Noble Beginnings (14 page)

“OK,” I said.
“We’ll be there within an hour.”

Abbot said
goodbye and hung up.

I stuffed the
phone back into my pocket. I stopped outside the motel room and leaned against
the vinyl siding between the door and window. I thought about Jessie and what
she might be thinking. Having her around felt like home, and I felt like myself
again. The Jack Noble I was before I left for the Marines, before I agreed to
become part of this damn joint program with the CIA, before I became a killer.

The wind
whipped the clouds across the sky and revealed a blue canopy with pinholes of
starlight illuminating through the fabric of the universe. I grew tired of the
cold and entered the room.

“Well?” Bear
asked.

“He’s close
by,” I said. “We can go. It’s a safe place.”

Bear nodded and
Jessie stood next to the door, her hand on the knob.

We piled into
the Tahoe. I started the ignition and drove along the narrow road that ran the
length of the motel in between the building and the empty field. I rounded the
corner and drove across the main parking lot. Pulled out onto the road and
headed toward I-95.

“You think it’s
safe to get on the interstate?” Bear asked.

I shrugged. It
might not be, but that was the quickest way that I knew to get where we needed
to go. “We’ll be all right.”

A row of blue
lights came streaming toward us in the opposite lane. I turned my attention to
the rear-view mirror after they passed by.

“Think they’re
going to the motel?” Bear asked.

“Yeah,” I said.

“How?”

“No clue.”

My phone rang
and I pulled it out of my pocket and glanced at the display.

“General
Keller.”

I started to
answer, but stopped and looked at Bear. Keller would have to wait.

“The phone.”

We said it at
the same time.

“For Christ’s
sake,” I said.

I stopped the
car, stepped out and threw the phone as far as I could. It landed on the other
side of the overpass with a thud, skidding along the asphalt and coming to rest
out of sight.

Tall trees
wrapped around Abbot’s lake house on all four sides. A winding gravel driveway
and a simple path to the lake provided the only break in the ring. The trees
kept the wind out. Despite the cool air, sweat formed on my brow as I stood on
the porch and knocked on the door.

The porch light
flicked on and the door opened. Abbot nodded and stepped back, waving us
inside.

I scanned the
room. Not much different from the last time I was here. Two full-sized dark
leather couches were placed in the middle of the room and faced each other. A
table made from the wide trunk of a tree was placed in between the couches. An
old recliner nestled up to the corner of the room. A big flat panel TV hung
from the wall. That was new.

Abbot caught me
staring at the TV. “That was a gift. Once everyone found out, they all wanted
to come up here on Sundays to watch the game.” He smiled and shook his head.
“Can I get you all anything? Food? Drink?”

“I’ll have a
beer,” Bear said. “No denying that I need one.”

Abbot
disappeared through an opening to the kitchen.

Bear and Jessie
sat on opposite couches. I stood by the front door.

Abbot returned
a few minutes later carrying a six pack of beer and a pizza box. Smoke escaped
where cardboard edges met. The smell of cheese and tomatoes and dough lingered
in the air. He set the beer and the pizza box on the tree trunk table. Then he
opened the box and gestured toward it.

“It got here a
few minutes before you three. Eat what you want.” He sat down on the same couch
as Jessie, leaning back into the corner and placing his feet on the table.
“I’ve got two spare rooms. Divvy them up how you see fit.” His eyes shifted
from me to Jessie, then back to me. He smiled.

Jessie looked
over at me and smiled as well.

“Don’t know how
much I can sleep,” I said. “Once all this is over I’m probably going to spend a
week in bed.”

Bear laughed.
Through a mouthful of pizza he said, “You speak the truth, Jack.”

Abbot smiled
through tightly drawn lips. He crossed and uncrossed his arms. His facial
expressions changed often, and he drew his brows tight over his eyes while his
lips pressed together. I caught him looking at me several times, and instead of
keeping eye contact, he’d look away.

“We need to
talk,” I said.

Abbot nodded
and set his feet on the floor. He put a hand down on the arm of the couch and
pushed himself up.

“Follow me to
my study.”

Bear dropped
half a piece of pizza in the box and leaned forward to get up.

“Stay out
here,” I said as I held my hand out toward him. “Stay with Jess.”

Bear shrugged,
grabbed his pizza and leaned back on the couch.

I followed
Abbot out of the room and down a hallway. We said nothing. When we came to a
set of six stairs, he turned and climbed them. I did the same. He reached the
top and flicked on a light.

“Room’s new,” I
said.

“Yeah,” he said.
“Built it last year. My study.” He shuffled some papers on his antique cherry
wood desk. “Clarissa calls it my grandpa room,” he added.

