Exception to the Rule Page 10

  “Mill Springs knows we were there,” Carolyne pointed out.

  “Now that we’re not there any longer, we can hardly attract the attention of anyone who might be interested,” Rio responded without hesitation, making a floorboard creak as he shifted within the sleeping bag.

  She sighed, which meant she wasn’t going to argue his point. And then she sighed again, which meant…

  He wasn’t sure. Not until she said, “I wish I could talk to Scott. I didn’t think I’d miss him like this.”

  “It looked to me like you could use some time apart.” Rio winced as the words left his mouth; tact was hard to find at the end of a day like this one. Or maybe some of Bonnie Miller’s refreshing bluntness had worn off on him.

  Okay, her bluntness was just a little beyond refreshing. Startling might be a better word. But it still made him shake his head and smile. In his family, where everyone took care of everyone else, he was still the one who took care of sticky situations.

  Bonnie Miller probably never called anyone else to help in her life. As petite as she was, she moved with the assurance of an athlete. Of someone who knew her own body and her own space, and how to use it.

  She sure knew how to use that little club she’d carried. And that revolver, hidden so well he hadn’t even detected she was carrying. For all those jeans hugged her tight little butt, she’d chosen them well, giving herself enough room at the groin to pull off the concealed carry.

  Don’t think about Bonnie Miller’s groin.

  Whoops, too late.

  Well, at least it was dark.

  But while he’d been mulling things that made it too plain he’d been out of his last relationship for way too long, Caro was still thinking about Scott. For she sighed again, and said in a small voice, “You’re right, we did need some time apart. And maybe it’s a good thing we got it…you know, that being away makes me see that I do miss him.”

  Rio wasn’t so certain. As frightened as she’d been these past days, she might merely miss the reassurance of an idealized relationship. She might just miss being home. But he said nothing, because of that long-learned lesson that no one was good enough for Carolyne, just as no one would ever be good enough for the daughter he hoped to have someday. “Go to sleep,” he told her, bringing them back around to the beginning of the conversation. “Start working fresh tomorrow, get that mysterious problem solved and then you’ll be talking to Scott again before you know it.”

  She rustled in the dark, sorting out her own sleeping bag, and then she said, “Good night, Rio.” But she didn’t sound convinced.

  The dirt road entrance to Camp Cardinal would have been nigh invisible in the barely dawn light had not its small, stout wooden sign—complete with a cheerful cardinal wearing a bandana—been posted by the roadside, nearly engulfed by late-season roadside chicory still wearing the intense blue colors of morning. Upon spotting the sign, Kimmer pulled to the side of the road. The tough chicory stems whapped the side of the Taurus as she brought it to a stop, and then grabbed at her legs as she walked to the dirt road. By rights, it should show no use, but the tire tracks were easy enough to see. A single set—and recent, disturbing the hard dirt, flipping up pieces of the sparse gravel in the roadbed. All subtle signs, but clear enough to draw Kimmer onward.

  She left the car where it was. If she was right about Rio’s bolt-hole, she’d have to hike out, return to town, and grab up more supplies. But until she knew just where he was within the camp, she had no intention of alarming him with the engine noise of the little wagon.

  Half a mile along the tree-crowded road, she warmed up enough to pull off her jacket, leaving her with the dark vest over an olive-green thermal shirt, jeans and lightweight hiking boots. Today she’d come lightly armed, with only the little knife and the .38; she didn’t expect to use either.

  Three-quarters of a mile in, she got her first glimpse of a platform tent, canvas flaps laced tightly closed against the season. She’d come back and search the tent groupings if she had to, but not until she’d checked the enclosed buildings—those that would have electricity and other possible amenities. If nothing else, Carolyne needed electricity to work—Rio would have checked that out before bringing her here. Computer batteries never lasted anywhere near as long as it seemed they should.

