Chapter 8 #3
“A little. But it’s also the truth,” Hallie said, and briefly touched his hand, conscious that there were other people around the house, not that far away.
She was not ashamed of her feelings for him, but she did feel oddly protective of them and of the honesty they had shared.
It felt newly minted and precious and not something she wanted to share with anyone else.
“It feels like this new information could mean something, might help.” She left unsaid that the cost of the progress was too high.
The loss of Oreste and Kasmo. The death of Manju, before he’d been able to tell them anything.
The attack on Frollo’s team. Girard’s injuries.
Tortain’s broken leg. It didn’t seem a fair exchange at all.
But Hallie vowed, in her own mind, that the deaths had to count for something.
She wasn’t going to stop until she’d found who was responsible.
Oreste and Kasmo, and Manju, even though she hadn’t known him as well, deserved nothing less.
After the drama of the morning excursion, the trip out to the burned house and back was anti-climactic. Every member of the team was on high alert. Dechtire drove, with Hallie and Modron crammed into the front of the vehicle with her while Frollo and Griff took the back seats.
They reached the house to find that the flames had died down, and there were a few locals there picking through the rubble.
Looking for things that they might use, or sell, Hallie guessed.
The locals scattered as soon as Frollo got out of the vehicle, dressed in black with body armour and his helmet in place, hiding most of his face.
He looked intimidating even to Hallie, who knew him, so she did not blame the locals for running away.
With the others on watch, Hallie and Modron sifted through what remained of the papers that had been on the table.
The table itself was badly burned, charred so that the legs collapsed when Modron touched it, scattering more ash into the air.
Hallie could feel the heat of the fire through the soles of her shoes as she moved, slowly and carefully, through the debris.
With the roof of the building gone, she could also feel the scorching heat of the sun on her back and shoulders as she worked, sweat building under the heavy armoured vest she was wearing over her lighter clothes.
She managed to ignore the physical discomfort as she worked, collecting what she thought might be at least some of the papers she and Girard had seen, along with two melted plastic devices, one of which she thought was likely to be Girard’s own phone.
She just hoped that the other was the tablet and that the forensic team would be able to get something from it.
The case had twisted and buckled in the heat of the fire, but Hallie thought the innards might have escaped the worst of it.
That done, they all piled back into the jeep and headed back to the safe house.
Hallie didn’t think anyone in the vehicle took an easy breath until they were back through the gates to the courtyard, and even then the tac team members were keeping a wary eye on their surroundings as they headed back into the house.
Coming out of the heat of the day and into the comparative coolness of the house’s main corridor, Hallie swayed, vision flickering. She shook her head but that only made the light-headedness worse.
“Are you alright?” Modron asked.
“Not sure. A bit light-headed. I need to get these bags to the office,” Hallie said, holding up the evidence bags she’d taken charge of.
“I’ll do that,” Griff said. He’d shed his helmet, revealing short, dark blond hair and a faint bruise on one side of his face. He gave Hallie a critical look. “Did you get any lunch earlier?”
“Lunch? Ah. No,” Hallie said. She looked down at herself, past the heavy vest she was still wearing, and realised that she was still wearing the same clothes as when the attack had occurred.
There were streaks of dust and ash and trails of what looked like fragments of plaster on the trousers. “Perhaps I should change,” she said.
“Come and get some food first,” Modron suggested.
It was only when she was sitting in the kitchen, a bowl of very excellent soup inside her and a second helping in front of her, that Hallie realised the rest of the tac team had been looking after her as if her well-being was their responsibility.
She frowned as Frollo and Girard came into the room.
“Was I a distraction?” she asked bluntly.
“Ma’am?” Frollo asked, looking genuinely confused.
She shook her head. “Sorry. Feeling a bit thick-headed. I just realised you were all looking after me. I didn’t mean to be a burden.
” There was heat in her face as she spoke and she couldn’t meet Frollo’s eyes.
She wasn’t used to working with other people.
Even though she and Girard had formed a good working - and closer - relationship, it was still strange to her.
And she hated the idea that she was burden to anyone.
“No, ma’am,” Frollo said, and even without her truth sense Hallie would have believed him. “You were essential. We look after each other. It’s very common for recruits to forget to eat on missions.”
The heat remained in Hallie’s face as she digested that, then she gave a small, rueful laugh. “I suppose I am like a new recruit.”
“Little bit,” Frollo said, with easy humour. “But only a little.”
“I was going to make some more coffee,” Girard said.
He’d managed to shower and change clothes in the time she and the others had been gone and was now back in what she thought of as his working clothes - a t-shirt and hard-wearing dull brown trousers.
He’d normally also wear a leather jacket, but even indoors it was too hot for that.
“But you might want to freshen up and pack first. The director called again while you were out. There’s a transport plane in the air and on its way to us.
Should be here overnight. We’re under orders to load up and head back to Daydawn as soon as we can.
” He looked at Frollo. “We need to get all our things gathered to clear out early hours.”
“Understood,” Frollo said.
“The director doesn’t want us to track down the other attacker?” Hallie asked, startled.
“We’ve got two living, and one dead, to take back with us,” Girard said. “He wants us back in Daydawn, with whatever evidence you managed to collect.”
“I found what I think is the tablet and also your phone,” Hallie said, getting to her feet. “Bagged them up along with what I think are the remains of papers. I know Isoud and her team are amazing, but I’m not sure what they will be able to recover.”
“We’ll let them worry about that,” Girard said.
On that good advice, Hallie headed upstairs.
A shower and a change of clothes seemed like an excellent idea.
The heat of the day was finally fading into evening.
From what the others had said, it seemed unlikely she was going to get much chance to sleep overnight as they got ready to leave.
And as they were going back to Daydawn, she followed Girard’s example and got into her own version of working clothes, in this case, jeans and a t-shirt.
She left a sweatshirt and her own leather jacket at the top of her bag.
Even though it was stiflingly hot here, she knew it was still winter in Daydawn and she’d need the extra layers.
Once she was in her normal working clothes, the zauber tucked into her jeans pocket, and her bag was packed, she stood in the quiet, shadowed bedroom, mind turning over what they had learned and not learned from the information she’d managed to photograph and about the attackers.
They had two live ones in custody, somewhere else in the house, Hallie remembered.
Frollo and the others hadn’t been able to get any information out of them, but then, as far as she knew, no body else had her truth sense.
So there might be something she could do now that no one else could.
With that determination, she lifted her bag onto her shoulder and headed downstairs to find Frollo and discover where the attackers were being kept.