Blind Run (11 page)

“Go on,” Callie said to him. “Tell them.”

He glowered at his sister but didn’t have a choice now that she’d started this. He had to tell Ethan and Sydney the rest. “The Keepers said Sean got sick in the middle of the night, but there was nothing wrong with him when we went to bed. They did something to him.”

Sydney looked uncomfortable, glanced at Ethan again, then said, “Danny, sometimes children get sick.”

“No, he wasn’t sick.” Danny didn’t know what he’d do if they didn’t believe him. “And he wasn’t the only one. Lots of others disappeared, too. Mostly the little ones, but sometimes one of the big kids.”

The room got real quiet, and Danny could tell they thought he was making it up.

“Sean wasn’t sick,” Danny insisted. “None of them were sick before they went away, but every time the Keepers told us the same story. They said Sean was too sick to stay on the island, and they’d taken him to a hospital on the mainland.”

Danny saw the doubt on Sydney’s face, but couldn’t tell what Ethan was thinking.

“Tell them the rest,” Callie said.

Danny needed no prompting. “I know the Keepers were lying, at least about Sean.” He stopped, looking from one unconvinced face to the other. “Because a few days after Sean disappeared, I saw him. I snuck into the infirmary and he was there.” Danny had been terrified of what the Keepers would do if they caught him. Would he be the next one to disappear in the middle of the night? “They’d stuck all kinds of tubes and needles in him, and he’d looked . . .” right at Danny. For a second, Sean had opened his eyes, and Danny could have sworn his friend had seen him hiding. “He looked real scared.” Something swelled in his throat as he remembered the look on Sean’s face, and that he’d been too scared himself to help.

Silence hovered in the room.

“A nightmare?” Sydney said.

He’d had nightmares about it for weeks, but he’d been awake the first time. “It was daytime.” And the last time he’d seen his friend. “Why did they lie and say they took all those kids to a mainland hospital? And why did none of them ever get well and come back?”

Again, no one spoke.

Finally, Ethan pulled out a barstool and sat. “Tell me how Anna fits into all this.”

Danny took a deep breath. Maybe Ethan believed him. “Anna was one of our teachers.”

Ethan looked doubtful.

“She was,” Callie said.

Danny understood Ethan’s doubts. Anna, the real Anna, the one who’d helped them run away from the island, wasn’t like any of the other teachers. And he had a feeling Ethan knew all about the real Anna.

“She wasn’t like that in the beginning,” he said, speaking to Ethan now. “I mean, she was different from the other Keepers, but she was nice.”

“She told us stories,” Callie added.

“We weren’t allowed off the island,” Danny explained. “We studied geography and everything, but that’s not the same. We didn’t really know what it was like on the outside. Anna told us all kinds of stuff.” She’d convinced Danny she was his friend, their friend, his and Callie’s. But she had lied, too. “I told her about seeing Sean, and she offered to take Callie and me away from the Keepers. She promised to help us find our father.”

“How was she going to do that?” Sydney asked quietly.

“That part is easy,” Danny said. “I know where he lives.”

CHAPTER ELEVEN

WHERE THE HELL
was Morrow?

Avery Cox pressed the off button on the remote and tossed it onto his desk. He shouldn’t have to get his news from a goddamn television report.

It had been twenty-four hours since they’d left Haven Island and gone their separate ways, Avery back to Langley, Morrow off to track Kelsey, Decker, and the runaways. At the very least, Avery had expected a progress report by now, but Morrow hadn’t checked in. Now this mess in Dallas, two dead cops and Decker on the run, and it had Morrow’s grimy prints all over it.

“Damn the man.”

Avery pushed to his feet and crossed to the glass wall overlooking the SCTC bullpen, a hive of activity deep within the bowels of Langley. Dozens of computer workstations filled the room, and two walls of monitors displayed video feed from around the world. Directly across from his office, a massive electronic map tracked worldwide operations. Around it all, hustled a score of people, his people, the best and brightest analysts in the world.

Morrow was getting out of hand.

Unfortunately, Avery still needed him. Turner had called a little over an hour ago. Not only had Adam finally revealed Danny and Callie’s destination, but the girl was sick. Real sick. With those two pieces of information, they had a rare, and narrow window of opportunity to retrieve them. If Morrow showed up.

Using traditional SCTC resources to find him was out of the question. It would raise too many eyebrows. Avery had also considered sending someone else after the kids, but that held its own risks. It was how they’d gotten into the current situation with Anna and Ramirez. The fewer people with contact to Haven Island, the better.

