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A web within a web within a web, he thought. “What else have you got?”
“It’s all there in the file.” She took a deep breath. “We need to tell D’Arcy. And I think Callahan needs to be told his name isn’t on that list because he’s the sheriff.” Keira’s dry tone conveyed that no one had really thought this, least of all her. Then she added in a voice that wasn’t quite steady, “And I’d bet anything you want to stake they’re gunning for you, too.”
Chapter 11
“No bet,” Cody said lightly. He picked up the phone and dialed a number. “Special Agents Walker and Jones need to see the boss as soon as possible. Is he free?” He listened and glanced at his watch. “We’ll be there. Thanks.” When he hung up, he told Keira, “Have a seat. We’ve got an appointment in twenty minutes.”
She sank into one of the chairs in front of his desk. “Are you going to wait to call Callahan?”
“No.” Cody started to pick up the phone, then thought better of it. He opened his drawer and pulled out the encrypted cell phone he’d used in Wyoming, the one he hoped couldn’t be traced back to him. He punched in a number. It rang and rang, but no one picked up. “Damn, where is he?” He let it ring a few more seconds, then hung up and dialed another number. This time it was answered.
“McKinnon,” said a voice in his ear.
“It’s Walker,” he said crisply. “Where’s Callahan?”
“Shift change. He’s briefing the deputy going on duty.”
“Tell him to call me immediately. It’s urgent.”
McKinnon asked guardedly, “Keira found something?”
“Yeah.” Cody wasn’t surprised at how McKinnon had worded the question. Keira’s partner had been right about her. She’d managed in less than two weeks to pull together assorted bits and pieces and assemble them into a complete—and deadly—picture. Even D’Arcy couldn’t have done a better job, he thought. “Would you believe a tie-in between the militia and the Russian mob? And not just now—back then, too.”
McKinnon cursed softly and fluently. Then he said, “Tell her— No, I’ll tell her myself. I’m a lucky man to have her as my partner. I’ll have Callahan call you as soon as he’s free.”
A click in his ear told him McKinnon had hung up. He disconnected, too, hearing McKinnon’s words again. I’m a lucky man to have her as my partner.
Cody gazed at Keira sitting across the desk from him, her red-gold curls tousled as if she’d been running her fingers through them as she worked, and realized the truth of those words far beyond what McKinnon had intended. Any man who had her in his life in any way was a lucky man.
And he wanted to be that man. Not as a working partner—no. What he wanted was so much more. He wanted to be the man in her life, the only man who counted. And he wanted her as his woman, so much it took his breath away.
The cell phone shrilled in Cody’s hand, and he almost answered it automatically with his last name until he remembered this wasn’t his official cell phone. “Yes?”
Ryan Callahan’s voice growled in his ear, “McKinnon said to call you. Said you’ve got something I need to know.”
“Yeah. Keira found it.” He quickly relayed the facts she’d uncovered, as well as the conclusions she’d drawn from them. “It all fits,” Cody said. “The money, the way the militia was revived so quickly, the political tie-ins, everything.”
“A nice, neat little package,” Callahan agreed. “You realize what this means?”
“Yeah. It’s not going to be as easy as it was last time.”
“You got that right. Damn!” said the man on the other end. “If I’d known...”
Cody knew, as if he could read Callahan’s mind, that the other man was thinking about Mandy...and their three children. Callahan had walked away from Mandy once to protect her. Now she wasn’t the only one at risk. Now he had three children he loved as much as he loved Mandy, all of them equally in danger because of him.
“Does D’Arcy know?” Callahan asked.
