Molten Gold (3 page)

“You’re a fine lady,” Jared replied with his most charming
grin. “Your mama would be proud. But if what I’ve said so far has you riled up,
then you might not want to know the rest. That temper you hide so very well
will possibly explode. And as much as I’d love to see it, I doubt you’ll
appreciate what I have to say.”

“I believe in the truth, sir,” she replied with more steel.
“Clearly there’s something serious going on, and I want to know about it. I
promise I won’t write anything until you give me the okay, but I’m not going to
let this drop. So what do giant trucks loaded with a billion dollars of gold
bars have to do with my uncle?”

“I mentioned that a small number of trucks were found,”
Jared continued. “They were headed in various directions—to the Iran border or
the Syrian border. Clearly they were organized in such a manner as to be split
up to lessen the chance of capture. And it worked, mostly.”

“But we caught them?” Adelaide said, puzzled.

“We now estimate that we barely scratched the surface,”
Jared said. “We think there were many more trucks that didn’t get caught, or
recorded. We also have reason to believe that not everything actually contained
in the trucks was registered.”

Jared noticed that this time when Adelaide nodded, it was
far slower. Her smile had almost gone and he knew she was a smart woman. He thought
she might have an inkling of where this was headed.

“If that’s true, we have no way to know for sure that what
was handed over to the Army, the items seized in the raids, was actually the
full load of gold.”

“This better not be going where I see it leading,” she said,
clearly miffed.

Jared shrugged. He was caught between his orders, his more
detailed knowledge of the situation and what he hoped.

“My uncle was a good man, one of the best. He spent decades
of his life defending this country and innocent people, doing his duty and
putting his own wants and needs last,” she railed at him. “Moreover, he was one
of thousands, tens of thousands, of men and women over there during the
conflict. Who do you think you are to smear his name? You, Lieutenant Jared
Teague, had better have a lot more than this admittedly very interesting story
as proof of what you’re suggesting.”

“Corporal Steven Graves passed away a month ago from a
sudden heart attack,” Jared said. He watched Adelaide very closely for her
reaction. While she appeared sad, he didn’t see any recognition in her gaze or
demeanor. “Corporal Graves was a member of the same team your uncle was part
of, back in the day.”

“Okay,” she said slowly, thinking. “Uncle Mark might have
mentioned a buddy called Steve. That does sort of ring a bell. I’m sorry he’s
gone. And?”

“And when his widow cleaned out their safety deposit box a
week ago, she discovered a gold bar,” Jared said. His voice had hardened and he
hated that, but the facts couldn’t be denied. “This isn’t regular gold bullion,
which is exceedingly pure gold. This stuff is 21-karat gold, which is what they
use to make necklaces and rings, that sort of stuff. The bars are made from
very crudely melted-down items of gold jewelry.”

“But how can you tell he brought it back with him from the
war?” Adelaide asked.

Jared shrugged. “Where else would a man get a solid block of
gold like that? You can’t pick one up at the local shop. The widow was shocked
to find it. The bar was hidden in a metal trunk full of his old Army mementoes.
Like many returned men, he almost never spoke of that time, so she didn’t have
a clue what circumstances he’d found it in or what to do with it. She thought
it might bring her bad luck to sell it or keep it hidden. So she contacted one of
Steven’s old supervisors and it slowly made its way through to us. We began to
investigate.”

“And what have you discovered?” Adelaide asked.

Jared could see her inner journalist pricking up its ears.
She might not like what he was implying, but he knew her imagination was
captured by the story. He could practically see her longing to jot this all
down. He’d have bet a year’s wage that the moment he left she’d be making notes
and working up a story for some time in the future. He kept his response brief
and as vague as possible.

“Records from back then are pretty sketchy, as you can
imagine,” Jared said. “War is a complex beast, which even in hindsight never
really makes much sense. There are always gaps, confusion. Having said that, as
best we can make out, your uncle and his team were in the area and could well
have stopped a truck carrying gold bars.”

Adelaide stood abruptly, vibrating with outrage.

