Christmas Justice (Carder Texas Connections #7)(29)

“Find him, Strickland. And kill him. No mistakes.” The phone call ended.

He grabbed the map from Krauss’s hand and smiled for the first time since he’d realized the McCallister woman had escaped the bomb. “We have a pointer to Galloway. Which means we have McCallister and the kid, too. They’re out in the middle of nowhere.”

“Easy to dispose of bodies out there. No one will ever find them.”

“Yeah.” Strickland stared down at his phone. Now if he could only find a way that he wouldn’t disappear either.

*

AT GARRETT’S BITING WORDS, Laurel’s hands froze above the computer keyboard. She winced and whirled her chair around. If she’d thought he might be glad she’d taken the initiative to use her skills, that notion vanished the moment she took in his tight jaw and narrowed gaze.

“I had an idea,” she protested. The niggling doubts that had skittered up her spine when she turned on the machine gnawed through her nerves. But what choice did they have?

“You’ve started the ticking clock.” His cheek muscles pulsed.

That she had an answer for. “The clock would have started anyway. We both know that. I just happened to control the start.”

“Explain.”

“I set up the signal to bounce all over the world. We’re on a ticking clock—like you wanted, but thirty-six hours from now. Maybe forty-eight.”

“How certain are you?”

“I wouldn’t play with Molly’s life like that. Or yours.”

He studied her expression, then finally nodded his head. “Then sit down in the damn chair and get us some information. You started this. Let’s see what your stint at the CIA can do for us.”

Garrett snagged a kitchen chair from the other room and flipped it around, sitting astride the hard wood. She let out a long, slow breath. She knew her business, but her nerves crackled at his constant stare. Leaning forward, she focused on the monitor.

Soon she lost herself in the task, following path after path. She didn’t know how long she’d been beating her head up against dead ends when a folder suddenly appeared.

Laurel stilled. “Look. The directory belongs to Ivy, but it’s not official.”

Garrett straightened in his chair. “Unauthorized?”

She nodded and clicked on the folder. It contained only one file. “It could be a trap.”

“You’ve been at this awhile. What’s your gut say?”

“To open it.”

“Then do it.”

She held her breath and double-clicked the file.

A password box came up.

“You know it?” Garrett asked.

“Maybe,” Laurel said. She typed in her sister’s anniversary.





Access denied.





Her children’s names.





Access denied.





Her birthday.





Access denied.





“One more shot and I’m locked out. I’ll have to start over,” Laurel said, rubbing her eyes. “I may not even get access to the file again.”

A long, slow breath escaped from Garrett. “You know your sister. Most of these passwords require at least one capital letter, one symbol and one number. And once you encrypt a file, if you forget the password, you’re screwed. She’d have to be able to remember it.”

Laurel drummed her fingers on the desk and sat back in the chair. She closed her eyes. “Ivy, what did you do?”

The room grew quiet, just the fan of the equipment breaking the silence.

Garrett didn’t chatter, didn’t interrupt her thoughts. She liked that about him. So many people didn’t know when to simply be quiet.

“I may have it.” She turned her head, meeting his gaze. “Ivy was older than me. She’d just started to date when Mom died. They had this special code. Even while Mom was in the hospital, she made Ivy promise to let her know if she was okay at nine o’clock. If there was trouble, there was a special message she’d leave on the pager.”

“What was the code?”

“Mom’s name, then nine-one-one, then an exclamation point. But if I’m wrong...”

“What do your instincts say?”

“That Ivy knew she was in danger and that she would pick something I knew.” Laurel kneaded the back of her neck, her eyes burning. “She knew there was trouble.”

“Do it.”

Laurel swerved around and placed her hands on the keyboard. She couldn’t make her fingers type in the password. What if she was wrong?

“Trust your gut.” Garrett placed his hand on her shoulder. “Do it.”

Laurel picked the keys out one at a time, taking extra care. Finally, she bit down on her lip and hit the enter key.

The machine whirred. The screen went blank.

“Please, no.” She half expected a message with red flashing lights and alarms to appear stating the file had been destroyed.

A few clicks sounded and the word-processing program sprang to life.

Ivy’s file opened. Laurel blinked. Then blinked again.

At the top of the file in bold letters were just a few words.