Snake Skin (4 page)

Setting up the boutique online child
modeling agency as part of Operation Honeypot had been Fletcher's
idea. So far they'd nabbed several US nationals trafficking for sex
with minors as well as drawing Canadians across the border—hence
the need for Immigration and Customs Enforcement on the
taskforce.

As a lowly GS06 civilian tech, not even a
full-fledged ICE agent, Fletcher was flushed with pride at the
operation's success. Lucy already had to turn down his request to
play a more active field role when their next group of sex tourists
arrived tomorrow. Worse than telling a kid he wasn't allowed to go
trick-or-treating.

He trailed after her as Lucy walked to his
SUV, now double parked ten feet away from the van where "Katie"
slept. She opened the rear of the Blazer and sat down on the
running board, her legs wobbly, adrenalin finally abandoning
her.

With trembling fingers she retrieved her
wedding ring. She brushed it against her lips. Her pulse finally
calmed as she slid it back where it belonged. She reached for her
bag, grabbed a water bottle and took a deep gulp, spilling water
down her shirt and not caring.

Then she emptied the muck from her boots and
checked her arms and legs again for bite marks. She'd seen guys
shot and not know it because of the masking effects of adrenalin.
Nothing. She wiggled her bare toes in the sun, soaking up the
heat.

The thought of trying to explain a
rattlesnake bite to her husband, Nick, made her wince. Although it
might finally get her back on Megan's "cool" list—a welcome change
from the cold shoulder her twelve-year-old had been giving her
lately.

"I can't wait to get my hands on their
computer. See what else they've been up to." Fletcher prattled as
he packed up his surveillance equipment. "Oh, by the way, your cell
phone has been going nuts."

He handed her the cell and she glanced at
the missed calls. All from Megan. Along with texts asking if they
were going to be late for the doctor's appointment.

Damn it, she hated leaving, but really all
that needed done here was paperwork and documentation. Nothing Lucy
needed to stay for. In fact, if she wasn't the only woman on her
squad rated for UC work, she wouldn't be here on a Saturday at
all—she'd be home and looking forward to getting back to work on
Monday to shuffle paperwork and review reports.

Still hadn't gotten used to that part of
being promoted. She wasn't sure she ever would—she loved being in
the field. Used to be she always told fellow agents that
supervisory special agents never made arrests, just supervised and
took all the credit. Now that she held the rank and had her own
team, she was trying to find a way to lead from the front lines and
still get all the administrative work done.

As always, she wanted it all. Usually she
figured out a way to get it.

Fletcher re-appeared, a key ring in his
hand. "The van needs to go back. Why don't you take it?"

Still, she hesitated. Men and women carrying
guns and displaying a variety of law enforcement insignia bustled
around the parking lot in an efficiently choreographed mob. The
FBI's Sexual Assault Felony Enforcement squad was
multi-jurisdictional: ICE agents mingled with her own FBI team,
there were several Staties as well. Back at the office, they shared
space with the High Tech Computer Crime Taskforce, Operation
Predator, the Innocent Images Initiative, and even had a few postal
inspectors and IRS agents working with them.

To some it might seem like a motley crew,
seasoned street operators working side by side with computer geeks
like Fletcher. But it was her crew and she hated to leave them with
the job unfinished.

Of course, with this job, there was never
any finishing. Something Nick was constantly reminding her of. But
she'd only been here three months, charged with setting up and
running the FBI's newest SAFE unit, and she hadn't yet figured out
where to draw the line.

Nick had. That was for sure. After a month
of not seeing her unless she woke him as she climbed into bed at
night, he'd insisted that she establish some kind of routine so
that she could spend time with him and Megan.

Which sounded great…unless you were the
parent who was constantly delinquent.

She glanced at the state trooper vehicle
where the twins beamed as they tried on Smokey Bear hats eighteen
sizes too big for them. The breeze carried their burble of
laughter. She smiled.

"Let the Staties take credit on this one,"
she told Fletcher. "I'll make it up to Walden, clear it with
Greally."

Fletcher's frown let her know he didn't
appreciate her generosity. Or more likely, he didn't think his boss
would.

