Against the Rules (11 page)

No, if the shrink had been worth half the money the government paid him, he would have known that Teague identified with the planes’ engines in a constant struggle with an unknown force. Except the planes always beat gravity and broke free. Teague, on the other hand, was hunted at every turn by an enemy that struck without warning. And never the real enemy—only a far-reaching tentacle that, once removed, just grew back more vicious and tenacious than before.

Damn her. He couldn’t even find peace here. His last remaining refuge gone. Giving in to the inevitable, he flipped open his cell phone and dialed the damn number. “Agent Seaver, it’s Teague four-six-two. I need an immediate transfer outta here.”

* * * *

Chantel couldn’t see for the tears pouring from her eyes. Moving through the house on autopilot, she ran to the bathroom then cried herself out, all the while calling herself every term for fool she could think of. It didn’t help. She could still feel him, smell him. Still wanted his arms wrapped around her.

How pathetic was that? The guy scared the crap out of her, obviously didn’t have any true feelings for her and yet she still wanted him.

Quickly, before the tears could start again, she undressed and got into the shower. Her fingers were prunes and her skin red and blotched by the time she surrendered all hope of scrubbing Reese from her memory. He was deeply entrenched, and a treacherous part of her wanted it that way. When she reached for the towel, her brain finally decided to turn back on.

The towel was wet. Why was the towel wet when she hadn’t been home for days? Panic struck hard. Her knees quivered and threatened to give out. She dropped the towel as if it had burned her and reached for her robe on the back of the door. As soon as she pulled it off the hook, she knew something was wrong. Staring at it, she sank down onto the toilet seat. Someone had cut out the chest section. Had she put it on, her breasts would have been left exposed. Chantel threw it to the floor and covered her face with her hands trying to force air into her burning lungs and calm her pounding heart.

She had to listen for a sound, something to tell her whether she was alone or not, but all she could hear was the frantic beating of her heart and the silent screams inside her head. With a Herculean effort, she pulled herself together. She was not a fainting violet. She could take care of herself.

As quietly as she could, she eased the door open, expecting everything from Jason with his machete to Norman Bates with a shovel, but only silence greeted her. Logically, she knew that if anyone were in her home he would have come after her already, but logic didn’t hold up against fear.

She had to make it to her closet—she had a virtual arsenal in there. A few years back a motorcycle gang had been terrorizing the community. Her father had been beside himself with worry. He wouldn’t rest until she could defend herself against an invading army. Or so she had joked at the time. Right now, she was just grateful. Why hadn’t she listened to him and put a cell phone and weapon in every room? He’d certainly told her enough times.

Steeling herself for anything, she quickly popped her head around the corner. Nothing moved at her so she decided to risk it. Slinking along the wall, she tried to stay out of view from the rest of the house until the bed came into focus. Chantel stopped moving. Or even breathing. She drew her hand defensively to her throat as a strangled sound escaped.

Her doll. Her precious doll, kept forever in a glass case to protect it from dust and sun fading, lay mutilated and tied to her bed.
Tied to the bed. Oh God!
This couldn’t be Reese. Could it? He’d just been kidding. Hadn’t he?

When he’d left to buy condoms, and she’d cringed at the thought of her wanton behavior, had he come over here? Her keys had been in her purse. He could have taken them and returned them without her knowing it. He had been gone a lot longer than she’d expected.

Chantel surveyed her room. She couldn’t believe it. Her underwear drawer was ajar. Glass from the shattered case littered the hardwood floor. Strips of satin, undoubtedly from her intimates, were strewn amongst the glass shards. How could she have missed this when she first came in? Scared that it might have happened while she was in the shower, she ran to the walk-in closet, grabbing the phone off the nightstand as she passed by, and closed the door.

Taking no chances, she pulled every weapon she owned from their various hidey holes and loaded them. Every knife pulled from its sheath and placed within easy reach. Then she felt safe enough to dress and pick up the phone. But who to call? Her heart, the betraying organ that it was, wanted her to call Reese.