He’d built this place from scratch, fighting for funds from tightfisted politicians. He wasn’t about to let it all fall apart because Anna Kelsey had helped a couple of kids run away from that damn island. Or because John Morrow was too damn arrogant to follow orders.

Avery had come too far.

Twenty-five years ago he’d arrived in Washington, a young man with no family connections and a law degree from a no-name school in rural Mississippi. He’d had to scramble for a position as a law clerk, which paid less, with longer and more grueling hours, than the bartending job that had gotten him through school. Add to that the subtle and not-so-subtle snobbery of Washington’s elite, and he’d been little more than an overeducated gofer.

A lesser man would have given up and gone home. Avery had joined the CIA, where talent mattered more than family name, and a flair for navigating the underpinnings of a bureaucracy counted more than his alma mater. With an eye for talent and no desire to go into the field himself, he’d done well. Very well.

Now, if he wasn’t very careful, he could lose it all.

John Morrow wasn’t his only problem. That had become evident at the morning’s quarterly budget review before the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence. A week ago, the meeting would have been a mere formality, but something had changed. The opposition had emerged unexpectedly. A junior senator from Montana or Idaho, or one of those god-awful backward states, had started poking his nose into Avery’s business. The senator had questioned the money allocated to the SCTC and wanted a detailed accounting of operations. Others had picked up on the inquiry, and it had become a feeding frenzy as old rivals surfaced.

Avery had crushed the questions, presenting charts and graphs and dire warnings about the need for newer and better technologies, along with the SCTC’s requirements to operate without interference. In the end the committee had approved his budget. For now.

The opposition’s timing, however, was too coincidental. It had to be related to the situation on Haven Island. Someone had gotten word of, or at least suspected, the true nature of the project and its current problem.

Avery retreated to his desk, the idea a nasty prick at the base of his skull. Who could have found out about the Haven Project? And how? Could Anna have sold information instead of the kids, then taken them as proof?

The approach fit her personality. It held less risk, and the outcome would be much the same. She might still have to face Marco Ramirez, unless she’d sold out to someone powerful enough to protect her. It was a tall order.

Avery tented his fingers beneath his chin and considered the few men with enough power to accomplish it. There weren’t many, and all of them had their own agendas, which Avery wouldn’t hesitate to expose if they delved too deeply into his affairs. No one wanted that. After all, Washington was the ultimate old boys’ club.

Could there be someone else, an unknown player Avery had overlooked? Someone behind the scenes of the Senate committee? A money man, pulling a few senators’ strings? No one got to the U.S. Senate without backing, without owing a favor or two. And in Avery’s experience those without a public political agenda posed a greater threat than those courting the voters’ favor. The possibility that such a man or men knew about the Haven Project disturbed him. It would mean the situation had moved beyond his control, and today’s battle had been a warning, the victory a memory if Danny or Callie surfaced in the wrong place.

Goddamn Morrow. If he’d blown their chance to retrieve those kids, Avery would have his head.

The intercom buzzed.

“Excuse me, Mr. Cox.” His assistant’s voice held a nervous edge. “John Morrow’s on line three.” She dealt with dangerous and powerful men on a daily basis, but Morrow disturbed her. She wasn’t alone. He intimidated even the most stalwart of Avery’s staff, and that was exactly the way Avery wanted it. Usually.

“Make sure I’m not disturbed.” He disconnected his assistant, punched the speaker button, then the flashing line. “You better have good news for me.”

After a single barb of silence, Morrow said, “Take me off the speaker.”

Avery smiled tightly, allowing Morrow his petty victory, and picked up the receiver. “Tell me you have good news.”

“You want me to lie.”

“What the hell happened?”

“We didn’t expect Decker’s ex-wife to call the cops.”

“And you let them get away.” Avery barely contained his anger, reminding himself he needed Morrow for a little longer. “Killing two police officers in the process.”

“It couldn’t be avoided.”

Avery doubted that. “Half the state of Texas is looking for them.” Under different circumstances he might take some pleasure in the high-minded Decker wanted for murder, but at this point the police could only complicate matters. The stakes were too high to indulge in personal pleasures. He, at least, wouldn’t risk the future of the Haven Project and control of the SCTC. “This better not come back at us.”

