Dashing Through the Snow (3 page)

“Why not?”

“Because it's none of your business.”

Well, well, she certainly got put in her place. “Might I remind you I wasn't the one who asked to share this car.”

“That was my mistake,” he freely admitted.

They sat in silence for a couple of minutes before she asked, “Is your sister married?”

He diverted his gaze from the road and glared at her. “Why do you want to know?”

“I'm just making conversation.”

“Well, don't. My family is my business.”

“Okay, then. Sorry.”

Ashley crossed her arms and turned her head, looking out the side window. The silence felt strained and awkward. She'd rather they were trading insults than sitting in this uncomfortable silence. She reached for her large purse and held it open on her lap as she dug through it.

“What are you looking for?” he asked, as she started divesting her bag of several items. She set her money case to one side and then her makeup bag, followed by her nail file and fingernail clippers, apartment and car keys, and a small bag of tissues.

Dash's gaze followed her action. “What's in there that's so important?” he demanded.

“A protein bar.”

“You're hungry?”

“No, but I think you must be.” Thankfully, she had two.

He snorted as if he found her response nothing short of humorous. “Do you have a gauge that lets you know other people's hunger index?”

“You're cranky,” she explained, “and that's a good indicator. You didn't have breakfast, did you?”

“No,” he admitted grudgingly.

“It's almost time for lunch.”

He grumbled a reply: “And I'm not stopping.”

“Whatever,” she muttered back. She found what she was looking for and held it up triumphantly as she peeled back the wrapper and handed it to him.

He ignored her. “I'm not eating that.”

“Why not? It's perfectly good.” She took a bite of her own to prove her point and rubbed her tummy as if it was the most delicious thing she'd ever tasted. “Don't tell me you're too proud to admit you're hungry.”

“I. Am. Not. Cranky.” Each word was pronounced distinctly.

“So you say. Consider it a peace offering, if that makes a difference.”

Reluctantly he reached for the bar and bit off the first half in a single bite.

“You'll feel better,” she said, wanting to reassure him, pleased that he'd followed her advice.

“You're one of those women who takes delight in saying ‘I told you so,' aren't you?”

“Only when I'm right,” she said, grinning.

He snorted and finished off the bar and handed her the empty wrapper.

She waited a couple of minutes. “Feeling better?”

“Yes. Are you going to rub it in?”

“I could, but I won't. It's a long drive and it'd help if we got along. Agreed?”

“Yeah, I guess.”

That was a step in the right direction. They made good time and Ashley found herself dozing in the warm car, daydreaming—and she hated to admit this—about Dash. She wondered what it would be like if they kissed. When she stirred she was surprised to find that they'd been on the road nearly two hours.

“I could use a rest stop,” she said, seeing a road sign stating there was one just ahead.

“Okay. Did you enjoy your nap?”

Ashley stretched her arms and yawned. “I did.”

“Has anyone ever told you that you snore?”

“I most certainly do not.” She was insulted that he would even suggest such a thing.

He chuckled. “Wanna bet?”

“Yes, I wanna bet. I wasn't even fully asleep. I'd know if I snore, and I don't. You're saying that to get a rise out of me.”

She did her best to quell her indignation and glanced over to see that Dash was struggling to hold back a smile. Just as she suspected, he was teasing her and enjoying it. She smiled. “You're flirting with me.”

“What? By telling you I heard you snore?”

“Sounded like a flirt to me.”

He laughed as though he found her accusation ridiculous, but even as he denied it, he was smiling.

Dash exited the freeway and pulled into the rest area, angling the car into an empty parking slot.

Ashley opened the door and climbed out, stretching her arms above her head. A shiver ran down her spine. It was much colder outside than she'd expected.

Dash grabbed his coat and searched through his pockets, then tossed it back inside and bent over the front seat.

“What are you looking for?” she asked.

“My phone.”

“Did you lose it?”

“It's here,” he barked. “It's got to be. Did you take it?”

“Of course not.” It irritated her that he'd even suggest such a thing. “I have my own phone, remember?”

“I can't find it,” he complained.

“It has to be there,” she insisted, and wanting to help, she opened the passenger door on her side, looking on the floor.

“See anything?” Dash asked.

Ashley shook her head. “No.”

“What could have happened to it?” he asked.

Ashley shrugged. The last thing she remembered was seeing him slip it inside his coat pocket.

“You got a text, remember?”

He frowned, narrowing his eyes as though searching through his memory bank.

“I saw you place it inside your coat pocket,” she reminded him.

“And then I tossed my coat in the backseat.”

“It isn't in your pocket?”

He glared at her, and that was answer enough.

“It must have fallen out of the car.”

“You think?”

“Well, it wasn't my fault.”

Dash looked sick. His shoulders sagged and he wiped a hand across his face. “It's lost now.”

