Читать книгу Protective Measures - Maggie Black K. - Страница 13

FOUR

Leo glanced at the picture of the vandalized poster of his girls, then up to where his girls were now climbing trees with Zoe. The old man with the dog had continued down the path. Eve was hanging upside down from a low tree branch like a koala, while Ivy was halfway up the tree. Leo reached into his wallet, pulled out the first bill he could get his fingers on and pressed it into his old friend’s hand. “I’m hiring you, all of you, because I need advice. We can work out the details later. But as of right now, I’m your client and everything we discuss is confidential. Agreed?”

Josh nodded. “Agreed.”

Leo let out a long breath. “Yes, I suspected that I was The Anemoi’s target. But I didn’t know for sure.”

Zoe wasn’t looking at him but he could see her shoulders flinch, as her earpiece picked up their conversation through Josh’s mic. He imagined it bothered her that he hadn’t been more forthright with her when they’d swum to safety together after the fire. But open book had never really been his style.

“Does this mean you know what The Anemoi is trying to steal from you?” Alex asked. “Have they stolen it yet?”

“That’s a complicated question with a very complicated answer.” Leo turned back to the men. He didn’t know how to answer Alex without breaking his cover and spilling classified information. But he trusted they could read between the lines. “I gather Josh told you the story of how we met? It was about six or seven years ago. I was commanding a ship, Josh realized that one member of my crew—a real charmer named Tommy Ferrier—was smuggling some drugs in his bunk. I looked into it, got the proof I needed, and Tommy was discharged and tried. He eventually went home, ruined his life dealing drugs in Canada and went to jail for beating his girlfriend so hard she miscarried. It was an incredibly sad story. But it’s why I trust Josh with my life and why I trust you and Zoe by extension.”

Josh nodded. So did Alex. Neither answered.

“Now imagine, instead of one ship it was a lot of ships, and instead of one rat on my ship there were a bunch of them scurrying inside a lot of ships, and instead of just telling me that info, Josh had offered to sell it to me for a whole lot of money. After seeing what happened to Tommy Ferrier, I know how important it is that information like that gets handled very carefully and what people would do to keep it from ever coming out. But let’s say that my boss just ended up in hospital from a car accident this morning, and I was obligated to get that intel, but I couldn’t ask any of my crewmates for help in case they were rats.”

“Wow, that would be quite the thing,” Alex said.

“Wouldn’t it?” asked Leo. Out of the side of his eye, he saw Zoe flash a smile in his direction. Despite the seriousness of the situation, he felt his shoulders begin to relax. It felt good to know he wasn’t alone. “Obviously you can’t be involved in my mission, at all. Hands off. If any of you were at an event with me and someone were to approach, you’d all have to skedaddle and disappear. I can’t have outsiders involved in this. You are all civilians with zero clearance. But you can watch my back, keep your eyes open, tell me if you see anything I should be worried about, keep me informed of whatever this Anemoi situation is, and of course make sure my girls aren’t touched by any of this.”

“Understood,” Josh said. “Eyes and ears only. Can I ask what you know about the new, less charitable version of me?”

“The informant?” Leo said. “Not much. He contacted my admiral a week ago using robotic-voice-disguising software and an encrypted line. He said he had ample proof of a large-scale rat problem to sell, but that he couldn’t trust anyone inside military intelligence to handle the negotiations. The admiral suggested me. I’ve been overseas for a long time and would spot bad drug-smuggling data in a heartbeat. The informant suggested the exchange happen during the symposium. I’m authorized to give him a lot of cheese, but only if the intel proves sound.”

“Can we assume he’s a criminal?” Alex asked.

“Yes and no,” Leo said. “He could be selling bad data, or good data, to make money. He could be a whistle-blower who just wants some leverage so he can disappear. You might remember, last year a hacker named Seth Miles found proof that some higher-ups in the military were in the pocket of Eastern European mobsters. He struck a plea deal for espionage, but he’s still been branded a pariah and his life was destroyed. It could be someone who doesn’t want to repeat what happened to him. Either way, I have to keep his identity a secret. My boss promised him total anonymity, and my work thrives on privacy. So, if all goes smoothly none of you will ever find out who he is.” He leaned back on the bench. “That’s all I’ve got for you. Now it’s your turn to answer some questions. You’re telling me some vigilante group, named The Anemoi, was at the gala last night, attacked Zoe and set the building on fire?”

