Page 76 of Dangerous Liaisons

Chapter Fifty-Six

Jesse and Cole strolled along the sidewalk outside the Office of International Affairs’ twelve-story, steel and glass high-rise in Langley, Virginia. Jesse glanced at Cole’s disguise with a critical eye. Despite his extra two inches, the dark-skin latex mask, black eyebrows, and cream-colored suit accented with white shirt and brown tie, made him look enough like Perez to fool even her from a distance. He had exchanged the chestnut dye in his hair for a deep brown, and had even bound his broken index and middle fingers together with flesh colored medical tape. The brown eyes threw her more than anything, though. She’d gotten used to the blue that always made her feel like she could fall into them.

She returned her attention to the street as they crossed Ivy Lane between the OIA building and staff parking garage. She hoped Lanton wasn’t late. The tight jeans and two-inch, backless Prada heels she wore to aid the elusion he was closer to Perez’s six-foot height were uncomfortable as hell.

Jesse glanced at her watch. Eight-thirty. She pressed the ear bud. “We’re at the garage.”

“Roger,” Tom radioed back. “Take a right. He always uses the north entrance between eight thirty-five and eight-fifty, statistically within three standard deviations. The mean is eight forty-three.”

Jesse laughed. Once a nerd, always a nerd. The woman who snagged Tom was going to be one lucky statistic. She touched Cole’s arm and headed right as she replied, “Roger. We’ll let you know once he’s inside.”

“Out,” Tom said, and ended the transmission.

She and Cole strolled the last forty feet to the parking garage ramp and stopped near a thin Elm tree. He pulled a box of Colombian cigarettes from his jacket pocket and lit a cigarette with a nonchalance befitting a high-powered drug lord. Mid-puff, Cole nodded almost imperceptibly at something down the street.

From the corner of her eye, she spotted Lanton’s silver Mercedes turn onto Ivy. “Show time. Hold your position until he’s halfway through the turn onto the ramp. Can’t have him spook and keep going.”

Cole drew on the cigarette. “He’s glanced at us, but doesn’t seem to have made the connection.”

Jesse remained motionless, staring at Cole. She blinked. He wasn’t inhaling the cigarette. The sound of the approaching Mercedes drew closer. She held her breath while the car passed behind her, then appeared in the right edge of her peripheral vision as Lanton made a slow turn onto the ramp.

Cole grasped her arm, easing her around to face Lanton. Halfway into his turn, Lanton’s attention jerked onto them. His eyes widened. He yanked the wheel as if to turn toward them, then immediately turned back in the direction he was headed.

Adrenaline pumped Jesse’s heart faster as Lanton stared in open-mouthed horror while Cole pointed his cigarette at him, then dropped it. Lanton’s gaze followed the cigarette’s downward journey until the butt bounced once on the concrete. He swung his eyes back onto Cole’s face. Cole fashioned his hand into a gun, his thumb cocked like a hammer over the firing pin, and pulled the imaginary trigger. Lanton’s head swiveled forward and the car accelerated down the ramp and into the garage with a roar.

Jesse waited until he disappeared among the isles, cars and ramps inside before saying into her mic, “The rabbit is in the hole.”

She turned and they hurried up Ivy toward the minivan parked a block over. A minute later, she climbed into the driver’s seat and Cole dove in back. Latex snapped free of his face in unison with the purr of the minivan’s engine as she turned the key. Jesse glanced in her rearview mirror to see him toss the mask aside while shimmying out of his slacks. She caught a glimpse of muscled legs as she pulled out of the parking space and onto Nash.

Next to Interstate 76, two blocks from the parking garage, she pulled to a stop behind Tom’s surveillance van disguised as a Verizon Wireless repair truck. She cut the engine. A second later, Cole scooted up behind her.

He clamped a hand on her shoulder. “I’m off.”

Jesse nodded at his image in the rearview mirror. “Good luck.”

She wondered if she should kiss him—if he would kiss her—but he slid the door open and stepped out. She watched in the passenger mirror as he started down the street toward home base. They had planned in great detail how things would go off. She’d known Cole had to return to home base. So, why did she feel as if her world had just ended? She couldn’t let him go. She grasped the door handle and pulled back the lever before remembering Amanda—and their mother.

Jesse slumped back in her seat. After their father died, their mother wasted no time in putting Amanda in a home. No retarded girl was going to prevent her from finding a man. Her mother had put herself before Amanda. If Jesse stopped Cole, she would be doing the same thing. She glanced in the passenger side mirror. Cole was gone.

She exited the minivan. Traffic along I-76 zoomed past as she headed for the rear double doors of the surveillance truck. Jesse pulled the key from her pocket, unlocked the door, and stepped inside. She slid into the nearest of two swivel chairs positioned along the centerline of the van.

Equipment covered both sidewalls, from floor to ceiling, leaving only enough room in the middle to swivel from right to left. Radio receivers, tape recorders, high tech surveillance equipment blinked little lights and hummed small cooling fans. Keyboards and mice cluttered a desk-high narrow counter. Various storage and other faceless, button-less electrical gear filled the racks under the shelf. A nickel-sized homing transmitter sat in a charging cradle on the counter. Jesse snapped the transmitter free and slipped it into a jeans pocket.

She had half an hour to plant the homer on Lanton’s car and get back. Then she’d set up electronics gear while she waited, deaf and blind until one of the men phoned in a report.