Amelia Autin - Cody Walker's Woman

“Yes, sir.”

“And, Walker, one more thing.” There was a pause at the other end. “I know you don’t agree with special rule eight.”

Cody was surprised into asking, “How did you kn—”

“It’s my job to know everything,” D’Arcy replied. “You might not agree with it, but I also know you’ll follow it...if you have to. Go with your gut.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Get going,” D’Arcy said. “You’ve got fifty-seven minutes.”

* * *

Cody’s team assembled in the ready room on the fifth floor, just down the hall from his office. He noted with approval that despite the late, or rather, early hour, both Keira and McKinnon were alert and sharp, as if they’d had eight hours of uninterrupted sleep. They were both dressed casually in jeans, sweaters and sturdy hiking boots, as he was, with the warm jackets they’d need in the mountains when they got close to Black Rock thrown over the backs of their chairs.

Both agents already had their Bluetooth earphones in place, and Cody fitted his in his ear as he briefed them quickly. He really didn’t have a lot that was new to share, other than Callahan’s warning and D’Arcy’s order, but he reiterated the plan they’d come up with earlier that afternoon, making one change.

“Two vehicles and three drivers means we can drive in shifts, and each of us can get a little sleep on the way,” Cody said. “McKinnon, you’ve got the GPS coordinates for my cabin already loaded?” McKinnon nodded. “I want to drive one of the vehicles on the last leg—I don’t care which one. Even with a GPS it won’t be easy finding the turnoff, so I might as well lead the way. You two sort out who drives when.”

They left just before two in the morning, Cody driving the SUV and McKinnon driving the pickup truck, with Keira trying to sleep in the cab of the truck her partner was driving. Cody had been very careful to make sure no one followed him from his apartment to the agency, and he did the same thing now, just in case. He drove with part of his mind on the road and making sure he had no tail, but another part wondering what could have happened to make Callahan call him in the middle of the night. And what did that mean for Mandy and their three children?

They stopped to switch drivers at a gas station about a half hour before Wheatland, Wyoming. McKinnon quickly downed a cup of black coffee and said, “I’m still good. I’ll sleep on the last leg, if that’s okay with the two of you.”

Cody nodded, finishing his own coffee and tossing the cup in the trash. Keira came over to the SUV and got into the driver’s seat. “You might want to stretch out in the back here,” she told Cody. “The truck’s not all that comfortable for sleeping.”

Cody did as Keira suggested, but found it impossible to sleep—his mind was still trying to analyze Callahan’s cryptic warning and plotting out ways and means; and the backseat of the SUV wasn’t wide enough to stretch out in, either, not for someone as tall as he was. And there was something else on his mind, too. After ten minutes he broke the silence. “I wanted to thank you,” he said.

“For what?” Keira glanced at the rearview mirror.

“For telling D’Arcy the whole story about what happened last Friday night,” he explained.

A long silence followed his words. “I owed it to you” was all she said finally.

“Maybe so, but I appreciate it. Not everyone would have done it.”

She seemed uncomfortable talking about the subject. “He told you, I take it?”

“Yeah.” Cody thought about his conversation with Nick D’Arcy, then added quietly, “He also said you offered to resign.”

“He told you that, too?” From the tight way the words came out, he knew she was embarrassed.

“Only in passing and only because I had to tell him Callahan knows about how you and I met.”

“Great.” The one word spoke volumes, her tone conveying not only embarrassment but deep humiliation.

Compassion for her welled in him. It can’t be easy for a woman in a man’s job, he thought. “I had to tell Callahan,” he explained. “It was the only way to convince him to keep you on the team.”

She didn’t respond right away, and when she did she said drily, “I would have thought telling him that story would have the opposite effect.”

Cody cast his mind back to his conversation with Callahan. “That’s where you’re wrong about him. He might be a throwback where women are concerned, but he respects courage and quick wits.” Then he added, “I also told him you remind me of his wife.”

The silence was electric, and Cody knew somehow he’d said the wrong thing. But all she said was “I guess that’s a compliment.” There was just a hint of something in her voice he couldn’t put a name to, and he realized anew that Keira had picked up on his onetime attachment to Mandy...and didn’t like it.

Putting his theory to the test, Cody said, “If you meet her, you’ll understand just how much of a compliment it really is,” adding more warmth to his voice than he would otherwise have done. “Mandy Callahan and I grew up together.”

“I see.”

She didn’t say another word, and the silence in the SUV was deafening. Cody lay back, pillowing his head on one arm, using his jacket as a blanket. He had a million and one things to worry about, not the least of which was how he was going to keep his team safe if all hell broke loose as it had once before with the New World Militia.

But a tiny smile played over his lips as he dozed off in the darkness.

Chapter 5

An hour outside Buffalo, Wyoming, they switched drivers again, Cody taking the wheel of the pickup while McKinnon moved to the passenger seat. “You could try the backseat of the SUV,” Cody offered. “I won’t mind.”

“That’s okay,” McKinnon said, stretching out his legs and reclining back against the passenger door, bunching his jacket behind his shoulders as a cushion. “I probably won’t sleep much, anyway. Besides,” he added, “I want to talk to you before we get there, without Keira around.”

Cody didn’t speak, just drove up the on-ramp to the highway, watched to make sure the SUV was following him and waited. Eventually McKinnon said, “She told me what happened last week.”

There was an edge to his voice that Cody sympathized with. A man’s relationship with his partner could sometimes be closer than his relationship with his wife, especially when he trusted that partner with his life. And it was a two-way street. Anything bad that happened to a man’s partner was conversely a reflection on him. Cody wasn’t sure exactly how much Keira had confided in McKinnon, but he sensed the other man was berating himself for not being there when his partner needed him. Cody made a noncommittal sound that could have meant anything. No way was he going to reveal what he knew, not even to Keira’s partner.

“I saw the bruises,” McKinnon said softly. “Did you have to hurt her like that?”

Cody kept his face impassive, but it was an effort. There was just a hint in McKinnon’s voice that betrayed the fact he wasn’t sure ; he was fishing, and Cody wasn’t rising to the bait.

“Don’t know what you’re talking about.” He kept his eyes on the road, knowing McKinnon was watching him like a hawk for any sign he knew more than he was letting on. He signaled a lane change and passed a slow-moving diesel truck on the left, then steered back into the right lane.

Eventually McKinnon sighed and said, “Maybe you don’t at that.” Then he slipped in a question so neatly Cody almost didn’t see the trap. “So, how do you know her?”

He almost answered that he’d met her in the agency cafeteria, or something innocuous like that, but then he remembered Nick D’Arcy had mentioned the day before that Cody and Keira already knew each other, and how would D’Arcy know that unless it was related to a special op, or...?