“We sanitized the building.” Morrow’s words sounded forced. He didn’t like justifying his actions. “Decker’s their only suspect. If they pick him up—”

“They won’t.” Not unless they got very lucky, or Decker fucked up, and Avery wasn’t about to count on either scenario. No, he wasn’t worried about Decker turning up in a jail cell. “He’s more likely to go so far underground we’ll never find him.” Until he surfaced to bring Avery and his organization tumbling down.

“He’s got the woman with him,” Morrow said.

“I heard the news,” Avery snapped. Sydney Decker was yet another factor he couldn’t predict. “And I don’t give a damn about the woman.”

“She’s not going to give up her life and go into hiding. Sooner or later, she’ll surface, and Decker won’t be far behind.”

“You don’t know that.”

“Call it an educated guess. We’ll get Decker,” Morrow said. “And the kids.”

“Yes, let’s not forget the kids.” Morrow’s priorities were screwed up. “
They
are what this is all about, not your personal vendetta against Decker.”

Morrow didn’t respond, a damn irritating habit which told Avery he’d hit on the truth. Morrow’s hatred of Decker went back to the fiasco with Ramirez. Something had happened between them that night, something that had left Morrow hungry for the other man’s blood. But Avery had no time for Morrow’s petty agenda. They had one shot at salvaging the situation before all hell broke loose, and he wouldn’t stand for another mistake.

“What about Anna?” he asked. “The media didn’t mention her.”

“No one’s made the connection, but New Mexico Highway Patrol found her body in the desert this morning, and I sent someone to check it out. It was a single gunshot to the head. Looks like Ramirez’s work.”

Avery leaned back in his chair, uneasy with this latest development. It could be good or bad, depending on who she’d contacted before dying. “Go on.”

“My men did a little digging and found a recently deserted trailer about ten miles from where the cops found the body. Someone had left in a hurry.”

“Decker?”

“Anna could have dropped off the kids and split.” He let out a short, humorless laugh. “Maybe she figured selling them was more trouble than it was worth. No surprise, with Ramirez on her tail.”

No, no surprise. The twist was that Ramirez had found her so quickly. Though it no longer mattered what had happened to Anna Kelsey, except in the matter of who she’d been working for, but Avery would deal with that later. For now, Decker had the kids.

“Any further sign of Ramirez?”

“Other than the increased body count?” For the first time, Morrow sounded a bit uncomfortable. “He’s out there, I can feel him.” He paused. “And I can bring him in.”

Morrow was entirely too eager, and he was hiding something. Avery considered calling him on it. Instead he decided to bring Morrow down a notch or two. “Maybe, maybe not. Ramirez just might find you first.”

Silence echoed across a thousand miles of phone lines. Avery suspected he’d struck the nerve that was Morrow’s ego. He would like nothing better than to wrap his hands around Avery’s throat. No, that wasn’t quite right. The gun was more to Morrow’s taste. Like Ramirez. Morrow’s fantasy would be to put a bullet between Avery’s eyes.

A fantasy he’d never realize.

Morrow knew he couldn’t survive without Avery’s protection. No one in the intelligence community wanted officers like Morrow, men who liked to kill. And he
did
like to kill, entirely too much. Such men had their uses, if they could be controlled, but Morrow was quickly getting beyond even Avery’s influence.

“This time, stick to the plan.” Avery’s tone allowed no argument. “First I want Danny and Callie, then Ramirez. After that, Decker’s all yours.”

“You’re running the show.”

“I suggest you remember that.” Avery paused, letting his own anger carry across the line. Then he repeated Turner’s information. “Decker and the kids are on their way to Illinois. Champaign-Urbana.” He heard the surprise in Morrow’s sudden stillness. “The boy’s going after a Dr. Timothy Mulligan. He thinks the man’s his father.”

“Is he?”

Avery ignored the question. It had no relevance to what he wanted from Morrow. “Don’t screw this up, John. And,” he paused for emphasis, unable to resist taunting Morrow one more time, “don’t underestimate Decker. If it comes down to it, he
will
kill you.”

Silence again, cold, angry silence. “I’ll be in touch.”

“See that you are.”

Avery hung up the phone, resisting the urge to slam it in place. Instead he pulled out a handkerchief, removed his glasses, and polished the lenses.

Just a couple more days. A week at the most.

Morrow was a lot of things, but he wasn’t stupid. He’d deliver the kids, and Decker would take down Ramirez. Then the three-year-old nightmare surrounding the assassin would finally come to an end. As for Ethan Decker, his death would be a bonus.

Then, Avery would have time to consider the best way to rid himself of John Morrow.