“How dare you? I’m sorry my uncle’s friend has died, but you
can’t come into my house and make accusations like that. My uncle was a good
man, a loving person and was
devoted
to this country. He spent most of
his life defending what we stand for and keeping us safe. Uncle Mark was
not
a thief. He was a warm, brave and strong man who held a fierce pride in our land
until the day he died. I will not let you sully his name or drag his team’s
reputation through the mud on some misguided witch hunt. Get out of my house.”

Even though part of Jared had guessed this might be her
eventual reaction, he felt a stab of sadness. He could see shock and confusion
mingled with her overriding anger. Now he’d given her a taste of what was truly
going on, he hoped that when she calmed down she’d see things more clearly.

“When confronted by something as visceral as gold, people act
differently. Sometimes—”

“No,” Adelaide cut him off fiercely. “My uncle would never
act dishonorably.”

“I was going to say,” Jared continued calmly, “that sometimes
things are hard to understand back here. It’s a different world in the Middle
East, especially when it was under so much unrest. Something like that gold bar
is easily slipped into a duffel bag. And it can mean the difference between
living comfortably and not making ends meet. Or it could have been viewed as
something to hang on to for the future. Life in a war zone is not cut and
dried, or easy to contemplate. It’s a cliché, but things really
are
different out there.”

“Circumstances might be different, but people aren’t,”
Adelaide insisted.

Jared could see that she was calming down, but remaining
stubborn.

“What might seem like a betrayal right now isn’t necessarily
what it seems,” he reiterated. “We can’t judge what was going on in their minds
until we’ve uncovered more about the situation.”

“And this is what you’re looking for? Gold bars?” Adelaide
tapped her foot.

Jared realized his time was running out.

“Actually I’m looking for those answers,” he replied. “If I
find the gold, then obviously I’d like to retrieve it too. But the Army needs
answers about what happened out there. So I’m looking into it. Only after we
know will we decide what to do.”

“My uncle had nothing to do with any of this,” Adelaide said
in a calm but strong and firm tone. “I’m really busy right now. On a deadline.
I’m sorry, but you’ll have to excuse me, please.”

And that was it. His time was definitely up in her eyes.
Jared stood and dipped two fingers into the breast pocket of his jacket. He
withdrew a business card. It was plain white except for his name, email address
and phone number embossed in black. Simple and understated. It also made no
reference to his connection to the Army or his job title.

Giving Adelaide the card, he met her eyes. He nodded
respectfully.

“Please think about everything I’ve said,” he asked. “And
don’t hesitate to give me a call if you think of something that might be
useful. Even if it’s just a name your uncle mentioned, or any reference to a
job or mission that went south or he wasn’t comfortable with. I’d really
appreciate any insight you can offer.”

He knew his gaze was heated. Adelaide was a sexy woman, one
he wanted more from than he was comfortable acknowledging. It was a pity he was
leaving like this, but he’d never been rude enough to overstay his welcome. Not
even for those lush, pink lips, dark eyes and silky-soft hair would he violate
his own rules. She wanted him gone, so he was leaving.

Adelaide pursed those gorgeous lips and nodded. She remained
silent though, and he knew he only had a fifty-fifty shot of her ever reaching
out, even if she did recall something of use. Chances were good that this was
the last he’d ever see or hear of her.

She escorted him to the door and he left.

Only a little part of him was sad, wondering what could have
been.

Adelaide slammed the door behind the delectable ass of
Lieutenant Jared Teague and struggled with her fluctuating emotions. The Army
man might be sex on a stick, designed purely for her lustful fantasies and a
few heated nights of powerful sex, but he also made her madder than she could have
believed possible. The nerve of him, accusing Adelaide’s uncle of being a
thief. What rot!

Even though she’d been able to see the hot thoughts in his
gaze, she’d been too mad to smile back, to flirt or show him her interest. Fury
had overridden even her usual charm and her natural instinct to use her wiles.
Adelaide leaned back against the door, still angry.

The more she thought about it, the more she realized Jared
could have been far less civil in his questions and his wording. He could have
accused her uncle of treason or pillaging. Stealing was quite a serious charge
in the Army, as was unbecoming behavior. So why had Jared shown compassion and
not been aggressive, as she suspected many others would have been in his place?

Surely there was more to the story than what he’d said.
She’d been positive he was couching his words in purposely vague language.
There might certainly be classified information she couldn’t be privy to,
but…there seemed to be so much more to this story.

