74. Garrett
Chapter Seventy-Four
GARRETT
H e burst into the street like he’d been shot out of a cannon. He was vaguely aware of Rainer and Elias at his back, but they gave him room as he strode to the widest free space nearest them, a small plaza on the other side road.
He walked the length of it over and over, trying to get ahold of himself before they made the trek back home.
I should call Emma. She needed to know that the nightmare was over. But his brilliant wife was going to ask him the same question he was asking himself.
Why the hell had Fletcher bothered to steal all that money if he was contemplating suicide?
It didn’t make sense. Garrett paced for several minutes, turning that over in his mind when he felt someone watching him. And it wasn’t his crew keeping an eye on him.
This scrutiny wasn’t friendly.
A tall older man with a full head of white hair was discreetly monitoring him. He was dressed in khaki shorts, a sleeveless white shirt, and aviator sunglasses.
He looked like any other tourist that frequented this small seaside resort. Except for the way he was tracking Garrett’s every movement .
On impulse, Garrett stalked to the opposite end of the plaza, taking out his phone.
The man was smooth, concealing his interest behind those aviators. But Garrett had been taught surveillance detection techniques by the best. He knew when he was being surveilled by a professional.
If Rainer was surprised to get a call from him when he was less than a hundred yards away, he didn’t show it.
“Don’t look at me or make it obvious in any way, but do you recall Emma’s description of the man who scared her? That insurance investigator?”
Across the plaza, Rainer turned his back, facing Ian and Elias to include them in the conversation. “She told George he was tall with white hair.”
“Hmm,” he murmured.
“Are you thinking what I’m thinking—flowered shirt in the café?”
Garrett shrugged for the white-haired man’s benefit, but he continued in a low voice. “Fletcher had a fixer of some kind. He mentioned him in the recording. He said he’d done something to break me and Emma up. But that it blew up in his face.”
“The fake insurance investigator was meant to apply pressure,” Rainer said, catching on. “He told her that as long as she was living with you, they would suspect her of insurance fraud because she couldn’t afford to live in that building.”
“And instead of letting her find a new place to live, I married her, ensuring she didn’t go anywhere. Fletcher’s plan to separate us failed.”
Ian’s voice was low, but he was standing right next to Rainer, so Garrett heard him through the receiver. “We can’t be sure that’s the same guy.”
“Test,” he muttered. “Walk in his direction, the three of you. Gamma formation.”
The maneuver was one they’d practiced with the Auric team. It was just three men walking… but with extreme prejudice. Garrett knew from experience that seeing that wall of muscle bearing down at you was one of the more intimidating experiences in life.
His friends did menace very well .
But the man in the flowered shirt was a very cool customer. He saw the guys coming and rose nonchalantly, grabbing a leather satchel at his feet as he did.
The white-haired man could have been sauntering in a garden for all the emotion he showed. He didn’t make a mistake. Not until he looked up and saw Garrett standing in his path.
Their suspect had kept his eyes on what he perceived to be the bigger threat, his three well-trained friends. Little did he know the biggest threat was him.
He’d taken advantage of the man’s distraction to cut off his escape route.
“Hello, Inspector Folsom,” Garrett said, grabbing his arm. “I believe you’ve met my wife.”
For one long moment, Folsom didn’t react. He simply stared at Garrett, nothing in his expression to give himself away.
Garrett had been expecting a denial—not the telescoping baton the older man whipped out, attacking without wasting time on protests.
He blocked the overhand blow, but Folsom was already running. Pivoting, he gave chase, pounding after his quarry.
He was at least fifty yards ahead of the other guys. Garrett ran for all he was worth, chasing Folsom through a warren of tiny streets. But the slippery older man knew the area better, cutting through the less touristic parts of town before bursting onto a flagstone-lined walkway crammed between two buildings.
Folsom was spry for his age, but Garrett was younger and faster. He grabbed the white-haired man by the shoulder, spinning him around.
The fake insurance investigator managed to twist away. But he knew he wasn’t going to get away now. He did the only thing that could give him any sort of leverage—he took a hostage.
“Come here,” Folsom yelled in English, snatching up the closest person to them—a small boy who’d been sitting on the ground with his back against the wall separating the walkway from a steep drop into the ocean.
Small colorful packages of Chiclets went flying— the boy must have been selling them. The child screamed, a high piercing sound that penetrated his eardrums like a stiletto.
Garrett flinched as Folsom pivoted and held the child in front of his chest like a human shield.
