Suspect Witness
Ryshia Kennie
An undercover operation is the only way to bring an innocent witness home…After months searching for a school teacher on the run from a criminal gang, CIA operative Josh Sedovich finally finds the innocent beauty in the remotest parts of Malaysia. Eager to get Erin Argon home and into protective custody, Josh goes undercover to gain her trust and prove he isn't a threat. And although Erin claims to have witnessed the murder of a very dangerous man, Josh knows there's more to the story than she's letting on. But getting to know Erin–in public and behind closed doors–makes Josh realise just how determined she is to keep the truth hidden. Seems he isn't the only one keeping secrets that could get them both killed…
He looked down and her eyes met his.
“There’s no time to hesitate.”
She pulled her hand free.
“Who are you?”
“No time. I’m here to get you out.”
“How do I know that?”
“Look,” he gritted out. “There’s no time to offer proof. You have two choices. Trust me or…” He nodded his head backward, where it was obvious only death waited.
She stood there almost rocking on her heels. He could see the indecision, the unwillingness to trust any further, and he didn’t blame her.
“I’m saying this only once more before I throw you over my shoulder. We can do it your way or we can do it mine.”
Suspect Witness
Ryshia Kennie
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
RYSHIA KENNIE has received a writing award from the City of Regina, Saskatchewan, and also been a semifinalist in the Kindle Book Awards. She finds that there’s never a lack of places to set an edge-of-the-seat suspense, as prairie winters find her dreaming of warmer places for heart-stopping stories. They are places where deadly villains threaten intrepid heroes and heroines who battle for their right to live or even to love. For more, visit www.ryshiakennie.com (http://www.ryshiakennie.com).
For Ken—who led the journey through Malaysia’s Gunung Mulu caves with the feeble light of a travel flashlight.
Our hiking boots were ankle-deep in bat guano and each step was treacherous. I clutched the back of his shirt as I couldn’t always see in the fleeting light.
But the vast beauty of the cave was worth a ton of bat guano.
Contents
Cover (#ue30668c2-6d1a-56dd-90f8-4f605de5d468)
Introduction (#u40b4adc3-f3fe-5274-9864-2db04c8559c7)
Title Page (#u6269ebab-8385-536c-bd3b-37c1122a2aa8)
About the Author (#uc243031c-5aa4-5124-a064-a01dad454dd6)
Dedication (#u9e151884-52bf-522b-a5ab-646edb2478f8)
Chapter One (#ub75fee45-ac20-5c98-927c-a9c222203394)
Chapter Two (#u0c758b33-d15f-5fdf-a931-b486b556cb8c)
Chapter Three (#u45894064-c63f-5e32-a1e0-ff6ddd13ffdd)
Chapter Four (#u317bfbae-a693-58ba-888d-193b2828afd8)
Chapter Five (#u40d3239e-8e57-543a-98ec-4336c841c5b4)
Chapter Six (#u49f35550-437f-5094-98cc-453ed194d6eb)
Chapter Seven (#u88a7ec4f-e745-5a16-b451-4a3e11b92d18)
Chapter Eight (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Nine (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Ten (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eleven (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twelve (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Thirteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Fourteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Fifteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Sixteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Seventeen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eighteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Nineteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twenty (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twenty-One (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twenty-Two (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twenty-Three (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twenty-Four (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twenty-Five (#litres_trial_promo)
Extract (#litres_trial_promo)
Copyright (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter One (#ulink_dea69e42-887a-5e46-9011-d1ed369a5a21)
Singapore—Saturday, October 10
She had been pretty once.
Now her skin gleamed in the glow of the fluorescent lights. A strand of auburn hair fell across a well-shaped brow and her lips held a glimmering trace of sherbet lip gloss.
“It’s a shame, really,” the coroner said as his sun-bronzed hand held the edge of the stark white sheet. “Life was just getting started. Twenty-five or there about.” He shook his head. “I try to remember that every time I step out of the house. Enjoy the moment. You just never know. And in this job you’re reminded of mortality every day.” A strand of salt-and-pepper hair drifted across his forehead. “I try not to think about it or it would drive me crazy.”
“True,” Josh Sedovich said. “Any idea how she died?”
The coroner nodded. “She was hit by a blunt object to the back of the head. Surprising, I always thought Singapore so civilized until I moved here and took this job. Unfortunately, it’s turned out no better than anywhere else.”
“Why does it always end like this? On a temporary visa to see the world and, just like that, it’s over.” Josh ran his hand along the side of his neck. “It’s damn hot in here.”
“No air-conditioning,” the coroner said. “Is she who you’re looking for?”
“No. Fortunately not.” He fisted his right hand. Not so fortunately for the unknown young woman on the coroner’s slab.
Probable murder, potential arson and an unknown assassin. He’d been on the trail of this case for the past three weeks, and now one person was dead and still, miraculously, the witness lived. Not only lived but thrived over days that had turned into weeks and weeks into months. It wouldn’t have happened had the FBI called him in sooner.
“Interesting that Victor has given you a hall pass. Maybe the fact that she’s American, too. But more than likely not.” The coroner looked at Josh with mild interest. “Private investigator...” He frowned. “I thought you would have to be a little more than that. CIA maybe. Or maybe I just watch too much television.”
Josh slipped his hand into his pocket and looked away before meeting the coroner’s gaze. “American? How do you know that?”
“Assumption on my part, but look at this.” He pulled down the sheet, exposing the cadaver’s torso, and pointed at her belly button. A steel stud pierced her navel; the steel was offset only by the red, white and blue of the American flag.
“Maybe,” Josh said doubtfully. “But she might be a wannabe, too.”
“Yeah, I know. Or her boyfriend was or, or... Still comes down to an unidentified body.”
He straightened, turning to face Josh. “’Course, tattoos, earrings...” He trailed off, looking pointedly at the metal ace of spades in Josh’s left ear. “Are rather a dime a dozen.” He shook his head. “Don’t understand it much. Must be the generation gap.” An overhead fan kicked on. “What’s this girl done? Any ideas on why someone murdered her?”
“Nothing that I know of.” Josh flexed his fingers as he looked at the sad, lifeless figure. He reached over and took the corner of the sheet and pulled it up over her breasts. “Wrong place. Wrong time.”
“Seems a little more than wrong place and time. Someone torched her apartment, but not before killing her.” The coroner coughed into his gloved hand. “Heard that the original lease is in a different name, sublet. Can’t get hold of the girl who signed the lease to tell us who she sublet to. Traveling Europe or some such idiocy.”
“Just a minute.” Josh held up his forefinger before turning his back and taking a few steps away. He pulled out the cell phone he’d bought at a local convenience store and hit Redial. “Yeah, Victor. I’ll be there in a half hour, maybe less.” He slipped the phone back into his pocket.
“Well, I suppose we’ll know who she is soon enough.” The coroner slid the drawer containing the body back into place and out of sight.
Twenty minutes later, Josh stepped over the charred threshold of the ruined apartment building. Outside, the cinder brick exterior was still intact but inside was a gutted mess. Water dripped from the ceiling and the acrid smell of burned plastic mixed with wood smoke and other synthetics.
He covered his mouth with the back of his hand and coughed.
“Josh Sedovich.” Victor Chong held out his hand. It was a quick shake, more a formality than one with any feeling.
“Chong.” He shook the man’s hand for the second time that day. “Still can’t convince you that a private investigator might get you more information than this team of officials you’re set on?”
“No more than you could this morning.”
“Definitely a case of arson,” Victor confirmed with a shake of his head. His safety helmet was tucked under his arm and there were smudges of soot across his cheek. His dark hair was matted to his head and it was obvious that he had spent a great deal of time inside the smoking and charred remains. “Have you seen the body?”
“I did.”
“And?” Victor arched a brow. “Was she the girl you’re looking for? Your lost person?”
“No idea who she might be, but she isn’t who I’m looking for.” He glanced beyond Victor into the small studio apartment where she’d lived.
“Can’t imagine hunting missing persons day in and day out. No variety.”
“It’s a job like any other,” he said shortly.
“Now if that wasn’t a false statement,” Victor replied. “People go missing for all sorts of reasons, and I’ll bet you’ve seen them all. So, best-case scenario that she’s not in the morgue yet. I mean the one you’re looking for. Obviously, the other... Well, we both know where she is.”
“Best-case scenario, it wasn’t her,” Josh agreed, turning to look at the damage the fire had done. “Too bad about the identification bit. You would have made my job easier.”
