“You a breakfast eater?”
He shook his head. “Mostly not.”
“Me, neither. Just as well. I’m not a domestic kind of girl,” she said. “I can make coffee and run the microwave oven, but I don’t cook to speak of. Lord knows my mama tried to teach me, but I was always more interested in climbing trees and fences and exploring the Two Acre Woods. I can burn a hamburger, and on a good day, make salad.”
“No problem,” he said. “I’m pretty good in the kitchen.”
“And not bad for a white boy in the bedroom.”
They both smiled.
She said, “I need to get going, Tommy. Work.”
He nodded. “You need a change of clothes?”
She raised her eyebrows. “You have women’s clothes here? In my size?”
“I think maybe my aunt might have left some stuff here when she came to visit a while back.”
“Uh-huh, sure she did.” She grinned again. “I have a fresh outfit in my car, and a go bag.”
It was his turn to raise his eyebrows. “Oh, really? You mean you
“Did I say that? I always keep a change of clothes and a go bag in the car. Never know but that you might be caught out on an all-night surveillance or something.”
“I thought the CIA wasn’t supposed to run ops inside the country.”
“Where on earth did you get that notion, sweetie? You need to come to town more often.”
She started to rise. He touched her shoulder with one hand. He needed to tell her how… great this was. And maybe see if she felt the same way. And maybe see where it might go. Definitely see where it might go. “Hey, Marissa…?”
She read his mind. Shook her head. “Don’t go there yet, Tommy. Let’s let it sit for a while and see how it feels. But, yeah, it was a pretty special first date, wasn’t it?”
She padded away and into the hall bathroom. He sat in the bed, the sheet around his waist, and sipped at the coffee. She wasn’t anything like his usual type of woman — they tended to be intellectual, brainy, and Nordic — blue-eyed blondes with sharp wits and gym-toned bodies. Marissa pretended to be less smart than she was — he’d checked her out and her IQ was higher than his — but she was still more of a heart-person. And given her chocolate skin, brown eyes, and black curly hair, about as far away from “Nordic” as you could get.
He shook his head. And none of that mattered at all. Because what Thorn was feeling was something that hadn’t stirred in him for a long time — but not so long that he had forgotten what it was called.
He didn’t want this feeling. Couldn’t afford it, really, not at this time, but there it was.
Like it or not, he was falling in love with this woman.
20
Thorn sat staring at his computer’s holoproj, not really seeing it. This thing with Marissa was definitely throwing him for a loop. He had to acknowledge it, but it was still weird. She was so… different…
He looked up and saw Colonel Kent standing in the doorway.
“Abe. Come in.”
Kent did so.
“So, what’s up?” Thorn said, shifting mental gears.
Kent said, “I’ve got a line on Natadze.”
Thorn blinked. “Really?”
Kent nodded at Thorn’s computer terminal. “Log in to his file, bring up the name Stansell.”
Thorn waved at the computer sensors, then said, “File: Natadze, sub-file, Stansell.”
A webpage blossomed in the air, a holoproj showing several guitars.
“Ask for La Tigra Blanca Tres,” Kent said.
Thorn did.
The image changed. A classical guitar appeared, rotating slowly. The instrument was a pale but rich color, somewhere between tan and off-white on the sides and back, and the color of an old manila folder on the front. The sides and back had patterns that looked like tiger stripes on them.
“Looks almost like it’s glowing,” Thorn said.
“That’s called chatoyancy. Same thing you get off a tiger’s eye gem, or a piece of fine silk. A characteristic of the wood used.”
“Hmm. Interesting.”
“The White Tiger,” Kent said. “And the third one with the name. Made by a guy named Les Stansell, in a little southern Oregon town just north of the California border.”
“Very nice.”
“The wood on the front is Port Orford cedar, that on the sides and back Oregon myrtlewood. Neck is Spanish cedar, the fretboard is ebony, if it makes any difference. Runs about five grand and change for Stansell’s basic models — he’s made a specialty out of these kinds of woods, and the guitars are apparently well thought of by serious players. I checked it out, they go on about tone and sustain and the top opening up fast.”
Thorn nodded.
“This particular one wound up in a specialty shop in San Francisco, and the asking price is ten thousand dollars.”
Thorn waited. “And…?” he said after a moment.
“Not a lot of people walk in off the street and buy ten-thousand-dollar guitars. I sent a bulletin to every luthier and high-end shop I could find via the Net, asking to be informed of sales where the buyer of a classical instrument costing more than five thousand dollars wasn’t somebody known to the seller. I get six or eight hits a day, and I usually am able to run them down and eliminate them — with help from one of Gridley’s guys.”
“And you haven’t been able to run this one down.”
“No. The backwalk runs into a dead end.”
“Could be a lot of things,” Thorn said. “Somebody trying to keep it from his wife, maybe looking to dodge taxes, like that.”
“That’s true. I ran across that once before — some guy bought a spendy guitar and didn’t want his wife to know. But I was able to find him and figure that out pretty quick.”
“You think this is our guy.”
Kent nodded. “I do. More hunch than anything else. The shop owner was contacted via e-mail, the money was transferred from an account in the Bahamas, and the buyer is supposed to drop by and pick the guitar up tomorrow.”
“And you don’t want to have the local FBI team check it out.”
“No. This is… personal. I’d like to be there myself.”
Thorn nodded. “Go.”
“Thank you.”
“Natadze is a bad mark on my record, too, Abe. You need any help?”
Colonel Kent shook his head. “I don’t think so. This time, surprise will be on my side, not his.”
“Keep me posted.”
“I will, Commander.” He paused. “How’s Jay’s son doing?”
“Okay now, so I hear. Not ready to come home yet, but doing better.”
“That’s good.”
“Yes.”
Kent went to the shooting range and put in an hour, burning a hundred rounds through his sidearm. He was
