Page 49 of Minutes to Die
He stretched out his long legs. “It’ll be no hardship, that’s for sure.”
She nodded, thinking the same thing. Bigger seats allowed her to sit farther away from him than the cramped coach seats. She’d just survived an hour in his Tahoe, and now this. She would give Mack an earful when she got back from the trip. He was clearly trying to throw them together. He’d wanted her to deal with Olin’s death for years. She got it. Truly she did. But Mack’s wishes, or even what Evan wanted, didn’t mean she desired the same thing. She’d much rather leave the whole thing buried in the back of her brain where she’d forced the trauma so she could go on. Now the angst was creeping out,nearly paralyzing her when she needed every bit of her focus to find these terrorists.
“How often do you catch military hops?” Evan got a stack of folders out of his computer case and shoved it under the seat.
“Pretty regularly actually,” she said, glad he’d found something safe to talk about. “In fact, Eisenhower has the Tacoma base on standby in case we need something faster than commercial flights right now. They’ll scramble a flight if needed.”
He shook his head. “Each time I think I realize the power of your team’s influence, something else surprises me.”
“Well, don’t think we have the military at our beck and call all the time. This is one of those ultrahigh priority investigations.”
The flight attendant brought coffee, and Kiley took a sip, savoring the full body of the above-average airplane brew.
Cam’s ringtone sounded from her phone. Glad for the distraction, she grabbed it. “Is this something Evan needs to hear?”
“I didn’t have a chance to update you on my progress before you split,” Cam said. “Must’ve been wiped. So anyway ... yeah, either let him listen in or you’ll have to update him yourself.”
“Hang on.” She got out her wireless earbuds with talk feature and handed one to Evan. “It’s Cam, and I don’t want anyone overhearing us.”
He nodded and leaned close, plugging the bud into his ear. She should have thought about how sharing earbuds would bring Evan closer, but she couldn’t very well jerk the bud from his ear now.
“Go ahead, Cam,” she said as she focused on passengers slogging down the aisle instead of Evan’s nearness.
“With the chlorine gas now in the picture, I’m expanding the list for potential bombers to include terrorists who’ve experimented with biological weapons. Hope to have something for you by the time you get back.”
She was always thankful for the way Cam went above andbeyond what many analysts brought to the job. “Thanks for adding to the search.”
“Yeah, sure, and I’ll email you the list of organizations Firuzeh belonged to. It’s a short list, and nothing looks out of the ordinary for a student except The Righteous.” Cam took a long breath. “I also made a list of those who unloaded the container and moved it. And a list of security guards who worked Terminal 18 since the container landed. Sean and Mack will interview Barzani this morning, and after that Sean will interview as many of the workers on my list as he can.”
“Great,” Kiley said.
“Did my guy from MIT call you back?” Evan asked.
“Nah, man,” Cam replied. “Maybe you should give him a ring and light a fire under him.”
“Will do,” Evan said.
“Okay, that’s it,” Cam said. “Now go destroy that Waleed guy.” Laughing, he ended the call.
Evan pulled out the earbud. “Cam might like to joke, but he’s really good at his job, isn’t he?”
She wrapped up the cord. “One of the best analysts I’ve ever worked with.”
Evan rested his head against his seat and looked at her. He was so close she could see the details of the scar trailing from his eye to his jaw, and she wanted to run her finger over the raised white skin.
She scooted back instead and asked the first thing she could think of regarding the investigation. “Do you still have dock video to review? If so, maybe we should send the remaining files off to analysts.”
He arched an eyebrow, the scar rising.
She sat on her hand. “I’m not questioning your work. I want you to focus on the bombing and our upcoming interviews.”
“I don’t have any left.” His expression relaxed. “Let me send a text to my guy at MIT before we take off.”
She watched his thumbs fly over the small keys on his phone.He’d been so helpful and proactive from the moment he’d joined their team. Sure, they’d had their share of tension, though she was the cause of it, not him. But then he was the guilty party here. He was the reason Olin died.
She let the moment play in her brain for the first time in years. She recalled the approach to the suspect’s door. Her on the left. Olin in the middle. Evan on the right. The door jerking back. The suspect opening fire with an automatic rifle. The booming rifle reports cracking the quiet morning air. Bullets flying. Evan reacting too late to drag Olin out of the gunfire but hurling himself at her and knocking her to the porch. Then swiveling to take out the shooter with his handgun, slicing his cheek open on a metal boot scraper as he landed hard.
And her, what had she done to help before Evan tackled her? Nothing but gape and reach for her gun. Was she excusing her failure to quickly respond to the fact that Evan was in charge? To the fact that as a woman she might not have been able to move a big guy like Olin to safety?
