Chapter 10
Despite the questions that had been burning in her mind for the rest of the drive, Abigail had managed to stay silent. Not quite as silent as the Marshal in the fourth seat but he was unnervingly so—she’d had the audacity to cough a few times and even ask for an update on their arrival time once or twice while he had kept his gaze fixed on the passing scenery.
The second they pulled to a stop outside a nondescript office building, he all but launched himself out of the car. Abigail couldn’t blame him; in fact, she was a little jealous of his ability to make himself scarce when she was stuck walking between the brothers as she didn’t know where she was going.
The drab walls of the building were occasionally punctuated with windows shuttered by blinds, plaques for vague consultancies, and CCTV cameras with their associated warning signs.
Abigail walked in time with Byron and John, hoping to catch a word or two but they stayed as silent as ever. The Marshal who had powered ahead was waiting for them in front of a door emblazoned with a sign for Clarke Consultancy, with By Appointment Only underlined on the brass plate.
He rang the bell and, immediately, a female voice answered.
“Do you have an appointment?”
“Yes,” he replied, “Mr. Abercrombie for three thirty- seven.”
A loud buzzing noise preempted a series of metallic clicks, and Abigail realized she was hearing a seriously secure door unlocking.
The Marshal gestured for them to head on in, and she looked to Byron to see if there was any sign she shouldn’t listen. Not that she was entirely sure what she would do if he told her to run; these guys were law enforcement.
He gave her an almost invisible nod of reassurance.
With a little bit of her hating that she had looked to him for reassurance like she was a child and just a little less liking that he had recognized her glance for what it was, Abigail stepped through the door into the poorly lit office. As the door swung closed, three suited people rushed towards them. John stepped forward and held up his hand.
“I know, I know, but what was I going to do? Let them walk up and bang on the door?”
The oldest of the men who had rushed at them stopped with a look of utter disdain on his face, “Oh, and that fact that it’s him had nothing to do with your decision?”
“No, actually,” John said calmly, “my decision was based on the fact that they showed up out of the blue and were looking for seventeen—found it too.”
Glaring, the two men stood apart from each other silently as the other marshals stopped and seemed to wait for instructions.
“Fine,” the older guy said, “but this is not done and dusted.”
He turned on his heel and retreated down the hallway. Abigail could just about see now that her eyes had adjusted from the bright day outside.
John’s shoulders sagged as he turned to Byron.
“So, you remember what comes next?”
She looked to Byron and saw him take a long, drawn-out breath.
“Yup, looking forward to it.”
A nervous laugh escaped her and both men looked towards the sound.
“You make it sound like he’s going to be tortured…”
A new voice joined the fray. “I think he probably does consider it torture, yes.”
The newcomer was a woman in her late fifties or early sixties. A neat suit and well-worn leather shoes matched her no-nonsense countenance.
“I’ll be back soon,” Byron said, brushing his hand along her upper arm and sending a shiver along her spine in the process.
Pushing away the fleeting thought, ‘What the heck is wrong with me?’ Abigail was able to give him a small smile and nod. She watched him walk down the corridor and enter an office with the woman. As soon as the door closed, she heard raised voices but couldn’t make anything out.
“Shall we?” John indicated for her to also head down the hallway.
“Why? You gonna scream at me like you don’t know the door isn’t soundproof?”
To her surprise, John laughed, “she does like people to be afraid of her. No, I’m not going to yell at you.”
“You wouldn’t want to,” she replied, unsure as to where her attitude towards this guy had come from.
“I bet…”
As they walked past the door Byron had gone through, Abigail slowed and tried to hear what was happening behind it.
“…a civilian to a safe house? Without clearance! What are you working on that could possibly justify such a stupid move!?”
“… —dn’t know it was a safe house… not working on anyth—”
“Stop eavesdropping,” John said with a smirk.
“Stop interrupting my eavesdropping with your moralizing,” she replied.
John gestured to the open door across the hall from the room Byron was in and Abigail rolled her eyes as she complied.
“Take a seat,” he said, pulling a file out of a wire basket on the wall and sitting down on the far side of the table.
“Interrogation?” she asked.
“Debrief.”
“Oh, you’re going to debrief me, are you?” Abigail raised her eyebrows and gave him her strongest glare.
“Hilarious, never heard it before. You should do standup,” John said in a droll monotone, “now, why are you sending my brother an obscene amount of money every month?”
The calm mask had settled in place again and it was somehow just as disconcerting as it had been every other time she had seen it snap into place.
“I hardly think it’s obscene…”
John raised his eyebrows.
“It’s market value for what he does,” she said, trying not to let his expression get to her.
“And what service, exactly, does he perform for you that warrants monthly bank transfers?”
Abigail felt her face fall. “Don’t be crass, and don’t act like you don’t know! You’ve clearly, somehow, looked at my bank records, so you must be able to figure out what it’s for with your massive intellect.”
She watched to see if he’d react but stayed infuriatingly neutral. Eventually, she let out an exasperated sigh.
“He’s basically my gardener,” she said. “As you know, I inherited the house in Rhode Island from my parents. I couldn’t handle looking after it, so I hired a local guy to keep it tidy and make sure it wasn’t falling apart.”
John watched her carefully as she answered before leaning forward and leaning his elbows on the table.
“So, you regularly accompany your gardeners to strange cities and share hotel rooms with them?”
