Nobody did much talking while we ate, although Walt was taking it all with a blithe lack of concern. He played the perfect congenial host, periodically offering juice, fresh fruit, or a plate of pancakes round the table. We accepted with a muted politeness. I knew from our past meeting just how quickly the old man could slip back into the professional skin of his former life. It made me constantly wary, expecting the worst.
In spite of the uncomfortable atmosphere, we were certainly hungry. The food had seemed plentiful in supply but was quickly consumed. It was then that Harriet pushed back her chair and stood, leaning forwards with her hands on the table.
“Walt, why don’t you take Andrew and Charlie through to the living room. I’m sure you have a lot to talk about and you’ll be more comfortable in there,” she said, her voice easy even if her body gave her away a little. “Trey, honey, how about you give me a hand to clear the table?”
I half expected Trey to kick up a stink about being excluded from the grown-ups’ discussion but to my surprise he jumped up and started stacking dirty plates together like he couldn’t wait to be out of there.
Walt and Andrew stood also. I was the last on my feet, mainly because I still had the gun resting across my thighs. The bag had slipped to the floor and as I reached down for it I managed to stuff the SIG back inside. When I straightened up I found Andrew had loosened his jacket again, just in case, and was watching me with narrowed eyes.
He had dark eyes, a little like Sean’s. At this distance it was hard to differentiate the changeover line between iris and pupil. Sean could have that vigilant and impenetrable air about him, too. It was clear that, whatever his uncle’s feelings on the subject, Andrew trusted me about as far as he could throw a small car. I suppose I couldn’t really blame him for that.
After all, so far I hadn’t had particularly good press.
Walt led the pair of us through to the living area and gestured us into the two sofas that faced each other across a shaggy rug and a glass-topped wicker coffee table. We followed him with neither quite wanting to offer our unprotected back to the other.
As we sat there Andrew regarded me for a few moments with a stony face, then he gave a snort of bitter amusement.
“I’ve come across some fugitives from justice in my time, Fox,” he bit out, shaking his head, “but I gotta hand it to you. You have to be one of the coolest.”
“Maybe that’s because I haven’t done anything I didn’t have to,” I returned. I waited a beat, then added, “Andrew,” to the end of it.
“That’s Special Agent in Charge Till to you, missy,” he shot back.
Special Agent in Charge no less. So he was FBI too, and not just a foot soldier. Nice to keep it in the family, Walt.
The old man held his hand up for peace. “Now, now, Andrew,” he said gently. “You’ve been busting to speak your mind all through breakfast, so let’s hear the worst of it.”
“This – person,” his nephew said delicately, not taking his eyes off me for a second, “is wanted for just about everything from kidnapping to homicide, including in connection with the shooting of a police officer down in Broward County. We’ve got half the cops in the state working on locating her and the Pelzner boy. And what you’re doing now by giving her shelter, Uncle Walt, constitutes a serious felony, as you are well aware.”
“You going to bring me in, son?” Walt asked, his voice mild. Andrew flicked him a single barbed glance.
“What happened to innocent until proven guilty?” I asked with just a smear of taunt to the question, “Or doesn’t that apply here in the Land of the Free?”
Andrew’s face darkened but he didn’t rise to it.
Walt, meanwhile, had turned his attention over towards the kitchen, where Trey was dutifully wiping plates dry and being very careful not to drop any.
“I may be a little rusty these days,” Walt murmured, “but the boy sure doesn’t look like he’s being held against his will.”
Andrew allowed his eyes to slide in that direction for a couple of seconds. When he looked back, he was frowning.
“If your theory is right,” I said, neutral. “I’ve had him for less than four days. If you’re going to play the Stockholm Syndrome card and try to say that I’ve brainwashed him, or that he’s formed an unusual attachment to his captor in such a short time, you’re going to struggle like hell to make that one stick.”
Walt’s face didn’t show his sudden amusement outright, but I thought I detected a certain twinkle. “You have to admit, she’s got a point,” he allowed.
Andrew studied his uncle’s expression and sat back with a frustrated gesture.
“Perhaps if you’d seen this lady’s record you wouldn’t be so ready to give her the benefit of the doubt,” he said sharply, then started rapping out the facts. He didn’t falter and he didn’t need to refer to any notes. Nice to see I’d made such an impression since I’d arrived in the US.
“British Army background. Expert marksman – well that didn’t take much working out. Selected for Special Forces. Then it all goes wrong and she ends up with a dishonourable discharge. How am I doing so far, Fox?”
“That’s Miss Fox to you, laddie,” I drawled, mainly to hide the growing unease. I liked my privacy as much as the next person. In fact, considering what my past contained, probably more.
He brushed aside my calculated insolence and kept going. “So after that she’s scratching a living teaching unarmed combat. Gets herself involved in a drugs racket. Year before last she ends up killing a guy – with her bare hands, for Christ’s sake!”
“It was self defence,” I gritted. “I was cleared of any blame.”
“Yeah well, looks like the courts over in good old England get it wrong sometimes too, huh?” he batted straight back, keeping his gaze on Walt now, working to convince him. His body was very still as he talked, as though he was putting all his effort into his voice. “Then there’s the part she played in a major civil disturbance last fall. There was a shooting there too, wasn’t there, Fox?”
I opened my mouth but he didn’t give me the chance to speak. “We did a search with Interpol and, surprise surprise, her name pops up again. Trouble in Germany. More shootings. Either you’re one unlucky lady, Fox, or you’re a magnet for trouble.”
“I was cleared,” I said again, more quietly this time. “You want to know what really happened with half that lot? Get in touch with Lancashire Constabulary back in the UK and speak to Detective Superintendent John MacMillan. I’m sure he’ll be willing to tell you all about the people I didn’t kill. The ones whose lives I actually helped save.”
MacMillan’s name was a surprise, I saw, but whether it was because it was familiar or whether the rank impressed him, I couldn’t tell. He regarded me gravely.
“I suppose you reckon you have a believable explanation of the events of the past few days, do you?” he asked quietly. “Just like that?”
“I’ll give it a go,” I said, calmer now. “It may not be believable to you, Special Agent in Charge, but it’s the truth so it’s the best I’ve got. Tell me, how much do you know about the workings of the stock market?”
***
It took a while to tell the full story. The FBI agent made rapid notes in a pocket book and only interrupted me twice. The first time was when I went through the attack on the young cop by the two men in the Buick. As soon as I mentioned shooting the guy who’d been in the passenger seat, Andrew looked up and said, “Shot him with what?”
“A SIG Sauer nine-mil,” I said, not making any moves to show it to him. “You’ll have found four empty casings at the scene, by the driver’s door of the Mercury. They’d already put us off the road by then and the cop was already dead,” I added pointedly. “The men in the Buick were using something fairly hefty. I didn’t get a clear look, but I would guess at possibly three-fifty-sevens. Large calibre handguns have their own distinctive sound. Oakley man – the guy at the theme park – had a forty-cal, like the one you carry yourself. Whitmarsh and Chris were both using nines at the motel.”