Identity Unknown (A Parker & Coe, Love and Bullets Thriller Book 1) (11 page)

"Can you do a wider search?"

"Sure. What are you looking for?"

"Anything you can find on Brantov after she made bail, and whether or not she's still using that name. I want to know everything there is to know about her, including where she lives."

"That's a pretty tall order," Cody said. "What exactly did this woman do to you guys?"

"You probably wouldn't believe us if we told you."

In the movies it always takes the obligatory computer geek about fifteen seconds to find the exact information he needs.
 

My obligatory computer geek was the real thing, however, working in the real world. And in the real world it wasn't simply a matter of typing the name
Anastasia Brantov
into a search bar and hitting
RETURN
.

Cody was forced to wade through a sea of information to find anything specific, clicking from database to database, website to website, as he tried to trace Emily's activities since her arrest and conviction for prostitution eight years earlier, and assemble the puzzle of who she really was.

Knowing that this would take awhile, Parker opted to save some time by heading out to pick up his rental car. He had parked it downtown near the bus stop, so it was possible it might not even be there. But he had promised to return with transportation of some kind, in anticipation of tracking Emily down.

"You sure you don't want to cuff me to a chair?" I asked as we said goodbye at the door. "You know—just in case."

"I'd much rather pin you to the floor again. But there'll be time for that later."

"Let's hope so."

Strange how the entire dynamic of a relationship can change in just a few short hours. But I wasn't complaining. In fact, I was starting to think that all those romance books that talk about love at first sight might not be so far-fetched after all. When the chemistry is there, it's there. And I would have been foolish to ignore it.

Parker smiled and we kissed. "Make sure you lock up after me. Be back soon."

Now, an hour or so later, Cody was finally at a point where he thought he could share some useful information with me. I sat on the sofa, leafing through one of his comic books, thinking that only women with gargantuan boobs were allowed to apply for super hero status, when he finally looked up from his collection of screens and gestured.

"I think I have this figured out."

I tossed the comic book aside and got to my feet. "What've you got?"

"I'm not gonna go through every step and show you all the cross-references and detours, but I know where you guys can find Anastasia Brantov."

"All right, where?"

"The Memorial Garden Cemetery in Austin."

"
What?
"

He pointed to a newspaper clipping on the top center screen. "She died in a motel fire about three months after the mug shot was taken, along with six other people. Turns out they were all members of a Ukrainian prostitution ring."

"And how does Anton Paponov fit in?"

"He doesn't, other than the name in the bail records."

"Which means he was probably part of the ring, but managed to escape the fire."

"Assuming he was at the motel at all."

"But what about Anastasia? We know she escaped, too, so what happened to her?"

Cody smiled. "That's where things get a little tricky, but I decided to run the facial scan again, narrowing the time and location data and compensating for any changes in appearance, like hair and eye color."

"And?"

"I got a hit on a woman who applied for and received a Texas driver's license at the Townhurst branch of the Houston DMV two months after the fire."

Cody jabbed a key on his keyboard and Emily's face filled the bottom center screen, a Texas driver's license showing her with short, dark hair and brown eyes. The card had been issued to
Natalie Tevis
.

Emily, Mia, Anastasia, Natalie.

How the hell did she keep track of all these names?

"I ran a check and there's a Natalie Tevis in Dallas who died twenty-four years ago when she was only two. So our girl used her birth certificate to get a Social Security number under that name, then opened bank accounts and applied for this license."

I tapped the image on screen. "You think the address is current?"

"No," he said. "It's a fake. I did a Google search and it points to a vacant lot. But when I ran a check on the social security number, I found loan documents for a condo purchased two years ago in downtown Houston. They also show that she's employed as a software training manager for a firm with offices all over the world. And based on her travel records, she spends a lot of time bouncing from location to location."

"The perfect cover," a voice behind us said.

Both Cody and I jumped in surprise and spun around.

Parker stood in the doorway.

"Jesus," I said. "Don't do that. You scared the hell out of us."

"Then you should've locked this door like I told you to." He closed and locked it behind him and came into the room carrying two bulky plastic bags. "You've gotta be more careful, Kelsey."

I nodded, feeling like an idiot. "You're right. I'm sorry. I must've gotten distracted."

He gestured to Cody. "I'll bet if you check her travel records against the dates of any contract killings or suspicious deaths in those locations, you'll find a lot of matches."

Cody's brows went up. "So she's like a hit woman?"

"That's exactly what she is."

Cody turned to me. "What the hell are you getting me involved in?"

"Don't worry," I said. "She isn't after any of us. It's actually the other way around."

A look of complete bafflement washed over Cody's face. "You're trying to catch a hit woman? A freaking hit woman?"

"That's what it boils down to, yeah."

"I told you you wouldn't believe it," Parker said, as he gestured to the screens. "What's in the newspaper clipping? What did I miss?"

I caught him up on the Ukrainian prostitution ring and Anastasia's supposed death in a motel fire.

He said, "What do you bet that was her first hit. And she was so desperate to get out of there, she didn't care
who
she had to kill to do it." He thought for a moment. "It also puts a whole new spin on the Papanov assassination. If he was part of the ring, killing him may have been personal instead of business."

"But why wait so long?" I asked.

"We're talking organized crime here. The more distance she puts between her so-called death and Papanov's, the less chance the Ukrainians will figure it out."

"Especially if she can pin it on someone like me," I said.

Cody's bafflement deepened. "Could somebody please rewind and tell me what's going on?"

Parker shook his head. "The less you know, the better. What we need from you right now is the address of that condo Anastasia bought."

Cody looked at Parker, then at me. "Why do I get the feeling I'm never gonna get that date?"

It was almost nine a.m. when we climbed into Parker's rental car.