Victor shrugged. “Although identification isn’t my problem, I still wouldn’t mind having one up on Detective Tay. He’s a prideful bugger, always rubbing my nose in it.”
Josh stepped around Victor, his gaze taking in the cheaply papered walls, the hint of a vine pattern only partially concealed by soot and smoke. The tiny apartment was pretty much ruined. The water had destroyed what the fire hadn’t.
“Interesting that the body wasn’t burned at all. Now it’s just a matter of getting the right people to view her. And then we’ll get that damn ID.”
Josh breathed lightly as he stepped into the room. Victor carried on his one-way conversation as he followed. The smell of smoke was more intense here as it saturated the air and bit harshly into his sinuses. His stomach rolled. He looked with envy at the mask Victor donned as he stepped over a pool of water and sodden books that were scattered around a fallen bookcase.
The dull red spine of a hard cover copy of Wuthering Heights lay across the top of a box of paperbacks whose bright and torrid covers curled and swelled. The classic was like an old dog in the midst of a pack of pups. He skirted a small, nondescript, collapsed wooden table—more cardboard than wood, the kind purchased in discount box stores—and walked over to a small desk that stood untouched except for the damp soot that clung to it. The desk was different from the other furniture in the room. It looked older and had character. The patina was richer and darker, the legs had deep scrolls carved into them that swirled through the wood. He slipped on a glove and opened a side drawer. There was nothing but a collection of elastic bands, tape, pens and blank notepads. The heat had not gotten to this part of the room. He did a quick take of the other side drawer. This time it opened to a small line of files. His fingers flitted quickly through them, stopped and went back. From the corner of his eye he saw Victor watching. He wasn’t sure how long Victor would allow his surreptitious view of the apartment before demanding that the fire investigative team and police take over. It was a lull in the investigation. The fire had only been out a few hours, and Josh was taking full advantage as he had done in other crime scenes in other countries throughout the world. It was all about speed and timing. He left the files and moved to the middle drawer.
He took out a blue leather folder and pushed the metal release. The folder opened; nothing was inside. He glanced over his shoulder. Victor was not looking. His attention went to the bottom side drawer, and his fingers skimmed quickly through the files.
He flipped through papers in a cardboard file. Empty—except one small sheet and a receipt. Both bore the name Erin and one Erin Kelley.
Tell Mike I took his last advice.
The note was written in a careful script, the letters fine, unlike a more masculine scroll that only confirmed what the signature said. The writer was Erin Kelley, or at least the woman currently calling herself that. The woman who had so recently been Erin Kelley Argon before she’d changed her passport and her last name. A twist of fate twenty-nine years ago had her parents on a business trip in Canada where her mother went into early labor. As a result, Erin qualified for citizenship in that country and when she’d run, she’d taken advantage of it. He took both pieces of evidence, folded them one-handed and slipped them into his pocket. He closed the drawer and opened the middle drawer and retraced the fine line he’d felt earlier. He pushed and something gave. He pulled open the drawer farther to reveal a hidden compartment.
“What do you have?” Victor was beside him. “The authorities only did a cursory look before they took the body away. And I just got here. So anything you can do to make our job easier.” He pulled the thin edge of his moustache with a troubled look. “Although, really, I shouldn’t be letting you do this.”
Josh ignored the man as he took out an American driver’s license and a passport. He flipped open the passport and it only confirmed what the first piece of ID had already told him. “Here’s your identification. Emma Whyte. She had it well hidden against thieves.”
“By jove. Good work, old chap.”
Josh grimaced and rubbed the back of his neck. “Since when did you become a Brit, Vic?”
Victor scowled and glanced at his watch.
“What time is it?”
“Seven o’clock.”
“It’s been a long day. I’ll leave you to it,” Josh said. “She’s obviously not the woman I was looking for.”
“Good luck!” Victor told him genially.
Josh stepped over the threshold, seemingly empty-handed. Once outside, he dialed the number that would be in service for only a few more hours.
“It’s not her,” he said. “But she was here. Whoever the bastard is that they have on her tail, he now knows her last location.”
“What’s the matter? You sound off.”
“Could be the last two years have been pretty much on the road.”
“What, you’re telling me you don’t love it?”
“Not that much. After this, Vern, I need a vacation. I need to go home.”
“To the RV? Josh you’re not a family man and you live in a trailer.”
His hand went into his pocket, his thumb smoothing the worn bead of a dime-store earring. “It’s home, Vern. And family or not, it’s time for me to take a break.”
“Okay, fine.”
He dropped the earring back into his pocket as a door slammed across the street. He walked away from the apartment building and around the corner to where an alley gave him a discreet view of the comings and goings around the apartment. “What gives with this case, Vern? There’s another body. A woman. Every bloody assignment... I’m so damned sick of seeing women dead. At least this time she wasn’t raped. Not that that is any better. Dead is dead.”
“You’re taking it personally,” Vern Ferguson, the director of Josh’s branch in the CIA said.
He turned away from the street and looked down the tight, concrete-bordered alley. Sometimes it was hard not to take it personally. He drew in a breath, held it a few seconds longer than necessary. “You said you have something new? What is it, Vern?” His gaze roamed the area—the overflowing garbage bin, the tiger-striped dog snuffling through the refuse. “I don’t think there’s much time. We could be talking hours, minutes... Who knows?”
“Intelligence has her in Georgetown, Malaysia.”
“Georgetown. Damn it, Vern. Too bad you didn’t have that for me sooner. You know the Anarchists don’t waste time. They’re not just any biker gang. As it is she’s been running for five months.”
“Yeah, I know,” Vern said with a hitch in his voice that was part wheeze, part cough. “She’s tired and with the trial going forward, they won’t stop.”
“Right, and they want her dead, and odds are they’re on their way. Fortunately, no one knows where in Georgetown yet.”
“Then quit wasting time on the damn phone.”
Josh grimaced as he clicked off and tossed the phone into a nearby garbage can.
Chapter Two (#ulink_6f6d8605-debf-5561-906a-6513b1a3e869)
Georgetown, Malaysia—Monday, October 12
“Give Respect, Get Respect.” Erin Kelley repeated the words as she wrote the phrase on the chalkboard and ended with a sweeping flourish. Her fingers shook and she had to stop. She ran her tongue along her lower lip, her back to the class. But even writing the word respect sent a slight tremor through her. The chalk dust clung uncomfortably to her sweaty palm.
The temperature was unseasonably warm and this early in the morning the heat was already unbearable in the small, cramped room. A finger of light skittered across the blackboard, briefly illuminating the words. She mentally shrank from the light as if under a searchlight, as if they’d found her after all these months. Impossible, she reminded herself as the chalk sweated in her hand, and the children shifted anxiously behind her. And as she had done so many times before, she reminded herself that she was safe, that her trail was cold. Enough time had elapsed. They’d never find her. They were no longer interested. And as she did at odd times throughout any given day, she considered the truth of those beliefs and whether she was really safe, whether these children were safe. One day, she knew, despite her hopes, the answer would have her on the run again but that wasn’t today.
She put down the chalk and turned to face the class.
“Today, we’re going to learn about respect,” she said in English. The school’s curriculum was taught in English to children who were already bilingual, fluent in both Malay and English, and who, in many cases, if they hadn’t already, would master a third or even fourth language in their lifetime.
At the back of the room a heavyset boy shifted in his seat. Beside him, a sullen-faced classmate shuffled papers across his desk. And at the front one boy whispered furtively to another. The rest of the boys eyed her uneasily. They knew what was coming. There wasn’t a boy who had missed the taunting in the schoolyard and not one who didn’t know what was going to happen as a result. She had made it all perfectly clear from her first day.
She fixed her gaze on the targets of this lecture. The two culprits dressed in crisply pressed navy pants with matching jackets, white shirts and sleek haircuts stared back without a flicker of emotion. They were both the sons of successful Malaysian businessmen, and neither lacked for pride or esteem. They were children of wealth and privilege with attitudes she had struggled to control since her arrival. Yesterday, their attitudes had threatened to harm another student. It was a scenario that played out in schoolyards across the globe and through the decades. They had taunted a slight, studious boy on the playground. She bit back the scathing words she wanted to say. Bullying aside, they were still only children. But for a second she saw another classroom a world away, and another child and a small girl pummeling another.
Leave my sister alone!
The skinny, carrot-haired girl stuck in her mind, running through reel after reel. The knobby knees, the brilliant hair, the circle of taunting children. And always she stood screaming those words, running intervention as she grabbed and punched and pulled hair, freeing her sister from the circle of tormentors—over and over again.
