The call to the deputy director of her agency had not gone well. Blake Hawkins was dead, and Jessica Devlin was missing, along with the prisoner she had been sent to recover. Her boss wanted answers. Thorn wanted answers too. The woman sighed. Where are you, Jes—
The retriever barked twice and bolted away from the bench.
Thorn opened her eyes, as the dog leash slipped from her hand. “Buster! Buster, get back here.”
The dog jumped on the approaching jogger.
“Get down, Buster.” Thorn hurried toward the stranger. “I’m so sorry.”
Dressed in a navy blue tracksuit, hair under a baseball cap, the runner bent over and played with the animal.
“He’s not usually like this.”
His tail whipping back and forth, Buster turned ninety degrees, sat, and leaned against the runner’s leg.
The runner patted the panting canine. “Hey there, Buster.” Taking the pooch’s head in her hands, she jostled it. “Have you been a good boy?”
Thorn clapped twice. “Come here, Buster.”
Rising to her full height and sliding her sunglasses down her nose an inch, the woman locked eyes with the marshal.
Thorn stopped. “Jessica...what—” something hard pressed on her ribs, as a voice came from her five o’clock.
“That’s the end of a sound suppressor attached to a twenty-two pistol...”
Stiffening, Thorn felt a hand patting her body before her service pistol was removed from its holster.
“...loaded with subsonic ammunition. Will it make noise? Of course. Will anyone nearby hear it? Not a chance.”
Knowing her boss’s habit of walking the pet at this park, at this time of day, Devlin led Buster to the park bench. “Let’s have a seat, Marissa.” Sitting, she ruffled the dog’s fur.
Thorn sat on Devlin’s right and faced the man with the gun.
Wearing an outfit similar to Devlin’s suit, Randall plopped his butt onto the slatted boards to the marshal’s right and smiled. “We haven’t met. I’m—”
“Simon Patton.”
He distorted his features while bobbing his head. “Sure...we’ll go with that for now.”
Devlin leaned back.
Buster plopped both paws onto her lap and tried licking her face.
She jerked her head away from the pink tongue at the last second. “Do you miss me, boy?” She clutched the mutt’s head and stared into the animal’s eyes. “You wouldn’t betray me, would you? No. You wouldn’t. You’re a good boy.” Devlin cranked her head to the right. “Can you say the same thing, Thorn? Would you betray me?”
The marshal frowned. “What are you talking about?”
Randall pushed the gun deeper into the woman’s side. “She’s talking about the...welcome parties you sent our way.”
“That resulted in...” Devlin pushed Buster off her thighs and made him lie at her feet, “the deaths of three deputy marshals.” Spinning toward her boss, she crossed her legs, laid her arm on the bench behind Thorn’s back, and glared at the elder woman. “Because of you, Blake’s dead.”
Thorn touched fingertips to her chest. “You think I had something to do with that?”
“You sent Blake and me to Mexico.”
“It’s my job...to send you after criminals.”
“Is it also your job to send a goon squad to finish me off when the first attempt goes south?”
Thorn maintained her innocent physical presence.
“I made,” Devlin lifted a finger, “one phone call after the ambush on the road...” she jabbed her boss’s sternum, “to you. The next thing I know I’m surrounded by armed men who obviously had shoot-on-sight orders. Those had to come from you. No one else knew my whereabouts.”
The marshal pivoted to stare at the pond in the middle of the park. The sun’s rays bounced off the water’s still surface. Her mind worked overtime to piece together the events of the last thirty-three hours.
“Why’d you do it, Marissa? Why?”
Thorn gaped at the pond’s fountain that sent outward arcs of water in different directions.
“Answer—” Devlin shouted before glancing around the park. “Answer me.” Her voice was quieter. “Why did you want Blake and me killed?”
“You’re right...” Thorn shifted her position on the wooden slats.
Randall pushed harder on the weapon.
“...about—” she winced and turned his way. “Is that really necessary? You obviously have the advantage here.”
“Careful...if it were up to me—” Randall gave the passing elderly couple a broad smile while crossing his legs to hide the gun. “Lovely weather, isn’t it?”
They returned his gesture. “A little warm,” said the old man.
“True, but after that brutal winter, I’ll take it.”
The couple chuckled. “Right you are, young man,” replied the old-timer. “We should be grateful.” The twosome shuffled away.
“Have a good evening.” Confronting his captive, his pleasantness evaporating, Randall slanted to within bad breath distance. “If it were up to me,” he glimpsed the dog, “Buster would already be an orphan.”
Not yielding an inch of personal space, Thorn stared down the man for several seconds and came back to her employee. “You’re right about one thing. I did send a team to your location.”
Clenching her teeth, Devlin felt pressure building inside of her. You bit—
“But not to murder you...I sent an unsanctioned S.O.G. team to pick you up. When the team arrived at the coordinates, they found three bodies, a lot of spent brass, and your smashed cell phone.” She faced forward, placed folded hands on her lap, and shrugged. “Without any solid leads on where you were, I had them return to base before the Mexican authorities caught wind of the illegal op.”
Devlin tilted her head. “Then how do you explain the hit squad? They were at the cabin less than an hour after I called you.”
Thorn ogled the wrought iron benches on the other side of the pool. “There was someone else who knew where you were.”
Devlin uncrossed her legs and sat erect. “Who?”
“The deputy director ordered me to send a couple of my people to Mexico,” she jerked a thumb toward Randall, “to extradite him. The DD told me he’d been tasked with finding a mole in the Marshals Service...”
Devlin and Randall exchanged looks.
“...and that Patton had