  The main road took her right by the office, a small shingled structure that hardly looked big enough to function as an office at all. Kimmer approached it with care but not concern; other buildings had more potential to serve as both work space and living space. She found no sign of intrusion, not so much as a raccoon print. The protected bulletin board along one wall held a permanent map of the camp layout, and she paused long enough to compare it to the much smaller version she’d memorized from the brochure.

  There. The mess hall. The nurse’s station. Possibly the craft building. She’d check them first.

  Not far along the root-riddled back path between the empty mess hall and the nurse’s station, Kimmer spotted a fine, reflected shimmer of light near the ground. She snorted. He must be kidding. Following the monofilament line took her to a rock, and up to a tree branch held back by the line and a precarious support system of rocks and other branches. Anyone triggering the little trap would take a huge brushy whack to the face, but it wasn’t going to stop anyone. It probably wouldn’t even slow them down, unless they were unlucky enough to take a stick near the eye. Anyone in the league to come after Carolyne would do no more than shout in surprise and thrash their way through.

  Ah. Making just enough noise so Rio would know an intruder was on the way. Kimmer found herself smiling in appreciation. What had happened, she wondered, to drive him away from the Agency? Veiled references to vague events were all Hunter had supplied. Rio certainly hadn’t left it all behind him, not coming at Carolyne’s beck and call, traveling across several states to join in this little play. She wondered what he’d get out of it all. Money? Carolyne could afford to pay.

  She continued with caution, expecting more trip lines…and finding them. She had no doubt he’d trapped all the paths leading toward Carolyne’s bolt-hole, and even some of the more obvious gaps in the woods. No doubt he’d add to his little collection of literal bushwhacking setups as time allowed.

  She bet he missed the CIA’s fancy toys. With those he could have had an honest-to-goodness secure perimeter. She tried to imagine herself without Hunter’s Nightstorm scope—a lightweight nine ounces, third-generation imaging, small enough to slip into a pocket…and nearly two thousand dollars’ worth of technology. Or the tracker and eavesdropper bugs she had at her disposal, or even the little PDA on which she studied her surveillance photos. She used it for plenty of her own photos, as well, but Hunter had provided it for her assignments. Nice to have that kind of backing, that much support…extra nice to have it coming from people who were bluntly upfront at all times with what they wanted from her.

  Perhaps some of that came from their knowledge of her abilities; she’d spot it if they ever tried to play her false. But she never worried about Hunter…with the agency, it was never personal—not before this mission. And it was the personal one had to watch for…the people who used relationships as tools and weapons. No one will watch out for you but you. Not eloquent, those words of her mother’s, but profoundly true. She wondered how Carolyne had never learned that lesson.

  The path widened, beaten down by many feet over the summers, little girls dashing to and fro where they probably weren’t allowed to run at all but did it anyway at every opportunity. There, in a small clearing…the nurse’s station. There, under the small front stoop, standing sock-footed and relaxed, Rio Carlsen. He had his head angled back, his expression full of concentration. Listening. Then he reached back just inside the doorway and retrieved a pair of loosely laced hikers; he jammed them on his feet while leaning on the door frame and commenced to tighten the laces. “Iitekimasu,” he said. “But I won’t be long. This is why I’m here, Caro—to keep track of things that are out an
d about. You know, the macho lone-wolf soldier, holding the high gr—” His eyebrows went up at her interruption. “I am too macho. In a good way, I mean, not in a strutting, unbuttoned shirt with chest hair sticking out way.”

  But Carolyn wasn’t through with him, and he stuck his head back into the house, shod feet firmly planted on the weather-worn welcome mat outdoors. Their voices filtered out with tones of playful wit, and Kimmer realized two things—one, that this was her chance to leave. Rio was coming out to check his perimeter and his bushwhacking trip lines. The other was her sudden conviction that he’d used the word macho with great purpose, expressly to get a rise out of Carolyne. To give her the chance for banter and normality.