Her gaze went to the thin boy in the front of the class. He wasn’t looking at her. Instead, he was fumbling through his backpack, which was emblazoned with a variety of action figures.
“Before we begin today’s lesson, who would like to volunteer to go tell Mr. Daniel that the air conditioner isn’t working?”
“They’ve shut it off, Miss,” Ian said. “They always do in October.”
“Besides, Mr. Daniel’s left.” Isaac waved his hand frantically in the air even as he spoke.
“On an errand,” Ian added.
“In your new car,” Isaac finished. He was fascinated by vehicles of any sort and had followed her into school last week pestering her with details of her new vehicle purchase and clearly unimpressed with what had impressed her; gas mileage.
“Right. I didn’t realize he was leaving this soon.” She pulled at the back of her cotton blouse, which was beginning to stick. She wiped the back of her hand across her damp brow as her eyes drifted to the parking lot and she thought of Daniel. Friend or not, she wasn’t apt to lend out her vehicle on a whim, but Daniel hadn’t asked. Instead, he’d planned to use public transport and lose over a half a day’s pay to attend a dental appointment. Knowing the pain the tooth was causing him and that he was too proud to ask for help, she’d offered him her car. Insisted, really.
“So, let’s begin.” She swept a hand to the blackboard. “Respect.”
The class of ten-and eleven-year-old boys in their fourth year of the six-year Malaysian primary school system should have been sweating and fidgeting. Instead, they now sat with backs straight, their eyes fixed on her.
“Anyone know what that means?” She placed her hands on the back of her chair. The sunlight seemed to shift and for a moment blinded her. She pushed the small crystal bowl to the front of her desk. The orchid and the bowl were a birthday gift from a group of teachers she’d had lunch with since she’d arrived. They’d presented the gift yesterday and even had sung a round of “Happy Birthday.” Except that her birthday wasn’t yesterday, nor was it this month. Her birthday was months past and a lifetime away.
“He’s a loser.” A boy stood up. His height and classic good looks belied his age.
The boy in question sat slouched over his desk, his untidy mop of black hair hanging forward and hiding his face from the class. She looked away and instead forced her gaze to the boy who had just spoken.
“Sit!” she snapped at Jefri. The boy was one of a small, tight-knit group who thought his family’s wealth placed him a tier above everyone else. “No one’s a loser.”
Out of the corner of her eye she saw a flicker of motion. Something moved in the parking lot. She allowed her attention to divert momentarily. Her heart thumped.
“Miss Kelley?” Jefri’s voice was insistent and still had the high notes of childhood, despite the fact that at almost twelve, he stood tall enough to face her eye to eye.
“Just a minute.” She motioned the boy to sit down. Outside the heat rose in shimmering waves from the pavement as the shadow cast by the voluptuous canopy of an ancient rain tree fell short of cooling the overheated tar. In the parking lot, her new lemon-yellow Naza Sutera gleamed. Daniel hadn’t left yet.
Her hand curled on her desk, her nails biting into her palm. A familiar figure moved with an easy walk toward her car, and whatever or whoever had caught her attention previously was gone. She breathed out a sigh as she recognized the school custodian, Daniel.
She turned her attention back to the class as she pointed to the chalkboard. “Shall we read this together?”
“Give Respect. Get Respect,” the boys repeated, their childish voices rising solemnly to the occasion, some looking rather sullen, while others repeated dutifully as they did everything she asked.
“So, now we’ll discuss what that means. I want—”
A blast of light exploded outside with a roar that rattled the windows and knocked the remainder of her sentence into eternity, where it would remain forgotten. Somewhere outside the room someone screamed.
A door slammed.
“Stay where you are. Sit down, all of you. Now!”
She rushed to the window even as the children jumped from their seats.
Flames shot into the air, smoke billowed, obscuring the parking lot, the grass. “Oh, my God!” She took a stumbling step backward. Her body seemed to freeze in position.
“Miss Kelley?” a small voice questioned her.
“Did you see that?” someone else shouted.
The class, she’d almost forgotten... A boy pushed in beside her, fighting for window space.
Voices chattered in the hallway.
She needed to secure the room. Protect the children.
“Sit!” she repeated as she swung around. “Stay away from the door!” She grabbed the edge of the desk and yanked it in that direction. But already the door had flung open and children scattered into the hallway.
“They’re here,” she whispered.
Chapter Three (#ulink_164b709d-ff3f-5ac5-abec-4998ca6194b6)
Flames shot in the air as Josh closed the space between him and the fireball that had once been a vehicle. Black smoke billowed through the flames, and the smell of gas and burning metal filled the parking lot. And there was a hint of something else, the putrid sweet scent of burning flesh.
No.
He shielded his eyes from the intense glare and grimaced at the sight of the blackened hulk behind the wheel. He watched silently, aware of two things in that instant—that the corpse was too big to be her and that the outlaw biker gang, the Anarchists, had found her. He backed up and returned to the shelter of a canopy of pepper vines that fronted the edge of the school and provided a leafy shelter. He had no qualms about moving out of sight now that he knew the victim was beyond his help. His attention settled briefly on the burning vehicle. Chaos erupted from the building as children yelled and shrieked. The sharp commands of authority cut through the mass of voices as two female teachers attempted to control a mob of children. He hovered at the corner of the building, away from the main crush, out of sight of curious eyes.
He edged forward. The children milled excitedly, some cupping their hands over their eyes to get a better view. An older, gray-haired woman in a suit jacket and skirt was hurling orders and pointing inside. When one boy headed for the steps, she yanked him back by the collar of his navy blue school uniform. Josh’s gaze went to the other exit.
“Where are you?” He pushed the knit cap back from his forehead and glanced at the car and the fire that continued to burn bright and hot. He turned his attention back to the school and debated rounding the building and entering through the back. But that would serve no purpose. He was well aware that a face-to-face encounter, especially now, would have her running. He’d come too far to lose her.
“Come on,” he encouraged his absent quarry. He wondered how she’d managed to survive as long as she had. From what he could see she had only a rudimentary knowledge of the art of disappearing and a bucket of pure luck. That was about to change.
“Daniel!”
It was a woman’s voice, clear with a sweet edge despite the shock that so obviously laced through the words.
“There you are,” he said under his breath. She had changed her name, her nationality and her look, but he would know her anywhere. Her hair was now a pallid blond contained in an elegant updo that he recognized as an attempt to add years to her youthful face. But even at a distance he would recognize those eyes and those cheekbones. He’d studied that face for hours, memorized it as he did for every job. Except this time he had wanted to know so many other things, such as what her voice sounded like. Now he knew.
Her gaze seemed to fix on the scene. He inched closer.
A movement out of the corner of his eye had him turning, and as he did he saw that one of the children had broken from the cluster and was moving much too close to the vehicle.
“Damn it,” he swore. The flames were licking at the vehicle and there was no way of knowing if the gas tank had gone with the first explosion. He moved fast, forgetting about keeping to the fringes or keeping his head low. He grabbed the child and rolled with him, sideways and away from the hot, still-popping metal.
The boy squirmed, and Josh pinned the youngster with one hand. “It might explode again. Stay back unless you want to die.” He repeated the command in Malay for good measure.
The boy nodded. Josh let the boy up and watched as he rushed back to his friends, who were all huddled a safe distance away. There was a look of hero worship in the group as the boys gathered around him. The boy was obviously considered a hero for undertaking such a risky business as getting close to the car or possibly being tackled by a strange man, or maybe a combination of the two. The adults were moving out of synch. One woman corralled another group of boys while another was frantically talking on her cell. Near the entrance of the school he could see two others, but all of their attention was focused on the vehicle, and all of them seemed to be moving in a disjointed fashion or not at all.
Josh diverted his attention back to the vehicle. The smoke curled thick and black, and in the distance he could hear the wailing sirens. The canopy of a lone rain tree threw shadows over the shrinking fire in the parking lot, its arthritic trunk standing thick and knotted, a silent silhouette. Across the street a woman clutched the handles of her pedal-powered pushcart, the vibrant pink, yellow and red flowers muted in the gathering smoke. On the main street cars continued to move in a steady stream as if smoke and fire were a normal part of their daily commute.
He scowled. He’d been so close. It had been gut instinct to check the primary schools in Georgetown, suspecting she would hunker down, consider herself safe again for a time. On Sunday, with the help of a local investigator that he’d met on a previous assignment, he’d acquired access to and checked the records of every school in the city that taught in English and that had acquired a foreign female teacher in the past few months.
