The Hunted

He flipped the phone closed and tucked it back in the inside pocket of his suit.

“She sounds nice,” Erin remarked.

“As long as you don’t get on the wrong side of her.”

Relieved, Erin let go of the tension. It would come back, she knew, but for now she could allow herself to feel safe. “Isn’t your office number programmed on your phone?”

“Of course. But would you have trusted it?”

“Good point.” He was outthinking her paranoia. Interesting guy. Then, slowly, she let her eyelids droop closed. It was a relief to go to sleep.

Jerrod almost woke her, remembering the doctor’s warnings about sleep, but the hotel was only another twenty minutes away, if that. He figured he could give her that much time safely.

Spunky woman, he thought, wheeling through thinning traffic. Striking. Black hair and bright blue eyes. Arresting. A fair-skinned Irish beauty, with a compact but tempting figure.

But her loveliness wasn’t what had struck him most. It was her attitude that had captivated him. Sassy, sardonic, sarcastic—and very, very sharp. Even with a concussion, all of that showed through. She didn’t like being told “No,” and she didn’t care if people knew that.

But she was also a mystery. Jerrod Westlake was no fool, and he knew she was keeping something to herself, something that had put her at greater risk than testifying at that ridiculous fraud trial. He could sense it in the almost slippery way she edged around some things, in the way she chose her words. She didn’t believe her apartment had been ransacked because she’d testified, nor did she believe she had been fired because of it.

Nor did he. She was on to something much bigger, and he wanted to know what it was.

But first he had to make her as safe as he could.

The thunderstorm had followed him from Austin. Or maybe this was a new one building. Either way, lightning jumped across the sky, cloud to cloud, a beautiful thing. He waited for the thunder, but if it reached him, it was deadened by the car. Another fork of lightning wrapped the clouds like a spiderweb. Still no rain. It wouldn’t be long.

He had chosen to go south, the least likely direction for anyone to look for him because it took him farther from Austin. He was pretty sure they didn’t have a tail, but he took some side streets to make sure before returning to the highway, and finally picking a hotel. Embassy Suites. Two rooms, which would give her a bedroom and him a front room with a sofa bed if he wanted it. Only one door.

He parked, rather than pulling up under the porte cochere. He would not allow them to be separated, even in public.

Coming around to her side of the car, he woke her gently by calling her name quietly. When her blue eyes flashed open, he saw the momentary confusion. Then he saw the return of awareness. It was almost as if something inside her closed the shutters.

“We’re at the hotel,” he told her. “I’ll get our bags, then we’ll go in.”

She wasn’t ready to talk yet, or even nod. He did catch her wince as she moved her head.

“When we get inside, take one of those pain pills.”

“I just might succumb,” she admitted.

He pulled their bags—hers newly packed, his always there in case of emergency—out of the trunk, then helped her out of the car.

“You don’t seem as wobbly.”

“No,” she agreed. “I think I’m off the carousel.”

“That’s good news.”

Inside the lobby, he checked them in, using his own credit card. He didn’t want Erin’s name on anything, at least until he found out what was going on. Check-in was easy and fast, and ten minutes later they were in their suite.

Erin collapsed in an armchair near the door, but despite her apparent physical weakness, those blue eyes of hers suggested she was regaining her full mental faculties, and along with them, a rising curiosity. Reporters weren’t much different from FBI agents. Questions were always turning in the backs of their minds. It was just a matter of who broke the ice and asked first.

“There’s a bedroom back here,” he said, throwing the door open and carrying her suitcase to one of two double beds. “And a bath. It’s all yours. I’ll stay in the front room.”

“Near the door?”

“Near the door. Guard dog on duty.” He came back out and shed his suit coat, draping it from a hook in the back of the small closet.

“My white knight,” she remarked, sounding a tad sarcastic.

He didn’t mind. He wanted her spunky as hell. “That’s me,” he agreed. Unbuttoning his cuffs, he rolled up the sleeves of his blue oxford shirt. “Hungry?”

“Not yet.”

“Stomach?”

“Unsettled.”

Her eyes followed him, and for some reason she reminded him of a cat watching a caged bird. On alert again. Returning to the strength and determination that had carried her this far.

