Tempting the Devil (33 page)

She stopped at an overgrown roadside park and ate in the car. A lumber truck rambled past, then a pickup. That was all.

The car clock said eight p.m. It would be dark soon, and she'd never cared about driving in the dark, especially since the accident. She would stop at the next motel.

On this road, it would probably be the Bates Motel, complete with a resident psychopath. Couldn't be worse than the passel of psychopaths she was facing now.

Could she do what the FBI hadn't been able to do? Was she tilting at windmills but with a far deadlier consequence than Don Quixote faced?

chapter twenty-three

Ben quietly raged inside.

He never should have suggested someone else handle the surveillance. He'd known how creative she could be. She'd managed to outfox everyone just two nights ago.

Her seeming acceptance of FBI protection, though, misled the detail. She knew, and they knew, that she was not a suspect, and no restrictions had been placed on her by the federal judge. She probably also knew that if she hadn't accepted FBI protection, they would have provided surveillance she couldn't control as well.

He'd underestimated her resourcefulness several times. He couldn't blame the agents. He
could
—and did—blame himself.

But he'd realized he had to get away from her before he did something really stupid. And in doing that, he'd probably committed the biggest blunder of his life.

Maddox was both humiliated and defensive. “She wasn't in custody.”

“She might have been kidnapped.”

“No. She meant to lose us.”

“How do you know?”

“That newspaper building is as tightly secured as ours,” he said. “A guard saw her leave. She was alone. She waved to him.”

“And you were where?”

Maddox winced. “Bathroom. She said she would be in the ladies' room for several moments putting on makeup. I needed to take a leak. I have a wife. I know how long putting on makeup takes.”

Not Robin Stuart, Ben wanted to say. But Maddox may want to know how he knew that.

“She has an incredibly creative mind,” he said. “Unfortunately it's not always tempered by caution. I should have warned you.”

“You did.”

“Apparently not enough,” Ben said.

“I'll probably be sent to Alaska,” Maddox mused woefully. “My wife will not be happy.”

“See if you can help find her,” Ben said. “Before the bad guys do. Check with her friends. See if she borrowed a car.”

Maddox nodded. “You?”

“I think I should check her house.”

Maddox started to say something, then snapped his mouth shut. “I'll question the other
Observer
staff members.”

“You do that.”

Ben drove over to her house.
Daisy
. She wouldn't have left Daisy alone, nor Damien. Were they with her? He knew from Maddox that they had been in the house when she'd left this morning. That meant she had to leave a key somewhere for someone to get inside.

He still didn't understand what had turned her against him. His attitude? Granted, he'd never been very diplomatic, but for a while he thought they had connected on several levels. He should have known that lawmen and reporters were like oil and water.

Hell, he
had
known it.

He tried to think what she would do. He doubted he could get a search warrant this soon, especially since she left on her own accord. The one thing he did know was she wouldn't leave the animals alone. Therefore someone would be coming to fetch them.

He could always plead concern for Mrs. Jeffers's dog, but he could also claim there was reasonable cause to suspect foul play since she'd been attacked earlier and threats had been made against her. It wasn't as if he were gathering evidence to use against her.

Damn it
!

He'd decided not to involve Mahoney. He was willing to risk his own career. He wasn't going to do the same to Mahoney, who was nearing retirement. Instead, he called his partner and told him what had happened. “Maddox is going to talk to staff members. See if you can get the names of other friends. Talk to them.”

Then he ignored every traffic law speeding to her house. He supposed that the agents were still parked in that house down the street. The private investigators, though, were gone, dismissed when the FBI took over.

Maybe a bad decision.

They couldn't do any worse than his own people. Or himself. Maybe
he'd
sent her running.

Or maybe she was on the trail of something.

If so, she was in more danger than before.

He was going to sift through everything in that house. A name on a pad. Something on her computer.

To hell with rules.

When the straight road started wavering, Robin knew she was in trouble.

Her eyes no longer focused. She pulled off the road and turned on the overhead light to read the map. The road led to a small town. Hopefully there would be a motel. She wished she had bought a couple of bottles of water and a cooler full of ice.

How much farther could she go without sleep?

She turned the air conditioner to full force, and the radio to music she hated. No mellow jazz now. More heavy metal. She drove the car back on the road.

Concentrate
!

How ridiculous if she were to be killed in another auto accident while seeking so desperately to avoid a bunch of interstate killers.

Finally speed limit signs indicated a town ahead. She slowed, not wanting to capture the attention of any small-town police officers who supported their town with traffic tickets. She didn't want questions.

On the outskirts she saw a motel. Old. Half the lights on the sign gone. But it still said “Vacancy.”

She turned in and went to the office. A teenager manned it.

He asked her name.

“Mary Murray,” she said. “I'll pay cash.”

He didn't blink. “Most of our customers do.”

And she had her room.

Ben found the key after scouring the front porch. It was hidden in a small metal box and barely concealed under some loose soil. Not the best hiding place.

He knew he was in the sights of the FBI detail in the house. They most likely assumed he had a right to be there.

He unlocked the door and went in. Damien greeted him with a frantic bark. Daisy was probably hiding in the laundry room. He leaned down to pet the poodle, wondering whether he should take the animals with him. Unease settled in his gut. He knew she wouldn't leave them alone. Either she planned to return or …

He went to her office and quickly surveyed the room. He had a good mind for crime scenes, for capturing individual details. Nothing appeared different. He went to the wastepaper basket. Ashes. So she'd burned something. He turned on the computer. She had e-mail but it was protected and he had no idea what the password was. He tried several possibilities. Daisy. Her sisters' names. Her birth date. Nothing came up. He checked the last time she logged in. This morning.