Fuck. He was still alone, the lack of footsteps telling him the others had taken a wrong turn.
He put up his hands. “I don’t have a weapon,” he lied, acutely aware of the knife strapped to his utility belt. “Let the kid go.”
Folsom looked him dead in the eye. “I didn’t do anything wrong. It was just a job—scare your girlfriend so she’d move out. That was it. I didn’t hear from Fletcher again until he called me last night, asking me to get him papers so he could get out of the country under a new name. I came to deliver them, but he didn’t answer.”
He lowered the boy a fraction to check his reaction.
Garrett narrowed his eyes, recognizing the lie for what it was.
Fletcher had called this man to fix his problems. But Folsom must have smelled the desperation on his former partner. Garrett was willing to bet that the bag Folsom was holding had been packed by Fletcher—and held a hell of a lot of cash.
“Let me guess,” Garrett began, keeping his hands up. “He was dead when you got there.”
Folsom, or whatever his name was, knew no one was buying his story.
Garrett could see the moment of decision in his eyes. No !
He was already moving when Folsom hurled the boy over the edge of the rampart.
The sound that came out of his mouth was so loud his ears didn’t process it. Garrett lunged after the kid, who was screaming bloody murder.
His hand grazed the child’s fingers… and he missed .
The bottom of his chest felt like it had fallen out. Until he realized that while the child disappeared over the edge, the high-pitched screaming continued.
Garrett slammed against the waist-high wall of the rampart, looking over the edge even as Folsom’s running footsteps signaled his escape. He didn’t consider going after him. His only thought was for the child, who was still crying out.
The cliffside here sloped down at an angle. The kid had slid down but managed to find a foothold in the patchy earth. His little brown hand was clutching a clump of weeds half a story down.
“Garrett!” Rainer was sprinting to him.
“Over here,” he yelled back, swinging a leg over the lip of the waist-high wall.
“What the hell are you doing?” Rainer slammed his hands on the rough concrete edge of the barrier.
“Do you have rope?” he asked.
“No, I don’t,” his friend panted. “Maybe the others do, but we split up when we lost sight of you.”
Then he couldn’t wait. No longer wasting time on words, he used careful handholds and every trick he’d learned in Auric’s climbing gym to make his way down to the kid.
He ignored the yawning void at his back, calculating their odds if they plunged down to the picture-perfect blue ocean below.
“ Va estar bien ,” he said, trying to reassure the boy, who was startled enough at his use of Spanish to stop crying. “ Aggarate de mí .”
Reaching out, he snagged the child’s arm just as a black rope dropped onto his head. He looked up, silently thanking Rainer and Ian who had just appeared above him.
Leaning forward to hug the wall, he tied the rope into a swing, working it around himself and the little boy. Then he nodded to the pair above him, letting them pull him up, using his free hand and booted feet to help as best he could.
When they reached the top, the little kid broke away, running as far from them as he could.
“Wait,” Rainer called after him, picking up the discarded box of gum and chasing after him.
Knowing his friend, the kid would be caught and paid handsomely for every Chiclet pack. He turned his attention to the remaining man.
“Did you catch Folsom?”
Ian shook his head. “We caught up just in time to see him toss the kid over. I doubled back for one of the bags of gear, expecting to have to trek back to Fletcher’s for it. But Juan Carlos was on our heels. He handed over one of our packs.”
“And Elias?” He hadn’t seen the other member of their quartet in a few minutes.
“The three of us separated a few streets back because we didn’t know which turn you’d made—he’s still looking,” he said, holding up his cell phone. “Rainer spotted you and Folsom first. I was one street over but came when I heard the kid yelling.”
A few minutes later Elias tracked them down, sweaty but not out of breath—a testament to his fine conditioning. “I think Folsom had a boat out here. Juan Carlos’ men saw one departing from one of the little piers fishermen use about half a mile down the waterline.”
“Are they sure it was him? Do they still have it in sight?”
He shook his head. “It was going fast and no, they didn’t see who was on it. We’re sending out boats in pursuit. And Juan Carlos is still looking on land, tapping his local network of informants.”
But hours later, they had nothing to show for their search. The small armada of boats they assembled found nothing as well.
Folsom was in the wind.
Dusk was falling when Garrett threw in the towel. “Let’s get the hell out of here,” he told the others. “We’ll let your contacts continue the search and take Fletcher’s body for an autopsy. We’ll see what the exam says about the cause of death.”
In the meantime, his wife was waiting for him.