“Why did the woman in your office say that he was dead?”
“She was under my orders to. For Coburn’s protection.”
“Explain that, please.”
“He’s been in a very precarious situation down there. I couldn’t risk someone coming to suspect him of being an agent and calling an FBI office and weaseling out verification of it. So I put it through the bureau pipeline that he’d been killed while on assignment. It’s even in his service records in case a hacker gets into our system.”
“You’re the only person who knows he’s alive?”
“Me and my assistant who answered the phone.”
“And now me.”
“That’s right.”
“So if something happened to Coburn, any information that he’d passed along to me regarding Sam Marset and The Bookkeeper, or anything that I’d picked up inadvertently, would be extremely valuable to the FBI and the Justice Department.”
He answered with reluctance. “Yes. And Coburn is willing to place your life in jeopardy in order to safeguard that information. Tell me the truth. What have you got? What’s Coburn after?”
“Even I don’t know, Mr. Hamilton.”
She figured that he was questioning her veracity during the long silence that followed.
Then he asked, “Are you saying any of this under duress?”
“No.”
“Then help me get other agents to you. They’ll come in and pick up you and your daughter. You don’t have to fear any reprisal from Coburn. He won’t hurt you. I’d stake my career on that. But you need to be brought in so I can protect you. Tell me where you are.”
She held Coburn’s gaze for several long moments while her common sense waged war with something deeper, something elemental that she couldn’t even put a name to. It tugged at her to abandon her innate caution, to stop playing it safe, to forsake what she knew and to go with what she felt. The feeling was powerful enough to make her fear it. She feared it even more than she feared the man looking back at her with fierce blue eyes.
She went with it anyway.
“Didn’t you hear what Coburn told you, Mr. Hamilton? If you send other agents in after us now, you’ll never get The Bookkeeper.” Before Hamilton could respond, she returned the phone to Coburn.
He took it from her and said, “Too bad, Hamilton. No sale.”
“Have you brainwashed her?”
“Forty-eight hours.”
“Waterboarded?”
“Forty-eight hours.”
“Jesus Christ. At least give me a phone number.”
“Forty-eight hours.”
“All right, goddammit! I’ll give you thirty-six. Thirty-six, and that’s—”
Coburn disconnected and dropped the phone onto the bunk, then asked Honor, “Do you think this tub will float?”
Chapter 23
When Tom got home, Janice was deep into a word game on her cell phone. She didn’t even know he was there until he moved up behind her and spoke her name, then she nearly jumped out of her skin. “Tom! Don’t do that!”
“Sorry I startled you. I thought you would have heard me come in.”