Mercy (Atlee Pine #4)(69)

“Yes, I saw it from out of my window.”

“And she didn’t contact you after you saw her last night?”

“No. I think you’re right. I don’t think she made it back to her room.”

“Anything unusual happen here last night?” asked the other agent, who had been introduced as Special Agent Neil Bertrand.

Blum glanced at him for a moment, her mind spinning rapidly. She did not want to tell the FBI about Mercy Pine having been in the hotel last night. But once they made inquiries, the agents would find out about the questions Pine had been asking the previous night.

“We were following up some leads, but nothing panned out,” she said, deciding to judiciously tell a semblance of the truth. She had been with the FBI for far too long to outright lie to two of its agents.

McAllister gave her the Bureau stare-down, which Blum handled with aplomb, having confronted it many times in the past.

“How long you been with the Bureau?” he asked coolly. When she told him, he said, “Yeah, I thought so.” He cracked a grin. “You’ve got all our numbers, right?”

“I just want to find Agent Pine.”

They went back downstairs, where McAllister and Bertrand methodically questioned the staff. They finally found one employee who was about to go off duty. He said he had seen a woman fitting Pine’s description leaving the hotel around ten that night with two men.

“Did it seem like she was being taken against her will?” asked McAllister.

“I don’t know,” said the man. “But they were real close to her. One guy actually had his arm around her waist. And she didn’t look very happy, now that I recall. But it’s not like she was screaming or anything.”

“Did you see if they got into a car?” asked Bertrand.

“No, I didn’t go outside.”

At that point McAllister called in the local police. The employee was given over to a sketch artist to provide a description of the two men. Security footage from the previous night was checked, but there was no sign of Pine on any of it. McAllister speculated that the men might not have been parked in the lot, but perhaps right in front of the hotel.

“But why would they have targeted her?” asked McAllister after they had finished with the local cops.

“I don’t know,” said Blum. She did explain about Dolores Venuti’s having been arrested, and having gone to see her in the detention facility. “Besides having enslaved a young girl, she apparently was running some sort of drug enterprise. These men might have been working for her as part of that.”

McAllister and Bertrand went to consult with the local cops about this possible lead, leaving Blum all alone in the lobby.

She walked around in a bit of a daze until she passed by the front desk. The clerk who had been on duty the previous evening walked into the lobby and spotted her.

“Ma’am?”

“Yes.”

“The guest you and your friend were looking for yesterday?”

Blum instantly tensed. “Yes?”

“She came back last night.”

“She did?”

“Yep. I recognized her. Eloise Cain. She sort of stands out. When I was driving in I saw her out jogging. When I pulled into the parking lot, she was going into the gym through the outdoor entrance.”

“Thank you so much.”

He smiled. “Hey, sorry we got off on the wrong foot. Where’s your agent friend?”

“I wish I knew,” said Blum. “How do I get to the gym?”

Praying with every step, Blum found the gym and approached the door. She peeked through the window and saw a very tall woman in a tank top and sweatpants lifting a stack of weights on the universal machine. Her muscles were taut and defined, and for a moment Blum thought she was staring at her boss minus the hair.

She used the key card to access the door. When it opened El Cain looked over at her. She seemed puzzled, because Blum was clearly not dressed for working out.

Blum thought for a moment about how best to handle this. Finally, she decided, in the urgency of the moment, that the direct approach was best.

“Mercy Pine? Your twin sister, FBI Special Agent Atlee Pine, has been kidnapped from this hotel, and I need your help to find her.”





CHAPTER





47


CAIN SLOWLY ROSE, TOWERING OVER BLUM, who had stepped a bit closer to her.

“Who in the hell are you?” said Cain.

“My name is Carol Blum. I work at the FBI. My boss is Atlee Pine, your twin sister. We’ve been trying to find you for a long time now.”

“I don’t have a sister, twin or otherwise.”

Blum took something from her purse and held it out to Cain, who snatched it and looked down at the photo. “That’s a picture that Agent Pine had of you and her and your mother when you were living in Andersonville, Georgia. It’s a Polaroid, the only one she had of you as sisters. I’ve been carrying it for her as we look for you.”

Cain’s gaze took in every aspect of the images. Things, murky elements in her memory, started to jostle back and forth, like bumper cars. The effect was as jarring as real bumper cars would be. “My mother?”

“Yes.”

“And this Atlee, you say she’s my sister?”