Marshmallow S'More Murder (Merry Wrath Mysteries Book 3) (12 page)

I decided to cut the mom some slack. Sure, she was grumpy, and we had to tell her what to do, but I didn't need one more thing on my plate. Between Kelly's baby refusing to come out, a possible problem with my parents' marriage, and Riley's kidnapping, I didn't need to worry about anything else. I made up my mind in the future to try to get to know her better if I could. With Kelly on maternity leave when we got back, it would be nice to have another adult to wrangle the troop.

We spent the rest of the day around the Washington Monument. Unlike the other memorials, this one had a line to get in, and it already wrapped around the base of the monolith twice. Which meant entertaining the girls until we could get inside—no easy feat for anyone.

Fortunately, I had a few tricks up my sleeves. We played the alphabet I Spy game, shouting out things they could actually see that began with consecutive letters of the alphabet. We had to disqualify a few suggestions, you really couldn't see farts or x-rays (and I was pretty sure
quizballs
wasn't a real word), but I had to admit, they were creative.

None of the other tourists from the Jefferson or Lincoln memorials had joined us, and that made me breathe easier. Paranoia was a tough thing for spies to control. I personally have been shot at by a sweet-looking little old lady in Peru, followed several times—including by a child on horseback in Mongolia—and compromised by a devious pigeon in Madrid. Watching for the unpredictable wasn't easy. Especially with the pigeon.

But with every assignment you'd start looking for danger everywhere, and retirement was no exception. I wondered if that would ever fade with time. It had to. I couldn't imagine that life following me around in retirement. In fact, I'd never heard of that happening in the Agency before. Was I the first?

I was just about to lead the troop in a rousing game of Telephone, when Maria nudged me. I had one of the Kaitlins take over, and we stepped away from the group.

"I just got the autopsy information on Midori," Maria said quietly. "Ahmed knows a guy on the Tokyo police force."

"She was killed by blunt force," I said hopefully. "What we thought was right, right?"

She shook her head. "Not exactly. I mean, yes, someone hit her pretty hard, but that's not what killed her."

"That's impossible!" I said a little too loudly. "I mean"—people were staring at me—"we've had those reservations at that restaurant for months!" Folks looked away, probably hoping it was their spot for dinner that had bumped us.

I leaned in closer to Maria. "So what do they think happened?"

"The coroner thinks she was already dead when she was struck on the back of the head. What really killed her was a thin blade inserted into her brain through her ear."

I thought about that. It was a nasty way to go. And difficult. The only reason to attempt it was to hide how the victim was murdered. And whoever killed her clearly wanted to do that.

"Do they have any idea how long it was between the stabbing and the bludgeoning?"

Maria shook her head. "Hours, maybe? Her body was in pretty bad shape."

That was on me. Riley and I had dumped the body, and it took many months before she was discovered. We'd inadvertently screwed up the evidence we hadn't known we'd need a year later. Didn't that just figure?

"So someone killed her then beat her to hide the real murder. Why would anyone do that?"

"I don't know." Maria shrugged. "Maybe the murderer wanted it to look more brutal?"

"Then why not just do that in the first place? What's the point of the cover-up?" I asked.

Maria frowned. Even frowning, she was gorgeous. I wasn't. When I frowned I just looked constipated.

"Maybe her death was accidental?" she suggested.

"How do you accidentally fall ear-first onto a long, thin blade?" I shook my head. "It had to be something else."

"What if they wanted it to look like she'd been mugged?"

"Not in my small town. I don't think anyone has ever been mugged in Who's There, Iowa. That's the reason the murders I've been involved with were so sensational."

"Mrs. Wrath!" Inez shouted. "It's our turn to go inside!"

Maria and I hurried over to the group. They were getting instructions for their ride to the top of the obelisk.

"I don't want to go." Hannah backed up. "I'm scared of heights."

Maria nodded. "Evelyn and I will take them up. You stay here with her."

I led Hannah over to a spot in the grass, and we sat down, watching the other girls go. I had a rule in my troop: no one makes anyone else do something she doesn't want to do. I didn't see the point in pushing a terrified kid off the zip line. There were other parts of Scouting they could get excited about.

I chose my field knowing full well all the risks I was taking when I signed on to be a spy. Hannah knew that this would be too much for her.

"You're sure?" I asked.

She nodded, her brown ponytail bobbing. "Heights are scary."

