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She smirked. “That was the idea, right?”
“You’ve implemented it expertly.” He sat up, the blankets dropping, revealing his bare, muscled torso.
Sam turned back to her coffee. She didn’t need the temptation, especially when she knew exactly how solid his body felt. Sipping, she closed her eyes, trying to control her stupid longing. A faint sound of plastic slapping was followed by a zipper sliding and cloth rustling, then a door closing. Water pattered against fiberglass—Trevor was showering.
She plopped into the chair and drank more coffee, trying to wake up and regain control. Pathetic. Where was the strong woman who controlled judges and juries with carefully crafted words, invoking the perfect emotions? The woman who smiled, then went for the metaphorical kill?
Hanging her head, she answered her own question—that woman was buried under the pitiful, heartbroken girl left behind by Trevor Mills, all too willing to fall under his spell again. The strong woman better rise again or she’d be in the same place—or worse, captured by Russian criminals. She had to treat Mills as a hostile witness or uncooperative law enforcement, or she’d be six feet under, physically and emotionally.
Trevor joined her, picking up his coffee cup. “Thanks. Appreciate it.” He wore hunting camo and tossed a stained orange ball cap on the bed near his bags.
“If I’m pouring one, I can pour two.” She sipped. “It’s not very good coffee, though.”
“Hotel room coffee usually isn’t.” He sat and put his cup down. “I’ve been considering our next steps. No matter where we hide, we both need to work. You need to survive, and I need to find a way into Marcus City Bank.” He sipped. “I’ve got some burner phones. We’ll pack up and I’ll call my boss from the car. We’re at the intersection of two highways, so there are four directions we can go.” He shrugged. “Even retracing our steps is a possibility. Then I’ll ask Aviss where we can work without discovery for a couple of days.”
“You trust her that much?” Sam didn’t trust anyone in the federal government. Not anymore.
“Yes.” Trevor raised his index finger. “For one, she rescued Young’s family without going through the proper channels first and let a civilian assist. That shows she’s willing to do what it takes to save others. A more callous individual would have left Young’s family to gain more intelligence or at least waited to get a search warrant. I have other reasons to trust her too, things I can’t tell you about.” He met her gaze calmly.
She nodded. “I understand confidentiality. If it impacts us and this case, I’m trusting you to share.”
He grimaced. “I probably shouldn’t, but I will. Your safety means more to me than my job or national security. I’m sure Aviss realizes that, too.”
She didn’t believe that, but making the point would only annoy him. A fight wasn’t useful. “Okay, but will she be able to help us without using FBI assets? Because anything the Bureau has is likely to be compromised.” Those words made her stomach toss uneasily, but they were true.
Trevor shrugged. “Maybe, maybe not. But I’m thinking you can fix this problem easier than I can. Don’t you know a District Attorney in Seattle? And you know Wiz. Between the two of them, they ought to know where we can hide with connectivity.”
Sam cringed. She knew Andreas Dahl, a deputy in the Western District of Washington. Too well; they’d dated her first year in law school. He’d wanted her to move to Seattle with him after graduation, but she’d never let a man dictate her future ever again. After that conversation, she’d broken up with him. Plus, to fully succeed, Andreas would almost certainly move to another district, probably when her career was taking off, and she’d be forced to decide between her personal life and career. Andreas wouldn’t win that contest, and that meant she didn’t love him enough to make a marriage work. He’d moved on to other women quickly, and it wasn’t long before they’d become friendly, if not true friends.
Besides, by her final year, she’d known she had no desire to practice law in a big-city, high-pressure firm. She wanted to live in Montana, despite potential parental problems.
“Uh oh. I’m not going to like this, am I?” Trevor frowned.
Sam waved his concerns away. “We dated in law school but broke up long before graduation. It’s not a problem because Andreas is a professional. But we have radically different lives, professionally and personally. His family’s wealthy, and he has a big trust fund, so he’s not driven by money. But that could have changed.” Suspecting everyone’s motivations was terrible. Still, better safe than sorry. “We need to ask Wiz. For all I know, his family went broke, and he’s under the mob’s thumb. It’s strange that he’s never left the Seattle area, but he’s still a rising star. I’ve never had trouble with him, but I just don’t trust anyone anymore.” And that loss hurt; a wound that would never heal.
Trevor took her hand and squeezed. “I’m sorry, Sam. I know you didn’t sign up for this life, but that attitude is key to surviving dangerous situations.”
She squeezed back and pulled her hand from his comforting grip, minimizing the mixed signals. “Can I use one of those burner phones? I’ll need a way for Andreas to contact us.”
Trevor nodded. “I’ll ask Aviss to set up a special email address for you. It will be a regular free commercial address but created so it’s impossible to trace the owner. Then you can call Wiz and Andreas, then turn the phone off. We’ll save it for emergencies. You’ll be able to check that email using a virtual private network on my laptop. We’ll leave yours unconnected and transfer files on thumb drives.”
“Understood.” It was the smart thing to do. Electronic trails were easy to trace. “But anything Andreas is likely to have will be in Seattle. There’s a lot of cameras there.”
“One reason to change your appearance.” He frowned, scanning her face. “Even with the changes, facial recognition is likely to pick you up. We can’t go to Seattle without a really good reason. Or if we go, it’s to the FBI’s offices and we stay for the duration.” He scowled. “But not until we’ve weeded out the corruption.”
Sam couldn’t stop her scowl. “No way. I’m not putting myself into that situation. Besides, you said they couldn’t offer me formal protection because I have nothing to offer them, remember?”
He grimaced. “But now you’re a victim.” He held up his hand. “I know, you’re a survivor. But you were attacked while assisting with a case. That’s enough to get formal assistance.”
“Right.” And she didn’t trust that offer at all. The dragon and dragon slayer were both dangerous; sometimes the so-called hero was worse because nothing stopped their quest.
“Trust me, it’s a last resort.” He stood and grabbed their bags. “Come on, let’s get going. We’ll make the calls from the car so we can move right after.”
Sam tossed their trash and made sure they had left nothing personal behind. She dropped a small bill on the bed for housekeeping and followed Trevor to the car. He opened her door, handing her backpack to her. She put it on the floor under her legs.
He put his bag behind the driver’s seat and got in the driver’s seat, holding three flip phones. He placed two into the compartment between the front seats, then turned on the remaining phone, dialing quickly. “Aviss, it’s Mills. I’m with Sam Kerr. We’re safe for now. I need some generic email addresses, including one for Sam, and a place we can work from without getting caught. Any ideas?”
Sam couldn’t hear Aviss’s reply, and Trevor said little for the rest of the conversation. He scribbled in a notebook, then hung up and handed her the phone. “She’s got nothing that other agents can’t trace. Call Wiz about your friend, then, depending on what she says, call him. Here’s your email.” He wrote on a fresh page and tore it from the book, handing the sheet to her.
