“Get in,” the driver said.
Chas climbed in first, and Gunner handed up Poppy and then climbed in the high cab. “We really appreciate this,” Chas was saying warmly.
“Where you headed? I’m going the opposite direction from y’all,” the driver said, pulling into the lane of traffic and accelerating slowly.
“Any place we can rent a car would be great,” Gunner answered.
“No problem. I’m headed for Philadelphia, myself.”
“Perfect,” Gunner responded. “We’re from there. We’ll just head home and cancel the whole vacation.”
The trucker nodded, and Gunner sat back as they exited the tunnel. It was tempting as hell to lean forward and look for a drone hovering at the entrance, but odds were the thing was waiting at the west end of the tunnel for them to emerge.
They’d caught this ride fast enough that he figured the hostiles would wait another ten or fifteen minutes for their car to emerge from the tunnel before they actually drove in to flush them out. By that point, they should be long gone from the area.
About a half mile east of the tunnel, he spotted a black SUV parked on the opposite side of the turnpike. He tried to catch a plate inconspicuously, but it was too dark for him to pick it up. Smug, he sat back in his seat and listened to Chas and the trucker chatting about where the trucker was from and what he was hauling.
It was a couple of hours later when they arrived at the outskirts of Philadelphia. Gunner picked a likely looking truck stop and got out there, claiming that they would grab a cab the rest of the way to their house. With a word of thanks to the trucker, he ordered a ride-share service on his cell phone.
“Where are we going?” Chas asked as they waited inside the warmth of the convenience store beside the gas pumps.
“Airport.”
“We flying somewhere?”
“Not without risking some difficult questions over the baby. But I can get a decent rental car there.”
An hour later, as Gunner loaded a sleepy baby and a nearly as sleepy Chas into a turbocharged muscle car, Chas commented dryly, “So by decent, you meant a fast car.”
“Hell yeah. I need to be able to outrun those fuckers if they manage to find us again.”
“Language,” Chas mumbled, his eyes already drifting closed.
Gunner was tired too. But he had a lot more experience with running on empty than Chas did. He got in the car and headed south. Time to call in reinforcements.
He drove about two hours, until the sky started to lighten in the east, and then he pulled into a random hotel—random but relatively nice. For some reason, people on the run tended to stay in dives. He supposed the assumption was a sleazy motel manager would be less inclined to talk to the police. But in their case, an upscale hotel manager would be less likely to talk to a bunch of criminals without badges asking questions about the guests.
He carried in Poppy, asleep in her car seat, and led a sleepy Chas to the room.
Chas mumbled, “Can I take off my shoes?”
“Yes. We should be safe here. Sleep. I’ve got a few phone calls to make.”
Chas tumbled into the bed, and Gunner looked longingly at it. He would love nothing more than to crawl in with Chas, snuggle up to him, and crash for about twelve hours. Instead, he went into the bathroom and closed the door.
He called Spencer Newman. The guy wouldn’t mind a phone call in the wee hours of the morning—he’d been an operator long enough to know that trouble didn’t always come during daylight hours.
To his credit, Spencer sounded alert when he answered his phone. “Hey, Gun. What’s up?”
“I’ve got a problem. I haven’t been able to shake whoever followed us out of Misty Falls. I’ve got the kid and the guy who rescued the kid with me. We’re in a hotel about an hour outside of Washington, DC.”
“Just a sec. I’m gonna put you on speakerphone so Dray can hear too.”
Drago Thorpe and Spencer were partners, both personally and professionally, these days. Dray was ex-CIA and apparently a hell of a black ops man.
“Hey, Gun.” Drago sounded noticeably sleepier than Spencer.
“Sorry to wake you up.”
Spencer said briskly, “What can you tell us about your tails?”
“They’re good. They had a tracking burr in Poppy’s clothes, and—”
“Poppy? Is that the kid’s name?”
“Nah. It’s just what we call her. The night Chas found her, she was wearing a shirt with a big red flower on it.”
“Cute. Continue,” Spencer said.
“I put the burr in a truck headed for Canada, but the hostiles didn’t bite. My best guess is they tracked us with a drone into Pennsylvania. I shot down one drone, but they must have put up a second one. We switched vehicles in a tunnel, and I think we’ve lost them for the moment. But I could use some backup. I haven’t gotten much sleep in the past several days, and I’ll need some extra firepower if these assholes close in on us.”
“An hour out of DC, you say?” Spencer asked.
“Yeah.”
“Catch a nap in place if you need it. Meet us at noon at… I’m going to text you an address in Potomac. Drago and I will meet you there. We’ll put together a plan to catch these bastards, or at least to figure out who the hell they are and what they want.”
“Any chance you could bring an extra field kit?” Gunner asked. “I’m feeling naked as hell with just a handgun and none of my usual gear.”
Spencer laughed. “I’ll see what we can scrounge up for you.”
“See you then. And thanks, Spence.”
“We take care of our own.”
“Ooh-rah.”
Chapter Eleven
SPENCER STRAIGHTENED his tie as they stepped into the lobby of CIA headquarters in Langley, Virginia. He was here mostly to lend moral support to Drago. It was his first visit back here since they’d both been let go.
Still, they’d moved on to bigger and better things. They’d finished doing the paperwork to incorporate, although they were still debating what to name their new security company. It would be nested behind several other innocuous tax entities, of course.
Spencer wanted to call the company something that sounded fierce, but he had yet to land on the perfect name.
He clipped the visitor’s badge Drago passed him to his lapel, and they strolled over to the wall of stars while they waited for their escort to come get them.
A rather rumpled, scholarly-looking man greeted Drago with a warm handshake. Drago said, “Good to see you again, Charles.”
“Good to see you both again,” Charles murmured. His lean features lit with a smile that animated his whole face.
They followed the CIA analyst to a tiny office off to one side of a cluster of people at desks. The group made up a special strategic analysis unit that Charles headed, according to the plaque in the sliding holder on his office door.
They piled inside, and Charles closed the door behind them. Spencer’s ears popped a little and he reassessed the door sharply. Soundproof.
“What can I do for you gentlemen?” Charles asked, donning a pair of horn-rimmed glasses that made him look exactly like an absentminded professor.