Paula Graves - Secret Hideout

“I know. Brand told me.” Scanlon leaned toward her, his expression troubled. “Go back to the Bureau. Brand will take you back—I know he will. As soon as we get you out of here.”

The last thing she wanted was to go back to the FBI, especially if Scanlon was telling her the truth. The idea that people she believed she could trust would lie to her this way…

She felt completely betrayed.

“I’m working with my brother now,” she said aloud. “At the security company. We’re doing good things there.”

“I thought you weren’t happy about your brother’s security company when he first came up with the idea.”

She hadn’t been thrilled. Her experiences with private security firms while working for the FBI had been more negative than positive. But Jesse’s concept for the security firm appealed to her. The big jobs they undertook financed the low-cost and pro bono cases Cooper Security chose on an individual, need-by-need basis.

“Things have changed,” she admitted.

Scanlon’s eyes narrowed. “I guess they have.” He waved at the bowl of soup. “At least have a bite or two. It’ll help your body fight off the effects of what they gave you.”

She forced herself to eat a few bites of the soup, knowing Scanlon had a stubborn streak that was nearly impossible to thwart. If she wanted answers, she’d have to play along with his rules, even if a bowl of chicken noodle soup was the last thing she wanted at the moment.

But she managed to finish half the bowl and even nibble on a couple of crackers by the time Scanlon had poured the rest of the soup into a plastic container and put it in the small refrigerator next to the stove.

She had so many questions racing through her mind, she felt overwhelmed, especially since the food had done nothing to ease her raging headache. She couldn’t think with her pulse pounding in her ears. The lights inside were dimmed, and heavy curtains shut out whatever light might be coming from outside the windows, but her eyes still ached from the glare.

“I need to go to the bathroom,” she said. To her alarm, the words came out slurred.

Scanlon crossed quickly to the futon and helped her up. Tugging her hand away from his when he showed every sign of walking with her to the bathroom, she said, “I can handle this myself. Just point me in the right direction.”

He stared back at her, his expression hard to read.

Unease fluttered in her stomach. “Please don’t tell me the bathroom’s outdoors.”

His expression cleared. “No. Through that door, take a right down the hall and it’s the first door on the left.”

She followed his directions and entered the tiny bathroom. It had a toilet and an ancient pedestal sink on one side of the room, and an even more ancient claw-foot tub on the other. She looked longingly at the tub, tempted by the thought of a nice, hot bath, but settled for running cold water in the sink and splashing it on her hot face.

As she was about to head back to the front room, her gaze caught on the window next to the toilet. It was closed off by thick green curtains. She eased the curtains open and took a peek outside, squinting as bright daylight assaulted her eyes.

There were woods outside, dense with new growth. The house seemed to have very little in the way of a yard.

Movement outside caught her eye. A man, she realized. His dark green baseball cap came into view first, dipped forward as the wearer looked down, watching his footing.

Instinctively, she narrowed the opening in the curtains to a crack. As he emerged into the clearing behind the house, the man in the cap looked up, directly toward the window.

Her heart gave a little flop.

She’d seen him before.

He wore a black T-shirt under a faded denim jacket. His jeans were equally faded. His sandy hair curled lightly around the edge of the cap.

Where had she seen him before? She could picture him in her mind, sandy hair, black T-shirt, faded jeans—

No cap. He hadn’t been wearing a cap. Not then.

The door behind her opened, making her whirl around in alarm. The sudden movement made her vision swim, and she had to grab the sink to keep from toppling over.

Scanlon rushed in, cupping her elbow to steady her. “Go to my bedroom. Now. Hide in the closet. No time to explain—”

“There’s a man outside. I know I’ve seen him before—”

“There’s more than one man outside,” Scanlon said tersely, leading her across the hall to a small, spare bedroom. He opened the door next to the bed to reveal a tiny closet and nudged her inside. “Just stay here and be quiet, no matter what you hear. Promise me.”

She nodded. “Are you in danger?”

He brushed her cheek with his fingertips. “I’m always in danger these days, Cooper.” He closed the door, plunging the cramped closet into darkness.

* * *

BEN SCANLON RECOVERED HIS CALM as he walked to the front room. Already, Davy McCoy was banging on the door, commencing the visit Scanlon had been expecting since he’d grabbed Isabel Cooper at the Fort Payne hotel and rushed her out to the van the FBI resident agency in Huntsville had supplied. He hadn’t gotten a good look at any of the men, but he knew Davy was involved. Davy was the one he’d overheard making plans for the ambush.

He swept a final glance around the living room, making sure he’d left no signs of Isabel’s presence. She’d slipped on her shoes before she’d gone to the bathroom, and he’d already returned the futon to its sofa position.

He took a deep breath and opened the door.

Davy McCoy was a short, wiry man in his midtwenties, with dark hair thinning prematurely and a sneering smile that was a permanent fixture on his vulpine face. He didn’t wait to be asked in, pushing past Scanlon and entering the living room.

“You cookin’ somethin’?” He sniffed the air.

“Just soup.”

Davy eyed the bowl in the sink. “Been out today?”

The van Scanlon had driven to the hotel was hidden in an abandoned barn a half mile down the mountain, where he’d left his battered old Ford pickup while he was in Fort Payne. But he and Isabel hadn’t been back long. If Davy had touched the hood of the Ford, would it still be warm?

“Drove over to Silorville Pond to see if the bluegills were bedding,” he answered, the lie effortless. Lying came all too easy to him these days. “No luck.”

“Little early yet, I guess.”

Scanlon knew Davy didn’t have a particular reason to suspect he’d been involved in thwarting the attempted abduction. Nobody among Bolen Bluff’s tight-knit community of weed growers and meth mechanics knew what he’d overheard that night at the feed store. He’d made damned sure he wasn’t seen.

But he’d been in Bolen Bluff only a few months. Strangers were automatically suspect. The paranoia among the Swain clan was legendary. One wrong move could get a man killed.

Scanlon knew that better than anyone.

Davy was clearly searching the room with his gaze. He didn’t even bother to hide it. “Mind if I use your bathroom?”

Scanlon nodded toward the hallway, hoping the rapid thump of his pulse wasn’t audible. It swished so loudly in his ears he barely heard Davy’s footsteps as he clomped down the hall.

He went to close the front door that Davy had left open and spotted Bobby Rawlings standing out in the yard, watching him through narrowed eyes. Rawlings was even scarier than McCoy in some ways. He was a Swain by blood, son of one of old Jasper’s cousins. That gave him even more carte blanche for violence around these parts than Davy, who was only a Swain clan member out of criminal loyalty.

He gave Rawlings a wave. Rawlings didn’t wave back. Scanlon hadn’t expected he would.