“How? We have an apartment. And no bodies.”
He said, “Did you kill the politician we’d recruited because you wanted to? Or because it was necessary?”
He saw the shock on her face, and the abrupt change in demeanor. She dropped her hands and said, “Are you questioning my commitment?”
“No. Not at all. His death is proof of your commitment. I’m questioning your judgment.”
She shifted yet again, closing on him and wrapping her hands around his neck, stroking his jugular with the middle nail of her right hand, saying, “You didn’t question that judgment last night.”
He felt the heat and pushed her away, seeing the crazy blossom in her eyes at his rejection.
He said, “Not here. Not now. Last night was a mistake. Get back into focus.” She turned feral, looking like she wanted to use the nail for real.
They waited in silence, letting the men search. A cat jumped on a counter, allowing Zhi to pick it up. She scratched behind its ears as if she were rebuking Chen for his rejection of her. Eventually, one man came back with an assortment of bills and said, “These are all for a woman named Nicole Shoemaker. She’s who lives here.”
Chen took the bills and said, “Why did he come here? Who is she?”
“No idea. That’s all we’ve found.”
Zhi said, “You want to keep dancing around the issue? Or find the guy? We have his phone.”
Chen saw her anger, and said, “Okay. Call the Third Department. Let’s get them in play.”
She gave him a smile, a dead thing that reminded him of teeth from a roadkill, and dialed the phone. He turned back to the men and said, “Get me an anchor here. Besides a name.”
They went back to work, and he looked at Zhi. She hung up the phone and said, “Last contact was on the A9 headed north. His phone is now dead.”
He slapped his hand on the counter. “That’s perfect for this operation. We get them involved and they’re no help. Just great.”
Zhi said, “It’s not all bad. They’re tracking it now. The lead time is gone. If he turns it on again, they’ll have a lock immediately.”
Chen shook his head and said, “Yeah, but now the entire organization knows we’re looking. We’re illegals. We don’t engage them without a reason, and usually that reason means someone has failed. In this case, me.”
A man came out of a bedroom and said, “I have a lease for the place, but there’s nothing else.”
Zhi asked, “Is there a phone number on it?”
Chen looked at her and she said, “If his phone is off, hers might not be.”
Which was pretty smart. He’d already alerted the hierarchy that he was in trouble here, so he might as well go all the way.
The man said, “No. It’s just an address to the rental agency. It’s in this building.”
Chen said, “In this building? Where?”
“First floor. Right below us.”
He looked at Zhi, and she nodded. He said, “Okay, we’re going down there, but no killing. All we want is the phone number to the person in this apartment. Understood?”
Chapter 19
Behind the wheel of his girlfriend’s Hyundai, Dunkin raced out of the parking lot and away from the apartment complex. Nicole demanded to know what was happening, but he gave her no explanation. Mainly because he didn’t have one. He handed her his phone and said, “Dial the last missed call. Put it on speaker.”
She did, and Dunkin heard a woman answer, saying, “Dunkin? Is that you?”
He said, “Jennifer?”
“Yes. Yes, this is Jennifer. Where are you? We’ve been trying to call.”
“Are you at my apartment?”
“Not anymore.”
“But you were there?”
The phone went blank. Dunkin and Nicole heard a shuffling, like the handset had been dropped or they were listening to a butt-dial. From what sounded like a tunnel, Jennifer said, “Pike!” Then they heard someone snarl, “Is this Dunkin?”
Dunkin said, “Yes, it’s me. Is this Pike?”
The tiny phone speaker did little to hide the venom coming out. “Yes, it’s Pike, you dipshit. What the fuck is going on with you?”
“Pike, I’m headed out of town. I’m sorry. I know I said you could stay with me, but I’ve had an issue come up.”
“No shit, asshole. I just killed two men at your apartment.”
Nicole put a hand to her mouth. Dunkin wasn’t sure if he’d heard correctly. “What did you just say?”
“I said I killed two men at your house. They were hunting you, and they found me. Tell me where you are. I’m on the road now.”
Nicole said, “How did he kill two people? What’s going on?”
Pike said, “Who is that? Who are you with?”
Now feeling real fear, Dunkin said, “It’s my girlfriend. Pike, some men are chasing me. I don’t know what to do.”
“No shit. I’m pretty sure that’s an accurate statement. Change your diaper and hang on.”
The next voice he heard was Jennifer. “Pike says to get out of blast radius. He wants you gone from here.”
“What about the police? Maybe I should go to them.”
“Not yet. Maybe in the future, but if you go now, we’re going to get wrapped up in a homicide investigation.”
“What will waiting do? I mean, the people are dead. They aren’t going to disappear. It’ll just get worse, like I’m hiding something.”
“Pike thinks this was done by professionals. He thinks they’ll clean up the mess for us. The key thing now is to get you safe. Can you go somewhere?”
“Yes. We can go to Sydney. Nicole’s sister has a place there. Is that far enough?”
“I don’t know. How far is it?”
“About fifteen hours away. It’s all the way on the eastern side of the continent.”
He heard a muffled conversation, then, “Pike says that’s good. We’re going to check out your apartment, then head there as well. He wants to know who the people who are tracking you.” There was a scrambled bit of conversation, ending with, “No, I’m not going to ask him that.”
Dunkin said, “I have no idea. I mean, I think I know why, but I can’t believe it went from suspicion to killing people in the span of a few hours. I’m supposed to be on vacation.”
He heard, “No, Pike, I’m not going to ask him that. Just drive the car.”
“What’s he want to know?”
He heard a sigh, then, “He wants to know how you could be so stupid as to set us up to be killed.”
“I didn’t do that on purpose! It just happened. I headed to my place and saw what I thought was surveillance, so I ditched them. I went to my girlfriend’s place, and they showed up there as well. I was just running!” He muttered, “I’m not a Special Forces badass. This is insane.”
Jennifer said, “They showed up at your girlfriend’s place as well?”
“Yes! That’s what I’m telling you.”
“How did they know to go there?”
“I have no idea. It’s not like it’s on my employment application. They just did.”