Long Road to Mercy (Atlee Pine, #1)(26)

The convertible top was beyond repair, but Stark had located a company that did replacements, and Pine had worked side by side with Stark to install it. Then there were new tires and rims, chrome front and back bumpers, new lights all around, refurbished grille and dashboard, parchment leather seats back and front, and a ton of elbow grease and more money than Stark really wanted to spend. However, Pine felt that the vet agent, a widower and childless, just wanted to do something to fill in a life that had become permanently lonely and would become infinitely more so once he handed in his badge. Since Pine had been equally lonely, it had been a good match. They could work together for hours and even days without saying much more than, “Will you pass me that wrench?” or “Grab me a cold beer.”

The initial bit of volunteerism had stretched into nearly two years. Stark had retired a month after they completed the project, and Pine was being reassigned at the same time. But before she left they had taken a long ride in the fully restored Mustang. Stark had let her take the wheel on the way back and she had opened it up on the highway, letting the four carbs of the big block ooze power all over the asphalt as they shot like a rocket down the road.

They had already decided that if they were stopped by the cops, they would use their FBI badges to get off. The federal agents decided they were entitled to one get-out-of-jail-free card.

With the top down and the wind ripping through her hair and the speedometer at nearly 120, it had been the best feeling Pine had had in years. She’d truly felt wonderful. If Stark hadn’t been thirty years her senior and crotchety as hell, she might have, in her euphoria, planted a kiss on him.

Unfortunately, a month after Pine had left for her new assignment Stark had died from a heart attack. He’d been found in his garage, slumped over in a chair, a socket wrench on the floor, apparently where it had dropped from his hand when he died.

Pine had been stunned to learn that in his will Stark had left her the title to the car. She had gone to retrieve it, and the Mustang had traveled with her to every assignment thereafter.

When she’d relocated, she’d driven it out west. Rather than keep it at her apartment when she was transferred to Shattered Rock, she’d kept it here, where it was protected from the sun and certain predators on two legs. She still had nightmares about somebody carjacking the vintage ride and then rolling it.

It was the only thing really that she had ever owned. Every time she drove it, she realized how much work had gone into restoring it. This represented two years of her life. It was the longest personal commitment she had ever made. Far longer than she had ever committed to a personal relationship.

She ran her hand along one fender and thought back to Stark, who was wise beyond his years, no doubt yearning for a daughter he would never have, until Pine had shown up for work one day only a year removed from busting her butt at Quantico.

He’d been a good friend, maybe the only true one she’d made at the Bureau, or maybe anywhere else.

He’d told her once, as they were installing the single Holley four-barrel carburetor, that the Bureau had really been his life. Except for restoring old cars.

He’d wiped his hands on an old rag, taken a sip of beer from a plastic cup, and eyed her from under tufted white brows. “Don’t make that mistake, Pine,” he’d growled. “Don’t let this be it for you.”

She’d ratcheted down the last bolt on the carb and glanced up at him.

“How do you know it was a mistake?” she’d asked.

“If you have to ask, you haven’t learned shit from this whole thing.”

As if restoring the Mustang was a whole thing other than simply putting an old car back together.

And maybe it was. And maybe Pine had gotten it. But that didn’t mean she would ever do anything about it.

She put the cover back on the car and was heading up the stairs to her office when her phone buzzed.

It was her IT buddy in Salt Lake City.

“You got anything?” she asked as she emerged in the hallway leading to her office.

“I do, but it’s strange.”

“This whole case is strange. What do you have?”

“There have been lots of people who accessed that website over the last few months. I couldn’t track them all down, but there was one that stood out.”

“Which one?”

“I recognized one of the IP addresses” was his surprising reply.

“How could you have done that?” she asked.

“Because it was yours, Atlee.”

“I know that,” she said impatiently. “I went on the site recently to check it out. So did my assistant. She’s the one who told me about it.”

“I knew that was your address from when you contacted me. But when I checked out things further, I noticed some funny lines of code in the mix, so you might want to have the FBI geek squad check your computers.”

“Why?”

“Because I think you might have been hacked.”





Chapter

14



COFFEE, AGENT PINE?”

Pine had just entered her office when Blum greeted her.

The older woman was dressed, as always, in a highly professional manner. Skirt, jacket, pumps, hose, minimal jewelry, and a bit less makeup than normal.

Pine absentmindedly nodded and walked on to her office.