Tough. This morning she was enjoying being
one of the good guys. Her phone rang. She glanced at the caller ID.
Megan. Sigh. Even if her pre-teen didn't always see her that
way.

"Call me if you need me," she told Fletcher,
heading towards the van with the mannequin in the back seat. She
flipped her phone open. "Hey sweetie, I hear you're not feeling
well."

"If you're too busy, I can call Dad. Again,"
Megan said. Somehow the twelve-year-old's tone managed to carry
more disapproval than a Taliban watching a striptease.

"No, it's fine. I'll be there in twenty
minutes." Thank god the operation was on the right side of the Fort
Pitt tunnel. And there'd be no traffic on a Saturday morning.

"The doctor said he has to leave for the
hospital by 9:30."

"I know, Megan. I'll get you there. I
promise." Silence. "Did you take some ibuprofen? That will help you
feel better."

"Yeah, Dad told me to take some. And to
drink lots of fluids."

"Good." Lucy started the van and pulled away
from her team, resisting the urge to go back and remind them that
they had another meet set for tomorrow. This one was in a motel, so
no room for snakes. At least she hoped not. She shuddered, told
herself it was the AC. "I'll be there soon."

"When we lived in Virginia, I never got
sick."

Lucy tightened her grip on the wheel. Bad
enough she had the powers-that-be in the Bureau judging her every
move, she really didn't need it coming from her twelve-year-old
daughter. "Think of it as building up your immune system."

Megan grunted in reply.

"Well, if you're really sick, I can call
your gram to come watch you." One of the few perks of moving to
Pittsburgh was that Lucy's mother was only forty minutes away in
Latrobe.

Megan used to love spending time with her
gram. But not since adolescence had gotten a stranglehold on her.
Now family was soooo boring.

"Whatever," Megan said and hung up.

Lucy tossed the phone aside and hit the gas
pedal. Maybe the stress of moving and starting a new school, making
the soccer team was too much for Megan. One more thing to feel
guilty about. As if trying to juggle a career and her family
weren't enough already.

Way she figured it, every kid she rescued
here at work put another penny in the karma bank, saving up to
protect Megan. That was some consolation for time spent away from
her family. Not that she could ever explain that to Nick or
Megan.

She glanced in the rearview, caught the
mannequin's eye and winked. "Let's not tell her about the snakes,
okay, Katie Mae?"

Chapter 4

Saturday, 9:06 am

Lucy twirled her wedding band around her
ring finger, rubbing it clean of the smudge of Ruby's lipstick.
Megan swung her legs from her perch on the exam table, her gown
flapping open, revealing tanned legs and bruises she wore with
pride ever since making the soccer team.

There were so many things Lucy should be
doing: double-checking on the snake handlers' processing and
paperwork, prepping for tomorrow's op, reviewing the latest NCMEC
bulletins, cleaning her guns...

Megan rustled through a tattered copy of
National Geographic
, looking up over the top of the pages,
glaring at Lucy.

"You know you look like a slut," she finally
observed in a bored, world-weary tone. As if her mother always
dressed like a trailer-trash single-mom ready to sell her kid to
strangers. "And what's that smell?"

Lucy remained silent, staring at the
duckling wallpaper above Megan's head. Lately, since they'd—no,
she'd
—uprooted Megan and moved to Pittsburgh, everything
Lucy said only made things worse.

"You could wait outside," Megan continued.
"Really, it's fine. I go in alone for my checkups now, you
know."

Lucy wasn't sure she liked that idea either.
Hard to believe her baby was twelve, almost a teenager. The thought
was laced with strychnine. Lucy knew all too well what dangers
waited for Megan as she grew older. Hated that no matter how good
she and Nick were as parents, Megan would still eventually face
them alone.

"Don't forget soccer next week," Megan said,
adding one more thing to Lucy's to-do list. "You promised brownies.
And not those lame store-bought ones with the gooey icing."

"Only if the doctor says it's all right for
you to play."

"Mom..." With the single syllable Megan
assigned Lucy responsibility for the fall of civilization and the
fate of the future of all mankind. "I can't miss anything. I'm the
new kid, remember?"