  She backed down the path, keeping an eye on Rio until the underbrush obscured him and she could turn to make her speedy way back to the mess hall and then to the main drive. She’d head back to town, acquire just enough gear to keep from freezing and starving, and return here to set up her own little camp in one of the abandoned platform tents. Still watching the watcher…

  Whom she’d done a decent job of observing back there at the nurse’s station after all, quickly getting a sense of what he was about. Maybe it meant her knack hadn’t failed at all.

  Except anyone could have done it, could have perceived what she’d seen, could have noted Rio’s affection for his cousin, could have seen the signs that he did this not for money at all.

  No, it didn’t mean her knack was back on the job with Rio. It just means you’re not blind.

  Kimmer drove out of Mill Springs and down closer to Pittsburgh until she found an outfitter where she’d go unrecognized—not to mention a store large enough to supply her every whim. She grabbed up trail food and then stopped at the local Giant Eagle to add a big bag of cherry Twizzlers and her mocha Frappuccino. By early afternoon she’d returned to the scout camp; she used the rest of the daylight hiking her supplies into the tent grouping farthest from the nurse’s station, satisfying herself that no one showed any interest in the camp during that time as she set up in one of the musty platform tents. She’d maintain her presence at the motel and keep in touch with the folks in town with whom she’d established contact, but for now the bulk of her time would be spent here. Rio might not know it, but Carolyne still had two layers of protection.

  To her relief, she discovered none of his little trip lines near her tent; she was easily able to establish a path through the woods to reach the Taurus, now parked half a mile down the road on a rutted track long abandoned to anyone but hunters. At first the absence of trip lines had surprised her…and then impressed her. As enticing as it was to trap this place so thoroughly that no one could intrude at any point without running into trouble, unless Rio heard the bushwhacking encounter, he’d have done nothing but warn an intruder to be on the lookout for other traps…such as the ones that were indeed close enough for someone at the nurse’s station to hear reliably.

  Before nightfall, Kimmer took her little brochure map and inspected the paths near the nurse’s station, marking the trip line locations and alert for Rio’s presence.

  She almost missed him.

  As alert as she was, as sizable as he was, she almost missed him.

  Like Kimmer, he’d dressed in browns and dark khakis, a fatigue sweater over cargo chino pants. If it weren’t for the wear on those clothes, he might as well have stepped out of an outdoor catalog—tall without bulk, lean without weediness. He moved with easy purpose, stopping in all the right places to hesitate behind cover created by the winding path, his tread landing no more heavily than Kimmer’s.

  Good. He’d had more than the usual complement of outdoor-survival and paramilitary training. She found herself caught in an unusual conundrum…hoping he was every bit as good as he looked, and yet not quite good enough to find her, crouched behind the broad, scaly trunk of a hickory with the wilting leaves of a bushy little slippery elm between her exposed head and his line of sight.

  As he came closer she studied his expression, hoping to fill in those details her intuition refused to supply. Was he as relaxed as he seemed, or did he hold hidden tension, indications of uneasiness that might mean when push came to shove, he’d fail?

  He hadn’t failed at the roadside convenience store. In fact, he’d contained the situation without going overboard; Kimmer had done more damage than he. He hadn’t failed at the picnic. He’d kept his cool and again avoided escalation. He could do more than take care of himself and Carolyne; he could think on his feet. Act, not react.

  And now his face showed his concern. The frequent glances over his shoulder weren’t to check his tail; they were aimed straight through the trees at the nurse’s station. To where his cousin worked. His tightly strung genius of a cousin, racing the clock for her own safety—and for the security of the country. Let it go, Kimmer thought at him. Out here in the woods, he didn’t need the distraction such worries presented.

  But he didn’t know anyone watched him. This was no front, no subtle ploy to keep up appearances. Kimmer had seen enough of keeping up appearances to spot them on sight, even with her intuition gone napping. No, the slight narrowing of those dark, angled eyes when he looked back, the mild furrow in his brow…those were for real. He cared about his cousin. He worried about her, and for more than just her safety. For her peace of mind.

