Furious Jones and the Assassin’s Secret (10 page)

The street that ran along the top of the bluff had been aptly named High Street and was lined with mansions that had been converted into quaint, and some not so quaint, bed-and-breakfasts. And, apparently, the B&B owners had decided to engage in a game of one-upmanship when it came to funny names for their inns. As I walked down the street looking for Betty's, I walked past the Stop on Inn, the Step Back Inn, the Dew Drop Inn, the Liv Inn, and the Butt Inn.

I found Betty's at the end of the block. Betty's was in desperate need of paint and the porch looked like it might come crashing down at any moment, but I was glad to see that Betty had decided not to participate in the name game that had consumed the rest of the block. The sign out front read
BETTY'S BLUFF INN
. Simple and pun-less. Under the name, someone had recently painted the words
AND TAROT CARD AND PALM READING
. I guess Emma had forgotten to mention that part.

A bell rang as I pushed the front door open. Betty's
living room had been converted into some sort of astrological supply shop.

“I'll be right there,” a woman's voice called from upstairs.

“No hurry,” I yelled back.

There was a table in the middle of the room that had been covered in a purple sheet. A large crystal ball sat in the middle of the table. The walls were lined with makeshift shelves that had been cobbled out of old plywood and bricks. I walked along the shelves. Betty was selling all kinds of strange books, jewelry, crystals, candles, herbs, and do-it-yourself acupuncture kits. I thought about leaving, but where else could I stay so cheaply? Even the Butt Inn looked like it was probably more expensive than Betty's.

“Welcome to Betty's Bluff Inn.”

I turned around to see an elderly woman with big curly orange hair walking down the stairs. She was wearing some sort of bright-colored robe or dress.

She continued her welcome. “Where the rooms are great, and we're not bluffing.”

Oh, ouch. I was wrong.
Betty
had
tried to participate in the name game. She just wasn't very good at it.

“Hi,” I said. “I get it now—Bluff Inn. Like bluffing.”

“That's us. Or me, anyway. I'm Betty O'Malley,” she said, extending her hand.

“I'm—” I paused. I couldn't give her my real name. Even Betty was sure to have a computer. If she entered my
name anywhere in it, Douglas and the CIA might find it. And me.

“I'm happy to meet you, Betty,” I said. I shook her hand.

“Thank you,” she smiled. “What can I help you with? A tarot reading, perhaps? Sage amulets? Love potions?”

“No. I'm just here for a room. I saw the fall colors special on your website.”

“A room?” Betty questioned. I wasn't sure if she was worried about my age, or if she was just shocked to have a guest.

My mom and I had stayed in hundreds of hotels, motels, and B&Bs over the years, and I knew what kinds of questions the employees asked when booking a room. And I knew she would ask me for an ID. Even if she believed I was older than I was, she would still need an ID. I had my US military dependent ID in my wallet. But that had my age on it. There was no way this was going to work.

“Yes! Yes! Yes! The colors special. Perfect. Do you want to get started right away?”

“Ah, yes. Please.”

“Perfect. Follow me,” she said as she took five steps toward what used to be the dining room. The walls were covered with posters of the human nervous system, astrological signs, and weird astrology charts.

“Please lie down.” Betty motioned to a table in the middle of the dining room.

“Excuse me?”

“Make yourself comfortable,” she said, motioning again to the table.

I don't know if it was her kind smile or the fact that I was exhausted from staying up all night with Emma, but I climbed onto the table and lay flat on my stomach.

“Oh, no. Please lie on your back,” Betty insisted. “I need to see your face.”

“I don't understand,” I said as I slid nervously off the table back onto my feet.

“I need to see your face. It is a big part of your aura. The colors are usually brightest around the face.” She made a circular motion with her hands in front of my face.

“Aura?”

“Yes, dear. I need you on your back to read the colors of your aura,” Betty said. Both of us looked a little confused.

Aura colors? The fall colors special had to do with reading aura colors and nothing to do with leaf colors.

“Oh,” I said. “I don't mean to be rude, but is there any way we can do this later? I've been on a bus all night and I'm exhausted.” I paused and decided to lie. “And unfortunately, I left my wallet on the bus and don't have my driver's license. But I do have cash.”