He’d gone to her apartment just as school would be beginning for the day. While he was fairly certain that they’d located her, he’d hoped to find something that might prove that the woman they’d found in school records was her. He’d jimmied the building’s back door. Fortunately the building was old and unalarmed, but who he suspected was the building’s owner had found him just as he left her apartment. In fact, he had just closed and locked the door, leaving it as he had found it including the small piece of tissue tucked in the latch, meant to alert her to an intruder. It had taken a bit of acting to back out of that situation, but he’d had what he wanted—confirmation that she was the teacher he was seeking and—what he’d thought at the time was an interesting tidbit of information—that she was the owner of a new Naza Sutera.
In the distance, the Penang hills cast a sinister shadow as they cradled one against the other, their dark protrusions muted by distance. His gaze cruised across the bystanders, did a mental calculation of faces, numbers, positions. Nothing.
Josh gritted his teeth over the expletive that wouldn’t change the reality.
She was gone.
Chapter Four (#ulink_9fc62aeb-8f80-55a0-9b07-54e9560650a9)
Erin was fighting for breath as she rounded the corner and stood out of sight of the school. A lorry swished past belching exhaust as a convoy of motorcyclists followed close behind. It seemed as though they were all fighting for space as a truck jammed in behind the cyclists and the loud red of Coca-Cola overlaid it all as a delivery truck squeezed into the street. A horn honked and a bicyclist swerved as pedestrians weaved their way through the intersection’s traffic snarl.
Her jaw was clenched so tight it ached, and her hand worried the strap of the bag as her eyes strained for a cab to flag. One broke with the traffic and pulled to the curb. She rushed to meet it, throwing open the door and flinging herself inside.
“Focus,” she muttered. She fired off her address in panicked words that she had to repeat when the driver turned around with a puzzled look.
Behind her, flames still punctured the otherwise quiet late-morning sky as sirens wailed and trouble inched closer.
“Daniel,” she whispered. She dashed a tear away and unclenched her hands. She looked out the window as sun glared through the windscreen. A motorcycle pulled up beside the cab, a chopper. The driver’s legs were propped up as he sat back on the low-slung seat. He turned, a dusty-brown beard covering much of his swarthy face, and smiled. The smile was not one of friendship. It was a leer, maybe, or worse. She hit the door lock.
She swallowed and clenched her free hand so tight that her nails dug into her palm. Her throat closed and her eyes burned with unshed tears.
She’d hated to run but she didn’t have a choice. The conversation with Mike Olesk had made that fact clear. A retired police officer who had been a friend of her father’s and a man she hadn’t seen in years, Mike had been the only person she could think of whom she could trust and who might help her sort out her options. The conversation that ensued was one she would never forget, for it had changed her life.
He tapped ashes into a glass ashtray, the Hollywood emblem once sharply emblazoned on it now blurred with ashes. “I know how these things go down. The authorities make promises. But face it, on this one we’re talking local police up against the Anarchists. They don’t stand a chance. If it were the feds it would be a different matter.”
“Why isn’t it?” Her stomach turned over, anticipating what he would say.
“It will be soon. The local authorities will be calling you in for questioning, unless you come forward first. I suspect you maybe have a day, maybe less.”
“No,” she said shortly. “I can’t. I won’t answer their questions.”
“You know you don’t have a choice. Why are you balking at this, Erin?”
She shook her head.
“It would be for the best. They could charge you with obstruction of justice.”
“I’d go to jail?” There’d be safety in jail.
“Maybe, maybe not.” He coughed, the sound deep and achy in the silence between them. “Word’s out that the Anarchists will do anything to ensure their leader, Derrick Reese, doesn’t serve time. Maybe if I put in a word with the sheriff’s office we could have this thing escalated to a federal level. We could live with that.”
“I can’t.”
He rubbed the bridge of his nose with his thumb. “If we don’t do that, if you run, that only makes you guilty of a crime.”
“I can’t. I’ll run. Can you help me?”
“Erin. Are you out of your mind? Did you hear what I just told you? If I can get to the feds, if you admit everything, they can keep you safe.”
“They’ll want me to testify,” she repeated, her heart thumping.
“Of course.”
“Under oath?”
“Under oath,” he agreed. “Erin, what is this all about? Who are you protecting?”
Silence hung between them.
“Who was it, Mike? Who turned me in?”
He took a long drag on a hand-rolled cigarette, his thick brows drawing down over narrow eyes.
“Word has it that only this morning that no-good boyfriend of yours squealed louder than a pig facing a luau.”
“Steven,” she whispered. And despite everything, the betrayal still hurt. She couldn’t trust anyone, not with the truth, not with who was really the witness.
Smoke curled around them and her nose tickled. She wanted to sneeze but instead she coughed.
“Mike, I can’t give you details. Just trust me. I have to run. I need to disappear.”
“Erin?”
“Mike. Please, can you help me? It’s life or death. Please, just trust me.”
He stood there looking at her for a long time before he nodded. “For how long?”
“I don’t know,” she said quietly. “As long as it takes.”
“Come.” He motioned with one hand. She followed him and together they worked out a plan.
She shuddered. She ached to go home, to where it all began—San Diego. And she knew she might never go home again.
She opened her eyes and for a moment she froze, thoughts of home driven from her mind.
“The children,” she murmured. She would have stayed for them, if it had been necessary. But the children were safe. She’d made sure of that. The principal had corralled many of them before they’d exited the building. The ones who had managed to slip outside were under the watchful eyes of two senior teachers.
She’d miss them, even the troublesome ones. Her life had become one of loss, of regret—it was what she hadn’t expected of a life on the run, or more aptly what she hadn’t thought of until the reality hit.
Focus, she reminded herself as the cab swung onto the congested street that she called home. Overhead, signs advertising products of the East and West vied for attention as the cab pushed farther into the crowded streets, and she wondered if this had been an error in judgment. Should she have gone directly to the airport? Were they on her trail even now? Or did they think her dead?
They.
She had been running from the faceless they for too long.
She could see the Victorian elegance of a former British mansion, the timeless beauty of its stone exterior a sign that she was almost home. She took courage from the familiar sight as the building pushed its stately presence into a world that seemed to be fighting for space. It was as if it refused to relinquish the hold it once had had, standing rock solid as the world around it changed.
The cab swung around the corner and the landscape changed again. If there was anything she loved about Georgetown it was how the old laced its presence through the new, how British traditions merged with Malay. She had purposely taken an apartment relatively close to the school within the hustle and bustle of daily life in Georgetown. Her apartment was a low-slung building in a cluttered section of the city where shops and open-air stalls dotted the landscape and fronted the more traditional brick-and-mortar buildings behind them. She’d loved this area from the first moment she’d laid eyes on it.
Not today.
Today, even under the brilliant afternoon sun, it seemed flush with shadows. On the sidewalk a man walked in a djellaba as his leather sandals skimmed easily across the concrete. His wife walked by his side in her traditional burka, her face and her thoughts hidden from the world by a layer of cloth and a veil. It wasn’t an uncommon sight in Georgetown. Yet today, despite the fact that he held her hand—it all seemed to take on a sinister edge. Erin turned away to look out the opposite window.
The cab pulled over, and as she opened the door, the scent of curry intermingled with the smell of sewer. It was familiar and had begun to remind her of home, of here. After two months Georgetown felt comfortable, safe. Had, she thought with regret.
“Could you wait, please?” she requested as she stepped out of the cab.
Inside the apartment building, the narrow hallway with its faded morning glory wallpaper was empty. Only the chatter of a television set coming through one door and the clunking of the ancient washing machine down the hall broke the quiet. She stopped at the dark wood door at the end of the hallway. For a minute it was as if she wasn’t here, as if this nightmare had never happened.
Daniel, she thought, and a sob hitched deep inside her and threatened her control. She took a deep breath. She needed to focus on running, but she could only think of Daniel. He was one of the few friends she’d made in Georgetown, and he’d still be alive if she hadn’t loaned him her car. He hadn’t asked to borrow it any more than he’d asked to die. It had all been her fault.
Her fault. Those two words kept reeling through her mind.
Stop it, she told herself. Just stop it. Now wasn’t the time for recriminations or even grieving. She had to get out before she jeopardized someone else’s life.
Erin reached for the knob and hesitated. She ran her tongue along her bottom lip. She looked down at the key in her hand. This time when she reached she touched the heavy brass knob, but then dropped her hand and took a step back. A small knot of white tissue lay on the floor. She worried her fingers against her palms, staring at that tiny piece of tissue.