"They can be," I agreed. "How do you like the trip so far?"

This gave me a chance to have a little one-on-one. I couldn't remember being alone with just one girl before. Usually I was surrounded by a herd all screaming at once.

Hannah grinned. "I love it! It's so cool! I want to live here someday!"

I laughed at her enthusiasm. "What did you like best out of all we've done so far?"

The child looked thoughtful for a moment. "Spending time with you! We don't get to do that too much."

My heart sank. I'd barely spent any time with the girls since I got that call from Riley. I'd spent all my time pawning them off on other people. But Hannah didn't think that. I wondered why. I gave her a huge hug.

"And the zoo. I really liked the zoo. Especially Mr. Fancy Pants—and how he follows us everywhere." She nodded for emphasis.

"He's not exactly following us," I lied. "It's just coincidence that he's here."

"Oh." Hanna frowned. "Then why have we seen him so much today?"

I shrugged. "I don't know. But we're in DC, and he's in DC, so it makes sense we might see him." There was no way I was going to tell the girls that this deranged bird had a thing for Girl Scout Cookies. They'd probably leave a trail for him leading back to our hotel.

"Do you really think he isn't following us?" she asked.

"I really think he isn't following us," I lied again. This was getting to be a habit with me.

"Then why is he standing right behind you?" Hanna asked, pointing over my right shoulder.

I slowly turned around and found myself nose to beak with the king vulture. I thought he'd heard me. And I didn't think he liked what I'd said.

"Um, Hannah?" I said quietly as the large bird cocked his head. "You should probably go to the entrance of the monument."

"But…"

"Right now. Please," I said as calmly as possible.

"I can't pet him?" she asked. Hannah was closer to me now. I could feel her breath on the back of my neck.

"No, you can't. Now please do as I say." I wanted to get her away from this raptor in case he attacked.

"What if we bought him a hat and T-shirt—like a disguise? He could hang out with us all day!"

While this sounded like a great idea (and I was pretty sure the bird would go along with it), the chance that he'd murder us in our sleep for shortbread cookies was a bit off-putting. I shook my head and pointed to the monument.

"Fine. We never get to do anything fun!" the girl grumbled as she stomped away from me. There went my meaningful one-on-one. Stupid bird.

Mr. Fancy Pants started to walk around me. He was actually going to make a run for the kid.

I stuck my arm out to cut him off, and he opened his wings in preparation for taking off. I had no choice as I tackled the vulture and wrestled him to the ground. The giant bird struggled against me, protesting loudly with furious squawking. But I held firm. This only inflamed him more, and he began attacking me with his beak. Somehow, I got my arm up and around his neck as I rolled over and pinned him to the ground.

A sea of cell phones surrounded me, all taking video of my fight with the bird. I heard someone calling 9-1-1 in the distance. Great, now the zoo could take him back, and he'd leave my troop alone.

My arms ached as I tried to hold the vulture firmly enough to take the fight out of him but lightly enough so as not to crush him. If I lessened my grip a fraction of an inch, he would strain against me to break free. I prayed that animal control would come quickly.

Mr. Fancy Pants stopped struggling, and I breathed a small sigh of relief (and hoped I hadn't killed him). I could hear cameras going off and looked to the side to see that group of tourists off to my left, snapping away. That wasn't necessarily a good thing, but I couldn't let the bird go. He was too valuable for one thing and one more problem I didn't need for the other. I tried to ignore the attention and focus on the animal that was facedown beneath me.

His head turned to the side, even with my arm on the back of his neck. One googly eye gave me the once over as if he were sizing me up for an epic escape. That wasn't going to happen.

Where were those damned zookeepers? I was worn out trying to hold the bird down. If they didn't show up soon, maybe someone in the crowd that surrounded me had something I could tie him up with—like a camera strap or something. I doubted anyone brought a collapsible cage. I could never be that lucky.

"Let us through, folks!" A man's voice rang out behind me, and I relaxed a little.

Two strong arms roughly lifted me off the bird as a net dropped over Mr. Fancy Pants.

"Thanks!" I said as I landed on my feet. "I was really getting worried…" My voice trailed off as I felt handcuffs being clamped onto my wrists.

"Hey!" I protested. "Hey, I was just helping you!"

A masculine voice spoke. "You are under arrest for the kidnapping of Smithsonian property and for molesting an endangered species."