Highland Airlines employee Stephanie Arness nervously clenched her hands together in her lap as she studied the FBI man standing over her. They'd sequestered her in a room inside the airport in order to question her. Another agent remained behind her and out of view.

“Let's go through this one more time,” Agent Jordan Wilkes insisted, waving his hand at her as he slowly paced the area in front of her chair.

“But I've already told you everything I know,” Stephanie protested. Wilkes had been interviewing her for the last sixty minutes and there wasn't anything she hadn't told him a dozen times or more. Apparently, she'd failed to follow proper protocol and didn't contact the authorities soon enough when she'd found Ashley Davison's name on the no-fly list. This interrogation appeared to be the price she had to pay.

Agent Wilkes chose to ignore her plea. “Humor me. Let's start at the beginning one more time.”

“Okay,” Stephanie said, drawing in a deep breath and doing her best to remain calm and outwardly patient. “A young woman in her midtwenties approached the counter and asked to purchase a ticket to Seattle.”

“Did she state a particular flight or time?” he asked—actually, it was more of a demand than a question.

Stephanie had already answered this same question repeatedly. “No, the woman said she was willing to take any seat day or night, it didn't matter.”

He nodded, as if Stephanie should continue.

“When I entered her name, Ashley Davison, into the computer it immediately came up on the no-fly list and as an FBI person of interest, suspected of terrorist activity. I was instructed to immediately notify the FBI and airport security.”

“Which you delayed doing, right?” The question was followed by an intense glare.

“I tried,” Stephanie insisted, “but Ms. Davison kept arguing with me. I repeatedly asked her to step aside and wait. I hoped to get in touch with security, but she continued talking and insisting that I get her a flight. I couldn't hold a conversation with her and call for security at the same time. I'd hoped to keep her at the desk long enough for airport security to arrive, but then I realized that I hadn't put in the call and the man standing behind her got impatient and—”

Agent Wilkes stopped her. “What man? This is the first time you mentioned anyone else.”

“He was just another passenger behind her who got impatient that Ms. Davison was taking up so much time when there was a long line of customers waiting.”

“He wasn't with her?”

“No.” She hesitated. She hadn't considered this. “At least I don't think so.”

“You're sure about that?”

Stephanie closed her eyes and mentally reviewed the scene as it played out in her mind. After thinking it over she was fairly certain they weren't connected. She gradually shook her head.

“I doubt it, but…” She wasn't sure this was significant, and so stopped talking.

“But what?” Agent Wilkes insisted. “This could be important.”

“The man was also hoping to get on a flight to Seattle.”

Agent Wilkes stopped pacing and looked across the room at a second agent, who had remained quiet for a good part of the interview. “Did you hear that, Buckley?”

Agent Buckley nodded and approached Stephanie. He reached for a pad and started to take notes.

“Do you happen to recall this man's name?” Agent Buckley asked.

He'd been good-looking, but she hadn't really paid attention to his name. Stephanie shook her head. “Sorry, no.”

“Think again.” Agent Wilkes insisted, none too gently.

Stephanie closed her eyes and did her best to bring up the memory of their short conversation. Unfortunately, she couldn't recall seeing anything with his name listed.

“I don't believe he ever said his name.”

“Did he take out his identification? People do that instinctively when looking to book a ticket,” he reminded her.

As hard as she tried, Stephanie couldn't remember seeing anything with his name. “I would have remembered if he had,” she insisted.

“Oh, and why's that?”

She shifted in her seat and looked down in an effort to hide her embarrassment. “He was the kind of man women notice.”

“How's that?”

“He was good-looking. Muscular…you know, physically fit, with one of those very short haircuts.”

“You mean a military cut?”

“Yeah, like that, and really the most incredible dark eyes. Real dark.”

“Sinister?”

“Oh, not at all. More like ‘look all you want, but you can't have me' eyes.”

The two agents glanced at each other and frowned.

“You writing that down, Buckley?”

Buckley snorted. “Not on your life.”

“Did you sell this man a ticket?”

“No. He claimed he had to be in Seattle before December twenty-second and couldn't take a chance with standby. He needed a guaranteed seat and was willing to pay whatever it cost.”

The two agents froze. “The twenty-second, you say?”

“Yes.” She specifically recalled the date because it was the last day she was scheduled to work before taking time off for the holidays.

“Do you think we should put Seattle on alert?” Buckley asked.

Agent Wilkes shook his head. “It's too early. We need more information.”

“Right.”

Agent Wilkes returned his attention to Stephanie once again. “What did you tell him?”

“The only thing I could. The only tickets available this close to Christmas were standby.” She wasn't sure why the FBI agents were so curious about this man when she was convinced Ashley Davison and the looker weren't connected.

Then Stephanie remembered something else. “That was when the woman…”

“Ashley Davison,” he supplied.

“Yes, Ms. Davison got terribly upset. She wanted to know why there was a possibility he could fly standby and she couldn't.”