"We've been here three months. Think maybe
it's time you let up on the guilt trip?"

Instead of appearing chastised, Megan merely
grinned as if she had plenty more tricks up her sleeve and was just
waiting to use them on her mom. Or more likely, her much more
gullible and malleable father.

Megan was a pro at getting what she
wanted—took after Lucy in that respect. Just as her features
reflected Lucy's Italian heritage more than Nick's Irish. Thick,
almost black hair, high cheekbones, dark eyes. The only thing Megan
inherited from Nick was her creamy complexion with its propensity
to freckle easily.

"I want to be certain the doctor has all the
facts," Lucy said. She used her work voice, although she knew Megan
saw right through her mask of control. "We need to get to the
bottom of this."

Megan shot her a look that said, "whatever",
but stopped short of actually rolling her eyes. "You always assume
the worst."

When it came to imagining "the worst," Megan
did not have a clue. Lucy fully intended to keep things that way
for as long as possible.

"And you worry too much," Megan continued
her analysis of everything wrong with her mother. "That's because
of what you see at work. It's just strep throat. I already feel
better after the Advil. But you think everyone's always in
danger."

That's because everyone
was
always in
danger. In Lucy's world, at least. But she forced a smile and said,
"Glad to hear it. And no, you're not getting a FaceBook page."

Megan's eyes widened at her mother's
omniscience. Then her lips curled into a wheedling smile. "You
could use it too, you know—like a stake-out or something."

Despite the stuffy heat of the exam room,
Lucy shivered at the thought of inviting the creeps she hunted into
her home. Letting them anywhere near Nick or Megan. "That's not
funny. Keep this up and you won't be going on-line again until
you're old enough to vote."

The door swung open, interrupting Megan's
protest. The doctor breezed in, wearing jeans and a polo shirt. He
did a double-take at Lucy's worse-for-wear appearance. "Hi, sorry
to keep you waiting. This beeper won't shut up. Now, what brings
you guys here on such a beautiful Saturday morning?"

Megan opened her mouth, but Lucy jumped in
before she could say anything, earning her another glare. This time
complete with eye-roll. "Megan saw Dr. Collins two weeks ago and he
said she had strep. She took ten days of the medicine but her
glands are still swollen and the fever came back."

"Hmm..." He flipped through her chart.
"Strep test was positive, but there's no guarantee it can't come
back again. We call it the boomerang effect. Anyone else at home
sick?"

"No." Lucy hesitated, knowing she sounded
over-protective. "She's been looking pale to me even before the
strep, and she has no energy. She's not herself."

"I'm fine." Megan threw Lucy a Magnum
caliber stare before she could say more. "It's only that we just
moved here and with a new school and new friends and soccer and
teachers giving out so much homework—"

"I'll bet that wasn't easy, leaving your old
friends behind." The pediatrician stood in front of Megan, focused
on her, warming his stethoscope with one hand, skillfully shutting
Lucy out of the conversation. She straightened, irritated at first,
but then took a breath and relaxed when she saw how he put Megan at
ease.

As he examined Megan, he kept talking. "Mono
is pretty common in kids your age and a lot of kids will get it and
strep at the same time. Open up." He glanced at Megan's tonsils.
"Actually those look pretty normal. Let's feel those neck
glands."

Lucy watched as he danced his fingers up and
down Megan's neck. Then he had her lift her arms up and felt her
armpits. Finally, after examining her belly and groin, he sat back
down. "She definitely does have a few nice-sized nodes. I'd like to
do some more testing."

Megan straightened at that, her hands
clenching the edge of the table, casting off her world-weary
facade. "What kind of tests?"

"I'll get another strep test here in the
office today. But if that's negative, then I want you to go to the
hospital for some blood work."

"Blood work? With a needle?" Megan squeaked.
"No way. Mom, I feel fine—really, I don't need any tests."

Before Lucy could answer, her cell phone
rang. She turned the sound off without looking at the display and
stood, taking control of the situation. "Megan, you'll do what the
doctor says. What are these tests for?"