Operation Blind Date (8 page)

Chapter 11

“I
t can’t be coincidence that he takes off on an unplanned ‘vacation’ right when Amber goes missing,” Teague said.

“Seems unlikely,” Quinn agreed. He thought for a moment, then seemed to reach several decisions at once.

“Tyler, do a run-through of our records, see if we have anyone in the database with a connection to North Country, up through third degree. I’m going to go talk to them about Page, and I’d like to have a reason for them to cooperate.”

“Third degree?” Laney asked, the first words she’d spoken since the discovery that Edward, too, had, in a way, vanished without warning. She was trying desperately to focus on something else, anything else.

“Someone in house first, a direct connection second, third is somebody with a connection to somebody with a direct connection,” Teague explained.

“You keep that kind of information on all your clients?”

“And their families,” Teague said.

“They only go into the database with their permission,” Hayley added.

“After you’ve helped them when no one else would, has anybody ever said no?”

Teague glanced at Quinn for that one, Laney guessed because he hadn’t been with Foxworth long enough to be sure of the answer. “A couple of times,” Quinn answered. “But with very good reason.”

“If Quinn called them himself, they’d help out, they just can’t risk being in a database. Our security’s the best, but nothing’s unhackable,” Tyler put in.

Laney guessed that Quinn had an interesting catalog of people in his head to reach out to if need be. Probably more interesting than the average sorts Foxworth seemed to help most often.

“You two,” Quinn said, indicating her and Teague, “go talk to Amber’s family. I know you’ve spoken to them several times on the phone, Laney, but sometimes a face-to-face has a different effect. You can read reactions that might lead to the right question. Maybe they know something they don’t know they know.”

“They’re in Spokane,” Laney said, “or I would have done that already.”

Quinn nodded. “I remember. Teague, take the plane.” He glanced at his watch. “It’s late, but you’d better go today. Weather on the way in by tomorrow.”

“Yes, sir.”

Nothing seemed odd to her, but something passed between the two men, a split second of something, lifted brow by Quinn, half-sheepish quirk of the mouth from Teague.

“Plane?” she asked as they headed back out to the parking lot.

Teague nodded. “And a sweet one. Cruises at better than two hundred knots. We’ll be there in a couple of hours instead of five driving.” He gave her a sideways glance. “You okay with small planes?”

“I don’t know,” she said frankly. “I see them all the time, it’s impossible not to around here, but I’ve never been on one.”

“Almost as many seaplanes as seabirds around here,” he agreed with a smile. When they were back in his car he added, “It’ll be fun, Laney. And a heck of a distraction, which I’m guessing you could use right about now.”

She couldn’t deny that, she thought. What she wasn’t so sure of was if she wanted to be alone with him for as long as this might take. She was all too aware that her reaction to him was uncharacteristic, to say the least.

But it wasn’t his fault if the first thing she thought at the idea of flying off with him somewhere had little to do with why they were really going, and everything to do with her suddenly too vivid imagination. When had she started having heated, daytime fantasies about a man she’d just met?

“So Foxworth has a plane and pilot on hand?”

“Don’t forget the helicopter.”

Laney shook her head. “Amazing.”

And it did amaze her. All this equipment, all these people, knowledgeable and well trained, and all for one goal. An honest, honorable goal, in a world that too often looked upon such words as cheesy or out of touch.

“We’ll go by your place,” Teague said, snapping her out of her thoughts. “Pick up whatever you might need in case this takes longer than expected.”

“You mean like...overnight?”

“Yeah. I never take weather in the northwest for granted, especially traveling over the Cascades.”

Wise, she was sure. The weather Quinn had mentioned that was forecast for late tomorrow could just as easily pick up the pace and arrive tonight. But somehow all she could focus on was the idea of being stranded somewhere overnight. With Teague.

She wasn’t sure if that excited her or terrified her. And finally decided it did both.

* * *

She’d been quick about it, Teague thought. She’d changed clothes, added a sweater over a T-shirt, thrown a jacket over her arm and put on sturdier shoes. Whatever else she thought she needed had gone into the canvas bag that was smaller than the purses he’d seen some women carry every day.

He’d been waiting in her small but cozy living room, looking around with interest. The colors were the soothing greens of the outdoors brought inside, but with splashes of yellow that seemed to brighten things the way the occasional sun break did during the long gray days of February. The TV was in one corner, fairly small and unobtrusive; the music system, with a slot for her smartphone, was a bit more prominent. Most prominent of all was the large bookcase on one wall, full of actual books, which was telling, he guessed. No e-reader for her...or maybe she had one of those, too.

He hadn’t realized she lived behind the shop, in a small, one-bedroom apartment attached to the main building. She was truly doing everything she could to make a go of it, sacrificing her own comfort to the building of her business. He appreciated that kind of dedication to a dream. He’d had it once.

And thanks to Quinn and Foxworth, he had it again.

“What about you?” she asked as she added a bottle of water from the fridge to the bag.

“We’ll have more aboard,” he said, indicating the bottle. “And I’ve got my go bag in the car.”