“Erin.”
She jumped, bit back a shriek and swung around.
“Yong, you scared me.”
“There was someone asking for you earlier today. Did they find you?” the apartment owner asked. His face was downcast, and his slight shoulders slouched as they always did. “I’m sorry. After he left I opened your door just to do a check. We’ve had to replace some of the locks in the building.” He shrugged. “I didn’t go in, but I wanted to make sure your lock was working, that it couldn’t be easily compromised. Besides, I’m sorry if he was a friend of yours, but I didn’t like the look of him. And a double check is never a bad idea.”
She unclenched her hand and took a step back. “I thought someone had been here.”
“I thought you might.” He smiled. “The old tissue in the door frame trick. Not a bad idea for a single woman. Not that we have much trouble with break-ins but you never know.” He cleared his throat, the sound raspy and raw in the narrow hallway. “Just glad you haven’t needed it.”
“Thanks, Yong. I don’t know what I’d do without you.”
“No trouble,” Yong said, but his eyes narrowed and he took a step closer. “You’re all right?”
“Fine. Thank you.” She turned the key over in her hand.
“That doesn’t sound fine to me. Remember, like I’ve said, you need anything. I have daughters your age. But you know that. You met one of them.” He hesitated. “You’re sure nothing’s wrong?”
“I’m sure.”
“Okay,” he said and turned away, jingling keys in his hand.
“Yong.”
“Yeah.” He stopped.
“What did he look like? The man, I mean.” She fumbled with words and struggled to keep the tremor out of her voice.
“A big guy, six feet, maybe more. Hard to tell from my view down here.” He chuckled. “I don’t know. Not bad-looking.” He paused. “Why? You think you might know him?”
“Was he Malay?” she asked.
“Don’t think so. Had an accent, not Aussie or anything. Something else.”
“Thanks.” She hadn’t asked his hair color or his race or... Did it matter? She knew he wasn’t Malay. If he got close enough for her to see him, did she stand a chance? She had to get out of here and fast. But she needed to know. She had to ask at least one of those questions. “What color was his hair?”
“Don’t know. He was wearing one of those knitted caps.”
He jangled his keys, his sneaker-clad feet almost twitching as he answered her. “Look, I don’t think he’ll be back. And I’ll be keeping a closer eye on things.”
Her hand shook as it went to the door frame.
“No worries,” he said over his shoulder as he headed down the hallway and to his own apartment.
“No worries,” she repeated.
She turned the key in the lock with fingers that still shook. She stood in the doorway for a minute, then two. She pushed the door open wider. Her eyes darted back and forth, taking in micro snapshots of the room. Behind her a door slammed, and she jumped.
Hesitantly, she leaned one hand against the door frame as if that would ground her, make everything normal or turn back the clock. But nothing changed. The cot folded down from the wall, the kitchenette was jammed against the opposite wall, the tiny television in the far corner. Through the narrow window that faced the street, she could see the cab waiting.
“This is it,” she murmured. “This is goodbye.” She wiped the back of her hands across both eyes. She took a breath and then another, pulled out a tissue and blew her nose.
She grabbed her bag from the top shelf of the closet, tore clothes from hangers and emptied her drawers. Within a few minutes she was packed.
She never looked back as she closed the door behind her, as if this was just another day, and hurried out the door and into the waiting cab.
“The airport, please,” she said. Her hand knotted around the straps of her knapsack and a small bag that carried her few personal items as she perched on the edge of her seat. She pressed her free hand to her temple as if that would still the headache that was beginning to beat dully and then dropped it to clutch the seat in front of her.
* * *
JOSH SLIPPED OUT the back entrance of the school and tucked the brochure he’d stolen from her classroom into his pocket. He would disappear as silently as he had arrived, leaving the retreating flames and tamped-down chaos to the authorities. He glanced at his watch, which functioned as a GPS as well as registered the time among other things. He hadn’t expected the car bomb. As a precaution, he’d planned to mount a small tracking device on her car that would have followed her anywhere she went.
The victim—collateral damage. It was the only way to think of such things without losing it. He’d seen a number of breakdowns in the field from either mental or emotional stress; he didn’t plan to become one of them.
Collateral damage.
School caretaker. That information hadn’t been too hard to obtain. He’d overheard the hysterical words of a female teacher, confirmed that the car was his target’s and that she’d lent it out, confirmed that Erin Argon was still alive.
Would she flee by land or air? Where? He considered the trajectory of her five-month flight. She’d begun her flight fueled by fear and misguided advice rather than immediate danger. Lucky and wily, her changed name and Canadian passport had kept her hidden until these past few weeks when he had been assigned the case. Still, she was damn lucky, and he knew he had little time to find her before the Anarchists beat him to it.
Luck aside it was amazing what she had accomplished and how easily she had slipped out of sight. So far she had crossed no fewer than ten international borders. Other than the weeks in Singapore, this had been the only place where she had settled. So where would a woman go who had crossed continents and countries, who had thought she was safe and who now had to come up with an alternate plan?
He was under her skin. An inkling of doubt rose at that thought. Doubt that maybe it was the other way around. He shrugged it off. She was an assignment, nothing more. He’d studied her, he knew her. She was tired. She’d go somewhere to regroup, to come up with a plan and another place to hide, because this time she had run, more than likely, without a plan. Where would she go? He touched the brochure in his pocket and wondered if it could be as easy as that.
“It’s a risk,” he muttered and smiled. There wasn’t anything better than a risk; throw in one of his infamous hunches and he was betting that he was bang on right. After all, who else would know that she was fascinated by Malaysia’s bat caves in Gunung Mulu National Park? He was guessing she had kept that information to herself. He certainly wouldn’t have suspected it if she hadn’t left her canvas satchel and run, taking nothing from her classroom but her purse. And if he hadn’t snuck into her classroom before he left he would never have known, either, for he would never have found her brochure on the Mulu Caves and literally stumbled on to where he was now sure she planned to go next.
He jumped in a cab and gave the driver the order for the airport even as his mind churned through the options. She was panicked. Would she take the slow route out of here or just hop a plane? He suspected the latter. If she were smart, and so far she’d proven she was, a few transfers around the country and her trail would become a little grayer, a little more difficult to follow. Keep on doing that and she could disappear. He needed to get to the airport to confirm he was right and get a ticket on that same plane. He leaned back.
“Damn,” he muttered as his thoughts went back to the one man she’d reached out to, the man who had been the catalyst to send Erin Kelley Argon on her five-month flight.
“Mike Olesk, we finally meet.”
He held out his hand.
“I don’t have time for this,” the grizzle-faced burnout said.
“You used to be a city cop,” Josh said.
“What’s it to you?”
“I’m with the CIA.” He held out his identification.
“And you want to know about Erin.”
Josh’s lips tightened. “I didn’t expect it would be this easy,” he said drily. He seriously hadn’t thought the man would admit to knowing her, never mind that he would just blurt out her name.
“That’s about all I’m going to tell you,” he said with a surly edge to his voice.
“She’s in danger,” Josh said. “And you have the power to help me find her.”
“How do I know you are who you say you are?”
“I could get a warrant,” he said, but it was only a mild threat.
“You don’t have time now, do you? The trial begins in a little more than a month. They need Erin, and the Anarchists need her dead. She’s the witness that can put them all away.” Mike shook his head.
“Why?”
“As if you don’t know. She witnessed a murder, and it wasn’t just any murder, was it? No, the gang leader up and shoots what looks like the gang’s link to crime-based money out of Europe.” He ran a hand through hair that shone with grease. “You’re not the only one in the know, and you’re not the only one hunting Erin.”
“How well do you know her?” Josh asked quietly. There was something else going on here or at least he suspected so. Information was flowing too quickly, and that, he had learned during his six years in the field, was always suspect.
Mike looked surprised and there was a secretive cast to his bloodshot brown eyes. “Not that well. I knew her as a kid when her father and I worked together. As an adult, we lost touch until... Well, until she came to me for help.”
“And you helped her disappear.”
“Something like that. But I don’t know where she is now. I haven’t heard from her in months.”
“Fourteen days,” he muttered as outside the traffic continued to flash by. That was the number of days since he had spoken to Mike Olesk, and then had cobbled together her flight path that had taken him to Singapore and finally to this point.