“Heavens!” she said as she clapped her hands. “You had me so worried. Your colors are awful dark. Awful dark. But if you're tired, and have had such an unfortunate trip, that would certainly throw them off. Yes, let's get you a room.
We can do the reading later. When you're brighter.”

“Thanks,” I said, sounding truly relieved.

Betty walked to a desk in the corner of the living room. “You'll be staying until Friday?” she asked.

“How did you know that?”

“It's what I do, dear,” Betty replied.

Was she referring to her experience as an innkeeper, or as some sort of fortuneteller?

Betty reached into one of the desk drawers and pulled out a clipboard. “What's your birthday, hon?”

“January twenty-sixth,” I blurted out without thinking. That was my dad's birthday. Why had I selected my dad's birthday?

Betty said, “That's strange. You don't seem like an Aquarius.”

“Oh?” I replied. She was right. I wasn't an Aquarius.

“Yeah. Aquarians are masculine. Tough-guy types. Aquarius is an air sign. I would have pegged you for an Earth sign. Probably a Taurus.”

Right again
, I thought. My birthday is May seventeenth.

“All the same,” Betty said, “I'm going to put you in the Second House.”

“Second House?”

“Yes,” Betty replied. “The Second House is the house of Taurus. I got a feeling it's what you need.”

“Okay by me.” I had no idea what she was talking about.

“Okay, sweetie. Follow me.”

I followed Betty upstairs to a door that featured a large painted bull and a small brass plaque that read
SECOND HOUSE
.

“Here you go, sweetie,” Betty said as she touched my shoulder.

“Do I need a key?” I asked.

“No. No need for keys here.” She turned and walked back down the stairs.

A
ll four walls in the
Second House had been painted emerald green and featured astrology symbols and hieroglyphic-­like signs. Someone had painted the words
WE OWN OUR EMOTIONS
above the door. The only furniture in the Second House was a black futon bed and a dresser with three drawers. The top of the dresser had been covered with sand, a few smooth rocks, and a miniature rake made out of tree bark. I hung out in the Second House long enough to be polite. But the room absolutely gave me the creeps, and I needed to go find a phone.

Betty told me there was a Piggly Wiggly grocery store on the edge of town. She said she didn't have a car and the Pig was only a thirty-minute walk for her. It seemed like the Pig was the best bet for buying a phone in Galena, so I headed out.

I took the bluff stairs down to Main Street and walked back to the highway. There were a few people still standing around the accident site, but traffic was flowing now and the hay bales had been removed. Just the same, I was glad to be walking north. I walked for a mile and came upon Galena Senior and Junior High School. Someone had spelled out
GO PIRATES
with plastic cups stuck through the holes in the chain-link fence surrounding the football field.
Pirates?
In the middle of the country? Someone had a sense of humor.

I found the Piggly Wiggly about a mile past the school. I picked out the cheapest phone, two seven-dollar T-shirts, and a bag of minidonuts for dinner. The bill came to $69.87. That left me with $234, and it was only Saturday. There were five more days until my dad's book came out. Five days until I could tell the world that my dad's new book was 100 percent true. That whatever happened in the book was actually happening in Galena. But there was no way I could stay in Galena for five more days on two hundred bucks. Not if I wanted to eat.

I walked back to Betty's and closed the door to the Second House. I plugged in my new phone, and it chirped to life. I pulled up my dad's website, entered the code, and read the next excerpt.

There were many aspects of Carson Kidd's job that he would agree were difficult. Interrogating
corrupt foreign officials was difficult. Running while wearing night-vision goggles was difficult. In the CIA, even the paperwork was difficult.

Carson Kidd could compile a long list of difficulties that came with his job, but spotting a trained killer, that was not one of them. That was easy. The CIA had volumes on the subject. They had entire manuals on assassin behavior. They had elaborate profiles, models, and statistics. And these weren't your typical Harvard professor touchy-feely hunches about the relationship between bed-wetting and serial killers. No, these were tried and true facts collected by studying killers. By creating killers.