He decided to let her watch him, and say nothing for now. He kept his belt holster and gun on, along with his badge, and went to the phone to call room service. “I can get you something later, but I haven’t eaten since this morning, and I wouldn’t want to become too weak to hold up my lance.”

One corner of her mouth curled upward in a smile. “Do they have French onion soup?”

He opened the loose-leaf binder by the phone, flipped to room service and scanned the menu. “One bowl coming up.”

“Thanks.”

He saw her pull the pill bottle from her vest pocket and went to get her a glass of water from the sink. As he handed it to her, he asked, “Do you always wear those safari vests?”

“Have you ever tried to carry a purse while taking notes on the fly, or even photos?”

“Can’t say I have.”

“I didn’t think so.” She downed one pain pill and drained the water glass before setting it on the end table. “A photographer friend gave this to me after I’d bitched about my purse for the thousandth time. I never leave home without it.”

He brought her another glass of water, then sat on the couch facing her. “I can see it’s handy.”

“Oh, yeah. It would be even handier if I kept to some kind of organization. I tend to drop everything in one or two pockets, though.” She pointed. “Phone, keys, gum, pens.” Another pocket. “Pads, tape recorder, wallet.”

“And the others?”

“Empty.”

“Kleenex?”

“Oh, yeah.” She patted a hip pocket. “Tissues are in there with the notepads. Easy to reach.”

“And now pills.”

She popped the bottle into a separate pocket. “They get their own space.” Then she touched a zippered pocket on the other side. “I forgot. Makeup. Lipstick. I don’t usually wear it, but sometimes…” She shrugged. “You do what you gotta do.”

Her hand wandered up to her neck, then slowly slid downward. “I feel naked without my press credentials.”

“I can imagine. About how I’d feel without my badge and gun.”

“We may be on the same wavelength. I can’t allow that to continue.”

He lifted a brow. “Why not?”

“’Cuz you’re a cop and I’m a reporter, which puts us on opposite sides of a huge divide.”

“Not really. I promise not to compromise your professional ethics.”

“You already have.”

He watched a look of mischief dart across her face. “How so?”

“I’m in a hotel room you paid for, about to eat food you’re paying for. That’s strictly a no-no. Print press never takes gifts, even if TV reporters do.”

“Ah.” He narrowed his eyes, trying not to smile. “Well, you’re not employed at the moment.”

“A saving grace.” She closed her eyes briefly, drew a deep breath, then opened them again. “I wish the guy with the jackhammer would clock out soon.”

“The pill should help send him on his way.”

“I hope. So.”

He raised his brows, waiting. That “so” had definitely been a segue.

“What are your bosses going to say about all this?” she asked, indicating the hotel room.

“That I exercised good sense.”

“Nice bosses.”

“Big expense account.”

A chuckle escaped her, causing her to wince. “I can’t believe you came all the way to Houston just to make sure I testified. You could have called the field office here and told them to keep an eye on me.”

“I knew you were going to be dangerous.”

She smiled. “It’s my job.”

“It’s your nature. Okay, I came partly because of you, and partly because there’s another case I’m working on.”

“I guess I got in the way of that. What’s the other case?”

He hesitated, unwilling and, in fact, unable to discuss an active investigation. But there was something she was withholding, something important, and he would never gain her trust if he didn’t give her some first.

“A teenage girl disappeared a few months ago.”

She cocked her head. “I don’t think I heard about it.”

“Most people wouldn’t. She was a runaway, working the streets. An older street woman had taken an interest in her. Called us when she went missing.”

Erin seemed almost to nod, yet barely moved her head. “You’re right, that’s not the kind of story that gets much coverage. Which is a damn shame.”

“I couldn’t agree more. Missing persons, especially children, are my specialty.”

Her eyes widened a bit. “You’re that agent I keep hearing about? The one who works all over the country on these cases?”

He nodded.

“Jeez, wouldn’t I love to interview you.”

“Maybe after we make sure you’re safe. But I can’t talk specifics about ongoing investigations.”

“I understand that. Still, you’ve got quite a rep.”

“Not enough that you recognized me right off, thank God.”

A half smile lit her face. “You haven’t quite reached your fifteen minutes of fame yet.”

“I hope I never do.”