“And what did you tell her?”

“Nothing, but really you can't blame her for being put out. I think a couple of people waiting in line agreed with her. Ms. Davison said this was gender discrimination because I chose to give the man a seat and not her.”

“Which is when you told her to kindly wait to the side?”

“Yes, but I'd been telling her that all along.” Stephanie couldn't imagine why she had to repeat this story over and over again, but she was beginning to understand now. Each time she told it she remembered some other small detail, like the man behind Ashley Davison in line. “I wanted to call security to come for her, but she took off right away.”

“And you didn't see which direction she went?”

Stephanie felt like a complete failure. She should have looked, but had gotten distracted by the man behind Davison in line, apologizing for keeping him waiting and explaining that she needed a minute while she reached for the phone. By the time she was able to connect with security, Ashley Davison was out of sight.

“You're sure you didn't see the direction in which she was headed?”

“No, sorry.”

Agent Buckley must have noticed her distress, because he said, “You've been helpful.”

“I wish I'd known to ask for more information.”

The door opened and a female agent entered the room.

“What did you learn from the surveillance tape?” Agent Wilkes asked.

The woman, Agent Bass, remained expressionless. “The camera isn't focused on the Highland Airlines counter, so we weren't able to get a clear photo of the woman.”

“What about after she left the counter?”

“We think we might have found her from the description provided by the reservation clerk.”

The only known photo available of the bombing suspect was blurred, but it gave enough detail to possibly identify her, Wilkes had explained earlier. He'd shown what he had to Stephanie, but she'd been unable to make a positive identification.

“The airport was crowded and it took some time to pick her out.”

“Is there a clear shot of her face?”

The female agent exhaled. “She's clever. Her head is lowered, so we were unable to get positive facial recognition.”

“Figures,” Agent Wilkes muttered.

Agent Bass agreed. “It's almost as if she knew where the camera was situated and when to look down.”

“Anything else of significance?”

“The suitcase. She's dragging a large suitcase with her. It looks to be heavy.”

The Highland Airlines clerk watched as the two male agents made eye contact. She wasn't sure why this fact would be significant, but from their reaction, clearly it was.

“Would you be able to pick out the man who was at the counter with Ms. Davison?” Agent Wilkes asked, directing the question at her.

Right away Stephanie nodded. The looker had a face she wouldn't soon forget. All that chiseled manhood would be hard to miss. Even now she got goose bumps just thinking about him. She really would have liked to help him, but there wasn't anything she could do. All the Seattle-bound flights were booked solid, and overbooked in some instances.

“Show her the surveillance tapes,” Agent Wilkes instructed the female agent.

“Right away.”

Wanting to leave the room where she'd been cooped up for the better part of an hour, Stephanie was more than happy to stand up and move about.

“I'm Agent Bass,” the other woman said, introducing herself as she led Stephanie out of the room. “Carlene Bass.”

“Stephanie Arness,” she said, following the other woman's lead.

“You've been a big help, Stephanie.”

“Thank you.” The other woman walked at a quick pace and Stephanie had to half trot in order to keep up with her. Although she'd worked for the airlines for five years, she'd never been in the area where the FBI agent took her now.

The compact room looked like the inside of a busy television station, with a long row of video screens showing a variety of activities taking place all at the same time in multiple areas of the airport.

“Can we show Ms. Arness the footage we discussed earlier?” Agent Bass asked the technician. Next she led Stephanie to a chair and indicated she should take a seat.

The technician typed in a few keystrokes and a video started to play on the screen in front of Stephanie. The scene looked like something out of a movie, with people hustling and bustling about. Mothers steered their children toward the security gates while others simply tried to move from one area to another.

Stephanie studied the faces as best she could and wasn't able to identify a single one. She'd thought it would be easy to point out the looker, but that proved to be far more difficult than she assumed it would be.

“That's the woman we believe to be Ashley Davison from the description you provided,” Agent Bass said, pointing toward the screen, and the technician froze the frame.

Stephanie squinted and shook her head. “That could be her.” From this angle it was nearly impossible to make out any facial identification. “That's the coat she wore and she's carrying the same purse,” Stephanie conceded. The more she stared at the technician's screen, the more convinced she became.

“We've had Ashley Davison on our list for the last two years. This is a surprise. The most recent information we have indicated she was in Texas.”

Stephanie hated to appear naïve, but she had an important question. “If she's so clever, then why is she using her real name?”

“Good question,” Agent Bass said, nodding approvingly. “It's one I asked myself. If I wanted to get to Seattle in a hurry and knew that I was on a person-of-interest list for the FBI, then I would use an alias and fake ID.”

“Right.” That was totally reasonable. Why risk capture by using her real identity? It made no logical sense that Ashley Davison would make herself such an easy target. It was almost as if she was asking to be held up and questioned.