“Pretty much.” Alex nodded.

“And one of them defaced a picture of my girls and posted it online?”

“He used the handle Jason of the Argonauts,” Josh said. “He’s quite the hacker. When Samantha tried to trace him, he deleted the picture and any trace of himself on the message board.”

“My mission, if you want to call it that, is so top secret that nobody knows about it,” Leo said. “So only someone very high up could have tipped off The Anemoi to the existence of this intel, or the informant himself did. Both scenarios are bad news. But either way, I don’t understand why they’d deface a poster of my daughters.”

“We’re baffled, too,” Josh admitted. “What can we do to help?”

“I’ve got to go to a bunch of symposium events this week,” Leo said, “and hope that the informant approaches me with the intel. I need someone to watch my back and make sure The Anemoi—whoever they are and whatever they want—don’t get in the way.”

A fresh burst of giggling dragged his attention back to Zoe and the girls. Ivy had dropped to the ground and was lounging in the grass, facing the water. Eve was standing on Zoe’s shoulders gripping the thick branch above with both hands. Before he could so much as call out and remind them to be careful, his little girl had scrambled up off Zoe’s shoulders and onto the branch.

“How many events are we talking about?” Alex asked.

Leo turned back. “There are symposium meetings tomorrow, a parade on Friday near Toronto and a charity auction back in Ottawa on Saturday, to raise money for children’s hospitals. After that the symposium is done and if I don’t get the intel by then it’s gone.”

“Understood,” Josh said. “Alex and Zoe have rented rooms at a hotel in Ottawa and can extend their stay a few more days. They can set up the surveillance van in your neighborhood when you’re home, make sure the girls are safe and come with you to events. I suggest you don’t change anything, act like nothing’s wrong and go on with life as usual. Just think of them as extra eyes and ears, watching your back. Nobody ever needs to know you’ve hired private security.”

“Good by me,” Leo said. “I’ll need someone to take the girls to and from day camp on Thursday. They’ll be with me at the parade on Friday.”

“All good by me, too,” Alex said. Then he called, “Good by you, Zoe?”

Zoe spun back, her dark hair dancing around her shoulders as she flashed two thumbs-up. But as her gaze seemed to linger on Leo’s face, for the very first time since they’d met he thought he saw uncertainty in her eyes.

They talked logistics for a few more minutes. Alex would run the surveillance van and be Leo’s backup at events. Zoe would take point on security for the girls. Josh was running back to his honeymoon at their Cedar Lake cottage, but he and Samantha would stay in touch. Leo would have the backup he needed, without compromising security. Then Alex went to move the Ash Private Security van from a nearby lot to street parking, so that he could give Leo a tour of it.

Leo stood up, Josh did, too, and for a moment they watched Zoe and the girls. Then Josh slid his hand over his watch, and Leo realized he was covering his microphone.

“Zoe’s incredible,” Josh said quietly, as if answering a question Leo hadn’t asked. “She’s battled more criminals and saved more lives than I can begin to count. Alex and I have owed her our lives more than once. I’m guessing you’ve read the online gossip and know her story?”

“No, I don’t,” Leo said. He’d come close to it, though. Last night, sitting on his porch in the muggy night air and feeling the memory of her pressing up against the edges of his mind, he’d entered her name in his laptop search engine. But he barely glanced at the first sentence that popped on his screen before shutting it down. He didn’t believe in gossip. He didn’t want his past to be internet fodder. So why should he treat her the way he wouldn’t want to be treated? “I know that she and Alex are stepsiblings. I know that she competed nationally in gymnastics and martial arts. But that’s all I know. I prefer to get to know people in person, not through gossip.”

“I’m sure she’ll appreciate that,” Josh said. “I’ll let her tell you her story if and when she’s ready. All that really matters to your mission is that she’s a bit camera shy and not a fan of media attention. So we’re not planning on using her as the inside person for any events right now, let alone by your side. There’s too large a risk she’d be identified and the fact the gossip media is determined to find out who the woman in your arms was when you leaped from the burning castle hasn’t exactly brought up the best memories for her.”