Deeply intrigued, personally involved now, Adelaide hurried
back to her computer. She saved her files and opened her search engine. To hell
with her deadline—she could use a rainy day emergency filler piece. She typed
“Saddam Hussein, gold bar, 2003” into the search engine. A dozen or more news
articles popped up.

A quiver rushed through her and her journalistic instincts
snapped to attention.

Something was going on here and she wanted to get to the
bottom of it.

The following afternoon

Adelaide had spent a productive day at work. She’d submitted
the filler article to Frank, saying she’d caught the end of something and
wanted some time and space to follow it on her own. He’d been curious, she
knew, but they’d built up enough trust and respect over the years that he’d
accepted her word and given her the go-ahead.

Scribbling notes in her notebook, she’d spent the day doing
background research and had the bare bones of the first piece sketched out.
This could easily be a three or more part series depending on how the story
panned out.

At minimum it could be a “What happened to…?” piece. Nothing
had been written about the missing bars of gold since a few trucks had been
found in 2003. Everyone seemed to have forgotten about them. So where had they
ended up? Were there more? A million questions revolved in her head, all unanswered.
Reviving the story might not answer anything, but it had all the elements of an
interesting piece even if she never learned any more.

But Adelaide was determined. There had to be more—Jared’s
presence in her home yesterday proved that.

As Adelaide drove home she kept her notepad on her lap and
her pen in hand. During the red lights she added more questions, angles to look
at, people she could contact and try to get answers or quotes from. Her mind
bubbled over crazily, full to bursting point. This could be something big, she
just knew it.

Whenever a particular turn of phrase came to mind that
slotted into the piece, she quickly wrote that down too. She needed to capture
all the stray thoughts and pieces immediately, or she’d lose them. It could
take her hours to recall that particular sentence or hook line, or she might
never recall it at all. Adelaide knew it was one of those times when she’d need
to keep pen and paper handy at all times.

The story burned in her brain, begging to be told.

She couldn’t wait to get home, take off her heels—her arches
screamed with pain—and maybe even indulge in a single glass of wine. Adelaide
rarely drank, but she had a feeling that this afternoon it might loosen a more
whimsical bent to the story and help her creativity. She wondered if she had a
bottle of wine stashed away somewhere. It had been months since she’d drunk and
she might not even have anything lying around.

She made a note to maybe make a liquor store run—loosening
her mind and tongue might help the flow of her words. The lights changed again
and a few minutes later she pulled up in her driveway. Adelaide locked her car,
gathered her belongings and hurried into the house.

As she shut the door behind her she stepped out of her heels
and sighed with relief. She placed her handbag on the entryway table and her
keys in the bowl. With pen and paper in hand, she turned and took a few steps
toward the kitchen. Food was uppermost in her mind. She’d missed lunch, too
eager to continue writing to be bothered eating.

Adelaide paused in the hallway. Something had caught her eye
in her peripheral vision. She turned and headed to the doorway of the living room.

The place was a mess. Not just a bit untidy or “I’ve just
had a party” dirty. No. Someone had been here while she was away and torn the
place apart.

Looking for something?

For a wild moment Adelaide wondered if Jared had come back
to see for himself whether she had that damn gold. Her anger rose but she
quickly got herself under control. No. He was more straightforward than that.
Maybe it wasn’t about the gold. She’d probably just been robbed. How
frustrating.

Horror stories she’d heard over the years came back to her.
Of kids throwing food on the walls. Even defecating and smearing it on the furniture
or the ceiling. Adelaide looked wildly around the living room. Nothing seemed
that bad, though all her treasured items had been strewn around. Every drawer
open, every cabinet rifled through.

Adelaide hurried back to the hallway and placed her pen and
notebook back in her bag. She needed to check the house. Make sure nothing else
was damaged.

She entered the kitchen and looked around. Much of her food
and dry products were on the floor, eggs cracked, milk spilled, but nothing too
outrageous had occurred here. Sighing, she crossed over to the kitchen island
and picked up the cordless phone. Her cell was back in her handbag—she hadn’t even
thought to get it.

