” Frustrated with himself and the situation over the cottage, Sam held out a hand to his sister. “Leave it. I’ll get it cleaned up.”

“I’m really sorry, Sammy.”

He nodded and retrieved the dustpan and broom from the small closet in the narrow hall. Sweeping the chunks into the dustpan, he tried to shed his sense of helplessness in with the dirt. It did about as much good. And hadn’t he learned in BUD/S that every minute was a choice?
His
choice.

He set the pan down and palmed the counter.

Leave the whole situation alone?

Or hunt her down like the SEAL he was?

His gaze hit one of the chunks of glass. A smudge caught his eye. Sam craned his neck to the side, allowing the light to hit the piece from a different angle. Not a dirty smudge. A fingerprint.

His heart backfired as the questions again plagued him—pursue or abandon?

Holding the piece as if it were directly connected to Ashland herself only heightened his sense of duty. The insane conviction that he was to protect her. He’d wanted that since she took his order at the Green Dot that first day he’d arrived.

Sam moved out onto the deck and tugged his phone out of his pocket. Dialed. Put the phone to his ear as his gaze bounced over the sparkling waters of the lake.

“ ’alo.”

“Otto, Sam.”

“You ask me to do complicated things, yet you feel the need every time you call to tell me who you are. You don’t think I know this already?”

“Otto,” Sam said, more terse this time. “Can you run fingerprints?”

Hesitation clogged the line. “I have a feeling I don’t want to know why you’re asking that, but yes—I can. And I can even read caller ID.”

“I’ll be over in ten.” Sam pocketed the phone and stepped back into the cottage. “Hey, I’ll be back in an hour.”

Explaining why he was leaving would give her the opportunity to condemn his efforts, chastise him again. He didn’t need that. When he pulled into Otto’s driveway, Sam stared at the Jeep already parked. Jeff. What was Jeff doing here?

Sam headed to the front door, which swung open as he strode up the path. Jeff gave him a nod. “What’s going on?” Sam asked.

“That’s what I’d like to know.” Jeff closed the door and, with it, shut off most of the natural light.

A thrum of electricity emanated from Otto’s living room, where artificial light cast from a ton of monitors glared back at him.

“Look, man,” Otto said, as he pushed up his black glasses and shifted in the oversized leather executive chair. “You just had that sound, ya know? The one like you’re on a mission, and when you’re like that…well, it scares me. I don’t want to go to jail—”

“Jail?” Sam scowled at the two of them. “What do you think I’m asking? I just want fingerprints.” He held up the glass. “Otto said she didn’t exist, so let’s find out who does. Running fingerprints isn’t illegal.” When neither man moved, Sam felt as if someone had tapped a det cord and he’d blow at any second. “What?”

The Green Dot owner stretched his jaw. “You know the deputies found no fingerprints of hers at the cottage.”

Sam shrugged. He didn’t know but also wasn’t surprised.

“It’s probably not hers,” Jeff said.

“Nobody else has been in that cottage since that night.”

“Except you.”

True. Sam had been inside, but he hadn’t touched anything. “The print is too small to be mine.” Sam roughed a hand over his face. Turned to Otto and held out the piece. “Just run it. Please. I won’t ask anything else of you.”

Otto glanced at Jeff.

“Since when is the sub shop guy mayor of Manson?” Sam’s anger rose and crested on a tide of roiling frustration.

“I’m not,” Jeff said. “I just don’t want you to vanish, too.”

Sam swallowed. Understood the implied threat. Ashland had vanished. “You think if I run this, I could end up just like her.” And though the itch at the back of his brain told him she was still alive somewhere, it wasn’t out of the realm of possibilities that she had died. He could end up in the grave, too, if they ran this. He lifted his chin. “I’m willing to take the risk.” A nod to Otto. “Run it.”

“All right then,” Otto said. “It’ll take a couple of days.”

Sam backed toward the door. “I’ll wait on your call.” And before Jeff could pepper him with more questions or doubts, Sam left. They’d long been friends, and more times than not, Jeff was right. A wise man in his own right, Jeff had counseled Sam through many dark days. But not this one. Jeff wanted to play it safe. Sam wanted to play it straight—and hit whoever took Ashland head-on.

Jeff would call it reckless.

Turning back toward the lake house, Sam spotted a brown sedan in his rearview mirror. Definitely not a car from around here. Maybe a tourist. Or a rental. He shrugged it off as he turned right.

A glint behind lured his gaze back to the mirror. Brownie was still behind him. No big surprise. Going through town, there weren’t many main roads, so it wasn’t uncommon to travel the same route. Passing the Green Dot, he kept his eye on Wapato Way Road, but his periphery homed on Brownie sedan behind him. When he hit Wapato Lake and headed past the casino…

Brownie followed.

Sam tightened his hand on the steering wheel, eyeballing the side mirror. There was no way someone could already know about the fingerprint. So…who was on his tail? He had to shake them before they trailed him home.

He hit a right on Roses Avenue and slowed.

Brownie came around the corner.

Sam whipped his car around. Flung open his door. And drew his Glock. “Out of the car,” he yelled. “Get out!”

Francesca

Manson, Washington

31 May – 1415 Hours

Though she was following a Navy SEAL, she had no idea Samuel Caliguari would tag her so fast. Biting back a curse, Frankie slid the car into P
ARK
. Hands up, she eased out of the rental.

“Hands!”

She lifted them higher, her heart thundering as she stood beside a field of grapes. A flicker of temptation had her sprinting away from him through the vines, but that would only get her shot in the back.

“Who are you?” Even yelling at her and his face scrunched into a tight scowl, the man was get-out gorgeous. “Why are you following me?”

“I just want to talk,” Frankie said, swallowing a big ball of dread.

“Bull.” He was within a few feet of her now. Close enough for her to see the tat crawling out from under his T-shirt on a very large bicep. “Talk? That’s what phones are for.”