Cloud Dust: RD-1 (R-D #1)(48)
*
Corinne
"Cori," August laid a folder on the kitchen island next to me. I was making a grilled cheese sandwich for dinner, with tomato soup. Everybody else was lined up at the makeshift cafeteria over the garages.
"I thought you were going to send me digital images."
"This is how these arrived, and it was faster to run them down here than to wait for James to scan them."
"Gotcha. Where did they come from?" I dumped my grilled cheese onto a plate and lifted a photograph.
"Rafe."
"I'll look now. Want a sandwich?"
"Got ham?"
"Yeah."
He ate a club sandwich while I studied photographs Rafe had taken in Dublin.
"This looks familiar," I said, selecting one of the eight-by-tens and holding it up.
"He says it's a cab driver."
"Yeah. I can see that. This guy was only partially in that last photograph, wasn't he?"
"I wondered if you'd notice that."
"I'm noticing now."
"What can you tell me? Anything?"
"He's not above taking money for not-so-legal activities."
"Will he tell where he picked up and dropped off Ms. Evans?"
"He'd better. Just be warned, he may not live long afterward."
"Will that be a bad thing?"
"Not necessarily. He has some blood on his hands."
"You think someone is watching him?"
"I can't say for sure without seeing them."
"Got it. I'll make sure the information is passed along."
"Thanks."
*
Ilya
"I don't squeal."
The cabbie spoke through swollen and split lips. I'd had to work him over after catching him—he didn't want to cooperate.
"Fair enough. I'll just kill you and toss your body into the Liffey. I'm sure nobody will be surprised that you ended up there."
"Wait," he mumbled. "If I tell you, will you let me go?"
"Sure. I'll let you go," I said. "Just tell me about the woman."
*
Corinne
"Cori, can you give me a reason to arrest this guy and keep him in jail?" August was back, only this time, he stood behind me as I sat at my computer and scanned the latest chapter in my book.
"He killed his wife. She's buried in a wooded area," I said.
"Can you tell me where?" August suddenly held his breath—hoping, I'm sure, that I could tell him exactly what he wanted to know.
"Let me pull up a map on my other monitor—may as well justify the expense, huh?" I said and typed in the information needed. It only took a few seconds, after which I pointed to a spot not far from the American Ambassador's residence.
"Are you f*cking kidding?" he hissed.
I switched to a satellite version of the map and enlarged it as much as I could. "There, in these trees," I said.
"Can you print that map for me?" August was all business, suddenly.
"Yeah." I printed the image, made a circle on it and handed it to him.
"I'll get on the phone right away. If this is true," August walked out of my suite, mumbling to himself.
*
Ilya
The cabbie was arrested by the locals the moment he walked out of the old warehouse. I'd let him go, as promised. The Garda was instructed to ignore the rope burns on his wrists and ankles, and the bruises and swelling on his face.
Corinne had come through for us, in a way I couldn't begin to understand. The body of the man's wife was found almost immediately; he hadn't hidden it very well. She'd been missing for five months. He said she was visiting relatives in Northern Ireland.
Somehow, my Cori had seen right through that. The information I received from the cabbie would send me to Edinburgh, and I had a flight scheduled the following morning, with a short layover in Manchester. That left little time to gather my things and get out of the safe house.
*
"Look, we need something to divert attention from our camp," Cutter explained.
"I have a target in mind already." Ted Ryan was more than pleased that Cutter approached him, and even happier that Cutter offered to provide funding and equipment for the endeavor. His militia needed new weapons and ammunition; working for Cutter provided a way to get those things.
"What's the target? I need to inform my associates."
"How about the capitol building in Sacramento?"
"You think you can pull that off? That would certainly be a coup," Cutter nodded with enthusiasm. "You have no idea how much I despise those people."
"We'll get it done. I'll need two million up front, though, and a quick trip for me and my boys to Canada immediately after."
"You got it."
*
Ilya
Half of Edinburgh Castle was destroyed by several bombs while I was in the air over Scotland. The news that the crown, first worn by James V and housed at the castle, had been taken during the bombing greeted me upon landing.
Nearly a hundred tourists were dead. More were wounded. I cursed the fact that I hadn't gotten on Mary Evans' trail earlier, and cursed those in the American government who'd held the photographs back from Corinne and me. If we'd been given that information only a few days earlier, this might have been avoided.