“We can and will,” Bain assured her.
Marsh shot her a warning look.
“Great. I’ll sleep on the witness protection thing and let you know what I decide tomorrow.”
“No rush,” Bain assured her.
Detective Marsh snagged her attention. “The media’s arrived.” His gaze swerved to a Channel 3 truck pulling up to the curb across the street. “Let me walk you to your car, Miss Blake. Guide you through the gaggle.”
A cluster of people gathered on the sidewalk and street stood watching. Presuming they were neighbors, Gabby nodded. “Thank you.” She fell into step at his side.
When they were out of Bain’s earshot, Marsh dropped his voice to a whisper. “Don’t do it.”
She didn’t glance his way. “Witness protection?”
“Testify.” His gray hair curled at his ear. He swiped a hand over his mouth. “They’ll kill you, and Bain knows it. Medros and his people are untouchable, Gabby. If there’s a high place, he has friends in it. And I’m not talking about just New Orleans. Medros’s interests stretch far and wide and really high.”
“How high?”
“All the way high.” Marsh shook his head. “Don’t do it.”
She’d drawn the same conclusion. “What should I do, Detective?”
Marsh paused at the door of her Mustang. “If you were my daughter, I’d tell you to vanish. Tonight. Just go.” He looked around, then spoke softly. “These people don’t stop coming, Gabby. They’ll never stop coming. And they could be anyone.”
Medros would likely hire an outsider. Someone distant and unconnected. Marsh’s warning was sincere and offered out of concern for her. That touched her. “Thank you.”
“Don’t tell anyone where you’re going. Don’t contact anyone here once you’ve left. Ditch your phone, close your accounts—whatever you can do tonight—and start fresh far, far away.”
“I could remind you that you’re the police and you’re supposed to protect me from criminals like these.”
“If I could, I would. But I can’t protect you against them. No one can. I told you, they’re untouchable.” His tone was frank and sober. “I’m being realistic and honest. Take it for what it’s worth. I am trying to give you the best advice I’ve got for you to stay alive.”
She measured the man and saw no conflict between his words and what was in his eyes. Marsh was doing his best. “Thank you, Detective Marsh.” She meant it sincerely.
He nodded and opened her car door. “You’re not safe at the apartment, either, Gabby. Actually, you’re not safe so long as you’re anywhere they’d expect you to be.”
“I understand.” In a rare moment of open honesty, she let him see the truth in her eyes. Relief washed through his, and she closed the door, mouthed a final silent “Thank you” and then followed his hand-signals to leave the tangle of cars and headed out of her father’s neighborhood for the last time.
Two blocks away, she formulated a plan and checked her watch. Nearly two in the morning. Well, Shadow Watcher had offered to help, and he had said “anytime.” She was in way over her head and smart enough to know it. She needed serious, competent help. In this minefield, serious, competent help she could trust.
She pulled over at an all-night grocery store and slid into a parking slot between two trucks, then grabbed her phone and texted Shadow Watcher.
In her crazy life, the irony of most trusting a man whose name she didn’t know wasn’t lost on her. But considering the majority of those who did know her name were out to kill her, contacting him didn’t seem crazy at all. It seemed sensible and sane.
“Help. I need you.” She sent the text.
His response was immediate. “What’s wrong?”
“Complicated. Can I phone you?”
“Yes. Burner?”
Did she have a burner phone? She did not. She looked up at the all-night grocery store. “Fifteen minutes.”
“Safe?”
“At the moment, I think so.”
“Fifteen.”
She bought a burner phone, returned to the car, then activated it and called Shadow Watcher. Her stomach was in knots. Male? Female? She had no idea what to expect.
“Hello.”
Deep, husky voice. Definitely male. “It’s me.”
“What’s going on?”
She quickly filled him in on events from Bain’s visit to her apartment to Medros’s man pretending to be Bain, then Bain getting the copies of the thumb drives. She relayed details of the breach at work by a man threatening Fitch, to her father’s house exploding. Then she told Shadow Watcher about meeting Agent Bain and Detective Marsh at what had been her father’s house, and what each of them had told her. When she’d relayed all she could remember, she added, “I was on my way back toward the apartment, to throw off anyone who might be following, but I can’t go back there.”
“Is anyone following you?”
“I haven’t seen anyone, and I’ve been looking.”
“Wise to stay away from the apartment,” Shadow Watcher said. “Definitely shouldn’t go back. I hate it that you can’t collect personal items.”
“It’s just stuff,” she said. “Well, except for a book of handmade soap recipes that belonged to my grandmother. It’s all I have of her.”
“Nothing of your mother or father’s?”
“No. Just the soap book.” An empty ache crept through Gabby’s chest. Silly, she supposed. She’d never met her grandmother, but she’d treasured that book. Long aspired to make every one of her soaps. Those she had made, she had loved. The lotions and oils, too.
Shadow Watcher paused, then changed the subject. “You realize, of course, Medros learned about the thumb drives way too fast.”
“He did,” she agreed. “I figure he tapped the house phone or bugged the house itself.”
“Or Agent Bain told him.” Shadow Watcher grunted. “Actually, my money is on Bain. He’s all about making his case, and he indirectly contacted you about the explosion, too. Not Marsh.”
“That’s right.”
“Odd. I can see a cop on the desk catching the call and phoning Marsh, but phoning the FBI? That should have taken longer.”
“Bain said a CI contacted them. While on the phone about him, Bain had the local call me. A Sergeant Falco, if memory serves.”
“So, Bain knew about the explosion before the locals did?”
“That’s my understanding. The CI warned him to get me out of the house.” She remembered the photos. “Bain also showed me some photos of known Medros associates. The man who pretended to be Bain was in them.”
“Did you tell Bain that?”
“No, I didn’t.”
He sighed relief. “Give me a brief description. I’ll dig and send my findings to see if we can peg him.”
She reeled off a description of the man. “The guy who pretended to be Bain’s partner, Medros’s guy, asked me if I knew Rogan Gregos.”
“Do you?”
“No, I don’t,” she said. “He wanted to know if Rogan Gregos had been one of my father’s clients or if they’d had a childhood relationship.”