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Dare drank his coffee, savoring each sip. His rancor eased some, as he glanced at the pile of paperwork on the table. He had ten days off, ten days of freedom. His winter preparations would do, for now. There was maintenance to be done, but nothing pressing. The paperwork wasn’t going anywhere. And forget tailing Angie Powell as if she was a helpless female in need of a fucking white knight.
He was going to go fishing, damn it. He was going up on the mountain on his own for some much needed peace and quiet, a little down time. And if that down time put him in Angie’s vicinity, maybe even in her path, well, that was just a coincidence.
Yeah, right. He’d just keep telling himself that. And he’d damn sure tell Angie, if he was unlucky enough that she saw him.
Once he’d made up his mind, Dare packed with the speed and precision of a man who’d done the same thing a thousand times. In his backpack he arranged strips of jerky, power bars, a small first-aid kit, some cans of bear spray, bottles of water, aspirin—because he might run into Angie and she was sure to give him a headache—and an extra flannel shirt. His satellite phone, charged and ready, went into the pack. There were more supplies up at the camp, but he never headed in empty-handed.
The fishing gear was another matter. Dare hadn’t been fishing on his own in months, so he took some time to inspect the fly rod, put on new line. Most of his clients came in to hunt, but he’d taken out the occasional fishing party. He never fished when he was with clients, though; if he intended to fish he preferred to go on his own, to enjoy the peace and quiet.
If his fishing clients knew what they were doing, he enjoyed the trips. If they were novices, he’d rather eat ground glass. They talked, they splashed, they tangled themselves in the line, caught themselves on the hooks. Teaching a beginner to fly-fish was a huge pain in the ass. He’d started referring callers to a fishing guide in the next county over, because business was good enough that he didn’t have to fuck with it if he didn’t want to.
Dare thought about packing waders, but given the cooling weather and dropping temps of the water he decided against it. He’d cast from the bank.
As he sorted through the flies, he wondered if Angie could fish, and imagined maybe sending the beginners her way. It was a perversely satisfying thought.
A few times in his career as a guide, clients had come in with their wives. One nightmarish job had included two teenage daughters. He’d rather be shot than do that again. But a woman … how many wives would be more comfortable with another female around? Angie probably wouldn’t be as annoyed by the constant chatter of a young woman as he was. He’d barked at that one girl when she’d squealed because she saw a deer, and then she’d cried. The trip had gone downhill from there. It wasn’t like having women around was the norm, but still … it was worth some thought. Why hadn’t Angie attempted to specialize in couples, families? Why hadn’t she used her gender to her advantage? Instead she’d tried to step into her father’s shoes and continue on as he had, as if nothing had changed, when in fact everything had changed.
It wasn’t the best time of year for fly-fishing. Weather and water conditions were changing, but the trout weren’t in their winter lies just yet. He might have good luck in a slow current, maybe target some pre-spawn browns. A big pan of trout would taste a helluva lot better than a power bar and jerky.
And if he happened to coincidentally keep an eye on Angie at the same time, well, keeping her safe would make one part of him very happy. His brain knew better, but his dick hadn’t given up hope. Not just yet, anyway. This trip might be just what he needed to convince his little brain that it had had a lucky escape.
Chapter Six
Chad Krugman w
aited in the terminal at the Butte airport as the SkyWest flight carrying Mitchell Davis taxied closer. There were only a few commercial flights a day coming in and out of Butte, most of the traffic was general aviation, but for all that the flight times were decent. Davis was an experienced hunter, so he wasn’t expecting to be able to fly first class in a 747 right up to the hunting area. Out-of-the-way was pretty much the norm for good hunting.
Out-of-the-way was perfect for his plans. In fact, the more remote the area their guide, Angie Powell, took them to, the better. He’d made a point of asking her about the general area, keeping the tone of his e-mails casual, but there was nothing casual about his interest. Once he’d known where they were going to be hunting, at least within about ten square miles, he’d studied maps, downloaded images from Google Maps, and taped them together to give him a better idea of topographical features and possible landmarks. The images weren’t as close up and detailed as he’d have liked, but they did give him a very good idea of the terrain and what he would have to do to execute his plan.
He’d known this day would be coming, had known it from the moment he’d begun skimming cash from the money-laundering service he provided for Mitchell Davis. No, even before that, because what he’d done had been carefully thought out, and all possibilities considered, before he’d ever taken that first step. With that in mind, he’d set a silent alarm on the accounts and computer files, an automatic notice if anyone tried to access certain files and information. That was his tripwire, and he was so good at what he did he’d even anticipated how long it would take Davis to become suspicious, and timed this trip accordingly.