It might take the cops a while to respond, so she might as
well start the ball rolling now. Burglaries were a lower priority than many
emergencies on the police’s list.

Just as she pressed the number nine, she felt a freight
train slam into her.

She was shoved painfully into the island, the hard marble
bench digging into her ribs so hard she knew she’d bruise. The phone skittered
out of her hand and slid along the bench top.

“Where is it?” a man gruffly demanded.

Adelaide shook her head, unable to speak. She couldn’t get
air into her lungs. Rough hands grabbed her shoulders and shook her. Adelaide
gasped, tried to call out, but she still couldn’t breathe.

“
Where is it
?” This time the voice was louder, angry.

“Please,” Adelaide wheezed. The word was raspy, barely
recognizable, but she finally managed to suck in some oxygen. She coughed as
the man shook her again, more forcefully this time. Her neck wobbled and she
felt the muscles tighten as they were stretched.

He’s going to kill me,
she figured, panicked. The man
was beyond rough and wore a black woolen balaclava. Adelaide had read enough to
know that while burglars were often not violent, a criminal who knew enough to
cover his face, bide his time and premeditate his actions knew he had nothing
to lose.

Do something, you idiot!

Snapping into gear, Adelaide grabbed the crystal vase
sitting on the bench and hurled it at her attacker, flowers and all. Water
splashed over his face and into his eyes. Instinctively he let her go and
lifted his hands to his face to wipe the liquid away.

On bare feet, Adelaide raced out of the kitchen and headed
to her bedroom. She kept her uncle’s gun in a box in the bedside drawer. She
wasn’t even halfway there when the burglar grabbed her by the hair.

She screamed in pain as she felt many roots snap in his
fist. He slammed her into the wall again.

“This is the last time I’ll ask. Next I’ll just keep hurting
you until you scream out what I want to know,” he said venomously. “Where is
it?”

Adelaide didn’t pretend to herself. She wasn’t built for
torture. She cried when she stubbed her toe or nicked her finger with a knife
while cutting vegetables. Adelaide was not a weak woman, but she was not one to
withstand physical pain. And since she certainly couldn’t answer this man’s
questions, she wasn’t going to hang around. She no longer wanted her gun or to
defend her house. She just wanted to escape.

“Okay,” she panted, buying herself a few precious seconds
while her brain whirled. “Okay, I’ll tell you.”

The man still grasped her shoulders painfully tightly, but
they were facing each other now. She opened her mouth, pretending to gather
herself for the big reveal, and kneed him as hard as she could in the balls.
The man winced, losing his breath, but he didn’t fall down.

Adelaide remembered her Uncle Mark teaching her some
self-defense in her teenage years once, when he’d been on leave. He’d shown her
not only how to hurt a man in his crotch but how to follow through with a
strong head butt.

Your skull is one of the strongest, hardest places on
your body, Addy. You only do this in an emergency, sweetness, but it’s
important to know these things.

Before her attacker could gather himself, she bashed her
head into his face. Pain exploded through her skull and rang in her ears, but
he released her and fell to the floor. Faster than thought, she turned and
fled. She raced back down the hallway. In one quick swoop she gathered her
handbag and keys. Adelaide dug a hand into her purse and pulled out her phone.
About to dial 9-1-1, she paused just for a moment and looked over her shoulder.

Her attacker lay on the ground, dazed, his eyes closed.
Gathering every inch of her courage, she took a few steps closer to him and
pulled his balaclava up. He had a split in his forehead and a trickle of blood
ran down from it, smeared from the woolen mask he’d been wearing. He was beefy
and Caucasian with brownish-blond hair. Too scared to hang around much longer,
Adelaide tapped the button for her camera on the screen of her phone.

She snapped a picture of the man where he lay. Turning back
around, she flew out the door and into her driveway. It was only as she climbed
into the car that she noticed her feet were still bare. For a second she pondered
going back inside to get her shoes.

Are you insane? With a giant man in there wanting to beat
answers out of you that you don’t have? What planet are you on?

Adelaide jammed the key in the ignition and turned it on.
Burning rubber, she peeled out of the driveway and sped away.

It took a few minutes for her heart to stop racing and for
her breathing to slow back down to normal. She hadn’t felt terrified, but as
time ticked over and she started to shake, Adelaide realized she must have
been.

