Jessica Andersen - Meet Me at Midnight

Figuring it was Chase, Shane or Ethan with new information, he flipped the phone open, welcoming the faint blue glow. The four of them comprised Eclipse, an under-the-radar black ops group that had grown out of their military service. Work with Eclipse had taken them to every hellhole on the globe and made them the best of friends. The kind you trust with your life.

It took Ty a moment to realize it wasn’t a call, then another moment to read the text message in the fading glow of the dying battery.

“Nice punch. You got lucky, but your luck is about to change. If you want to see Grant Davis alive, bring your girlfriend and at the O—”

That was all he got before the battery quit.

GABBY HEARD his hiss of indrawn breath, and immediately tensed. “What is it?”

“It is, or rather was , a text message.” He repeated it aloud, not bothering to hide his irritation, or the way his voice went dry on the word girlfriend .

Hey, she wanted to tell him, this isn’t my fault. Which made her realize that the reverse was true. Anger flared in her chest and she snapped, “That guy broke in because of you, didn’t he? Because he saw us together.”

“Maybe,” he said neutrally. “Or maybe you and he were working together and something backfired.”

“Don’t be stupid.” Her breath hissed between her teeth. “I didn’t ask you to come here. In fact, I’m pretty sure I tried to end it between us. I would have been perfectly happy never meeting you in person.” Or if not happy, at least content. Safe and secure in her little world, which no longer seemed quite so safe. “This man—Liam was it? He came here because of you. He wrecked my things. He took my computer, for God’s sake. Do you know how much that thing cost me, and how long it’s going to take me to rebuild the Braille translation hardware? I’d finally gotten the peripherals exactly where I wanted them.” She broke off, aware of his silence and nearly palpable tension. “And you don’t care about that, do you?”

He exhaled. “Your stuff isn’t stolen, but it’s busted up pretty good. And it’s not that I don’t care, it’s that I have bigger things to worry about right now.”

“Vice President Davis,” she said, remembering the text message and trying not to linger on the word girlfriend or think about how long it’d been since that word had applied to her for real. “Do you know where you’re supposed to meet this guy?”

She could feel him weighing his answer. Finally she heard him shift and give heard a low curse. “No, I don’t. And it’s nearly midnight, damn it.”

That surprised her. Hadn’t it just been ten o’clock? Hadn’t she just been hiding in the corner of the courtyard, unable to bypass the opportunity to meet Ty, even if only through Maria’s eyes?

Apparently not. Apparently nearly two hours had passed in a blink.

“Let’s work this through logically,” she said, thinking fast. “He was just here and he knows you and I are here. That suggests the meeting place is somewhere nearby.”

He didn’t speak for a minute, and she’d just about decided he wasn’t going to answer her at all when he suddenly said, “How many places within, say, a five-minute walk have names that begin with the letter O? ”

She thought fast, partly to help, partly to make him go away, make it all go away so she could lock her doors and crawl back into her familiar, comfortable patterns. “There are a couple of restaurants that begin with O —Orsini’s and Only Seafood. But they’re closed because of the blackout.”

“Not a restaurant,” Ty said. “He thinks bigger than that. Something important. A monument, or an historical building, maybe?”

“Let me think.” She frowned, reviewing her mental map of the area. She imagined herself walking up one street and down the next, counting the steps, tapping with her cane. At the edges of her brain, a faint sensory memory lingered. It was the smell of old wood and candle wax, overlain with the fragrance of summer flowers. It could’ve come from a hundred places in the historical city, but this impression brought a sense of peace. Of reverence. “There’s a big church nearby, but it’s called Christ Church.”

“Which doesn’t start with an O ,” he said.

“No, but that’s not its only name.” Excitement built as the connection clicked in her brain. “They used to call it the Old North Church.”

“As in ‘one if by land, two if by sea’?” he quoted. “That Old North Church? I thought it was near the water.”

“We are,” she countered. Realizing he didn’t know the city well, she led him to the front door. It hung open, letting in the night air, which was heavy with summer humidity and the hint of an incoming squall. She gestured beyond the neighborhood, nearly due east. “The New England Aquarium is that way, right on the harbor.” She turned and pointed northwest. “The church is that way, overlooking the mouth of the river. Two blocks over, one up. You’ll make it if you run.”

“ We’ll make it,” he corrected. “Come on.”

“Not on your life.” Heart picking up a beat, Gabby backpedaled up a step and reached for her front door, for safety. “I’ve had more than enough excitement for tonight. You’re on your own.”

But when she swung the panel shut, he blocked it halfway. “The message said to bring my girlfriend.”

“I am not your girlfriend,” she snapped.

“He doesn’t know that. If you’re innocent, then you’re right—he either followed me and backtracked you to your place somehow, or he already knew about you from my e-mails. Now he’s wondering exactly how much you know, or how important you are to me.” He paused. “Either way, you’ll be safer with me than staying here.” His words sounded logical, but there was an undercurrent in his tone that she didn’t like.

Swallowing past the growing knot of panic in her throat, Gabby shoved on the door, trying to force it closed. When he resisted, they engaged in a brief tussle that brought tears of frustration to her eyes. “Would you just go!” she shouted. “Go away and leave me alone! I’m not the person you’re looking for!”

Her words echoed, gaining new meaning.

Ty’s voice went soft. “Listen, Gabby—”

“No, you listen,” she said, her temper spiking. “I joined Webmatch because I was looking for a friend. Someone who doesn’t need much sleep, like me. Someone I could talk to.” Her voice broke on the memory of the things they’d said to each other during their nighttime exchanges, things she’d never told anyone else. Things that made her feel stripped bare now. “I wasn’t looking to become part of some shoot-’em-up that belongs in an action movie, not real life!”

But even as she said that, a small part of her wondered whether she might not have been looking for adventure, after all. Something new and different. A way out of her rut. A hint of danger amidst the peace. Why else had she discouraged all the other respondents and homed in on a divorced bodyguard who, by his own admission, rarely stayed in one place too long and dated online because his lifestyle didn’t leave room for a more traditional relationship?

Typical , she thought with a burst of self-directed anger. Just typical . Whenever she had things running smoothly in her life, that same little destructive part of her had to step out and mix things up by goading her into doing things she knew she shouldn’t.

“I know this situation really, really stinks,” Ty said. “But I need your help. Hell, it may sound corny, but your country needs your help. This guy is serious, Gabby. If I don’t follow his instructions to the letter, he could kill the vice president. He’s made that clear before, with my partners. Are you willing to risk Grant Davis’s life?”