"What?" Molesting? I turned around to face the man. He was a Fed. I wasn't fond of the FBI. "You've got it all wrong!"

My troop started filing out onto the grass around me, their tour of the monument obviously over. Maria rushed over to me. Evelyn smirked. The girls, seeing Fancy Pants straining against the net, began to cry. Loudly.

"What's happening here?" Maria flashed her badge at the Fed, who scrutinized it before looking a bit confused.

"We are arresting this woman as a domestic terrorist," he said simply, still wondering why a CIA agent was involved.

"She's a Girl Scout troop leader!" Maria said. "That vulture has been stalking us! She was probably trying to catch him for you!"

"Well, yes…that…" I said. "And he was going after one of my girls. This bird has a record for chasing groups of little girls."

The Fed looked at me curiously. He seemed to be weighing his options and probably thought I was crazy to boot. And the crowd around us was growing. It was getting out of hand.

"Sorry, ma'am. I've got to take you in to straighten this all out."

"But you don't know the whole story!" I protested as he gripped my arm and propelled me through the crowd that now parted to make way.

"We can sort it out downtown," he said, not looking at me.

"Look…Agent…" I stammered.

"Grayson," he replied.

"Okay, Agent Grayson," I continued as we kept walking. "This really is a mistake. I was trying to protect a child from a giant raptor!"

Grayson said nothing as we approached a black Lincoln Town Car. I rolled my eyes. It was always a black Town Car. He opened the door and carefully pushed me into the backseat. The door slammed shut and locked before he got in and started the engine.

I'd been bound and locked in a car before. I knew how to get out of this situation, but I didn't move a muscle. I wasn't going to have resisting arrest thrown at me too. It would be best to just do what the man said for now. Hopefully, Maria was on the case and taking care of things.

We arrived at FBI headquarters, and for the first time, it hit me that this wasn't an ordinary cop. What did the FBI have to do with any of this? Wait… He'd called me a terrorist. Was that what I'd be charged with? That was overkill.

Agent Grayson led me to a cell, unfastened my handcuffs, and locked the door behind him. As I rubbed my bruised wrists, I realized something. After all my years of espionage, I finally got arrested. And it wasn't in a Turkish prison for spying…it was in DC for kidnapping a vulture. I had to admit—I never saw that coming. Not in a million years.

I was there for hours. No one came to read me my rights or process me. With my luck, I was heading to Guantanamo. Normally in this situation, Riley would have been here to get me out. But Riley was missing.

I was in no hurry to have my prints taken and run through the system. When I left the field, I changed my name and appearance. But fingerprints were different. I couldn't change them. Well, I could have, but it would've been more painful than it was worth. My cover would have been blown, and all the anonymity I'd worked for would be lost.

I was alone here. It seemed as though hours had gone by, and no one even checked on me. The least they could do was bring me a bottle of water and maybe a little food. Okay, fine. I'd use this time to think about something else.

My mind wandered to the dreams I'd been having. I hadn't thought about my time in Japan for a while. In fact, I'd forgotten all about it. While that wasn't necessarily a great trait in a spy, it had seemed necessary. Not to make room for more valuable information but to avoid thinking of the relationship Riley and I had then.

I felt a twinge in my stomach that could either have been emotional pain or hunger. I'd never really dealt with that mess. Maybe that was why Riley flirted with me, even to this day. He thought he had a chance. That was stupid. I had Rex now. Riley probably couldn't have imagined failure where women were concerned.

There were no clocks anywhere. No windows to tell me how much time had passed. I had no idea how long I'd been there. I lay down on the wooden bench against the wall and stared at the ceiling. The bench was brutally uncomfortable, but I'd had worse. One time in Tibet I had to sleep on a rock. A rough rock that was ice cold. My pillow had been…you guessed it…a rock. It took weeks to get the kinks out of my back.

Where was everyone? Surely Maria could've brought in the CIA's big guns to get me released. Or my dad could have used his influence to do something. Or that stupid zoo could just have told the Feds the whole story. They knew I was telling the truth, and they knew that Mr. Fancy Pants had stalked groups of girl before.

And yet, here I remained, having to pass the time productively. It was all I could do. Save my energy for any fights ahead. Closing my eyes, I tried to meditate and succeeded only in falling asleep.