She looked up from zipping the bag closed again. “Go bag? As in always ready?”

He shrugged. “You never know.”

“A holdover from your time in the service?”

“More a requirement for Foxworth. Quinn wants us ready to jump fast if we have to. In his way, he’s as good at logistics as Charlie. Well, almost,” he amended, looking up as if for a lightning strike.

She laughed. “I begin to see why Hayley’s nervous about meeting the infamous other Foxworth.”

“Better her than me,” Teague said with a feigned shudder. “Charlie scares the hell out of me.”

He’d gotten her to laugh, and that made him feel good. So good it also made him a little nervous.

You’d better hope that weather holds off,
he thought
. You get stranded with her overnight and you’ll be in big trouble.

And that realization truly scared the hell out of him. Which scared him even more. Fear compounded fear. And he was acting like some idiot schoolkid who’d just discovered girls were different for a reason.

He was grateful for her silence as they headed out toward the small airport. If they’d been really rushed they could have taken the chopper to the airport, but unless Quinn flew them himself, that would have put both it and the plane out of service, and they tried to avoid that if possible. And right now, although he would never tell Laney this, there wasn’t that much of a rush. If they were closer, if they had a better lead on where she was, then Foxworth would pull out all the stops. Right now they were still in the information gathering stage, and while the sense of urgency was there, it wasn’t overwhelming yet.

He hoped it never got to that. For Laney’s sake, he hoped they found out Amber was simply off on a romantic jaunt, acting oddly because she was all wrapped up in her new guy. Some women got like that. Or so he’d been told; he’d never run into it firsthand.

Would Laney be like that? So besotted that the way she acted with even her best friend would change? He couldn’t picture it. She seemed the kind who would be rock-solid loyal, unchanging, barring some unforgivable offense. The kind of woman you could count on and could trust on every level.

And that was a hell of an assessment to reach in two days, he thought ruefully.

They’d reached the interchange, turning to put the Naval Shipyard behind them and heading toward the airport just three miles farther on, when she spoke.

“Should I call them? Let them know we’re coming? Or would it be better if they didn’t know?”

Teague thought about that one for a moment. “What’s the likelihood they’d be gone?”

“Not much. They play a lot of golf, that’s about it, otherwise they’re homebodies.”

“Health? You said they moved there for the weather.”

Laney frowned. “They’re fine. They just wanted the heat after years of living on the rainy side. Why?”

He shrugged. “Just wanted to be sure nobody would keel over if you showed up out of the blue.”

She clearly hadn’t thought of that. “They’re going to realize how worried I am.”

“Yes.”

“And that will worry them, in turn.”

“Probably. But don’t call. If they know something they’re not telling you for some reason, the surprise might work to our advantage.”

“They wouldn’t. Seriously.”

“All right. You know them.”

He made the turn onto the airport, kept to the fifteen-mile-per-hour limit as he headed toward the large hangar Foxworth leased. The slow speed allowed him to take a longer look at her. She was staring down at her hands, where she was rubbing at her fingers one at a time. Something about the angle of her head, the half-lowered lashes, the way her ponytail brushed her nape and the concern in her troubled expression made him want to reach out and touch her, comfort her somehow, even though he had no idea what to say.

But he had to say something.

“Do you really think they’re not worried at all?”

Her head came up. She didn’t look at him, but out through the windshield toward the long stretch of runway marked by tracks of dark rubber left by countless landings. After a moment, she let out a long breath.

“No. If they haven’t actually spoken to her, either, then they’re worried. She talked to them at least two or three times a week.” After a moment of silence, she added quietly, “Thank you.”

He wasn’t sure what he’d done, but he’d take it.

Chapter 12

H
e hit a button on the console above his head, and Laney saw a door on the large hangar at the end of a row of them start to open. It was fully open by the time they got there, and they drove right into the cavernous building.

The first thing she saw was the sleek blue-and-white airplane. It seemed big to her, larger than some of the planes tied down outside, but certainly much smaller than any commercial plane she’d ever flown in. The wide windshield was divided, and there were generous windows on each side of the cockpit as well, followed by three smaller rectangular windows along the side. The swath of dark blue, accented by a ribbon of light blue, flowed over the white body from the bottom, sweeping up toward the tail as if caught by the wind.

“Told you she was pretty,” Teague said with a laugh as he parked toward the back, well clear of the airplane.

“Definitely an eye-catcher,” Laney said, feeling both a thrill and a touch of nervousness at the thought of making the trip over the mountains in something this much smaller than the usual commercial jet.

They got out, Laney shouldering her bag while Teague opened the lift gate and grabbed the smaller of two backpacks from the back of his SUV.

“Two?” Laney asked.

“Long-term, short-term,” Teague said.

“And you just keep them like this all the time?”

“Except for rotating the rations now and then, yes.”

She blinked. “Rations?”

“You never know,” he said again. And as if reminded he said, “Snacks are on the plane, plus water and sodas, but if you want coffee you’ll have to do it yourself.”

“I’ll be fine without.”

They stopped beside the plane.