Chad couldn’t help feeling a little smug. As the time neared for the hunting trip he’d begun to wonder if he’d overestimated Davis, the vicious bastard, but then, bang!—just yesterday his silent tripwire had sent out the alarm. The precision of the timing made him almost giddy with triumph. Was he accurate, or what?
For the past year he’d been training for this, making preparations, studying and learning and getting the timing down just right. Maybe he was too careful in making certain nothing he did would signal Davis that he himself had been alerted, but he’d bypassed certain toys and tools that might, if Davis was enterprising enough to search his belongings, have made him wary because they weren’t something Chad would ordinarily have possessed—at least, not as far as Davis and everyone else knew. That meant no sophisticated GPS, no satellite maps, no passport. His passport was safe in a post office box here in Butte, easy to retrieve when he needed it. He’d have bought an airline ticket in advance, but he wasn’t certain exactly which day he’d need it, so that was something he’d have to do at the last minute. No big deal.
Chad enjoyed the disconnect between the way people perceived him and how he really was. No one, literally no one, had any idea what he was capable of, but then he’d spent almost his entire life carefully building his persona, crafting his mask, as if he’d known from childhood that one day his life would depend on it. He’d been blessed—or cursed, depending on how you looked at it—with ordinary features, and he’d worked hard to make himself even more ordinary. He kept himself in fairly good shape, something no one would ever guess to look at him, because he deliberately dressed in clothes that never quite fit properly, that made him look shorter and heavier, and as dweebish as possible. Who would ever be wary or suspicious of a slightly plump Woody Allen? No one. And so he’d gone about his life all but invisible, and all the while he’d been amassing a fortune right under their noses.
It was second nature to him now; he didn’t even have to think about stuttering, or the slightly off-balance way he’d taught himself to walk, or the fumbling way he handled everything from a water glass to a cell phone. God, the CIA could take lessons from him in undercover guises.
Mitchell Davis approached the baggage claim area, pulling a rolling duffel behind him and carrying a computer bag in his other hand. Chad stumbled to his feet, dropping his cell phone and sending it skittering across the floor. Clumsily he lurched for it, and when he straightened his face was red from being bent over. He didn’t let himself even glance at the computer bag, though it was a solid confirmation, if he’d needed one, that Davis was on his electronic trail. He felt a little bit of a thrill, because Mitchell Davis would have him killed without a second’s hesitation if he could find what he was looking for, but at the same time Chad was contemptuous of Davis, not only for bringing the laptop but evidently not being aware enough of where they were going to realize that not only would there not be wifi everywhere, there wouldn’t even be cellular service.
“Good flight?” he asked, automatically monitoring the amount of nervousness he let enter his tone. He judged it to be perfect.
Davis grunted. He was several inches taller, his hair going gray, his eyes cold and hard. “I hope you’ve already got the rental.”
“It’s waiting for us. I got a four-wheel-drive SUV, is that okay? I thought we’d need one for, um, the room in back and all that. But I can change if—”
“It’s fine,” Davis said curtly. “Let’s go.”
Davis was accustomed to people kissing his ass, but he wasn’t usually that brusque. He’d want to be certain, though. Chad was too good at what he did for Davis to have him eliminated without solid proof. There were money launderers, and then there were true currency geniuses, and Chad was the latter. To some people, those more astute than others, that would have been a tip-off, so Chad had countered that signal with his degree in accounting and the implication that his talent with money was more along the lines of savant than savviness. That way his talent could be regarded as an oddity, an outlier, rather than an integral part of his overall intelligence. For this he thanked that Tom Cruise/Dustin Hoffman movie about the autistic savant, because that was the image that had been planted in people’s minds.
Davis followed the signs to the rental parking area, with Chad trailing behind, pulling his own duffel. “It’s the red one,” he said, keeping the uncertainty and nervousness foremost in his tone. “Is that okay? Red’s kind of—We can get another color, maybe something black, if you don’t—”
“Who cares what fucking color it is?” Davis interrupted impatiently, and held out his hand. “Give me the keys.”
“Keys? Oh. Oh, sure.” Chad released his duffel and let it fall, rather than standing it upright, as he fumbled in his pocket for the keys to the rental. No way would his character’s persona argue about who was driving, the way a more dominant man would, even though he’d been to the Powell place before and actually knew where he was going. He’d fudge on that, too, consulting maps and directing Davis to make at least one wrong turn. The very last thing he wanted was to have Davis the least bit on guard.
Perception. It was all about perception.