“Is that
right,” I said. “She has a kid now?”

He shook his
head and looked down at his desk over his arms folded across his chest. He then
leaned back in his leather chair.

“No, and I
prefer she keep it that way. That girl has no business raising a child at this
point in her life. Not after being raised by me.”

“How old is she
now?”

“Nineteen.”

I pulled the
key attached to the carbineer clip from my pocket and tossed it on his desk.

“That’s what I
got from your contact.”

He pulled open
a desk drawer and reached in.

I fought the
urge to reach for my gun.

He lifted his
eyes in my direction while keeping his face pointing down.

“Just getting
my glasses, Jack.”

I nodded and
sat back in my chair.

He pulled a
thin pair of gold rimmed glasses from the desk drawer and put them on. They
slid down his nose and he readjusted them with his thumb. The key sat on a
white notepad. He picked it up and studied it.

“What’s it
for?” he asked.

“Don’t know.
Bullet ripped through his head before he could tell me.” I leaned forward,
interlaced my fingers and rested my elbows on my knees. “I was hoping you would
know.”

Abbot shook his
head and tossed the key back toward me. “What do you think it unlocks?”

“Whatever is
holding the documents? Look, Abbot, I don’t know what these documents contain,
but it must be some heavy stuff for someone to take out Delaney like that. Not
to mention follow me all the way down here.”

Abbot lifted an
eyebrow. “They found you down here?”

I shook my
head, stopped and shrugged my shoulders. “I can’t be sure. I went out. Ran into
some rednecks. One of them struck me as odd. The way he placed me as a Marine,
and said he was untouchable.”

Abbot’s eyes
narrowed. He pulled out his cell phone and placed it on the desk.

“That’s another
thing,” I said. “I am pretty sure they were tracking me through my phone.”

He sat up. “You
didn’t bring it here, did you?”

“No. I
jettisoned it before we got back on the interstate.”

Abbot picked up
the phone and spun it in his palm. “I need you to wait outside the room for a
few minutes, Jack. I need to make a call.”

I stood up.
“Before I go…”

“Yeah?”

“You talk to
Keller yet? He finally called me back, but that was when I realized they were
tracking through the phone.”

“No, I haven’t
heard from him yet. We can call him after I make this call.”

*
* *

I waited in the
hallway, halfway between Abbot’s study and the living room. Bear and Jessie
talked quietly in between bites of pizza and swigs of beer. The heat cut off
and the house fell still. I leaned back against the wall and closed my eyes. I
felt calm and relaxed. For the first time in days I felt like I could lie down
on the floor and sleep for six hours straight.

I paced the
hall. Smiled at Bear from the end and turned back and walked the other
direction. A series of pictures in a single frame hung neatly in the middle of
the hall. Most were of Abbot’s daughter, Clarissa. The pictures were a chronology
of her growing up. It had been five years since I last saw her, and she had
been a gangly young teenager then. Half the pictures were from then or before.
The last picture looked to be the most recent, and she appeared to be quite
grown up now. Her bright red hair had darkened and the freckles on her cheeks
and nose faded.

Bear called
from the other room. I walked down the hall toward the sound of his voice.
Thirty seconds after I stepped into the living room I heard a crash and the
sound of glass breaking. I froze in place for what seemed like minutes. I
turned to run down the hall. A gunshot rang out and echoed down through the
house.

“Get her away
from the windows,” I shouted to Bear.

I raced down
the hallway, drew my gun and kicked open the door to the study. Immediately I
rolled to my right and backed up to the wall next to the open doorway. I led
with my Beretta and peeked around the corner, up the stairs.

“Abbot,” I
called.

He said
nothing. It was quiet and a cool breeze flowed through the open doorway.

I took each
step slowly, one at a time. Once eye level to the floor, I scanned the room.
The only person I saw was Abbot. He was on the floor in front of his desk. I
looked to the wall and saw the broken window. A jagged hole in the middle told me
that the gunman had most likely stood outside the window, jammed his gun
through and fired. How long had he been waiting out there for the perfect shot?
Was he there when I was in the room, my back to the window? I ran my hand over
the back of my head.

Abbot lay on
the floor. His eyes fluttered. His breaths were short and rapid. Blood pooled
below him, leaking from a hole in his chest.

“Jessie,” I
called down the stairway and through the open doorway.

I walked over
to the window. A risky move, given that it was pitch black outside and light
inside. Whoever did this didn’t stay around, though. They would have stormed
the house if they were after me. I had the feeling that this was a hit on
Abbot.

And it was my
fault.

Bear and Jessie
entered the room.

“Cut the lights
downstairs and turn on whatever outside lights you can find, Bear.”

