In the Grey (38 page)

Thinking about the
question, they naturally looked away from each other. Alex’s eyes
caught the bright glint of the gold.

“
He’s pretty controlling,”
Alex said.

“
Not more than Scott,”
Jesse laughed.

“
You’ve got that right,”
Alex said. “Joseph set up the team. So he knew everything about
us.”

“
More than Alex the
confessor?” Jesse asked. “I doubt it.”

“
He’s not great with
languages,” Alex said.

“
I bet that’s it,” Jesse
nodded. “Someone wrote something on that book or piece of paper
that we could figure out. Remember how Tommy was always getting us
to learn obscure dialects and alphabets.”

Alex nodded.

“
Most of the time, Joseph
didn’t even bother with them,” Jesse said. “That’s got to be
it.”

Alex gave him a vague nod
and looked around the room.

“
You think this book is
here?” Alex asked.

“
No,” Jesse said. “Cooper
said it was something Paul had.”

“
Paul was never in here,”
Alex said. “I didn’t connect . . .”

“
You would have had to
check anyway,” Jesse said.

“
Yes, let’s check,” Alex
said.

Alex dropped to her hands
and knees to look for a compartment in the floor. Jesse worked the
walls. When they finished, they switched places.

“
You think it’s
underneath?” Jesse pointed to the gold.

“
We have the videotape
showing that the gold has been here since 1978,” Alex said. “If
there’s something underneath, it was there when the bars were set
here.”

“
There vault below this
one is empty, so it’s possible,” Jesse said.

“
It’s possible that
there’s something other than limestone and pallets under this
gold,” Alex said. “But not
the
thing they are looking for.”

“
Eleazar’s property,”
Jesse said.

“
Right.”

Jesse nodded. They scanned
the ceiling and walls. Alex turned to look at him.

“
Are you mad?” she
asked.

“
At you?” Jesse
shrugged.

“
Same shit, different
day,” they said in unison, and laughed.

Alex smiled at
him.

“
I’m sorry,” Alex said.
“I’m . . . fumbling. Again.”

“
What are you going to
do?” Jesse asked.

“
I’m going to think about
what you said,” Alex said. “I have a file of every scrap of
evidence related to the murders of the Fey Special Forces Team. In
light of what you have said, I need to go through it
again.”

“
My best friend in the
whole world used to tell me that you only see what your filter
allows you to see,” Jesse said.

“
Maybe my filter has been
wrong,” Alex nodded.

Jesse smiled.

“
I’ve missed you,” Alex
said.

“
What’s not to
miss?”

Jesse put his hands out,
and she held hers up. For a moment, she felt the tingly sensation
of his hands pressed against hers.

“
Alex?” Matthew’s voice
came from the door.

“
I
should . . . ,” Alex pointed to the
hallway.

“
I’ll be around,” Jesse
said, and disappeared.

Alex went out the metal
gate and waited for it to reset itself. When the vault was secure,
she switched off the light and went out into the hallway where the
team was waiting for her.

“
Anything?” Joseph
asked.

“
Nothing,” Alex
said.

“
Shit,” Matthew said.
“What’s next?”

“
I was
thinking . . . ,” Alex looked from team member
to team member. “We need to track the investigation into Y’s death
and follow up on Cooper . . .”

“
Meetings,” Raz
said.

The team
groaned.

“
And Trece,” Joseph
said.

“
But other than that, I
think we should take in the sights,” Alex said. “We’ve been working
so hard, we haven’t had a chance just to hang out together. We can
take today and tomorrow and still be home by Saturday. What do you
think, Major Walters? We are in Paris. We have a condo to
ourselves.”

“
Sounds perfect,” Joseph
said.

“
On your dime?” Vince
asked.

“
Use your team cards,”
Alex said. “We’ll sort out the details later.”

The team
cheered.

“
Be on your guard,” Joseph
said. “While you are on your own time, you are still and
always . . .”

“
The Fey Team,” the team
called back.

“
Just be careful,” Joseph
said.

“
Yes, sir!”

“
Captain
Mac Clenaghan?” Alex asked.

“
Let’s do this thing,”
Matthew said.

FFFFF

Two days later

Friday
afternoon

November 19 – 3:25 p.m.
CST (10:25 p.m. CET)

San Antonio,
Texas

“
Well, that was fun,” Alex
said, as she slipped into the passenger seat of the dark-blue
sedan.

Rather than respond, Raz
started the rental car.

“
I had the nicest time,”
Royce said in a mock Texas accent. “Those crazy crackers are so
nice.”

Matthew laughed. Lost in
their own musings, they drove for a while.

“
Holy Crap!” Matthew was
so loud that Raz pulled the car over. He and Alex turned around in
the sedan to look at Matthew. “What the hell was that?”

“
Cee Cee Joiner’s
funeral,” Alex said in her most official tone.

“
Cee Cee Joiner?
The
Cee Cee Joiner who
killed his own children and raped women all over the
world . . . ,” Matthew said.

“
Raped and killed women
all over the world,” Alex nodded.

“
They were talking about a
hero who loves his family and worships the Lord,” Matthew
said.

“
Hush, now,” Royce said.
“Cee Cee’s in the trunk.”

“
Right, the hero might
hear you,” Raz laughed.

Matthew and Alex laughed.
Raz grinned.

“
All I can say is thank
God that Trece’s in prison,” Royce said. “Can you
imagine?”

“
We would have had to
sedate him,” Raz said.

“
Did I hallucinate, or did
the pastor talk about Cee Cee being welcomed into heaven?” Matthew
asked.

“
Nope,” Alex said. “That
actually happened.”