“What did I say about being crass?” Abigail shot back, “We got mugged—again, I can’t imagine you don’t know that—and didn’t have the ability to book anything else. We were lucky that the hotel even had a room to give us after they’d given away the two singles I’d pre-paid for.”
“Mm,” John said, steepling his fingers, “and why didn’t you get separate rooms when his favorite ghoul started to bankroll you?”
“Peta isn’t a ghoul,” Abigail said defensively, “she’s just … a bit weird.”
She paused, though, why hadn’t they gotten separate rooms? Abigail knew Peta had offered to pay for whatever they needed until their banks got sorted out.
“A bit weird? She’s a certifiable genius and she chooses to dig around in dead bodies all day…”
“Gross, don’t put it like that! Being a medical examiner is hard and important,” Abigail said—was he trying to unsettle her?
“Yes, well,” John said, “still doesn’t explain why you and my brother chose to continue sharing a room if he’s your… gardener. But then again, he isn’t your gardener anymore, is he?”
“What do you mean?”
John turned the topmost document in the file to face her. It was her bank statement.
“The payments stopped suddenly a few months ago. Why?”
But they hadn’t stopped, she thought, picking up the paper to read it more closely, I kept paying him because I’m too awkward to ask if it’s weird…
“I—don’t know, I didn’t do anything to stop them,” she said aloud, “why do you even care what your brother does for work?”
He withdrew the statement from her and replaced it back in the file, “You need to explain yourself—you pay my brother thousands of dollars over a decade, suddenly stop paying him, and show up unannounced—delivered by a chauffeured vehicle, no less—at a safe house with such a classified rating that they wouldn’t even confirm its existence before I arrived there physically.”
She glared, “How can they not admit somewhere exists while sending you to it?”
The tiniest twitch of his bottom lip showed her she had managed to break through, even just a little.
“Ma’am, have you heard of the United States Government?”
She felt her own lips want to smile at that but she resisted as best she could.
“Why have you been watching us? Invading my privacy? Have I done something that makes you think you need to investigate me?”
John sat back in his chair, “have you?”
“I can’t tell you if I’ve done something that makes you feel a certain way. That’s kind of up to you,” she replied.
What she hoped wasn’t written across her face was that, well, she kind of had been doing stuff that could cause the United States Marshals to look at her. She’d found a ton of stuff in a house she was reasonably certain had been used as a safe house. She’d spent a lot of time looking into various crimes and criminals in Newport, and had recently made two police reports—one to try and report Bee missing and one to report the mugging.
Abigail swallowed hard as he surveyed her.
Suddenly, the door burst open and Byron barreled through it.
“How dare you interrogate her?” he said, his voice low and growly, “anything she had said is off the record and inadmissible.”
“Why would I need to submit anything she’s said?” John asked with a self-satisfied smirk.
“I wouldn’t put anything past you,” Byron replied.
Abigail opened her mouth to speak but gave up when she realized neither of them would listen, even if they heard her through their glaring anger.
“I didn’t answer anything,” she said, “he wouldn’t answer my questions either.”
“I don’t have to answer your questions, and in many cases, I’m legally bound from doing so,” John exclaimed, his exasperated tone surprising her.
Something in the exchange broke the tension in the room and John turned away while Byron pressed his hands over his face.
“Can we please sit down and have a civil conversation now that the principal has royally dressed you down?”
Byron shrugged and nodded, coming to sit next to Abigail at the table.
“What led you to this address? You need to explain yourself,” John said, “It looks really bad—an ex-marshal showing up to a live safe house with a civilian.”
The way he looked over to her before answering made her heart leap. He was asking permission to tell her story. She nodded.
“We found some documents in her father’s old study,” Byron said, “one thing led to another, and the name of someone she wanted to talk to about an old friend was listed in one of the documents with that address next to his name.”
“What was the name?” John said quickly.
“Henry Whittaker,” Abigail supplied.
John scrawled something on a sheet of note paper, rose from his seat, opened the door, and handed the scrap to someone waiting in the hallway.
“Why do you think your father had this person’s name and that address?”
Abigail shifted uncomfortably, “well, honestly—”
“Honesty is preferred,” John interrupted, “I’m not asking you this stuff to get you in trouble. I’m asking you because lives could be at risk.”
“I understand that,” she said bitterly, “and honestly—after finding some of this stuff—I began to suspect that my family home had been used as a safe house for witness protection. There was security no one needs domestically, a suspiciously large record of criminal visitors, most of whom disappeared or apparently died shortly after. It was kind of a leap... but...”
“Not that much of a leap,” John said, sighing, “okay, I’m going to need more details, but from what I know and what I’ve been cleared to discuss with you—yes. Your house was a safe house for people in transit under witness protection, but it hasn’t been used in a decade. There’s no listed reason why, but I’m assuming it’s because—”
He broke off and looked guilty all of a sudden.
“Because my parents finally died and no one thought to check to see if they’d told me about it?”
“Pretty much,” John said, “sorry for the... uh, loss. Byron, I have to go talk to Claire—you want to come?”
“Sure,” Byron said, rising before gently resting a heavy hand on Abigail’s shoulder and squeezing reassuringly, “I’ll be back soon.”
Abigail nodded and strained to hear their conversation as they exited the room and walked off down the hall. She could just about hear John, but couldn’t catch anything Byron was saying.
“So,” John said from the distance, “she’s how Rhode Island worked out for you, huh? Helluva assignment, brother.”
Her stomach twisted. Assignment? What assignment?