Mulu Caves in Gunung Mulu National Park. He opened the brochure. The glossy pictures would have been enticing in another situation. The information gave the usual condensed and carefully edited descriptions, all of it what he already knew. The park was isolated and accessible only by a ten-hour boat ride or a small plane. It was the perfect place to hide, but it was also the perfect place for a trap. He suspected she hadn’t thought of that; she hadn’t had time.
He looked out the window and smiled.
She was in his sights. He wasn’t in hers.
Chapter Five (#ulink_4b864273-9826-557e-81f4-d281db00a0e5)
In the past hour Josh had laid a false trail from Miri, Malaysia, through Beijing and then to Hong Kong, a hotel registration here in Erin Kelley’s name, a car rental there. But that trail would delay the men who were after her only for so long—a day, maybe two.
“They’re offering ten million for the kill, Josh.” Vern folded his arms, his feet propped on the desk, his florid skin at odds with his blond hair. “Fortunately, the first man out of the gate isn’t one of the best.”
The passage of time since that conversation seemed nominal considering all that had transpired. Josh shifted his pack and artfully dodged milling passengers in Miri’s airport, all the while taking in the change in her appearance. Despite the fact that her new hair color gleamed a startling blue black and wire-rimmed glasses glinted beneath the artificial light and hid her vivid blue eyes, he still recognized her. Her frame was thinner, more fragile than her pictures had indicated, and the blue-black wig made her delicate skin look pale and gave the illusion of fragility. It was an amateurish attempt at a quick disguise, but it was effective for now. In fact, the black hair color was genius in a population where the average person was dark haired and dark skinned. It made her blend in just a bit more. Unfortunately, she hadn’t had time or hadn’t thought of the pallor of her skin accentuated against the unnaturally dark hair.
He shrugged. It would do and sometimes on the run, that was all you had. He imagined she’d be pulling out hair dye when they reached the Gunung Mulu National Park. It wasn’t a bad idea and it was all he had or, he amended, she had, at least until he developed some kind of rapport with her.
Erin Kelley Argon.
He had followed her flight halfway across the world and watched her survive despite the odds. Her path hadn’t been as simple to pick up as he’d first thought it would be. He’d been surprised at every turn. At times she’d shown gut intelligence for flight, as if she had done this at some other time in her life. Despite having help and advice from Mike Olesk, alone she had still gone through the steps with a polish that hadn’t left one misstep. That was evident in the fact that the Anarchists hadn’t expanded their search off the continental United States until shortly before he’d been deployed.
Yet nothing in the history he had gone over said she had ever had a reason to run, to hide. Until the murder, she’d led a normal life.
He was still in awe of those initial moments of her disappearance. Her flight had been brilliant, classic even. She’d put everything in place before running. She’d left San Diego and legally changed her name, dropped her last name while still in the country and in a matter of weeks had obtained a passport in her new name and country. And when she’d run, she hadn’t flown but instead had zigzagged north into Canada and taken a train across that country. But what he’d least expected was the creativity that followed. She’d jumped a container ship and taken a convoluted path before finally arriving in Eastern Europe. He had followed her journey as he had prepared for this assignment with an almost morbid fascination. She had kept him awake nights as he’d admired the ingenuity this woman had put into her escape.
A movement caught his eye.
She was at the ticket counter. He took a step forward, his gaze locked on her and then veered left. He had to transform from Josh Sedovich, CIA agent, to just Josh, tourist. He headed to the washroom and his own change of appearance.
* * *
ERIN TOOK A deep breath as she tried to portray a casual traveler. It wasn’t easy considering everything that had happened. This was the third flight since this morning’s tragedy. She was lucky there had been room on the flight to Miri, and now she hoped her luck would hold out again on the flight to the Gunung Mulu National Park and its legendary caves.
“Just made it.”
The voice behind her was male and too close.
She turned to face a shock of dark curly hair and brown eyes that sparkled with humor, yet something more serious seemed to lurk there. He was clean-shaven and attractive in a boyish kind of way. Still, she took an involuntary step back even as she took in his knee-length beige shorts and white T-shirt with Kuala Lumpur’s skyline emblazoned across it. Only an overly enthusiastic tourist would actually wear a T-shirt like that, never mind the socks. Yet in this world, her new world, nothing was a given. Nothing was as it appeared and no one was safe. It had been a harsh reminder, today’s lesson—short and brutal. She blinked back tears. She had to act as if everything was normal, as if she was no different than anyone else.
She offered him a half smile.
“You did,” she agreed as she assessed and discarded the man behind her. She’d never seen him before and his dress screamed tourist. He was no threat.
She turned away as the couple ahead of her moved from the counter and the clerk motioned her forward. She stepped up, dutifully provided her weight and that of her luggage, and within minutes was checked in.
“When do we board?” she asked.
The clerk swung around to where a clock face ticked the minutes. It was two o’clock. “Fifteen minutes,” he replied. “Through that gate.”
Outside the tarmac made this morning’s classroom feel cool. Heat shimmered and distorted the landscape. Even the low-lying shrubs that skirted the edges of the pavement appeared to be wilting in the heat. The distant hills rose in a scalloped frame of shadowed images that were fronted by patches of emerald-green forests and stretches of clay in hues of rust. Ahead of her stood a small prop plane with Malaysia emblazed in red and blue lettering on its narrow metal frame.
As they lined up to board the plane, Erin could feel every breath and her heart seemed to thump loud enough to be heard.
“It’s hot today, again. Odd,” she muttered.
“Excuse me?” the man with the so-uncool T-shirt asked.
“Oh, I... I’m sorry. I was talking to myself. Bad habit.”
“Traveling alone does it to one. Do it myself,” he said cheerfully.
“I suppose.” She tried to keep her attention on him. She eased her hold on her bags.
“A way to self-medicate,” he said. “Talking to oneself. At least, so I was told. Not sure what exactly one is medicating, but there it is—self-help. All I know.”
“Thanks,” she said with what she hoped was a smile. She pushed a strand of hair out of her eyes and felt the sweat that she knew must be glistening on her forehead.
“It is unusually hot,” he added.
She offered a half smile and held back as he and the others inched forward, waiting for bags to be loaded.
“Next!”
A bag was thrown onto the scale.
A heavyset man followed the suitcase, stepping onto the scale.
It was a pattern—weigh luggage, weigh passenger.
“Small plane—they have to juggle the weight.” It was T-shirt man, as she’d begun to think of him.
“Next.”
“After you,” he said and accompanied his words with a slight sweep of his hand motioning her forward as they reached the front of the line.
“Thank you.” Her hand tightened on her bags and she blinked and blinked again. She bit her lip and her hand stopped shaking. She turned her attention to him, noticing that he was taller than she’d first thought, but his broad build gave the illusion of a shorter frame. As she’d determined before, he was good-looking, but more than likely a bit of a goof if his souvenir T-shirt, too-long shorts and tennis shoes with socks were any indication. Yet he wasn’t as boyish-looking as she had thought. In fact, he wasn’t boyish-looking at all. In the sunlight, his features were almost craggy in a roguish kind of way.
“No worries,” he said.
“No worries,” she repeated.
She glanced around as she took her seat. No additional passengers, just the same ones she’d already accounted for. There was no one who might pose a threat. The passengers included an older couple with a slight camera addiction, judging from the camera bags that dangled around both their necks. Both carried a few extra pounds that were not the well-toned form she assumed would be required of a hit man. She shuddered at the thought.
She’d come close, too close.
She turned her attention back to the occupants of the small plane. The other couple, both male, was obviously excited about the trip and even more obviously in love. Both were slight and short in stature, and effeminate, one more than the other. Definitely not hit men material. No threat there, either. She folded her arms under her chest and looked out the window, but instead her thoughts went to the past and her family.
“You can’t leave us Erin.” Tears swam in Sarah’s eyes.
“There’s no choice, Sarah. You can’t breathe a word of what happened.”
“But Erin, you can’t leave. I won’t let you.”
“There’s no choice,” she repeated as she put an arm around her sister, hugging her close. “You’re pregnant and that changes everything.”
“You said I was a fool,” Sarah said. “And you were right.”
“The baby’s real, Sarah. And whether I agree with your decisions in getting to this state, or who you chose to have a baby with...”
“Father absentee,” Sarah muttered. “I think I’m off men, possibly for life.”
“I’ll protect you both, and the only way to do that is for me to get out of here.”
“But your job?”
“Not permanent. I’m substituting at a variety of schools.”
“But you love the kids. You live for your work.”
“There’s no other choice, Sarah. If I don’t leave the Anarchists will hunt us down.”