A knock sounded at the door. In one fluid moment, Jerrod rose to his feet, indicated with one hand that she should go to the bedroom, and with the other unsnapped the guard on his belt holster. He was taking no chances.

Over the years, he’d realized something important about his psychology, and possibly the psychology of others: once the unthinkable happened in your life, there was never anything unthinkable again. Forever after, you always expected it.

And something about this situation had him at high alert. He and Erin McKenna needed to have a serious talk very soon.

“Be right there,” he called to the door, hand on his pistol butt. As soon as he was sure Erin was concealed in the bedroom, he went to answer the knock.

4

Erin kept the bedroom door open a crack so she could watch what happened. Part of her felt that all this was way over the top, utterly ridiculous, but then she remembered her apartment, and the throbbing from the back of her head reminded her that someone was pretty serious about something.

Maybe even serious enough to pursue her.

Still, it was a hard connection to make. She was one of those people who were accustomed to feeling comfortable and safe in almost any situation. Accustomed to believing she could take care of herself. The reporter in her was probably too bold by half.

In fact, she was sure of it. Her past held some episodes that made other people shake their heads and say, “Are you crazy?”

No, she was just a grade-A, dyed-in-the-wool adrenaline junkie. But while adrenaline helped the wise to flee, she had a tendency to walk where only angels dared to tread.

Knowing this about herself did not, of course, make her any more cautious. Nor did she want it to.

The room-service guy appeared to be on the up-and-up. Jerrod pulled the cart into the room without letting the waiter bring it in, and signed the slip. Moments later, the door was locked again.

Erin didn’t wait for permission to come out. She walked down the very short wannabe hallway past the kitchenette to the front room. “So what were you expecting? A team of ninjas?”

“I’m working very hard not to roll my eyes at you.”

“Don’t waste the energy. Roll away. I can take it.”

Instead he lifted the covers from the dishes. “Soup.” With a flourish, he offered her the bowl on a plate after she resumed her seat in the armchair. A napkin and soup spoon followed it.

She’d expected him to be a meat-and-potatoes kind of guy, but he’d chosen grilled salmon, salad and rice. He put his plates on the coffee table and leaned forward to eat.

“TV?” he asked.

“Why not.”

He glanced at her. “I suggested it because you don’t seem to want to talk about why someone busted into your apartment and stole anything that might contain information.”

“You sure of that?”

Holding his plate and fork, he smiled and leaned back. “You betcha.”

She set her soup on the end table. It smelled good, but her stomach rolled over nonetheless. “Maybe the court forgot to tell them I was testifying early. After all, I wasn’t supposed to testify until Monday.”

“You wouldn’t have anything on your computer that wasn’t already in the hands of the U.S. Attorney.”

“Damn, you’re good.”

“Don’t I know it.”

“I wonder if there’s any club soda on this planet.”

He set his plate down. “Stomach?”

“Awful.”

He leaned over and reached for the phone, then told room service to bring up a six-pack of club soda.

“So,” he said when he hung up and reached for his plate of salmon, “why don’t you tell me what it is about Erin McKenna that’s keeping her so calm in a situation that would have most people in hysterics.”

“I’m not the hysterical type.”

Now he did roll his eyes at her, but the way he did it was humorous. “I’d already gathered that,” he said with sarcasm so heavy it was obviously meant as a joke.

“I’m just weird,” she said finally. “I’ve always done things most sane people wouldn’t do. I’ve gone into burning rooms, walked out into forest fires, chased tornados, chatted up gangs for a mega-turd—”

“A what?”

“Mega-turd. Newsroom slang for those big in-depth pieces. The official name for them is enterprise stories.”

“Ah.” He sat back, savoring a mouthful of salmon. “Gangs, huh?”

“Yeah.” She shrugged one shoulder. “Once they knew I wasn’t a cop and wouldn’t rat on them, they were okay.”

“And fires? Did you actually walk into a building on fire? This I gotta hear.”

At that she had to laugh, despite everything that seemed to be squeezing the joy out of her. “Well, yes. But it was actually a burning room. I suited up and everything.”

“What aren’t you telling me?”

“That it was one of those practice rooms.” She laughed again. “It’s like a big trailer. They have gas jets shooting fire, stuff burning, all so guys can get used to the difficulties. Even suited up, it was so damn hot in there I could barely stand it. And the equipment weighed a ton. One of the guys had to help me move.”