Matthew shook himself like
a wet dog. They laughed.

“
Did you touch your weapon
when Buffy came up for a hug?” Royce asked.

“
Unconscious gesture,”
Alex smiled.

“
Kill them!” Matthew said.
“Kill them all, and let the Lord sort them out.”

Royce fell over laughing.
Alex shook her head at them. Raz glanced back at Matthew and
started driving again.

“
Can we just run away
screaming?” Matthew asked.

“
We have been charged with
the duty of presenting Mr. Cee Cee Joiner’s ashes to his grieving
widow,” Alex said.

“
Isn’t it widows?” Matthew
asked.

“
Cee Cee said he’s only
ever had one wife,” Alex said.

“
Let’s light that fuse and
watch it go off,” Royce said.

“
You’re quite the
firecracker, Petty Officer Tubman,” Alex laughed.

“
I’ll remind you that I
was shot because of that motherfucker,” Royce said. “I’m lucky to
be alive. I’m lucky to be able to walk. Welcomed into heaven, my
ass.”

Matthew turned to look at
Royce.

“
I thought it was Alex’s
fault you got shot,” Matthew said in a conspiratorial
tone.

They laughed. Alex’s phone
rang. She looked at the number and answered.

“
Sue Ann!” Alex
said.

“
Now, I know that you’re
probably some place I never heard of or something, but I wanted to
let you know that Cee Cee’s funeral was today,” Sue Ann
said.

In the background, Luana,
their housekeeper, said something to Sue Ann. She responded in
Portuguese.

“
Love the Portuguese,”
Alex said.

“
I know! I’m getting
really good,” Sue Ann said. “Anyway, there’s something else going
on today that I thought you might want to know about.”

“
Oh yea?” Alex
asked.

“
Sergeant Beetle is
getting married today,” Sue Ann said.

“
He is?” Alex tried to
keep the shock from her voice. Raz turned to look at her. “What
happened?”

“
He just decided he wanted
to be married,” Sue Ann said. “So he asked her, and she said
yes.”

“
He asked who?” Alex
sneered and thought of the many ways she was going to peel the skin
off of Sergeant Pete Beetle.

“
Me,” Sue Ann laughed.
Alex laughed and breathed a sigh of relief.

“
Don’t you think it’s kind
of fast?” Alex asked.

“
We’ve been dating almost
a year,” Sue Ann said. “And anyway, he has to travel after
Thanksgiving. He wanted to get married before he left. This way, we
have some time and Thanksgiving, and then he’s gone for a bit. And
he’s decided he’s going to live with us.”

Sue Ann sounded so happy
that Alex smiled.

“
What’s going on?” Raz
whispered.

“
Pete and Sue Ann are
getting married,” Alex said. “Today!”

Matthew
cheered.

“
Is that your gorgeous
partner?” Sue Ann asked.

“
Yep,” Alex
said.

“
Now, I was hoping you
could come,” Sue Ann said. “And I know Pete was hoping the team
could come, but I told him you were out of the country. He tried to
call, but you’re ‘out of pocket.’ What does that mean?”

“
It’s a fancy way of
saying I’m not reachable because I’m doing something,” Alex
said.

“
What was it this
morning?” Sue Ann asked.

“
I went to a funeral,”
Alex said.

“
You what?”

“
We’re on our way to
Buffy’s house right now,” Alex said.

“
You’re here?”

“
A couple of miles from
your house,” Alex said. “We were going to call after this drama was
over.”

“
You are such a stinker.
Krystal!” Sue Ann yelled. “They’re right here.”

Krystal cheered. The
clipped sound of Krystal’s high heels across the marble floors came
closer to the phone.

“
They’re coming, right?”
Krystal said to Sue Ann. In the phone, she added, “Hi
Alex.”

“
We’re missing a few,”
Alex said. “But we’ll be there.”

“
See,” Krystal said to Sue
Ann. “Out with the old, and in with the new and good
lookin’.”

The tap of Krystal’s heels
indicated she was moving away from the phone.

“
How was the funeral?” Sue
Ann asked.

“
Crazy,” Alex
said.

“
Of course,” Sue Ann said.
“Well, when you get done with all of that, you should come on by.
We’ll start around six. We’re going to have it at the house. Just
the family, and now you!”

“
Sounds great,” Alex
said.

“
And Alex?” The tremor in
Sue Ann’s voice caught Alex’s full attention.

“
Yes?”

“
You think the boys would
have wanted this?” Sue Ann asked. “Golly, their daddy’s funeral was
today, and everything.”

“
Absolutely,” Alex said.
“I think the boys made it happen.”

“
You do!” Sue Ann’s voice
was flush with joy. “I do too. See you soon!”

Alex looked at the phone
when Sue Ann hung up. Shaking her head, she smiled.

“
That’s a good way to kill
two birds,” Raz said.

“
Indeed,” Alex
said.

“
What?” Royce asked.
“We’re going bird hunting, too?”

“
We’re going to a
wedding,” Alex said. “Don’t worry; we’ll have a great
time.”

“
What about Cecil Joiner?”
Matthew asked. “Weren’t we supposed to track him down,
too?”

“
Birds,” Raz
said.

“
He’ll be at the wedding,”
Alex said. “You’ll be surprised. He’s doing really well. He got
remarried last year.”

“
They seem happy,” Raz
said.

Royce leaned forward to
look at Alex, and then at Raz.

“
You two are social
butterflies,” Royce said.

“
We keep tabs on people,”
Alex said. “It’s basic intelligence work. At some point, any one of
these people could stumble onto something important. I want to be
the first person they call.”