“Instead, they’ll only hunt you,” Sarah said sadly. “I can’t talk you out of this insanity?”
“You can’t.” She hugged Sarah. “We’ll be in touch.”
“I love you, sis,” Sarah said.
The engine vibrated the small plane, and as it cut into a turn that seemed to shift passengers and luggage alike, Erin held her breath.
She pinched her fingers together, her nails biting into skin. She looked out the window. Beneath them the forest canopy sprawled in lush greenery hugging ragged limestone cliffs that punctured the jungle floor with primitive ease. The forest appeared endless, and for a brief moment Erin allowed herself to be caught up in the natural beauty of this place. While her gut tightened as she remembered that she’d be isolated, alone and only temporarily safe, temporarily out of sight. She needed a plan and she needed it quickly.
“Completely awesome, isn’t it?” said the man who had waited in line behind her.
“It is,” she agreed as ahead of them the two couples admired the view out their respective windows, the two men silently watching the passing scenery, and the husband and wife taking an endless stream of pictures.
“Name’s Josh,” he said easily.
“Erin,” she supplied reluctantly. So far she’d managed to dodge conversation with any of the other passengers. She looked at him. She had to be sure he was no threat. She reminded herself that if he were out to kill her, he would have done so, unless, of course, he was waiting for the plane to land and for anonymity. But if that were the case, he wouldn’t have been wearing that ridiculous T-shirt.
You’re seeing danger where none exists, she told herself. Still, she had to make sure he was safe. Nothing in his demeanor suggested a threat of any kind. But she’d learned early on that danger came quickly and unexpectedly.
How long would it be safe to stay here? She knew the answer even as she asked the question. Not long, a matter of days until she got a plan together. She had to get out of Malaysia, get across the border to another country and safety. She needed to sketch a path, a number of flights within the border, before leaving Malaysia for good. She needed a plan and a map, and she had fled without either.
She took a deep, shaky breath. It had been a huge misjudgment, an error. She had thought she was safe. She had let down her guard. Now one innocent person was dead and she was running without direction.
“Something wrong?” Josh leaned forward, concern reflected in the furrows in his forehead.
Damn, she thought. He’d been watching her and she hadn’t noticed.
“You’re afraid of flying?”
The roar of the engine seemed to fill the small cabin.
She wished that was all it was. Instead of replying, she remained with her gaze riveted on the window and on land—a new challenge.
“We’re about to land. See.” He pointed. “It won’t be long. You’ll be fine.”
“I...” She began to assure him and to deny any fear of flying, and then stopped. The new Erin could not afford to offer too much information, too much familiarity. Lies were her new truth. It had taken her months to become comfortable with that, and still it rang false. She still had to remind herself. Lies weren’t who she was. The old Erin had been open, trusting, honest... No more. She took a breath, put a smile on her face and met him head-on. “Thank you. This whole small plane thing makes me a bit queasy.”
“Used to do the same to me,” he agreed. But this time when he looked at her there was something darker and more intense in the look that seemed to belie the flippancy that had seemed second nature to him.
She shivered.
“Are you cold?” This time his brows almost met over the question.
“I’m fine.”
The plane began its descent and the afternoon sun gleamed on the dense greenery, adding a sparkle-like affect. Another time it might have been amazing. Now, she could feel Josh’s eyes on her. She sighed. That was all she needed—a man’s interest.
Or did she?
She shifted in her seat and eyed him from the corner of her eye. A plan began to form. Her hand drifted to the window frame. She was a woman alone, on the run. That was what they were looking for. That was how she had left. An American posing as a Canadian, one who taught school and didn’t fit here. They’d looked in the schoolyards, and they’d found her.
Once.
They’d find her again.
Traveling alone made her stand out. She had to change her name again and her identity, but right in this moment, there was nothing to do but forge ahead with who she had become. But there was something she could change.
She looked over at Josh, and he smiled almost hopefully.
Maybe that was the best cover of all. She hated being alone, yet, oddly, she had become used to it. While she didn’t like it, she didn’t feel as uncomfortable as she had in the beginning. Of course, the beginning had been laced with so much fear. The fear was still there, but it was like white noise, something that had become her daily companion, a familiar entity that reminded her not to trust.
She’d trusted and Daniel had died.
Chapter Six (#ulink_b28bed50-6390-5d1a-a37f-6d83d62b286b)
Josh stepped onto the metal stairs of the plane’s exit ramp. He was right behind Erin, her black wig gleaming like a beacon in the late-afternoon sun. He looked to the right and left as he matched his steps to hers. The tarmac stretched out, cut through the relentless jungle that closed in around them. The resort was built well above the ground and away from the unpredictability of nature in a satellite of stilt-legged buildings adjoined by wooden walkways. It was rustic in an elegant fashion.
“Heard the king of Monaco stayed here. Or maybe it was a prince. Not sure, royalty of some kind,” the older woman with a camera dangling from a leather strap around her neck said to the man who stood beside her sporting a camera of his own.
A resort that had housed royalty, Josh thought. That was new since he last visited, and reassuring. The logistics of security had already been tested.
While he considered these things, his attention never turned from Erin. He was aware of every movement, of the fact that she now stood in line just ahead of him. He watched as her fingernails scraped against the strap of a small canvas bag, making an odd rough-edged sound, the only sign that she was nervous.
His gaze shifted slightly ahead of her to the couple closest to them, and his biggest concern because of that, because of proximity. They had matching hard-shelled suitcases on wheels—oversized and, he suspected, overpacked. The luggage was a fairly good indicator that this trip was the most risky of their travels, for the luggage almost screamed safe and their demeanor capped his assessment. They were no threat.
There was a low hum of chatter around them as the passengers stared at the amazing backdrop the distant cliffs made as they pierced their off-white talons through the lush green jungle. He watched the tourists, listening to what they said, how they interacted with each other, mentally recording all. It was humans who would cause any problems in the future, not scenery. Because of that, he didn’t care for limestone peaks or bat caves except as a strategic means of escape, places to hide if the worst-case scenario occurred. In the meantime, what he cared about were the nooks and crannies where an assassin could lurk. Again, he scoured the disembarking passengers and moved on to the resort crew that waited on the edge of the empty runway with a minivan to take those less limber up to the resort.
His gaze slid over the employee at the head of the line. The man was lean, sun-bronzed and approximately five foot four. He was dressed in pristine white cotton pants and a T-shirt with the Royal Mulu Resort logo emblazoned on it. Instinct told him he was no threat, but he’d wait to pass judgment once he had the evidence to back up that initial determination.
The last bag was unloaded and he saw Erin take a step toward it.
He hurried forward as she reached for an oversized knapsack.
“Let me take that.” He lifted the bag as he made the comment, leaving her no option but to graciously accept. “Mulu is more beautiful than the brochure promised.”
She gave him a look that could only be called leery.
“I never anticipated this.” He swept his arm in a half circle. “Did you?” He didn’t even consider how inane the comment was. It didn’t fit who he was, but it fit his current persona. He’d just have to watch it so as not to go overboard with it.
“It is, but then that’s why I came here. As I imagine you did, too.”
“Actually,” he said, “I’d never heard of Mulu until a friend enlightened me. I didn’t even make a reservation.” He shrugged. “I don’t like to travel like that, but...”
“No reservation? Really?”
She only looked mildly interested and far from trusting.
“Did you reserve ahead?” he asked and felt her eyes on her bag.
“Yes, of course.” She frowned. Her eyes narrowed as they met his and her lips were compressed in a fine line. “You are lucky it’s October. One of the few months where there’s less tourists.” She held out her hand for her bag.
“You’re sure? I can take it.”
Her hand brushed his. Something shifted in her gaze and her lips softened.
“It’s heavy. Let me,” he said.
“Thanks,” she replied as she led the way with a determined and slight sway to her hips, which despite her slim figure were seductively curvy.
Overhead a bird screeched. The shadow of the bird’s startled flight cut across them as it dove, giving a view of glossy black tail feathers before it disappeared into the lush jungle. She jumped and slipped on the wooden walkway, which was slick from a recent rain. He took her arm, steadying her.
“Careful,” he warned as she looked at him with an expression of fear mixed with gratitude. There was a haunted look in her eyes, or maybe he imagined it, for the look was as quickly gone, and replaced by the determination he’d seen earlier, an emotion that consistently emanated from her.
“I can take it now.” She reached for her bag.
“You’re sure. There’s no need...”
Their eyes clashed, and he handed her bag to her. “I could have taken it the rest of the way.”