Jessie hunched
over Abbot, applying pressure to the wound. “Call 9-1-1.”

I walked back
to Abbot, dropped to my knees next to his head.

He sucked in
air, his head bobbing an inch, and tried to speak. His mouth worked hard to
form the words.

“Jack.”

I leaned in
close to his head.

He took two
short gasps.

“F-F-Find
C-Clarissa.” He paused for more air. “Watch over her for…” The words trailed
off.

I took his hand
in mind and cradled his head with my other hand. “I will, Colonel.”

“Th-the desk.”

His body went
slack.

“Help me
perform CPR,” Jessie said.

I stood, looked
around the room and then at the desk.

“Jack,” she
said.

“There’s no
point, Jess. Look at him.”

She ignored me
and went to work trying to revive Abbot. The words “lost cause” meant nothing
to her.

I stepped over
her and moved to the back of the room and stopped and stood behind Abbot’s
desk. What did he want me to find there? I went through each drawer one at a
time not knowing what to look for. The drawers were organized, each having its
own purpose. One had pens, markers, paper clips and other office supplies. Two
were empty. The third contained a few file folders housing documents pertaining
to the property. There was no actual file cabinet. The house served as Abbot’s
weekend home and he likely did very little in terms of work while here.

My eyes scanned
the desktop. Back and forth I looked for anything that wasn’t there when I sat
across the desk from Abbot. Nothing seemed out of ordinary. There was his
computer monitor, an award of some sort, his desk calendar, and a picture of
Abbot and Clarissa when she was a little girl. He held two fishing poles and
she held up a nice sized largemouth bass.

Jessie rose
from the other side of the desk. Her blood covered hands hung by her side. Tear
stained cheeks were red with frustration. She shook her head and looked down at
the floor. She blew upwards to get a strand of hair out of her face.

“I’m sorry,
Jack.”

“I know.
Nothing you could do, Jess. This is my fault.”

“No, Jack.
Don’t say that.”

“I called him.
We showed up. Half an hour later he’s dead. Hard to ignore the damn pattern.”

She said
nothing. Her eyes scanned the desktop.

“I need to get
you someplace safe. You’re in danger with me.”

“What are you
looking for?” she asked, ignoring everything I had just said.

“He said, ‘the
desk.’” I gestured across the six-foot long, three foot wide desktop. “So I’m
looking on the desk.”

“Maybe inside
the desk?”

I shook my
head. “I checked. Nothing that made sense in there.”

She started to
speak, and stopped after letting out an
ah
sound.

“What is it?”

She hesitated
and bit the left side of her bottom lip. She lifted her head and initiated eye
contact. “202.”

“What?”

She reached out
and pointed at the calendar.

“202.”

I followed her
hand. There it was, 202, followed by a dash, three more numbers and another
dash followed by three more numbers.

“202 is D.C.,”
she said. “It’s a phone number. Missing a digit, but still a phone number.”

“And a name,” I
said. “Look.” I put my finger down on the calendar next to the name and number.
“Conners.”

“Who is that?”
she asked.

“I don’t know,”
I said. “It’s either who Abbot was talking to or who he was being referred to.”

“The desk,”
Jessie said.

“I need to find
him.” I tore off the section of the calendar with the name and number and stuck
it in my pocket, then gestured to Jessie to follow me.

Bear met us in
the living room. “We should go, Jack.”

I nodded. I had
a feeling the police would show up soon. Whoever did this would try to frame me
for it. My prints were all over the house by this point, and we had no time to
clean up.

“Go start the
car,” I said. “I’m going to take a quick look around.”

Bear ran to the
door. His heavy steps reverberated through the floor. He left the house.

“Should I go
outside?” Jessie asked.

“Stay with me.”
I led her into the kitchen. “Look for bottled water and food we can take with
us.”

She scavenged
the kitchen while I checked the table, drawers and cupboards. A phone hung on
the wall. A piece of paper was held in place behind a piece of plastic above
the number pad. The paper contained a few names and numbers. My name was there,
so was Keller’s. That wasn’t what I was looking for though. At the top of the
list was the name Clarissa. Next to her name was a 212 phone number. New York
City. I popped the plastic off the phone, grabbed the piece of paper and
stuffed it in my pocket. I checked over my shoulder. Jess didn’t seem to
notice.

“We can go,” I
said.

I left the
kitchen with Jessie following behind.

Bear stood in
the open doorway blocking our exit to the outside.

“Everything all
right?” I asked.

“Yeah,” he
said.

“Let’s go
then.”

“It’s too all
right, Jack.”

“What do you
mean?”

“If you did
this wouldn’t you do something to the car?”