“And why did you do this?”

“For a story.”

“You’ll do anything for a story, I take it.”

“Well, you know, there were a whole bunch of us media types there. The chief was showing off the room and how they use it. And when he asked if one of us wanted to try it, I was the only volunteer. God, did I have those firefighters laughing. They walk around in that gear as if it’s nothing, and I could barely stand up once they got me into it. But it was instructive, too. All that protection and I still felt hot enough to burn, and the smoke made it nearly impossible to see. Believe me, I wasn’t in there long before they helped me out.”

“That’s a rough job.”

“You don’t know how rough until you’ve done a training exercise with them.” She shook her head. “I had a lot of respect for those guys beforehand, but after that, I’d give them all a medal.”

Jerrod laughed again. “You lead an interesting life.”

“Sometimes. Like any other job, there’s a lot of humdrum.”

“But you like it.”

“I love it.” The statement was unequivocal. “And at least I don’t have to cover auto accidents and plane crashes anymore. Nothing can prepare you for that smell.”

He nodded. “I know what you mean.”

She looked at him, studying him. “I guess you do.”

“So you’ve really walked into a forest fire?”

“A TV cameraman and I wanted to see what it was like. So we wandered off down this forest road.”

“And?”

“It wasn’t what I expected. This loud roar of rushing air being sucked in, and yet it’s…cold. I don’t know if it was the smoke blocking out the sun or the draft from the fire itself. Maybe both.”

“I hope you don’t plan to do that again.”

“You sound like my mother.”

“Still…”

“We came back fast, and we didn’t go that far.”

He seemed to study her for a long moment. “What part aren’t you telling me?”

“You mean, the part where we were walking back and the fire jumped across the road?”

“No!”

She nodded. “Yeah. For a few seconds all I could see was fire. Everywhere. But it was arching through the branches overhead. Not down to ground level yet. We ran like hell, and the next thing you know it was behind us. It was way cool.”

“Cool? You are an adrenaline junkie.”

She rose from the chair and began pacing, unable to hold still despite the jackhammer in her head.

“Y’know where the real adrenaline rush is?”

“Tell me.”

“Writing the piece up under deadline. Racing the clock to get the front page done when the people down in production are screaming for the layout and everyone around you is yelling at someone because they need some little tidbit to finish what they’re working on. TV blaring so if the world comes unglued we’ll know it, plus so we know what the Barbie-and-Ken world are saying about the story. It’s barely controlled chaos, a dozen blindfolded foxes chasing chickens around the same yard, knowing Farmer Time is just around the corner with a shotgun and that’s why they call it a deadline. That’s the real rush.”

She realized she’d been talking a blue streak, and sat down and went silent for a moment. He was eating his salmon, yet she knew he’d taken in every word. Finally he looked up. “I knew guys like you in special ops. The crazier it got, the more they felt at home.”

“But not you?” she asked.

His eyes took on a faraway, haunted look. “Nah. I couldn’t feel at home when I was holding an artery closed, trying to keep a buddy alive until the evac team got there. All that training and discipline and focus, and y’know what I was thinking at that moment?”

“No,” she said, and forced herself to down a spoonful of soup.

“That he and I wouldn’t be shooting hoops anymore. That’s what we’d done, last thing at night, every night. There was a basketball net in the hangar back at base, and every night, we’d wind down from the shit by playing three-on-three or H-O-R-S-E or just whacking the damn ball off of the backboard until the world no longer seemed so…loud. No way we were ever going to do that again, not with his leg hanging by a tendon and me pinching the femoral artery so he wouldn’t bleed out. That’s when I knew I wasn’t like you, that I couldn’t shut everything out and learn to love the chaos. That’s when I knew I had to get out.”

Her soup had lost its appeal. She pushed the bowl aside and looked at him. “I know. Kind of. Some stories still give me nightmares. Ever since a plane crash I covered, I still can’t eat spaghetti. A county commission meeting may be boring, but at least I know that after the deadline rush passes, I’ll sleep.”

