He noted the change in subject but wasn’t going to press his offer and risk a no. He couldn’t afford a no from her, not when that meant she’d be on her own as this was wrapped up.
“I’m worried about the cop I already pulled into this.”
“Who is he? The guy you trusted with the accounts?”
“An FBI agent with the Dallas office named Jim Nelson. Fifties, a wife and two college-aged kids; he worked narcotics cases in the New York office before moving to Texas.”
“Did you really worry about him taking the money if you turned over everything you had?”
“No. I worry about him turning up dead.” She studied the burning logs in the fireplace. “There isn’t much they could force him to say. The hand-offs are always done with no notice to him, and I leave the state immediately afterward. He’s never known where I was or when I would be back in touch. He doesn’t know the name Ann Walsh or Kelly Brown or the other names I’ve used; he doesn’t know I was ever in this state. But still I worry that somehow Richard Wise figures out Jim is the cop I’ve been talking to and turns his fury that direction. Jim’s at risk, and as much care as the man takes, I still worry that it won’t be enough. The guys on my tail-they showed up within days of my last hand-off. The only thing that makes sense is they had Jim already under surveillance from the prior accounts I’d turned over or else someone in that office got turned.”
“I’m sorry. You must see you can’t run forever. You need more help than Sam can give you. And your sisters-it would destroy them to hear you’d been running all these years and then were killed. You can’t do that to them.”
“They’re in enough risk without me showing my face and just adding to that risk.”
“You came back to see them, didn’t you? to know for certain they were safe? that they had adequate protection?”
She didn’t turn her attention from the fire, but she nodded.
“Then let me do my job and help you out. Let me set up a reunion.”
She violently shook her head, not looking back toward him.
He walked around the table and joined her, sliding an arm around her shoulders as she battled silent tears. He could feel her grief, and he wished he could end it. “They’ve thought you were dead for the last eight years; let’s end at least one grief they’ve carried. We can go on the offensive to deal with the rest of it.”
“I’d bring trouble right to their doorstep.”
“Trouble’s already here, and your presence won’t change it. If anything, your being so hard to find makes your sisters the more attractive targets.”
The words were cruel to be kind, and he felt her stiffen. “You can’t drive your sisters into a life on the run too, and that’s what this is going to come down to unless it is finally stopped. Let me and the officers working with me do our jobs; let us finally stop this.”
“It can’t be done.”
He smiled. “Sure it can. Richard Wise is in jail. The guys who still have enough loyalty to him to do his bidding are less than a couple dozen. All it takes is one or two arrests and you and your sisters are suddenly not nearly so attractive a problem to take up. We’ll win based on attrition, if nothing else.”
She didn’t answer him.
“Trust me, Amy. Please.”
He felt the sigh that came from her as a soft acceptance. “I so want to see them again, just once.”
He eased back a step and pulled out a handkerchief. He gently wiped at the tear traces on her cheeks. “Let me set it up. Let me show you it is possible to safely settle here near your family.”
“If there’s a mistake, one or both of them dies.”
“Do you really have a choice? You leave them thinking you are dead, they’ll resume the search for information. They’ll slip security around them not realizing the risk. They’ll let someone looking for you convince them you’re still alive. It’s not going to get better, Amy. It’s not going to go back to the way it was.”
“One time, Luke, one meeting. That’s all I can offer.”
“Then I’ll take it.” He tucked the handkerchief into her hand and smiled to lighten the moment. “Practical stuff first. What name are you using? Where are you staying?”
“I can’t answer that. I can’t,” she whispered.
The words erased his smile and his optimism. The idea he was through this lady’s fear was merely a shadow; he didn’t have her trust yet. He pulled back the hope he’d felt and quietly settled for what he thought she could accept. “Are you okay for cash?”
“Yes.”
“Got something to wear to a reunion?”
It got him a brief smile.
“I’ll get it set up for Thursday night, somewhere private, easy for you to access, and far from the attention that is around your sisters. I’ll make sure your sisters get there without a reporter or anyone else trailing them.”
“They can’t know ahead of time. The odds are too high I might have to wave off.”
It was a reasonable fear. “I can wait until you are there, then give the all clear to their escorts. If it’s waved off they’ll never know it was ever being planned.”
“Thank you.”
“I brought a phone with me for you, never used; the number is not going to be in anyone’s hands. Call me Wednesday night, eight o’clock. I’ll give you the details for when and where. Are you set okay for transportation? I can arrange another car…”
“It’s covered.”
He wasn’t sure what to ask next, to say.
She looked away from him. “It’s best I get going. Thank you, Luke. You can’t imagine how much I want to see them again.”
“Thursday’s going to be just the beginning.”
“We’ll see. Thanks too for the meal.”
“Next time we’ll make it a dinner when you’re feeling more able to eat.” He helped her with her coat. His expression sobered. “No matter what happens, if trouble shows up, if you have to leave, promise you’ll call me. Promise you won’t just disappear again without a word.”
“I’ll call.” She rested her hand on his arm, squeezed gently, and disappeared through the back door.
Luke heard his dogs greet her. He cleared away the dinner plates, put the remaining pieces of steak on two paper plates for the dogs, and when he moved to the back door to let them in, Amy was gone.
Chapter Nine
THE GROUND WASN’T FROZEN YET, but it was hard packed and ankle turning, and the walk took twenty minutes across rough pasture. She was a lone figure on the horizon with nothing around her but the fence she was working on and the tools she carried. The destination was easy, but what Luke would say was not so simple. It was too early for the coffee he carried even though the sun was up, his sleep something that had ended with the alarm clock sounding at 4 a.m. He could think of a lot easier ways to start his Monday morning.
“You’re a hard lady to find, Lieutenant.”
Caroline St. James looked around to see him, and he caught a brief flash of surprise followed by stillness. “Chief.” She turned her attention back to the job at hand and tightened another coil of barbed wire, then stapled it to the post.
“I thought you were staying in the city this winter.”
“My uncle needed a hand.”
“Humm.” It looked like she was rebuilding most of this pasture fencing. He set aside his coffee and put his weight against the next wire to be stretched and pulled it taut. She drove in the staples.
She’d grown up on this land. She’d learned to shoot in the upper pasture firing at old Coke bottles and learned to be still and watch by tracking deer through the woods. He’d thought when he first met her that the city and the job wouldn’t be her cup of tea, but she’d turned out to be one of the best cops he’d ever had the privilege of working with.
