Long Road to Mercy (Atlee Pine, #1)(59)

“Sort of feels like both,” mumbled Pine as she sat down on the toilet lid and took a long drink of the beer. Then she wrapped some of the ice from the tub into a washcloth and held it against her face.

“I’ll trade the second beer for the whole story,” said Blum, holding up the can.

Pine glanced up at her and finally nodded. “Sit down, it might take a while.”

Blum sat primly on the edge of the tub and looked at her expectantly.

Pine laid out for her what had taken place, from the moment she’d stepped inside Priest’s home to getting the crap kicked out of her and driving away afterward.

“He was the best I’ve ever seen,” said Pine. “Fought some pretty good ones. This guy was way out of my league.”

“But in the end, you bested him,” pointed out Blum.

Pine coughed, winced, put her beer down, and clutched at her side. “Doesn’t really feel like victory.”

She got up, opened the medicine cabinet, took out a bottle of Advil, downed four with a swallow of sink water, and resumed her seat.

Blum said, “This flash drive, have you opened it yet?”

Pine shook her head. “I’m just hoping there’s something in there that will help us.”

“Priest must have thought it pretty important, if he hid it away like that.”

“That’s what I’m counting on. Otherwise, there was zip at his house.”

“Can I make you something to eat?”

“I’m good. I just need to check the flash drive, and then I need some sleep. The ice is working. I can feel the swelling going down.”

Pine rose and gingerly walked into her bedroom after running hot water in the tub to empty out the ice. She dressed in sweats and ankle socks, and walked into the kitchen carrying her laptop and the flash drive. She still held the ice pack against her face.

Blum put a cup of hot tea down in front of her. “Peppermint. It’s good for anything that ails you.”

“You don’t get a buzz from peppermint.”

“It’s a different kind of buzz. Drink.”

Pine set down the ice pack, took a few sips from the cup, then opened her laptop and inserted the flash drive into the USB port.

She hit the requisite keys, and what was on the USB started to load on the screen. They both stared at the writing and blank box there.

“Shit,” exclaimed Pine. “Of course, it’s password protected.” She shook her head. “I got my ass kicked for this?”

“Can you figure out the password?”

“Maybe. If it’s something personal to Priest. But if it’s a random computer-generated password, you need a lot of computing power to break it.”

“Well, something will occur to us. Now, any idea who the two men at the house were?”

“No, but I have a way of checking.”

She took out her phone and dialed up the pictures she had taken of their weapons. “They don’t look like any pistols I’ve seen before. Hang on. I’m going to check this out online.”

Blum said warningly, “They already hacked us once. Can’t they track us through your computer?”

“They could if I weren’t using a variation of a VPN.”

“VPN?”

“Virtual Privacy Network. It’s like allowing your online footprint to be hidden in secure tunnels. The one I’m using is really top-grade. It allows me to use the Web virtually anonymously.”

Pine brought up a database of pistols. She scrolled down page by page, all the time glancing at the photos she’d taken. She stopped on one. “Damn.”

“What?”

“Hold on.”

Pine kept scrolling, and then stopped when she got to a photo that matched the other pistol. She looked up at Blum. “It’s no wonder I didn’t recognize them.”

“What do you mean?”

“One’s an MP-443 Grach. And the other’s a GSh-18.”

“Those surely aren’t American pistols. I’ve never heard of them.”

“No. They’re Russian. The Grach’s carried by the police, and the GSh by the military.”

Both women stared at each other for an uncomfortably long moment until Blum said matter-of-factly, “Well, of course the Russians are involved. They’re always the bad guys.”

“But why? And what does Moscow have to do with a dead mule in the Canyon?”

Neither one had an answer to that.

“You need to get some sleep, Agent Pine. You need to heal and rest. I have a strong feeling that you’ll need to be at your best.”

“I think we both will.”

Pine went to her bedroom and stripped off her clothes, because even the light, floppy sweats against her battered body hurt. She looked down at her oblique. There was a massive yellow-purplish bruise where the guy had walloped her. She felt along her leg to where he had applied the pressure with his finger to break her leg lock. Her limb was still tingling. He must have found a nerve there she didn’t even know she had.

She gingerly lay back in the bed with the ice pack still cemented to her face. In her other hand, she clutched her Glock.

She took several deep breaths, and the result was bruised ribs carping at her.

Pine closed her eyes and let her thoughts wander back to the two men in the house.