  Intellectually, Kimmer saw it clearly enough. Emotionally, it didn’t track with her own experience; it made something crimp in her throat to see the contrast.

  So she quit looking. Instead she watched his easy stride as he passed her tree, only six feet away while she did a quick mental accounting of any possible scents she might be carrying. No perfume, no scented deodorant, no floral shampoo…And then she watched him walk away, her gaze drawn to his shoulders, down his straight back and lingering on—

  Well. Even a woman who knew better than to touch could still amuse herself by admiring.

  After a short nap and soup heated on the diminutive Coleman stove, Kimmer dressed for the colder night air, tugging on a neck warmer and then a fleece balaclava folded up as a hat, donning her new parka and getting ready to poke her nose out into the night. Using an aluminum fire shield, she’d heated her soup right there on the wood-plank floor of the platform tent, raising the temperature of the four-cot structure considerably. Bereft of its tent, the platform would look like nothing so much as a freestanding porch. Three steps up, a simple two-by-four railing all around, wood framing to hold the canvas. Standard Scout camp fare. From the outside of Kimmer’s tent, no one would ever be able to tell it was any more occupied than the others grouped around this tiny clearing.

  Of course, if Rio checked every single tent, Kimmer would be out of luck. But he had no reason for it; anyone coming in after Carolyne was racing time, and would not go out of the way to set up house here.

  She gave her pockets a last check, making sure everything had been transferred from earlier in the day: the little club, the Talon Mini, a handful of sharp things. The .38 rested in its SmartCarry holster, nestled snugly, low between her hipbones. The target-shooting wadcutter load wouldn’t penetrate far, but it’d make an instant wreck of whatever flesh it traversed on the way. A real attention-getter—and all the distraction she’d need to handle things. Or to run away…whichever best suited the moment.

  She didn’t think she’d be doing any running tonight. Tonight she flicked on her red-beamed flashlight, slipped out between the tent flaps, and fastened the ties back as they’d been. Tonight she headed for the nurse’s station, and a long vigil there. Watching on Carolyne’s behalf, of course, but also watching Carolyne herself as much as possible, getting a sense of how things stood with her work and whether this further retreat had calmed her nerves any. It was also her first chance to get up close to the little nurse’s station, checking the doors and windows and layout details. She might even run into Rio’s rental car, which she suspected was well hidden but nearby.

  Bypassing several of the trip lines, Kimmer found the station
by its light alone. Those thin curtains weren’t meant for blackout conditions or living quarters. At the front door a slight overhang covered the square concrete platform that acted as a step to the door, interrupting the black gap of a crawl space beneath the raised building.

  On approach Kimmer readily saw both Carolyne and Rio inside, occupying the front area of the building. She pulled the balaclava over her face and crept in close, each step a slow eternity of quiet just as she’d learned over a decade ago. Slinking out of the house and out to the barn, out to the pond, out to the woods—out to anywhere that wasn’t full of shouting and the sounds of fists on flesh.

  She took a breath, squelching memories. Those skills served her well enough now, didn’t they?

  Well enough to bring her up to the nurse’s station, to peer inside and find Carolyne on the other side of the small room at an ancient metal desk, her back to the window and her laptop open. She tapped her pen against a yellow pad, staring off into space. As Kimmer watched, the laptop screen saver kicked in; Carolyne flicked the touch pad with a finger to bring up the program window again, indecipherable text against a white background.

  Not exactly what Kimmer would call progress.

  The rest of the room was pretty much as she expected—the entrance door opposite Carolyne’s desk, two bare cots lined against a wall, a file cabinet and the less expected luxury of a recliner in the front corner, complete with reading lamp. The painted wood floor had an old oval braided rug in the center, theme of brown, and the insufficient curtains were a matching taupe. The walls held a few empty hangers near the desk—the right spot for nursing certificates—and one hugely enlarged photo of the camp that had been taken either from a terribly low-flying plane or else the raised service bucket for a power-line repair truck.