Conner was not surprised when the cab dropped them off at the most expensive hotel in downtown Chicago. Devlin smiled at her look, as though he expected some comment about his extravagance. “I figure four hours in that filth is worth this, wouldn’t you agree? As a friend of my father’s used to say—’never complain, never explain.’“
Conner smiled back. “Henry Ford.”
Devlin seemed slightly surprised. His eyes lingered on her face. “You’re no dumb mouthpiece, are you?”
“No, Mr. Devlin, I’m no dummy.”
Devlin remained silent until they were in his suite. He showed her where to make the drinks and left to take the much needed shower. Conner was flipping through a thumbed copy of short stories when he returned to the living room wearing loose khaki pants and a tight polo shirt. He looked very good with all the gunk removed. His blond hair was just beginning to thin but was a nice contrast to his blue eyes. He had a muscular body. Conner was swift to note that it was his natural build and not one he worked on. He had the beginnings of that soft look that comes from an easy life and middling ambition.
She held up the book. “Fitzgerald. So, Mr. Devlin. Is it true? Are the rich really different from me and you? Or should I say me?”
He shot her another dazzling smile and pulled her into his arms. She felt him grow hard beneath the pants. “No, not at all. I’d say the rich aren’t very different. The main luxury is more time to think about things.”
Conner pulled away and sat down on one of the overstuffed damask sofas. “The rich seem to skip a lot of preliminaries.”
Devlin sat across from her and picked up the drink she’d made for him. She noticed the manicured nails before she noticed how fine the hands were. “I’m sorry, Conner. May I call you Conner? I hope I didn’t seem rude, but you are an incredibly beautiful woman and well read on top of that. I guess I got carried away.”
Conner nodded an acceptance to his apology and pulled out a notebook. “Devlin — may I call you Devlin? Or do your friends use your first name?”
He showed a set of perfect teeth. “Devlin is fine.”
“So, Devlin. Tell me about a life of environmental activism after a youth of unparalleled luxury.”
Devlin leaned back, crossing his legs and putting both arms on the back of the sofa. He looked for all the world like the scion of a wealthy family. “The hounds of the press appear to skip a lot of the preliminaries also.”
“I’ve always found a good interview to be an excellent preliminary,” Conner remarked, her eyes meeting his.
Devlin talked for a long time.
Later, when they were lying in a tangle of linen on his king-size bed, he asked her about her newscast that night. She looked down at him, pushing aside the tendrils of dark hair that had fallen across her eyes, and informed him that if she didn’t show up at the station on time they knew she was on a story.
Devlin wrapped his hands around her thin waist, looked up at her, and replied: “Well, I’d definitely say you’re on a story now.”
At the time, Conner had found the comment amusing, and she had silently agreed.
The next day a bouquet of roses was waiting on her desk at work. Conner became irritated when her coworkers looked at her curiously, and the whole incident began to seem like a mistake. She knew that the flowers put the burden on her to get in touch with him, but she didn’t. She had her life planned, and a relationship with Devlin — or anyone — would just get in her way.
Conner sometimes wondered if she’d made the right decision, but then came the offer of the job in Atlanta and she’d thought about nothing but work since then — at least until the other day when she’d picked up the phone and called Devlin.
With the click of the computer screen locking upright, Conner banished that memory and went to work to ensure that her future would be as successful as her past.
“Come in,” Sammy called out, pressing her back against the far wall of the van and pointing the pistol at the back door. The metal door swung open and a figure was standing there, silhouetted against the parking lot lights.
“Whoa!” The man dropped a duffel bag he’d been carrying and held his hands away from his body. “Take it easy. I’m Riley. Colonel Pike sent me.”
“Come in and shut the door,” Sammy ordered.
Riley threw in his duffel bag and then followed it. With the door swung shut, the inside was almost pitch black. “Could you put down the gun, please?” Riley asked.
Sammy slid the pistol back in the shoulder holster. It had been an anxious four hours waiting here in the dark. She’d started doubting reality in that time, not wanting to believe she’d killed a man earlier this evening. Then she’d started getting paranoid, wondering if even Pike was to be trusted. When she’d called him with parking lot information, the colonel had relayed to her Riley’s name and approximate time of arrival. She’d spent the interim trying to figure out what steps to take next. Although she might be relatively safe for the moment, she knew her sister was heading into something much more dangerous than she expected.
“The colonel told me to keep you safe and not much more,” Riley remarked as he sat down on his duffel bag. “Care to fill me in on what’s going on?”
For the second time that evening Sammy related the events that had occurred since leaving the office supply shop. Riley also had her backtrack a bit and give him all she knew on Eternity Base. When she was done he sat silent for a few moments, then spoke. “We need to get rid of this van and the gun. They’re the two things that can link you to the body.”
Sammy shook her head. “Our first priority is to warn my sister.”
Riley shook his head in turn. “No. At least not through SNN — that’s the most likely source of the leak reference Eternity Base. Think about how those places operate. They’ve got more people getting paid off than any South American government. It’s the perfect conduit for intelligence organizations to sink a line to fish for information. If you try getting in touch with her through SNN, you might as well advertise your presence, and from what you told me about your sister, she would probably continue on with the story anyway.”
“Then we catch up with her,” Sammy declared firmly.
“What?” Riley blinked in the dark.
It was the decision she had come to more than an hour ago, and she was determined to follow it through whether Riley agreed or not. “We catch up with her and warn her. You can protect her along with me.” Sammy leaned forward. “The colonel told me not to go to the cops. You’re telling me not to go to SNN. I agree with both of you. Either way we could be putting our heads in the lion’s mouth.”
She continued. “We don’t know who that man worked for, and until we do, we won’t be safe. The only way we’re going to find out who is behind this is by linking up with Conner and helping her find Eternity Base.”
Having said what she’d needed to, Sammy watched Riley in the dim glow from the windshield, waiting to see how he’d react. Pike had only said that Riley was ex-Special Forces and did good work. He was a far cry from the Rambo type so commonly portrayed in films, but Sammy had expected that because her own father had been slight of build and a quiet, thoughtful man.
The one quality Riley had — a quality Sammy noticed in almost every ex-SF man she’d ever met — was a sense of quiet competence and confidence. He looked as though he’d had a rough couple of days, with his growth of beard and his red-rimmed eyes, but then she had no idea what he’d been doing, so that didn’t bother her. Something about him told her that he’d know what to do, and that he’d do it without his ego getting in the way. Underlying that, she also sensed some other deep emotion, but right now she couldn’t put her finger on it. She only hoped that he would be willing to go along with her plan.