He nodded, but offered nothing else in return. She fell silent, then got up and began once again pacing the room, hating this caged feeling, hating the notion that her movements were limited because someone was after her. They really wouldn’t go far enough to kill her—would they? It was like a bad movie. Reporters didn’t get killed for doing their jobs.

But this story…Something inside her seemed to freeze. Maybe some stories were worth killing over. Maybe this was one of them. It was certainly worth dying for.

“What are they after, Erin?” Jerrod asked quietly behind her.

She paused, then wrapped her arms around herself. She realized that someone else had to know. In case…This was too important. If something happened to her, someone else had to be able to pursue this, and who better than an FBI agent? She decided to take the leap of faith.

“I think Mercator’s in the white slave trade.”

Seconds ticked by in silence. Then he said, “You think, or you know?”

“I knew most of it. I needed confirmation.”

“Jesus.” He was quiet for a little longer. “And they took everything you had.”

She faced him. “I’m not a bimbo. When I work on a story this big, I keep backups.”

“So they didn’t get it all?”

She almost forgot and shook her head, but caught herself just in time. “I send everything I get to an anonymous e-mail account.”

“Could they trace it from your computer?”

“Not unless they’ve been following me. I used cybercafés all over town. I guess at some level I was already paranoid.”

“Not paranoid,” he said. “Careful. There’s a big difference. So…what do you know?”

“I had a source. Inside Mercator, I think, but I’m not positive.”

“Then he’s in their crosshairs, too,” Jerrod said.

She shook her head. “Maybe not. I hope not. After our first contact, I never dealt with him on my work or home machines.”

“Why did he contact you to begin with?”

“He saw the story in Fortune. He said I’d caught the jaywalkers and missed the killers.”

“He said that?”

“Word for word,” she said. “He said it was one of the perks Mercator offered for some customers. Buy Mercator’s stuff and they’ll get you a girl.”

His face seemed to freeze. “Shit.”

“That’s what I said.”

“Can you prove it?”

“That’s what I was working on.”

He nodded. “And your boss knew about it?”

She faced him. “Yeah.”

He sighed and rubbed his face, as if he were tired. “You really do need protection.”

“They don’t know I have anything. With luck they think they took it all.”

His cheeks were taut, the muscles in front of his ears flexing as he drew a slow breath through his nose, as if trying to hold back some part of him that she found almost…frightening.

“They want the whistle-blower. They think you know who he is. Or she. That means they need you, Erin. And you don’t want to even think about what they have in mind once they have you. You don’t know these people.”

“And you do?”

“Yeah,” he said. “I do. I was one of them.”

5

“Okay, who are you really?” Erin asked.

It was a good question, Jerrod thought. He wasn’t sure it had a good answer. “I’m not who I was.”

“So who were you? You said special ops before. But that’s not what you meant just now.”

He nodded. “Once I got out, I did what a lot of special ops guys do. I went to work for a PMC.”

“Private Military Corporation,” Erin said. “So you were a mercenary.”

He’d always hated that word, but he couldn’t deny it. “Yeah. I was a mercenary. Private executive security at first. Then K-R-and-R work. Kidnap, Rescue and Recovery. There are a whole lot of fringe groups whose main source of income comes from kidnapping foreign executives or their families. The execs usually have insurance for it, if the companies they’re working for want to spring for it. Some of them buy it for themselves. The company I worked for had a K-R-and-R team that contracted out to the insurance companies. We’d handle the ransom negotiations, cover the exchange, and generally keep stressed-out people from making stupid mistakes.”

“And rescues?” she asked. “You’d try to find the victims and get them out without having to pay?”

He stifled a bitter laugh. “I wish I could say yes. That’s what I’d hoped I’d be doing.”

“But you didn’t?”

“Almost never. It was a straight business deal. Negotiate the ransom down to a reasonable amount. The insurance companies had actuaries who actually had tables of this stuff. A site manager for a Fortune 500 company is worth X. Chief engineer is worth Y. Everything according to the ransoms that were customarily paid. The kidnappers knew it, and we knew they knew it. So they’d give their demands, we’d go through the motions, and they’d eventually come down to the standard asking price. We’d show up at one side of a bridge with a big bag of cash. They’d be at the other with our client. Sometimes the guys even shook hands at the exchange, like they’d bought a house or a car.”