Barefoot with a Stranger (Barefoot Bay Undercover #2)(86)

He could remember the road clearly. They were probably passing the Navy Lodge Hotel with that pit of a bar called Windjammer. Or Cockjammer. Gabe used to call it that because of the distinct lack of women inside. Then the Navy Exchange. Walmart for sailors.

It was like Little America in the heart of Cuba, flanked by guard towers manned by some of the best snipers in the business. Not American snipers—Castro’s snipers, making sure none of the locals made it over the “border” and got into Gitmo safely.

The van slowed, he figured because they approached the main shack, an aluminum deal that used to be armed with rotating National Guardsmen armed with M16s and a few nine-millimeter pistols. Was it still? And would they search the van or let it through? Back in the day, they’d have searched.

But now, Gitmo was essentially a holding tank. And he had to hope they didn’t care about a secretary coming back to her office.

Sweat trickled down his temples and stung his eyes. It had to be a hundred degrees, even at night, in his hot box, but it wasn’t the heat or the pain of a bullet graze that had Mal sweating.

He was a convicted embezzler who, anyone who worked here believed, had siphoned off half a million dollars from the US government. Shoot on sight? Maybe not, but they’d throw his ass in a cell for trespassing a place he had no clearance to be.

But Mal didn’t care. He had to find Chessie.

If that * hurt her, if he so much as touched a hair on her head… Mal squeezed her glasses, still clutched in his hand, as the van came to a stop. He had to give them to her and hold her again. He had to do whatever was necessary to save her and…keep her.

Maybe he would let Gabe make up a new life for him. But she’d need one, too. And they’d have to live far from her family, and she would never do that.

Not even for him.

Maybe for him.

Had he lost his mind?


Though surrounded by metal, he could hear the exchange between Alana and the guard. A gruff, unfriendly man asking typical questions even though he had to know her. And Alana answering, light and quick, lying like a pro he knew she was. Not CIA, but damn good…unless her kids were in physical danger. Then she crumbled.

Finally, the van moved, and he closed his eyes, remembering the layout of the employee parking lot. She drove north, toward the admin offices. Camp Delta was off to the east, nearly empty now. He knew every cell in the place.

Camp No was just outside the northern perimeter, but still on American soil. In there was the CIA facility commonly known as Penny Lane, where so much torture had taken place. And beyond that, in the darkest, farthest corner of the deepest secret in Gitmo, was the small group of cells he had guarded in his undercover role, where Gabe had lured terrorists to the other side, and where Roger Drummand had called the shots.

The van came to a halt, sudden and sharp, jerking his shoulder right into the iron wall that surrounded him. He sucked in a breath and touched the dried blood stuck to the wound. He was probably covered in blood, which made him hope to hell no one was around when he tried to get into wherever the hell she was taking him.

Hurry, Alana.

As if she’d read his mind, the back door of the van lifted up with a squeak, and she opened the hot box.

“I came around to the far side of admin,” she said. “No one is here, and I can get in the back door.”

He urged her toward the building. “Come on. I’m a blood-covered sitting duck out here. Where will he go?”

“My office.”

“And he’ll take Chessie there, because he probably knows damned well she has the ability to hack into a bank account.”

“She doesn’t have your fingerprint or password.”

“She doesn’t need either one.” They entered a dimly lit hall, a good fifty feet of offices away from the admin headquarters where Alana worked.

At the door of a kitchenette he gave her a nudge inside. “You’re staying here,” he told her, starting off.

“Mal! Wait!” She ripped a corner of a paper towel hanging on the wall and grabbed a pen from a cup on the counter. “The original account. Drummand’s account. If you ever get into it…” She scribbled something on the paper towel and shoved it into his hand. “Here’s the password.”

He took the paper, then checked to make sure the SIG’s safety was off and stuck the Glock from Ramos in the back of his jeans.

“Don’t leave this room,” he said as he left and headed down the hall, stopping at the door with Alana’s name on it. He pressed his ear and listened, hearing nothing. No keys clicking. No talking. No nothing.

Very slowly, he turned the lock and opened the door, his weapon poised to fire.

The room was empty. A tidy office, an empty desk with a computer. He walked around to the screen, tapped a mouse to flicker it to life, picking up the last screen where she must have left it in a hurry.

Place finger on scanner to enter account.

His account? Of course, she’d gotten this far with Drummand and stopped because they needed his fingerprint.

Slowly, he touched his index finger to the small scanner next to the mouse.

Balance $523,694.58

Holy shit.

Could he do something with that money now? Move it? Transfer it to the government? Prove it came from Drummand? With this password Alana gave him, he might be able to.

He slid the tiny corner of paper towel under the edge of the keyboard and—