A slightly hysterical laugh burst from her chest as she realized that she didn’t even know his number. Her brain told her to call her father. He always came to her rescue, no matter the disaster, but if she did, she would have to tell him about Reese and she didn’t think she could do that. Knowing she was only postponing Armageddon, she called nine-one-one.

* * * *

“Budget cuts?” A bean counting, muddle-headed moron was telling him
no
due to budget cuts? They were a black budget agency. Their budget went up, not down. Back in 2000, when the agency had been formed as a response to Congress signing the Victims of Trafficking and Violence Protection Act into law, they’d only recruited the best, most seasoned officers who knew their ass from a hole in the ground. Initially their manifesto had been fairly narrow and focused on human trafficking. After 9/11, the scope had shifted to incorporate anything coming over the border illegally. The downside, though, was that as the agency grew, so did the red tape. Now, it seemed as bogged down in bullshit as the rest of the government bureaucracies.

“Unless you want to be more specific concerning the immediate danger, your transfer will have to go through committee,” Agent Seaver told him again.

“Are you aware of the ‘specific’ details ‘concerning’ the last threat made against me? The ‘threat’ that ended in two men dead? Or how about the one before that where my house was blown to kingdom come?”

“Sir, I can understand your fears. However, the information you gave me is a bit vague. We would need specific details before we could take any action.”

Blah, blah, blah was all Teague heard. Maybe the agent could sense that Teague was full of shit. In his gut—not his heart, he refused to acknowledge such an organ—he knew that Channy was innocent. He just wanted to keep her that way. If he stayed near her, he would have her again and again. And when Mr. G. found him, he’d hit him through Channy.

With a healthy dose of disdain in his voice, he tried again. “So, you’re telling me an armed, redheaded woman searching my home isn’t specific enough? Does she need to actually shoot me before you’ll take action?” He always tried to keep his tales as close to the truth as possible. It made them sound more believable and they were easier to remember.

“Actually, even if she shot you, we wouldn’t necessarily do anything. With our current budget constraints, we would need a clear link between her and the cartel.” Seaver chuckled. “She sounds feisty, sir. In my experience, all redheads are. Maybe you should try a brunette or a blonde? I’ll tell ya what. You give me her name and address and I’ll check her out myself.”

Teague didn’t bother to reply. Nothing fit for human ears would have come out of his mouth anyway. Agent Seaver sounded more like a fifteen-year-old pubescent than an experienced law enforcement officer—so much for the NBIA cherry-picking the best agents. And Teague refused to acknowledge the surge of jealousy that spiked his brain when the pinhead had offered to ‘check her out’.

Just talking to the twit set off warning signals. It always had. Seaver dressed like a candy-ass. His pinky extended, tea drinking, fifteen hundred dollar suit-wearing tendencies always sent up red flags. Had he told him that Channy had red hair? He didn’t remember. Maybe Seaver was the leak. The last he’d heard, the price for Teague was set at ten million. That would certainly buy a lot of tea and fancy suits.

* * * *

Chantel sat rocking on the closet floor until the nine-one-one operator told her the police had arrived at her house. The police, through the operator, warned her to stay where she was until they had searched the premises. She heard the police give the all clear just a moment before the operator told her it was safe.

Slowly, she opened the closet door and stepped out. She knew they would freak out when they saw that she was armed so she wasn’t too shaken when the officers all pointed their weapons at her, yelling “Drop it” in unison.

“I’ll holster it, but I’m not dropping it, gentlemen,” she assured them with as much grace as she could manage. She noticed that no one moved until she had shoved it into the shoulder holster and clipped the thumb snap into place.

“Ma’am, you’re perfectly safe. Please remove the weapon and place it on the floor.” The officer in charge spoke calmly, expecting his order to be followed.

Chantel’s eyes widened, matching her rising temper. “Did you look at my home, officer? Clearly I am not perfectly safe. In my purse, you’ll find a concealed weapons permit authorizing me to carry a loaded firearm. Now get out of my way. I need out of here.”

