“Mmm,” Kai hummed. “Bet she’s got a killer bod.”
“Ryder,” he warned.
He didn’t need any reminders. He’d been watching her for two days and she wasn’t particularly discreet when it came to changing clothes. But then, under normal conditions, she wouldn’t need to be. From the street, her home was virtually nondescript, the only entries the front door and one curtained window. Lakeside, the house was nearly all glass, but its orientation and landscaping created a seclusion Mitch could only get around with a boat specifically positioned on the lake and a pair of binoculars.
He hit a dense patch of fog and another tremor gripped him bone deep. “Shit. I thought I knew fog, but this place is colder than San Francisco. What intel did you get? I’m going to confront her in the morning before she goes to work.”
“She’s a secretive little thing,” Kai said.
“No shit,” Mitch muttered.
“From what I’ve found, she’s not using her real name for anything. She’s completely dropped it. The alias Heather Raiden goes back seven years, and I still think her using your middle name for her last name is . . . odd. Kinda creepy, actually. I mean, it’s almost like there’s a message there or something.”
Mitch got that feeling, too, though he kept vacillating over the possible meaning. “Like, ‘Fuck you, Foster. You’re too stupid to find me even when I’m using your name?’ That kind of message?”
But even as he said the words, he didn’t believe them. Not at gut level. When she’d walked out on him, she hadn’t been cruel. She’d been . . . withdrawn. She’d been . . . resolute. Keeping her husband a secret from Mitch—yes, that had been cruel. But when she’d admitted it, when she’d broken off her relationship with Mitch to go back to the husband, she hadn’t done it in a careless or vicious way.
Even now, seven years later, his gut told him that if the man hadn’t been there with her, silently standing sentinel when she’d confessed and broken it off, she wouldn’t have been able to do it. Wouldn’t have been able to resist his pleas for an explanation. For a chance to talk to her—in private.
God, he’d been such a fool for her. And remembering still both hurt and angered him.
Kai made an indecisive sound in his throat. “I don’t get that.”
Hope percolated to the surface. “You’re picking up emotions from her?”
Kai was only one of seven firefighters exposed to radioactive chemicals in a military warehouse fire six years before. The way the chemicals had warped their DNA gave each member of the team paranormal abilities. Kai was empathic, but generally only picked up on emotions from those close by or those endangering the team. And at the moment, Kai was eight hundred miles away.
“No,” Kai said, but he didn’t sound convincing. “I think this is more intuition.”
“Screw intuition.” If Mitch clenched his teeth any harder, they’d crack. “Either use your powers or get me hard intel. I don’t want to hear any shit in between.”
“Damn, you’re irritable. You’re bringing me down, dude.”
“Ice cubes generally aren’t warm and fuzzy.” Neither were men tracking down exes for explanations about conspiracies ruining their lives. He pulled into the slip designated for the rented boat and tied off. “And what the hell’s up with your new attitude, Ryder? Did you get yourself a new lay or did you just finally get that stick out of your ass?”
“Someone sounds jealous,” Kai said, singing the last word. “I know where you can find a good stick . . .”
“Got that covered, thanks.”
“Ah, good point. Back to said stick—her job at the university deals with vaccine research. She’s evidently making headway in this new wave of DNA vaccines. She’s well respected in the field. Travels, lectures, publishes in trade journals.”
“How nice for her, but hardly scintillating.” Although that remnant of her altruistic personality was just another annoying paradox. “Move on.”
“She’s low, low profile. No scandals. No legal disputes. No community work. No charity work. No family. No deep personal ties that I can find at all. I think Keira’s abilities went askew here. I can’t find anyone named Dex or Dexter in her life at all.”
Keira O’Shay, another firefighter in the team, was clairaudient and had been trying to pick up thoughts from Halina by using a photograph Mitch had dug up from their time together.
He jumped to the dock and rain tapped his face as he jogged toward his rental. He couldn’t understand why it wasn’t snowing. It was sure as hell cold enough. He unlocked the car with a press of a button on the key fob and slid in.
“The more I need all your so-called powers, the more limits pop up,” Mitch complained. “Talk about annoying.”
“Dude, she’s not working with an ideal candidate. Why don’t you call me back when you warm up.”
Mitch cranked the heater and revved the engine. “Tell me about her finances. Her house is small, but in a prime location. Comparable properties run well over a million bucks. She’s driving a nearly new, fifty-thousand-dollar BMW.”
“Don’t bite my head off, okay?” Kai said, irritation deepening his voice with warning, “—but I don’t know. She makes a little over a hundred grand a year at U of W. She rarely gets more than her expenses paid when she lectures. And we haven’t been able to find any strange influx of cash. So, unless she’s drug running on the side—”
“Or got a big payoff seven years ago . . .” Mitch muttered. That probability twisted the hot knife that had already plunged to the center of his body. As if she hadn’t betrayed him enough in their relationship, the discovery of Halina’s involvement in this conspiracy was beyond any sick plot he’d witnessed in his criminal law practice.
“Jessica has been combing through Schaeffer’s financials,” Kai said, referencing another team member. “She hasn’t found evidence of a payoff.”
“Yet.” The car’s heater melted the chill from the interior, but not from Mitch’s soul. Halina’s immersion in this conspiracy meant everyone who mattered to him was living in fear because of something that had involved him. “She will. I have no doubt.”
“And I thought I was jaded,” Kai said.
“So, basically, you’ve got nothing I can use.”
“You’re so welcome for giving up my week and researching this chick fifteen hours a day, dude. Though, I have to admit, the pictures were worth it. Where do you find these women? One is hotter than the next. This one, though . . . she may be my favorite. She’s got a really exotic look—”
“Ryder.”
“I’m tempted not to tell you what Ransom discovered about her trainer,” Kai said, “and let her kick your ass tomorrow morning.”
Mitch braked hard before turning out of the parking lot. He idled there, his mind suddenly consumed by this flash of information. “Ransom” was Luke Ransom, another team member and former firefighter who now worked as an ATF agent.
“What kind of pictures?” Mitch asked. “And what trainer? Why do you save all the good stuff for when I’m ready to hang up on you?”
“Just a few photos, really. Considering how long and deep I had to look to find them, I’d bet she doesn’t even know they’re on the Internet. A couple are from her lectures. A couple are of her with the U of W rowing team. She’s given clinics there in the past.
“Luke says her trainer is a retired marine Special Forces guy with a company called Precision Tactical. He teaches everything from hand-to-hand combat to marksmanship. Gives classes out of Halina’s gym. Runs clinics around the country for both military and civilian groups. Has a dojo in the back of his storefront where he sells the highest tech weapons and surveillance equipment between San Francisco and Seattle.”