But Kidd didn't need any of those studies to identify the killer standing in front of him now. He knew this guy was a killer, because they had been trained together. Anton and Kidd had become killers together.

Kidd was about to cross the street and approach Anton when Anton suddenly stopped and knocked on the front door of Cannova's Pizzeria. An Italian-looking man with long black hair opened the door and had a brief conversation with Anton. And then they both disappeared into the restaurant.

Kidd stood and stared. Did Anton know the guy in the restaurant? Was this part of Anton's cover?

And then Kidd remembered his training and realized he was standing still in the middle of a public sidewalk. He was drawing attention to himself. Kidd started walking slowly down the sidewalk, trying to blend in. He wondered if he would blow Anton's cover if he tried to connect with him in public. But as he pushed open the door to Cannova's Pizzeria, he figured he would pretend to not know Anton until Anton made it clear it was okay to talk.

Kidd stood in the doorway and lowered his left hand. It brushed against his hip. It was a subconscious move. He did it every few minutes without realizing. He only noticed the move when the bump from his faithful sidearm, his SIG, was missing. But it was there now and Kidd subconsciously felt safe as he walked into the restaurant looking for his coworker.

The pizzeria was one small room with a dozen linen-covered tables and brick walls. It looked nice. It looked like the kind of place Kidd would have enjoyed. Like the kind of place that would know how to make good gnocchi. He loved good gnocchi.

Kidd took a few steps into the restaurant. The floor creaked. He paused.

“Hello,” a woman said as she walked out of the kitchen. “We don't open until noon, but I can bend the rules a little.” She smiled.

“Oh, excuse me,” Kidd said. “I thought I saw people coming in.”

“Nope, just the staff. But you're welcome to stay. Or grab an apron and help out.” She smiled again.

“Ah, that's okay. I'll just stop back later,” Kidd said, heading toward the door. He stopped and turned. “How's your gnocchi?”

“The best in town.”

“Perfect. I'll be back for dinner.”

“We fill up this time of year. I'd be happy to make you a reservation.” She walked to the podium by the door.

“Thank you. I'm serious about my gnocchi,” Kidd said. “I like to enjoy dinner without a lot of people around. What time does it quiet down around here?”

“Our latest reservation is nine o'clock,” she said, “but we're usually dead after eight.”

“Nine would be perfect, then,” Kidd said, thinking it might give him a chance to quietly connect with Anton.

“For one?” she asked.

“Yes.”

“You won't be disappointed. Our gnocchi is out of this world. We have a wonderful new chef. He's Sicilian!”

“Sicilian?” Kidd asked. “What a coincidence. I know a guy from Sicily.”

“And your name?” she asked.

“Carter Kenney,” Kidd lied. “My name is Carter Kenney.”

“Ah, your name sounds a little Irish,” she said.

“More than a little.” Kidd laughed.

“We'll see you tonight.” She smiled again and set down the pencil.

Carter Kenney was not an alias Kidd had ever used before, but he hadn't missed a beat when asked. It was an old CIA alliteration trick. When making up a false identity, use your actual initials. It makes the alias easier to remember. It was the same advice the FBI gave to families entering the witness protection program. Heidi Strauss becomes Helen Stassen. Over the years, Carson Kidd had gone by hundreds of names but, for the rest of this trip, he would now be Carter Kenney.

Kidd had no idea what alias Anton was using, but he knew his real name. His name was Amado Anton. Kidd knew just about everything there was to know about Anton. He knew Anton was born in the Philippines and moved to the Hampton Roads area of Virginia when he was twelve. Kidd knew that Anton had joined the navy when he was eighteen and was quickly recruited into the navy's most elite fighting force, known as SEAL Team Six. He knew they both
had been trained at The Farm. And as recently as two weeks ago, they were both members of the CIA. But what he didn't know was what Anton was doing here and who Anton had been talking to. Was the guy with the long hair the new Sicilian chef? Was he
the
Sicilian? Had Anton actually managed to find and get close to the Sicilian? If so, why hadn't he killed him yet? The kitchen at an Italian restaurant should have offered many opportunities to kill him. If, indeed, the man was the Sicilian.