fan.
“Just hand me the crackers and the peanut butter.”
He turned. She’d followed on his heels and was standing right behind him. He blinked and handed her the requested items. She took one in each hand and headed back toward the couch.
He followed.
“So, where does one get clothes like these made anyway?” she asked as she sat back down and pried the top off of the peanut butter.
“Cuba.”
“Oh?” She raised a brow, dipping a Saltine into the top of the container and scraping a big brown glob of crushed peanut and hydrogenated fat onto her cracker. “They just make them there like someone would make tie- dyed t-shirts here, huh?” She asked, not a little sarcasm lacing her words.
Jack’s gaze narrowed. “A man in Cuba makes suits for important, but threatened political figures. They’re bullet-proof. One of his workers is willing to supply people in the private sector.”
“How did you get such a perfect fit?” she asked.
“I sent him an old pair of your jeans and a long-sleeved shirt for reference.”
Annabelle stopped eating and looked back up at him. “You took some of my jeans? I never noticed any missing.”
Jack suddenly realized his mistake. He swallowed and leaned back into the cushioned seat. He was treading uncomfortably close to the truth with this new line of conversation. But there was no way out of it now. “They were a pair that you donated to Goodwill. As was the shirt.”
Annabelle didn’t say anything for a long time. She watched him carefully and it was his turn to become uncomfortable under such scrutiny. She chewed on the inside of her cheek for a moment and her gaze narrowed.
She was figuring it out. He could tell. Her next question would be how he had managed to find just those clothes, and he would have no way of answering. No way but the truth, that is. One of his men had pulled them from the black bag she’d dropped off – after watching her make the drop. Just like they watched everything she did in public.
But, again, Annabelle surprised him. Instead of questioning him, as she had every right to do, and putting him on the spot that he so deserved to be on, she remained silent. She looked down at her crackers and peanut butter and continued to eat quietly.
He wasn’t sure whether he should be grateful. He had a feeling that the subject would come up again and that there would be no such easy escape from it the second time around.
“I found it!”
Annabelle and Jack both jumped as Dylan charged through the hidden door in the corner of the room. Annabelle’s cracker crumbled all over her mouth and shirt front as she accidentally crushed it. She stood and brushed herself off, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand.
Dylan stood in the doorway, a small white piece of paper in his left hand.
“You found what?” she asked then, brushing the last bits of cracker away from her jeans.
“This,” he said, coming into the room. His eyes were wide and red-rimmed and his color was still pale, but his expression was hopeful. Expectant. Excited.
Annabelle took the paper and looked down at it. She scanned the lines several times, in silence, before finally reading them aloud.
“Fourth S-S plus T, colon, underscore R, A, underscore G, underscore R, A, N, underscore, underscore, and then CUMC.”
Annabelle looked up from the paper and met Dylan’s gaze. “Dylan, this is what was hidden in the pink on pink?”
“Yes. That’s all of it. I checked and double-checked.”
Annabelle turned and looked up at Jack. His expression was once again unreadable. Their earlier conversation would have to wait, but Annabelle would be damned if she would forget about it.
She sighed. “Okay, so it looks like some kind of word puzzle.”
“Right up your alley,” Jack said.
Annabelle looked back down at the sheet of paper. It was true that she loved word puzzles. She did Mensa word puzzles while sitting on the toilet at home. It seemed to be the only extra time she had of late.
And Max had known she was good at them. But how had he even had time to pull all of this together before the bad guys had reached him? She and Cassie hadn’t been gone all that long…
“Jack, how is Cass? Is she still okay?”
“She’s on her way here, actually. Alex went to pick her up.”
Annabelle’s eyes widened. “Is Alex the guy who was here earlier?”
Jack nodded.
“My God, she’s going to flip out. Jack, she has no idea what’s going on. What do you think she’s going to do when Mr. Dressed-In-Black with a goatee shows up on her front doorstep and tells her to get in the car with him?”
Jack’s lips twitched. “Well, if it were you he were retrieving, I’d expect him to get shot. But it isn’t. And Cassie’s a level-headed woman.”
“Christ,” Annabelle sighed. She put one hand on her hip and placed her fingers to her forehead. “She’s going to rip him a new asshole.”
“I gave him your cell number.”
As if on cue, Annabelle’s phone began to ring from inside her jacket pocket. She stared up at Jack, disbelieving.
He smiled.
She blinked and shook her head, then pulled the phone out and opened it.
“Hello?”
“Miss Drake, please talk to your friend.” There was some shuffling on the other end, and then Cassie was on the line.
“Annabelle, is that you?”
“Jesus, Cass. I’m so sorry about this. Trust me, Alex is kosher. He’s cool. Just go with him.”
On the other end, she could hear kids playing in the background. Annabelle’s heart leapt into her throat. “Oh no. Trinity’s with you, isn’t she?”
“Annabelle, he wants us all to go with him. What about Emma and Rose?”
“Them too, Cass. They’re not safe there.” Inside, Annabelle was dying. She couldn’t believe that she’d pulled her friend into such a catastrophic mess. And the kids. The little girls. Would any insane bastard really hurt the girls just to get to the nonsensical message that Annabelle now held, scribbled on a white piece of paper in her hand?
Yes. People were not kind and life was pain.
“I can’t do this, girl. This isn’t good. Trin’s freaking out.”
“Cass, you have to trust me. Please, for the love of God, pack up what you’ll need for a few nights – do it fast. Then go get in the car with Alex.”
“He’ll bring her here,” Jack said, suddenly, obviously able to follow the conversation from where he stood a few feet away. “The others, he’ll take to a safe house outside the city. It’s temporary.”
“Cass, did you hear that?”
“Yes. God, his voice really carries. I heard it all. Hold on.” On her end, Cassie moved away from the phone to talk to Trinity and the girls. Annabelle tried to listen as best she could, but the voices were muffled.
Annabelle covered the phone receiver and pinned Jack with a hard gaze. “Swear to me that they’ll be safe, Jack.”
He watched her for a long, silent time. Finally, he shook his head and gave a slight, slow shrug. “I can’t promise that, Bella. But I swear to you that we’ll try.”