As he started the engine, he handed me a cell phone. "I bought a couple of cheap burners. My number's stored in the memory, in case we get separated again."

 
I nodded and tucked it into the pocket of my new jeans. In addition to the burners, Parker's plastic bags had been full of clothes from a local thrift store—jeans, T-shirts, jackets, baseball caps, sunglasses and, for me, a worn pair of running shoes. The fit wasn't perfect, but it was close enough, and should Taggart and his friends happen along, they might be thrown off by the change of attire.

At least temporarily.

Of course, we had no reason to believe they'd find us before we left town. Not with Taggart's tracker lying at the bottom of the Dumpster. But Parker told me it was better to be safe than sorry, and I couldn't disagree.

That sentiment only carried so far, however. Before we left Cody's place, Parker had a change of heart and tried to convince me to stay and let him go after Emily alone.
 

But I refused—with a big hell no.

I wanted to be there when he slapped the cuffs on her.

I wanted to see the look on her face when she realized the world she had constructed to hide her crimes—and make me her fall guy—had come crashing down around her.

Was that foolish of me?

I don't think so, but I'll let you be the judge.

The drive from Hunter City to Houston is a long one, through small towns and seemingly endless stretches of empty landscape. We were nearly an hour into it and rolling toward a town called Cedardale, when the rental car's engine suddenly cut out and Parker swore under his breath.

"What happened?" I asked.

"I'll tell you when I know," he muttered as he wrestled with a steering wheel that had lost most of its power and pulled to the side of the highway.

A moment later he had the hood up and was poking around inside. I got out and stood next to him, and while I don't consider myself a clueless female, I might as well have been staring at the engine of a space shuttle.

"I can't tell what's what," I said.

Parker smiled. "I used to work on cars with my dad, but technology has ruined all that. These days, you need an advanced degree in engineering just to…" His eyes narrowed as he spotted something amiss. "Uh-oh."

"What? What's wrong?"

He leaned forward for a closer look. "The car's been rigged with a kill switch."

That didn't sound good. "What's a kill switch?"

"A mechanism that rental agencies install in case one of their cars gets stolen. They can cut power remotely and stop the thief in his tracks."

"And you think that's what happened?"

"The way it just went out on us? Yeah."

"But you rented it, right? Why would they think it's stolen?"

"No reason they should, unless I gave them a call and told them it was." Parker looked grim. "Or someone else did."

"Taggart," I said.

Parker nodded. "He's right—I
am
predictable. I came in by plane and he knew I'd have to use a rental to get you to Houston, so he called around until he found the right agency. But losing power isn't the worst of it."

"What do you mean?"

"The kill switches are also GPS trackers—only a lot more sophisticated than the one we found on you. Which means there's a pretty good chance he knows exactly where we…" Parker paused and looked toward the highway, scanning the horizon. His expression hardened and he swiveled his head back to me. "We need to get out of here. Now."

I turned and saw a couple of black dots in the distance, shimmering in the morning heat as they moved toward us along the highway, but there was no way to tell if they were a threat to us.

"You think that's them?"

Parker opened the passenger door, unlatched the glove box and pulled out a pair of binoculars. He pointed them toward the two black dots, watched for a moment, then lowered the glasses and tossed them onto the passenger seat.

"Run," he said.

We ran. Harder and faster than ever before, heading for the nearest off ramp that took us straight to a massive truck stop. The only saving grace was that I was now wearing running shoes.

The
Cedardale Truck Plaza
looked like a shopping mall, with a post office and fast food franchises and a grocery store and repair garage and even a small chapel. The lot was the size of a half dozen football fields, jammed full of RVs, trucks with campers, and long haul freight trucks.

We ran past a multi-pump gas station and onto the lot, moving into a sea of sixteen wheelers parked in rows alongside the main building. We slowed as we approached, catching our breaths and checking over our shoulders to see if anyone was behind us on the ramp.

So far so good.

Maybe what we'd seen on the highway hadn't been Taggart and his friends after all. Maybe it was just a case of Parker being overly cautious.

But just as these thoughts exited my mind, a black SUV appeared at the top of the ramp and drove toward us. I felt Parker's hand on my shoulder and he jerked me sideways, pulling me into the space between two big rigs. Breathing hard, we watched as the SUV glided past, followed by Taggart's cruiser.

Something came loose inside me. The donut I'd eaten during the drive started wreaking havoc with my digestive system and I began to tremble involuntarily.
 

Sensing my distress, Parker got behind me and put his arms around me as we watched the two cars approach the main building.
 

"Easy," he said. "They can't even be sure we're here. For all they know, we've already caught a ride."

The SUV came to a stop and deposited two of the Ukrainians onto the blacktop, who then separated and headed in opposite directions. As the SUV started moving again, Taggart pulled his cruiser into a slot in front of the main building and got out, reaching for his shirt pocket as he approached a couple of truckers standing near the entrance.

He showed them what I assumed was a photograph of either me or Parker, got negative head shakes in response, then headed inside. Fortunately, no one had seen us yet, but the SUV was probably sweeping the area, and with two of the Ukrainians on foot, we needed to get moving. Quickly and quietly.

We heard a faint clanging sound and Parker pulled me backward, toward the rear of one of two trucks. Crouching down, he peered through the undercarriage of the big rig on our left and raised a hand, warning me to be quiet.

I crouched beside him and saw the legs of someone walking. I couldn't be sure, but my instincts told me it was one of the Ukrainians.

Taking hold of my elbow, Parker pulled me to my feet, urged me to follow him, and we weaved our way through the maze of trucks, all the while keeping our eyes out for the second Ukrainian, who could pop up anywhere.

After several minutes, we paused to catch our breath in front of one of the rigs, neither of us speaking, but knowing we had to find a way out of here. Fast.

Then a voice said, "Something I can help you folks find?"