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Jerry slid lower in his seat as he watched the hit man turn and walk into the hotel. Did he know where Alex was? Or was he heading toward Seattle, as well? Had he done enough research on Alex to know she was from Seattle?
Another, more horrifying thought occurred to Jerry. Had the hit man flipped? Made a deal with Alex? Assured her he wouldn’t kill her if she paid him more than Jerry had paid?
Maybe it had been the hit man who’d taken down the Russians. Maybe he and Alex were traveling together.
That just made his job more difficult. He’d figured he could get those files from Alex easily. He was bigger than her. Stronger.
But if the hit man was on her side, his life had just become more complicated.
* * *
Forty-five minutes after he’d placed their order. Gideon fetched their food from the Uber Eats driver. He scowled the whole way up to their room. When he got inside, he said to Alex, “Damn driver wouldn’t come into the hotel. He made me go outside and pick it up. I didn’t give him a tip.” He smiled. “The guy flipped me off, but I felt righteous.”
They sat side by side on the tiny couch, setting their food on the coffee table in front of it. They turned on the local news station while they ate. Eventually, the chyron along the bottom of the screen announced that the Bozeman pass was scheduled to open at daybreak the next morning, assuming another storm didn’t develop.
Her right heel jittering on the floor, Alex wrapped her arms around herself. Swallowed, then turned to face Gideon. “What should we do?” she whispered. “Do we leave early and try to put some miles between us and Jerry? Or do we wait for him to leave? Give him a couple of hours to get ahead of us?”
He clicked off the television and turned to Alex. She was so tightly wound that he was afraid she’d shatter. He curled his arm around her shoulder and pulled her against him. Left his hand on her shoulder for reassurance.
They were in this together now.
He pondered her question for a few moments. Finally said, “I think we try to get ahead of him. We don’t want him getting ahead of us, then waiting for us. Luring us into a trap.”
“But he has no idea where we are,” Alex said, frowning. “How could he? We checked everything, and there were no more trackers in my belongings.”
“I have no idea,” Gideon said, tightening his hand on her shoulder. “But I don’t want to underestimate him. He could be working with someone who has the same app I have -- the one that uses a cell phone to nail down a person’s location. Maybe the Russians have a source at the FBI.” Kramer? “An agent could be feeding them information, and the Russians could be sending it to Trotter.
“No matter what, we can’t assume he’s going to drive blithely up to Seattle. He’s a desperate man. He needs you dead so he can collect that insurance money. He’ll do whatever it takes to make that happen.”
He didn’t miss Alex’s glance at her purse. So Trotter needed whatever she’d taken from his safe.
He needed to see those files.
Her eyes shifted away from her purse, and she shivered. He tucked her more closely against his side. “Once we get over the pass, we’re only a few hours away from the compound,” he said, closing his eyes and inhaling the faintly orange scent of her hair. Fixing it in his memory. “Four at the most. We can do it without stopping. We’ll watch for his car. Like you said, probably not many Mercedes Benz sedans in this part of Montana. Tomorrow afternoon, we should be safe inside the compound walls.”
“You’re making it sound easy,” she muttered. “Nothing about this has been easy since I heard you talking to Jerry that night.”
“Yeah,” he said, letting his fingers caress her shoulder. “But you’ve aced every test you were given. You made the right decisions every step of the way. You’ve been damn impressive.”
“Then why am I falling apart now, when we’re almost at your compound?”
“Because you just told me about your teen-aged years. You re-lived a horrible, harrowing time in your life.” He stroked his hand down her arm. “Of course you’re off-kilter. Restless. Twitchy. It would be more surprising if you could just shrug it off. Tell me what happened to you, then let it go.”
She stood up and began to pace the room. “I haven’t told anyone that story since I told Sierra. And it took me a year to work up the nerve to tell her everything. I’ve known you for less than a week, and I blurted it all out to you. Every ugly bit of it.”
He reached out and snagged her hand as she paced past him. Pulled her onto the couch beside him, then swiveled to face her and took her hands. “The last week has been extraordinary in every possible way, beginning with you hearing your husband hire a man to kill you. Your entire life has been turned upside down -- your home. Your work. Your everyday life. Most people who face what you’ve faced would be curled up in a ball somewhere, whimpering.
“But you? You just keep doing what you need to do. You’re incredible, Alex. Clever and smart. I promise, this nerve-wracking journey is almost over. Once we’re at the compound, you won’t have to be constantly vigilant. You won’t have to look over your shoulder every fifteen minutes. You’ll be safe, and we’ll have help figuring out your next step.”
Her fingers tightened around his. “Thank you,” she said, her voice so low he barely heard her. “For everything you’ve done. If you hadn’t had that app on your phone, I wouldn’t have known Jerry was following me. If you hadn’t been with me, I would have been forced to go to the high school. Stay in the gym with a whole bunch of strangers.” She sighed. “God knows what might have happened there.”
He tightened his hands on hers. “Probably nothing good.” Those two Russians would have gone to the high school looking for Alex, led there by the tracker in her tote bag. Trotter would have given them a picture of her. For those two guys, it would’ve been child’s play to slit Alex’s throat while she and everyone else was sleeping, then sneak out of the gym and vanish.
“Yeah.” She blew out a breath. “I wouldn’t have been able to break into that motel by myself. Probably wouldn’t even have thought of it,” she admitted.
He smiled into her hair. “That’s because you’re a law-abiding citizen.”
She drew away from him. Swallowed as she stared at her hands. “After listening to my story, you know I haven’t always been.”