Absolutely petrified.

Finally she pulled off the road and into the parking lot of
a group of shops. She wound down the window and sucked at the fresh air.

Okay, now what?
she wondered.

The police, she decided. Digging into her handbag, she
pulled out her phone then checked that her purse, notebook and other personal
effects were all safely inside. Relieved, she had a moment’s pang thinking of
all the other cherished items she’d left behind. Adelaide forced them out of
her mind. Right now she couldn’t do anything about it. She needed the police to
get that man out of her house, assuming he hadn’t left when he’d properly
regained consciousness.

Adelaide had no proof this was connected with the gold Jared
had told her about. Maybe it was all a coincidence and she’d simply been
burgled and assaulted.

“Where is it?”
she remembered the man demanding. No.
It wasn’t random or fate. The man had certainly been after something. And
unless there was a sudden black market for sexy, strappy shoes or trashy
romance books, Adelaide didn’t own anything remotely valuable.

But somehow there were evidently a few people who thought
she was in possession of some gold bars from Saddam Hussein’s stash.

Jerks. She didn’t know diddly-squat about any of that. And
ransacking her house should have proven that. If she had gold lying around,
would she have such threadbare cushions on her couch? Would her wardrobe be so
woefully bare? If she had a bunch of gold, she’d have three times as many shoes
and a dozen more slinky cocktail dresses to go out in at night.

No. She’d been just fine until a certain Lieutenant Jared
Teague had stomped his big, Army-boot-clad foot into her placid little life.

Equal parts annoyed and afraid now, Adelaide acted on
instinct. The call to the police could wait—her attacker would be long gone by
now and the cops could make their reports anytime in the next few hours.
Pulling her purse from the handbag, she riffled through her business cards and
snagged Jared’s. She called the number on the card before she could lose her
gumption.

“Hello?”

She’d have recognized that deep drawl anywhere. Clearly he’d
given her his direct line.

“I hope you’re happy now, Lieutenant,” she snapped, far more
angry now than anything. “My life wasn’t perfect but it was quite satisfying
until you stomped your way into it. What have you done? Is this some lame trick
to get me to talk to you? Were you the good cop and that mongrel you sent the
bad one?”

“Wait, Adelaide? Is that you? What are you talking about?”

“I’m talking about that jerk you sent over to my house.”
Adelaide found herself getting furious all over again as she thought about what
had just occurred. “The guy looking for the gold—who else could have sent him?
Did you know he was a psycho? I really think he was going to kill me. He sure
didn’t have an issue with bruising me or hurling me around my house. Speaking
of which, you’d better be willing to pay for it to be cleaned up. Heaven knows
what he’s broken in there. And if you think I’m the kind of paltry, weak little
woman who will let herself be beaten up or worse just to answer a few questions
I don’t even know the answer to, then let me tell you something for free,
mister—”

“Hang on a minute,” Jared interrupted her.

Adelaide was working up a steaming head of anger, but the
sharpness of Jared’s tone caught her off-guard. She was about to start up
again, but he talked over her in a firm, no-nonsense tone.

“Adelaide, look, I really have no clue what you’re talking
about. Are you all right? Why don’t you—”

“Oh, so it’s perfectly fine for you to be innocent and
unknowing but not me?” Adelaide snapped. “Listen, Lieutenant, I told you I don’t
know where your stupid gold is. I don’t even believe my uncle had anything to
do with your heist.”

“Dammit, stop for a moment and explain it to me,” Jared
insisted. “I can’t follow you. Now start back at the beginning and assume I’m
an idiot. Tell me what’s happened.”

Adelaide frowned and a lot of the heat of anger went out of
her. Jared sounded genuinely perplexed and a bit frustrated. If he’d sent her
attacker, then he’d know what she was raving on about. Was this some sort of
trick? A tremor ran through her. Once again she didn’t know what was going on
and felt confused, out of her depth.

“Well,” she started a bit more hesitantly now. “I came home
from work just a little while ago and my house had been trashed. I checked it
out a bit, then went to call the cops, and the guy attacked me. I got free,
obviously, but I’m really mad right now.”