I arrived at the appointed place a little early. Skirting the park to surveil the area, I spotted a person in a fedora, dark sunglasses, and a trench coat sitting on a bench near where I was told to be.

The sky was gray and drizzly. Clearly, this was my contact because who else would wear sunglasses on such a dreary day? And how stupid to dress in a way that screamed espionage? I, myself, was in a stocking cap and black wool coat. After satisfying myself there was no one else around, I joined the contact on the bench.

"Thank you for coming," a voice with a slight German accent said.

"Oh, my God! You're that bimbo from the German Embassy!" I said. "What the hell do you want with me?" My first thought was that she was trying to drive me away from Riley, and if that was the case, she could have him.

The woman took off her sunglasses and glared at me. I was right. Bimbo.

"My name is Chlotilde," she snarled. "And I'm Interpol. I'm just undercover at the embassy."

I stood up to leave. "Look, if this is about Riley…you can have him!"

She looked startled—like I'd just told her aliens had landed. "Is that what you think?" She scoffed. "You spies always think you know everything. This has nothing to do with Riley."

I sat back down and waited for her to say more. I wasn't going to speak until I knew what was going on. Spies often got into trouble by talking too much. It was human nature to babble on to fill uncomfortable gaps in conversation, and many a mission has been lost because of it.

Chlotilde waved me off. "Like I said, this has nothing to do with him, Finn Czrgy."

Okay. Didn't expect that. "Well, by sleeping with my boyfriend, you certainly achieved that goal."

She didn't even have the grace to look chastened. In fact, she got that weird, confused look again. "Look, I need some information…"

"Forget it. You're not going to turn me into one of your stooges. Go find someone else," I said as I got to my feet again. I was the one who recruited. I wasn't going to be recruited as a double agent and certainly not for those rubes at Interpol.

"Sit down!" the German hissed. "This is more important than either of us! There's a British mole trying to pass off information to the Americans."

I sat. Not because she told me to but because I was kind of curious as to what she had to say.

"I'll give you three minutes," I said. "Not one second more."

A twig snapped behind us, and we both looked over our shoulders. Nothing was there, but I knew better. Someone was watching us.

Chlotilde began to sweat. "Here." She shoved a packet of papers into my hands, along with a burner phone. "Look this over. I'll be in touch." And with that, she stood and strode off quickly.

I carefully stuffed the packet into my coat and began to walk in the other direction.

"Merry?" A man's voice shook me out of the dream. Riley had obviously come to get me out of here.

"Ma'am?" the voice said again, and I looked up. It was Agent Grayson, not Riley. Riley was still missing.

"Ms. Wrath," Grayson said as he inserted a key into the cell. "You are free to go. Your handler explained everything. I apologize for arresting you. I didn't realize you were with the CIA."

I sat up, and with as much dignity as a woman with messy hair and drool on her chin could have, rose to my feet and walked out of the cell.

"If you'll follow me this way, I'll take you to your handler and release you."

I said nothing, just stared at Grayson as he spoke. Now that he was my new BFF, I saw that he was a very attractive man. Thick, brown hair topped smiling, brown eyes. He was built like an athlete. If I didn't have Rex, well, maybe I'd have another option.

Holy crap! What was I thinking? I shook my head to clear it.

Maria stood waiting for me in the lobby. She smiled as I walked up to her and led me out the door. It was night. How long had I been in there?

We climbed into the van, which was filled with twelve little girls who stared at me without speaking. Evelyn frowned. Why was everyone so quiet?

"Okay, ladies," Maria said as she started the van. "Who wants dinner?"

Hands shot up, but the girls still didn't speak. What had Maria done to them? And did she have more of it? We were all silent as she drove to a historic tavern in Georgetown called the Wig and Pen. The maître d' showed us upstairs to a private room with several tables of four.

The filter came off, and the girls squealed, anxious to have tables to themselves. Maria murmured to Evelyn, who nodded, albeit with the usual frown fixed on her face. If she weren't careful, she was going to have frown lines. I watched as Mrs. Trout pulled a chair up to the Kaitlins' table. Which girl was she the mother of? Never mind—I'd find out when we got home.

Food came in family-style—Yankee pot roast, potatoes, baskets of bread, and corn on the cob. The girls dug in, and that was when I finally said something to Maria.

"Thanks for getting me out of there," I said quietly. I left out
what took you so long
. That didn't seem appropriate.