Maybe that was another reason for the distance she’d been keeping and the doubt he’d seen in her eyes. It was probably wise for both of them. She didn’t want her name flashed across the tabloids as some damsel in distress he’d plucked from the flames. He wasn’t sure he could handle the distraction of having the beautiful bodyguard on his arm, even if they both knew she was only there professionally.

“Hi, Daddy,” Eve yelled. “See me?”

“I do.” He frowned. His baby girl was now at least six feet off the ground and holding on to the branch with one hand while she waved enthusiastically with the other. While he could usually count on Ivy to be the overprotective older sister, his eldest was now lying contentedly on her stomach watching the small puppy from earlier as it trundled down the path on the other side of the canal.

A black van pulled up on the street. Alex waved out the window. Josh walked up the hill to greet him. Leo started across the grass toward his girls, feeling his brow furrow as he looked at Zoe. The bodyguard met his glance head-on and didn’t even flinch.

“Eve, honey.” Zoe looked up at the child. “I think your daddy would prefer that you come down and we go find a smaller tree.”

His footsteps froze. Zoe had read that in a glance? There’d been something in Zoe’s tone—caring, yet firm—that rattled something inside him. There was a spark in Zoe’s eyes as she looked up at his daughter, and trust in Eve’s eyes as she looked back down at her. Even Ivy was smiling. Whatever this odd pull he’d felt toward Zoe the moment he’d met her, it was almost like his daughters felt a version of it, too.

Help me, Lord, I can’t let my mind even begin to think this way. During a particularly rough patch in his marriage to Marisa five years ago, after her first brush with cancer, she’d asked him to promise that when she died he wouldn’t bring another woman into their daughters’ lives until they were adults. He didn’t know why it had mattered so much to her, but it had. That had been around the time her overprotective nature had really kicked into high gear. She’d needed to know he would protect the girls, even if it cost him his heart. He’d promised her that and that pledge to protect their daughters had given them the strength they needed to keep the family together.

He’d never once imagined wanting to break it. Until now.

“But, Zoe—” Eve’s lower lip pouted.

“No arguments.” Zoe reached her hands up toward the girl. “Come on. We’ll find something fun to do down on the ground. Now just turn around on your stomach, slide your legs down to the branch below you and I’ll help you down from there.”

“It’s okay. I’m a lot taller than you are. I’ll get her down.” He was at least a foot taller than Zoe. He could pluck her out of the tree like a kitten. “Eve! Just stay there and wait for me.”

Eve glanced from one adult to the other. Her forehead wrinkled in worry and frustration. “But, I’m almost there.”

“Just wait.” His voice rose.

Her little voice rose, too. “I want to do it myself!”

Then in one sickening moment everything happened at once. Eve’s foothold snapped. Her wail of complaint rose to a scream as she fell. Leo’s heart pounded. His little girl tumbled through the air. Lord, save my baby girl!

In one fluid moment, Zoe bent her knees, stretched out her arms, and caught the falling child in her arms. Eve hit Zoe in the chest like a tiny, blond cannonball. Zoe absorbed the blow, letting it knock her over as they fell backward into the grass. Zoe lay there in the grass for a moment, her head bent low over Eve’s, as she cradled the small girl to her chest.

“You okay, honey?” Zoe asked. Her cheek leaned against Eve’s head. Emotion choked in her throat. “That was a very impressive fall.”

“The tree broke!” Eve said. His little girl sounded more amazed, even thrilled, than scared or hurt.

The sound that slipped through Zoe’s lips was a laugh and a cry in one. Yes, as a parent, he knew that feeling well.

“Yeah, it did,” Zoe said softly. “And you were very, very brave. I’ve fallen lots and lots of times. You didn’t even land on your head like I have!”

The little girl started giggling. Zoe started laughing, too. Then Eve sat up and reached for Leo.

“Daddy, I broke the tree! Zoe caught me.” Eve was still giggling.

“I saw that.” He knelt down and reached for her.

Zoe half pushed and half lifted Eve up toward her father’s waiting arms. “I think your daddy needs a hug right now, too.” Zoe’s dark eyes searched his face. “My daddy always said it can be a bit scary for a daddy to see their children fall.”