He checked the computer printer. Jammed. He opened the side of the printer and dug out the offending piece of paper, or the several pages of paper. The first apparently had been stopped during printing by a second page that was caught in the feeding mechanism. He took out both pieces of paper. One looked like a folding fan. The other contained half a photo of a boat and five men holding their catches. From the quality, he knew it had been enlarged and possibly other people had been cropped away at the edges.

One man in the photo seemed familiar, but he couldn't place him right away. He wasn't worried, though. He knew it would come to him soon.

He peered at the boat for a name. It was blocked, though, by the fishermen.

He sat back in the chair. He'd never been on a fishing trip, but he judged this was an oceangoing boat. It appeared rigged for deep-sea fishing. And who were the other men standing there, beaming with pride as they held sizeable fish?

More important, why was it in Robin's printer, and what did it mean to her? Was that the reason for her disappearance?

He made several copies of the photo. He'd finished when he heard Damien bark just a second before he heard the doorbell ring. He hesitated, then decided to answer it. Perhaps whoever it was had some answers.

He stuffed the photos in his shirt, then went to the door and opened it. A thirties-something woman with warm brown eyes stood there, looking frazzled. She held a cat carrier.

Startled, she stared at him. “Hello?” she said, a question in her eyes.

“Hello,” he replied. “I'm Ben Taylor, FBI.”

Her lips pursed into a big O.

“Why are you here?” she blurted out.

“Ms. Stuart appears to be missing.”

“Oh, that. She decided to take several days' vacation,” the woman said. “She asked me to look after her dog and cat.”

“That's kind of you, Mrs.…”

“Meeks. Betsy Meeks. Do you mind if I see your credentials?”

He took out his badge and watched as she examined it closely before handing it back to her.

“I'm trying to find Ms. Stuart,” he said. “There's been several attacks on her and I'm afraid she could be in danger.”

Mrs. Meeks blinked several times. “She didn't say anything like that. Only that she needed a few days rest.”

“Why did she call you about picking up the animals?” he asked.

“I work with an animal rescue group. Robin knows how much I enjoy animals. She's written several stories about our organization. Our guardian angel, I call her. She's brought in enough donations to keep us going. This is the least I could do for her. I would have been here sooner but we had an emergency … and, well, I'm late.” Mrs. Meeks said it all in nearly one breath.

Guardian angel? He wouldn't have suspected she would take that much interest in a story that wasn't going to lead the front page. But then he'd been wrong about her from the beginning. About everything. “Did she say where she was going?”

“No. Just that she needed to get away.”

“And she didn't say how long she'd be gone?”

“Just ‘several days.'”

“When did she call?”

“This morning. About six thirty. I've been keeping up with the story, and knew she might go to jail. She asked me to foster the animals for several days, and said that if she didn't go to jail, she would take a few days off. She sounded tired and stressed …”

Her voice faded off as if she knew she'd said too much.

“Did she mention a special place, a location she particularly liked?”

“No. She just said she really didn't know where she was going. She was just going to imitate a wild goose and go where instinct took her.”

That sounded like her. Instinct and impulse ruled her. Yet instinct told him the photo had something to do with Robin's abrupt disappearance.

He stood aside. At least something was being done about Daisy and Damien.

He waited, hoping to learn more as the woman went in search of Daisy, finally finding her in the laundry room.

“Robin told me Daisy might be here.” Mrs. Meeks scooped up the cat and put her in the carrier. Daisy complained loudly.

Then she picked up Damien, who trembled. With a few soft words the dog settled in her arms.

“Do you know anything else? Anything at all?”

“I don't think I should be saying anything. She would have told you if she wanted you to know.” She turned and bulldozed her way past him.

He watched as Betsy Meeks returned to her car. She had looked meek in the doorway. Now he knew there was nothing meek about her when protecting her charges.

Just as Robin was.

He left the house, copies of the photos folded and tucked out of sight.

It was dark when Ben went to the home of Wade Carlton, Robin's editor.

The door opened to him immediately when he rang the doorbell.

The editor's face was lined with worry. “Have you heard anything from Robin?”

“I was going to ask you that.”

Accusation was in Carlton's face as he said, “You said the FBI could protect her better than the people I hired.”

“I thought they could. I didn't bargain on the fact that she would try to evade them.”

“Maybe you should have.”

Ben wanted to retort that Wade Carlton might have been able to stop her as well. But that wouldn't solve anything. He needed an ally, not an enemy.

“What exactly did she tell you?”

“She didn't tell me anything. She left the office after finishing a story with Greene, then the agent with her rushed in and said he couldn't find her. When I arrived home, I found a message on my answering machine that she had to get away for a few days. I'd already offered to give her the time, but I would have appreciated a warning.”

“She's not on assignment then?”

“No. Greene's taking over the story temporarily.”

“She didn't say anything about new information?”

Carlton's surprise was evident. “No.”

“I think she met with her source the night before last. I think he, or she, gave her some lead she's pursuing.”

Carlton narrowed his eyes. “And not tell me? Or you?” He seemed to emphasize the last word. “Are you sure?”

“She disappeared for hours Sunday night. You know that. She said she just wanted to get a rental car, but she was gone a very long time and said very little when she returned.”

“That doesn't mean she met with her source. And maybe it's just as she said. She needed to get away after the hearing today. She knows you want to send her to jail.” The editor's voice had turned harsh.

“I don't want to send her anywhere. I want to help her, damn it. She's going to get herself killed, as well as others.”

“Have you thought that maybe she doesn't trust you?” Carlton said bluntly. “Apparently the Hydra has its tentacles in more than the Meredith sheriff's department. Are you sure the FBI isn't penetrated?”