Another officer came into the room and whispered a message to the man in charge. Immediately, he lowered his weapon and helped Chantel wade through the debris on the floor. The other officers followed his lead and holstered their weapons as well.

“Ms. Donley, we will need to ask you a few questions,” he spoke softly once she was seated on the couch.

At first, he was the perfect gentleman, very sympathetic, but as she evaded their pointed questions about her whereabouts over the weekend, the kid gloves came off. She refused to tell him. Once her father found out, and he would, Reese would have his entire life sifted through. It wasn’t fair to him. Deep in her heart, she knew he wasn’t a part of this.

“Let’s recap. You spent the weekend with a ‘friend’. A friend you refuse to name,” the officer began.

“That’s right.”

“You were upset. By what, you again refuse to say. But you were so upset you don’t remember if your door was locked or if the security system was armed.”

“That’s right. I assume they were, but honestly, I don’t remember. The company could probably tell you if the system had been armed or not over the weekend. I believe the computer keeps track.”

“So, you walked in, dropped your purse on the couch and walked straight into your bedroom. You
didn’t notice
your room in disarray and headed straight into the bathroom. Once there, you again
didn’t notice
the shredded robe or wet towel until after you’d showered.”

“That’s right. And, officer…whatever your name is, your condescending attitude is insulting.”

“I’m having some trouble with this. You seem like a very observant person. How could all this”—he waved his hand to encompass her trashed house—“go unnoticed?”

“I was upset.”

He nodded. “I see. It must have been something very traumatic to upset you to that extent. Honestly, I was a bit shaken by the disturbing condition of your things and yet you have managed to sit here with me without any hysterics. No sobbing, no fainting.” He gave her a once-over. “In fact you seemed unfazed facing four seasoned police officers with their service weapons pointed directly at your pretty little face. I am certainly curious what could shake you up enough to miss all this.”

Policemen didn’t intimidate her. Weapons certainly didn’t. She was practically born with a gun in her hand. If he kept ticking her off, she was going to rip his patronizing eyes out with her bare hands.

“Jeff, you might want to see this,” one of the officers shouted from her bedroom.

‘Jeff’, aka big stupid buffoon, turned to another officer and told him to ‘watch her’.

She was resting her head against her knees when the first salvo of Armageddon burst through the door.

* * * *

Foster had spent the rest of the evening contemplating a bullet in his head. It might just solve his immediate problems. Mr. G. would have no reason to go after his family and God would surely have more mercy on his soul than Sammy, but he couldn’t do it.

A sliver of hope sprang to life. When he’d tried to access information from the database, Chief Donley had been the one to call, questioning him. Donley’s transfer to the west coast had come through right after the last botched attempt to grab four-six-two. Did that mean that four-six-two had relocated within Donley’s team? It made sense. Why else would Donley have been the one to call? It might just buy him some time.

Using a throwaway cell phone, he sent Sammy a text.

Target relocated near Phx, AZ

Within moments he received a text back.

Exact coordinates?

Damn
. Here’s where it got dicey.

Exact location unknown. More time needed.

Almost immediately Foster received a reply.

Friday.

That wasn’t enough time. Shit, he wasn’t even sure it was Phoenix. It could be El Paso or San Diego for all he knew, but he seemed to recall that Donley had been heading west to wait out retirement. Arizona just stood out in his mind. Phoenix seemed logical.

His only hope was to fly out there and do some reconnaissance. It was an impossible task, but he had to try. As he was throwing clothes into a duffel bag, his agency issued cellphone rang. He didn’t recognize the number, but that didn’t mean anything. “Foster,” he answered out of habit.

“Agent Foster, this is Teague four-six-two.”

Chapter Seven

Round and round the cobbler’s bench

The monkey chased the weasel.

The monkey thought ‘twas all in fun.

Pop! goes the weasel.

He smiled, humming the tune as he watched the video feed of Chantel and the police. The look on her face when she realized he’d been in her home was enough to send him squirting. He printed a hard copy and put it in prominent view of the screen.