Chapter 4 #4
Cate removed the scarf from the bag and wound it around her neck, working the fabric between her fingers as methodically as she worked through a problem. “Brunner said that we shouldn’t have mentioned Alpenhorn in the building. He didn’t say we shouldn’t have mentioned it. He said in the building.”
“Like the building is a living, breathing being.” Draco nodded. “It has eyes and ears.”
“Yes,” Cate said. “I think he wanted to say something but couldn’t...not in the building.”
“He walked us to the door,” Draco said. “Just to tell us we shouldn’t have said that name.”
“That’s not something a man who didn’t want to help would do,” Cate commented. “He knew he couldn’t in the bank building where eyes and ears were taking in everything.”
“It’s as if he was telling you to ask him anything as long as it wasn’t there. You can ask him anywhere else that the walls aren’t listening.”
“Do you think he’ll try to contact us outside the building?” Cate asked.
“You didn’t give him your information,” Draco said.
Cate’s lips quirked.
Draco shook his head. “Or did you?”
Her lips spread in a grin. “I don’t make a living as a PI by walking away from a potential informant without leaving him some way to contact me.”
With a glance down at her, Draco frowned. “How? You don’t have any business cards. You don’t have a passport or any kind of identification. I was with you the entire time. I know you didn’t whisper anything I didn’t hear.”
“When my father handed me the burner phone and told me the number, I wrote it on a piece of paper napkin at the restaurant and tucked it into my pocket.”
A flashback of Cate insisting on shaking Brunner’s hand raced through his memory. “You handed it to him when you made him shake hands with you.”
When her cell phone chirped in her pocket, Cate’s eyes widened.
“You don’t think...” She jammed her hand into her pocket, pulled out the phone, and stared down at the screen.
“Unknown number.” Without hesitating, she received the call, put it on speakerphone, and held it between them, her gaze locked with Draco’s. “Hello.”
“Frau Marsh,” a voice said in a hushed, yet unmistakably British-accented voice. Brunner. “You should not have come to the bank. Since you did, you need to listen carefully.”
“I’m listening,” she said.
“I have a family—a wife and two children. I have not slept in over a week. If I’d said anything at the bank, in my office today, I’d be dead by the next day, if not sooner.” He breathed raggedly. “Who am I kidding? I’m already a dead man. So...”
Draco held his breath and Cate’s gaze.
“Tonight,” the banker said. “We meet somewhere I can see all exits, where there are people around us. I will tell you what I know, those I know are involved, what I moved into which accounts and something I should have handed over to the police long ago.” He paused.
“Come alone. No police. No Interpol. Just you.”
Draco shook his head vehemently. No way would he let her meet with Brunner alone.
Cate gave him a brief nod. “I’ll only come if I bring my man—the man I’m traveling with. That’s not negotiable.”
“The one who came with you today? The one who watches the doors?” Brunner asked.
“Yes,” Cate said with a slight smile. “He’ll stay back and stay quiet, but he comes with me or I don’t come at all.”
A shaky breath sounded on the phone and then, “Very well.” Another breath, steadier this time. “I will text the location. We will meet at nine o’clock.”
“We’ll be there,” Cate assured him.
“Frau Marsh,” Brunner’s voice dropped to barely above a whisper.
Cate and Draco leaned closer to hear his words.
“Do not say the name Alpenhorn to anyone, on any phone, in any building. And don’t say it to your friends. And for the love of God, don’t say it to your father.”
Cate frowned but didn’t say anything.
“And don’t say it to anyone in the US State Department.”
The call ended abruptly.
Cate lowered the phone, still staring at it, her brow furrowed.
As if coming up for air, she raised her head and met Draco’s gaze.
A trolley rolled past on the next street. People moved along the sidewalks. A horn honked, and the scent of baking bread drifted past Draco’s nose.
The city continued to bustle. People went to work, shopped for groceries and lived their lives despite the dire warnings imparted in that one phone call.
“He said State Department.” Cate stared at Draco, a frown denting her forehead. “His list of who not to tell included the State Department.”
Draco nodded. “He did.”
“My father works for the State Department,” she said softly.
“Brunner may not know your father is a member of the State Department,” Draco said. “He lumped him in with friends and anyone.”
Cate lifted the end of the scarf and worked it with her fingers. “The State Department made his list. How much more specific could he have gotten? My father works for the State Department.”
“As did Marcus Calloway.”
“And who else?” Cate whispered, her hands moving over the scarf.
Draco reached out and took her hands in his, squeezing them gently. “We find out. Tonight.”