“Just pulling into Heron Air Service at Dulles. Traffic sucked even heading out of town. What about you?”
She quickly explained to him what she had done and where she was. She fingered the flash drive.
“I’m going to take the rental car we left here and see Edgar. Maybe he can find some stuff on the flash that will make sense.”
“Good idea. I’ll join you as soon as I can.”
Michelle clicked off.
Sean put his phone down just about the time the gun was placed against his head.
CHAPTER
70
PERIPHERAL VISION. IT WAS A necessity for many jobs.
NFL quarterbacks had to have it so they wouldn’t be crushed by charging defenders.
Basketball referees needed it to cover all the goings-on around the court.
And Secret Service agents needed it to prevent harm from coming to their protectees and themselves.
Sean saw the gun and eyed the person holding it all without moving his head.
His elbow hit the horn, and the sound shattered the relative morning quiet around the airport. At the noise the gunman’s hand flinched just a bit, but it was enough to give Sean the space he needed to do what he did next.
He grabbed the man’s shirt and jerked him forward.
His head collided with the hard metal of the Land Cruiser’s door frame. Blood spattered on Sean along with bits of a tooth from the man’s mouth; then the gunman slumped down to the asphalt.
Sean already had the vehicle in gear and the wheels spinning. He punched the gas to the floor, and the truck shot out of the parking lot. He looked in the side mirror and saw the man slowly get to his feet and stagger sideways before falling down again.
It wasn’t Jenkins. It was someone else.
“Shit,” Sean muttered. He’d been spotted. That did not bode well for anyone he cared about, particularly Tyler and Kathy.
He got on the phone and called Michelle. He talked as he drove, filling her in.
“I never saw the guy until the last second. It was my screwup.”
She said, “I distracted you with my call.”
“I can chew gum and talk at the same time,” he snapped. “At least I used to be able to,” he added darkly.
“Should we tell Wingo?”
“No, he’s already close to going off the deep end. This will send him there for certain.”
“So what now?”
“I’ll meet you at Edgar’s. Hopefully, he can flesh out some of the computer files for us so we can get a direct line on these bastards before it’s too late.”
An hour later Sean pulled to a stop in front of Edgar’s farmhouse. The skies had partially cleared and the sun was doing its best to poke through the clusters of gray clouds. He noted that Michelle’s rental vehicle was already there. He would have expected no less with the way she drove. He touched the hood of her car as he passed. It wasn’t even warm. She’d been here awhile, probably smoked her wheels the whole way. And never gotten a ticket. He shook his head and kept going.
He knocked and then walked into the house.
Michelle was hunched over Edgar’s shoulder as he was gazing at his multiple screens on his plywood desk.