She was already five minutes late.
At 11:08 the kids picked up their bat and ball and left. Sam eyed the small field where they were playing, his head slightly tilted as he tried to listen for any sign of trouble. Out the passenger side window he thought he heard something move.
His head snapped around.
With his Bersa concealed under the cover of an open book — The Devil Colony, by James Rollins — Sam swept the safety lever into the fire position.
The clear ground outside the passenger’s window was empty.
His eyes went wide.
Behind him, he heard a female voice say, “Sam Reilly, you don’t know how glad I am to see you!”
He turned to the driver’s side window, where Virginia was now standing.
Sam lowered the handgun and smiled. “Virginia.”
He glanced at her.
She looked a disheveled mess, but otherwise no different than the last time he’d seen her more than two years ago. Her feet were bare and she wore a pair of paramedic blue cargo pants. She’d discarded her conspicuous paramedic top, keeping just her black tank top instead. It revealed her slim figure and muscular arms, the way he remembered her. Her clothes looked like they had recently been wet, but were now close to dry. Her blonde French braids were wet and windswept, giving her a decidedly sexy appearance, that Sam hadn’t quite seen when they were both in the military.
Sam felt the tension leave his body in an instant. His lips curled into a grin. “Well, are you going to get in the car or are we going to have a picnic here?”
Without responding she moved to the passenger side door. She moved with the commanding gait of a professional soldier. Her face was set hard and her eyes determined. She opened the door, climbed in and closed it.
He stared at her for a moment.
She smiled a full set of even white teeth, bare one. Sam recalled it had been knocked crooked during an attack in Afghanistan by a small fragment of shrapnel that ricocheted off a protective wall by an IED blast. She’d once meant to get it fixed when she returned stateside but decided against it, telling everyone it reminded her that she should have died that day, and now every day is a bonus — as such she didn’t want to waste a day of it.
She had a small gold piercing through her left nostril. That’s new. Certainly wouldn’t have met Navy regulations. Her blonde, windswept hair had a pink tinge to it where it appeared she’d taken a blow to the side of her forehead.
Her full lips curled into a grin. “What?”
“You look like hell, Virginia.”
“Thanks.” Her soft blue eyes examined him, noticing differences in him, too, no doubt. “I missed you, too.”
“Hey, you made the news this morning!”
“That’s good. Anything interesting?”
“Not really,” Sam admitted. “They found your Ambulance and they’ve had divers out looking for your body all morning.”
“Well, the longer they think I’m dead the longer I’ll get to live.”
Sam carefully scanned the underpass for people. “You hungry?”
“Starving.”
He released the handbrake and took off. “Good. Let’s grab a bite.”
Chapter Twenty-Six
Detective Eric Greentree peered upward past Armstrong through the dirty windshield of the unmarked police cruiser from the passenger seat. There were several rows of cheap houses, not unkept, just decidedly working class living.
“The red brick one here,” he said, squinting through shards of afternoon sun.
Looking toward the building on their left, Armstrong braked and rolled one wheel up over the curb into a space. “1349 Greene avenue, apartment 2. Lodgings of one Charles Michael Beaumont.”
“At least it’s probably ground floor,” Greentree said. He removed his Glock 9 from his shoulder holster, checked it, and replaced it.
“This building looks old, thirties probably, must have survived the blackout here.”
“Our boy probably watched it all burn from the front window.” He said, flicking his cheap suit lapels with a shrug.
“Let’s go see if he’s home,” Armstrong said getting out and slamming the ballistic panel door.
The building appeared run down compared to its neighbors. Graffiti was scrawled on the ajar steel and glass door, and trash bags were piled on both sides of the stoop. A broken security camera hung from its wires above the entrance. “Nice place,” Greentree said, running his eyes across the peeling paintwork and pushing the door with his fist. “I thought this area was trendy now?”
“I think Paramedics earn even less than us, if that’s possible — he probably bought this place twenty years ago for a song.”
Greentree placed his ear to the worn black door marked 2, taking care not to obstruct the looking glass, or step in front of the threshold and make a telltale shadow. After a moment he shrugged and withdrew his handgun.
“Timber door,” he said to Armstrong as she pulled her own from its hip holster under her jacket. He looked at Armstrong, stance ready, fearless. He knew she would have his back and would wade straight into battle at a moment’s notice if that was what happened right now, no question. He hoped he wouldn’t be ordered to kill her at some point.
He took half a step back, paused, and kicked the timber door just below the striker with the full force of his body weight. The door crashed straight off the frame and fell open, hanging from the lower hinge.
“Police!” Armstrong yelled as she blazed in and left, Greentree a step behind and moving right.
The unit was dark, and silent. It was instantly obvious to both from the stale air and stillness that they were alone.
“Anyone here?” Greentree called, as he turned and hoisted the door back up into the frame with his left hand. He gently pushed the lock, keeping his handgun in his right hand. With flashlights and gun sights they swept the apartment as they had a hundred others. Both satisfied with the search they holstered their weapons.
Greentree found the lights. “Maybe she’s dead?”
“I watched that water for ten minutes, and nothing came up from that wreck. I told you Virginia was dead.”
“So the cash has to be here somewhere right?” he said, moving toward the kitchen.
“Right.”
Greentree tore at the contents of the cupboards, anything he could grab clattered to the floor beside him. Armstrong had pulled the cushions from the sofa and was dragging a switchblade from one end of the interior fabric to the other when Greentree read aloud from the flight itinerary he had just found on the refrigerator door.
Mr. Charles Beaumont. Thank you for choosing Delta for your upcoming flight from La Guardia to Palm Springs International Airport.
Armstrong snatched the itinerary off the fridge and read a couple lines and smiled. “Well how do you like that?”
Greentree snatched the itinerary from her. And read the intended destination — a medical clinic that specialized in a new type of cancer treatment. “Virginia comes into a million dollars and the next thing you know her father is on a flight to a specialist treatment center.”
“He’s not going to be happy.”
“No. And it gets worse.”
“How?”
“He called last night. Said there was a mix up with the assassin. He said after she killed the Senator and stole the map, she placed it in the duffel bag with the kid’s money. The idea was when we got the duffel bag, we would retrieve the map.”