“You could have,” she agreed. “But I prefer not.”
She gave him a smile that took some of the edge off her words, and then turned with the bag slung over her shoulder, the straps gripped with one white-knuckled hand as she followed the two men who were already a few yards ahead. Two minutes later he was holding open the glass-plated door to the reception area for her as a rush of air-conditioning swirled around them.
“Well, we’re here,” he said as he graciously waited for the woman behind him to enter before relinquishing the door to a heavyset gray-haired man who was towing a wheeled suitcase behind him.
“We are,” she said over her shoulder and strode determinedly toward the reception desk without a backward glance.
* * *
“WE HAVE YOU booked for a double occupancy.” The desk clerk looked up and then over at Josh as if he were the missing double. “As you requested.”
“That’s right,” Erin said. “My boyfriend will be joining me later.” Her eyes slid to Josh and her hand slipped through the strap of the bag. Her eyes flitted to where a round, white-faced clock hummed on the wall behind the reception desk.
Four o’clock.
She sneaked another peek at Josh and saw only admiration in his gaze. Despite the wire-rimmed glasses and tacky T-shirt, he wasn’t as geeky as she’d first thought. In fact, there was something about him that she couldn’t quite put her finger on. She gathered her passport and held it in an iron grip.
She looked away but felt his eyes on her.
“Boyfriend?” he asked, disappointment etching his words.
She nodded as her gaze flitted to his. There was an intensity there, a knowing that belied the unbecoming tourist T-shirt. There was smoke in his eyes that seemed to pierce through the lens of his black-rimmed glasses and a ruggedness to the face behind the frames.
“This place is amazing,” he said as he turned and looked one way and then the other, clearly overwhelmed. She suspected he was an infrequent traveler.
Her lips twitched, and she almost smiled.
“I’ll see you around,” she said as she left him to check in and followed the concierge out the door.
Five minutes later she scanned her room for exits. The airy, sunlit room held a wicker desk and chair and a comfortable-looking queen-size bed, but those were minor points. What was important were the window, the door and what was outside. From what she could see, barring the front entrance, the only exit was the window that looked out onto a narrow catwalk, a thin bamboo walkway that might have been used by resort employees. She glanced at the window. It would do in an emergency. First she had to determine if she could open it or if she would need to break the glass. If the latter were the case, she would need something handy to break the glass with.
She opened the stained bamboo closet door. Inside was nothing but a row of old-fashioned wire hangers. She ran a thumb over one, thinking that these hangers could be used as a weapon if necessary. They weren’t much, but they’d be better than facing any threat empty-handed.
Her hand quivered. Whoever was after her was more sophisticated than coat hangers. They’d blown up a car. They meant business, and they meant to kill her. It was as Mike had said and she hadn’t wanted to believe—only worse. A slight headache began to pulse low in the base of her skull. She missed her friends, her family, her apartment—and she missed her cat.
She’d delivered Edgar to her sister the day before she’d run. Sarah had been sworn to silence and Mike to vigilance. They’d both be fine. The cat would be well cared for, spoiled and more than likely a few pounds over his ideal weight by the time she got home, and her sister would have had the baby she shouldn’t be having. A single woman with no career aspirations and no man willing to stick around wasn’t the ideal candidate for motherhood. But that was Erin’s opinion, not Sarah’s.
Home.
Her thumbnail pinched into the palm of her hand.
“Focus,” she reminded herself as the wave of homesickness, loss and despair washed through her. She took her mind from other places back to the moment and to reworking the plan. She couldn’t worry about family or friends or even cats; there was nothing she could do for them but stay away and stay alive.
She looked at the closet, closed the doors and went through her list of defenses. The list was meager. She had pepper spray from a night market stall. Other than a self-defense course she’d taken with another primary grade teacher, she had little in her favor.
As she thought through the events of the past few days, she realized that she had to get out of the country in a very short time. This escape was only temporary. She didn’t know how good the people hired to find her were, but she suspected they might be very good. They’d found the school she’d worked in, they’d found her new identity and they’d attempted to kill her.
“Stay calm,” she reminded herself. But there seemed no end in sight and no one she could approach for help.
She looked at her watch as if that would give her the answers that weren’t forthcoming.
Her headache was escalating.
She sat down on the bed. She’d run three quarters of the way around the globe and they’d found her. She’d changed her appearance yet again. And she’d been on a cash-only basis since leaving home. She needed to do more.
She wasn’t sure where she was going next, but she knew what she needed in the short term while she was here.
Her nails bit into the palms of her hands. She relaxed her hands and took a breath—panicking would get her nowhere.
“Damn boyfriend dumped you,” she murmured with a laugh that held no humor at all. “And then along came Josh.” She hated every aspect of this story, from its very necessity to its needy woman overtones to using an innocent man—possibly toying with his affections. All of it was distasteful and all of it was necessary. She pulled a box of hair dye from her pack.
Josh Sedovich, an easy man to reel in. She thought that without arrogance but instead with the thoughts of an attractive woman who knew she was attractive.
She wouldn’t hurt him, just engage in some harmless flirtation—the illusion of a couple.
She sucked in a deep breath. Her life was an illusion, an illusion that hurt.
Chapter Seven (#ulink_674b05c8-37e2-5f8e-b706-f55c09c2ae8e)
Josh shielded his eyes. Despite the threat of rain later in the day, the sun beat hot and relentless even in late afternoon. This was the least popular time of year, as the rain made things muggy and uncomfortable. It wasn’t usual for numbers to drop too much, but with renovations on some of the more distant accommodations, tourism was noticeably down. That was good news—less activity to monitor, fewer potential incoming threats.
The drone of a plane’s engine pierced the sultry heat.
It was on schedule. He watched as the plane landed.
He’d just gotten word that, as he had suspected, the last hit had been by one of the Anarchists’s gang members. Bobbie Xavier was not the brightest tool in the shed, but he was one of the deadliest. Josh had gotten confirmation that his diversion had worked. Bobbie was on his way to Hong Kong.
But with the recent news the stakes had just gone up. The Anarchists had hired someone else, a man who wouldn’t work in tandem with Bobbie, and one who wouldn’t depend on luck or the mistakes of a woman who had never had to disappear before. The man was a professional. He had a record of success that ended in a trail of death, and he had a record of outsourcing. That meant the numbers on her trail could and more likely would, go up. That meant that there might not just be one. In the near future, there might be two or three. They needed to get out of here, maybe sooner than he’d previously thought.
Sid Mylo was not someone to take lightly. Why the hell were they hiring someone with Sid’s capabilities to go after someone like Erin? Sure, she had been on the run for five months, but—and that was the next mystery—why had it taken them that long to send someone after her? Until now they had depended on the muscle of the various club members across the states as the alert had gone out and the nets had gone up. But they hadn’t looked outside the continental United States.
“Erin Argon,” he muttered. It was the real woman he would be bringing back, not the actress Erin Kelley. He wondered how she could have gotten herself into this mess. She didn’t look like the type to date bikers. But that was exactly what she’d done.
He knew some women got off on that. Some dated criminals slated for death row, sought out men who were bent on destruction, their own as well as that of others. But it was rather disconcerting to think that a primary-school teacher would spend her free time with men who had questionable ethics. Drug dealers, pimps and murderers—and that was only the beginning of the crimes that could be attributed to various members of the Anarchists. It didn’t seem to fit anything he knew about her. And whether she’d learned her lesson after one colossal mistake, he didn’t know. Only she knew that. And it wasn’t something he needed to know. That knowledge would no more save her than hiding out in Mulu would.
He pulled open the door of the hotel lobby.
The concierge stood by the desk. His brown pants and jacket seemed to fade into the background. But his posture and wide smile, despite his solid but short stature, made him immediately stand out.
Their eyes met and held in a moment of understanding before the concierge looked away.
Josh waited a few minutes, glancing through a display of pamphlets before turning to the concierge. “Must be nice to work here.”
He looped his thumbs into the belt loops of his shorts. In listening range was an older couple that seemed to be involved in their own discussion, but they glanced over at him with what he thought of as a tourist’s curiosity.
“Yes, sir.” The concierge met his gaze this time with a rather puzzled expression, as if he didn’t know where the question was leading.
“Josh.” He held out his hand. “Three,” he mouthed. It was the number of days, maximum, that he planned to stay before getting Erin out of here.
“Tenuk,” the concierge said with a rather solemn grace and tapped his finger silently, one, two, three. It was confirmation, nothing else.
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