“She’s a bit unique in the light aviation world. A prop plane with a pressurized cabin. We’ll go over the Cascades like they were foothills. All due respect, of course.”

She liked that, that he expressed respect for the mountains. She wouldn’t have trusted someone who disregarded a mountain range full of volcanoes and that held the fourteen-thousand-foot Mount Rainier along with ten other peaks over nine thousand feet tall. Her parents still talked about the day Mount St. Helens had left that group in one huge explosion that sheared off the top thousand feet.

She looked around the rest of the hangar with interest. There was a row of what looked to be offices and storage across the back, one with windows open to the main hangar bay.

“Backup,” Teague said when he saw her looking. “That’s why the hangar’s really bigger than we need for just the plane. We can operate all of Foxworth out of here if we have to.”

“Have you ever had to?”

“Not yet. But Charlie’s a big believer in redundancy of systems.”

Laney felt a pang of sympathy for Hayley. Even she was feeling intimidated by the impressive Charlie Foxworth, and she didn’t have to cope with the thought of being related.

Teague walked toward what looked like a small tractor and fired it up. He was heading toward the front of the plane when a fuel truck appeared outside the doorway. He waved at the driver, who stopped, then backed up slightly.

She watched what was obviously a familiar routine as Teague hooked the small tractor up to the plane.

“Can’t start the engine inside the hangar, airport rules,” he said when he saw her watching intently. “I get it, safetywise, but it’s a pain in the backside when it’s pouring rain.”

She managed not to ask how often they flew in that kind of weather. Obviously in the northwest if you only flew when it was dry you didn’t fly much.

The plane seemed smaller to her after it was rolled out of the hangar into the open air. It gleamed in the late summer sun, and she found herself following the rather rakish curve of the three-bladed prop with her eye. The silver cone in front was polished to a high shine, the nose looked long and racy, and she had the whimsical thought that the plane looked eager to fly.

She glanced around at the other planes tethered outside several yards away. Some of them looked downright clunky next to the sleek lines of this one. Wings above and below, she was used to seeing that, but she rarely saw the planes stationary so noticed other differences.

“Why the different propellers? Two blades, four, but this one has three?”

Teague laughed. “Just open up the trickiest part of aerodynamics, why don’t you? We could spend the whole flight on propeller theory and barely scratch the surface.”

“Oh.” She felt a little sheepish. She’d thought there might be a simple answer, like the size of the engine or something. And belatedly, the obvious began to dawn on her.

“But to answer what I think you’re asking,” Teague went on, “Quinn went with three for takeoff performance, since we don’t always end up at wide-open airfields. Four tends to keep the engine cooler, but he figured up here that was a decent trade-off, since we don’t usually have much ambient heat to deal with in this region.”

The fueler went about his business briskly while Teague walked around the aircraft, checking things whose function was beyond her. Tires, that was obvious. Flaps she figured out and the thing on the tail that went side to side. But he seemed to go over the thing inch by inch, taking his time, with all the care of a surgeon prepping for an operation.

And he was the surgeon. She felt foolish for not realizing sooner. The absence of anyone else around should have tipped her off right away, before the way he talked about the plane had. When Quinn had said “Take the plane,” he’d meant it literally for Teague. Take it as in fly it. Himself.

The fuel truck finished and departed, and Teague walked back into the hangar to pick up his bag.

“Ready?” he asked her.

“I guess,” she said, sliding him a sideways look. “You really fly this thing?”

“Nah. She practically flies herself. I just steer now and then.”

She smiled at that, watching as he reached up and grabbed a handle on the side of the plane’s fuselage and pulled. A clamshell door opened, each half lifting and lowering smoothly. The lower half held two wide, comfortably deep steps that looked easy to negotiate.

“She seats six,” Teague said as she lifted her foot to the first step. “Pick your spot.” He gave her a considering look. “You can sit up front if you want, or if that will bother you, or you want more room to relax, you’ve got four to choose from back here. There’s a stowaway desk over there, if you want it.”

She hesitated, then jumped. “I’d like to start out up front.”

He grinned that crooked grin, and she wondered how flying could flip her heart any more than that.

“You can move back later. In the meantime, you can always close your eyes if it freaks you out.”

“No stunts, okay?”

The grin vanished. “In this? Charlie would have my head. And rightfully so.”

There was no mistaking his seriousness. When it came down to business he was as steady as Quinn. That made the last of her reservations fade.

As it turned out, the flight was smooth and uneventful, exciting only because she’d never done it and had never felt so close to the process. He did angle the plane once so, on this severe clear day, she could look down the range of mountains and see the string of volcanoes that were the crown jewels; Baker to the north, to the south majestic Rainier and the remains of St. Helens, reminding everyone of the power of the giants that they lived with. From Canada to California the string of fire stretched.

Then the jagged peaks were behind them and they were on the dry side, and she was so busy looking she forgot to be nervous. That she spent as much time watching Teague smoothly handle the controls, and the rather fearsome-looking electronics in front of them, was something she told herself was purely for her own edification.

Sooner than seemed possible they landed at a small airfield northeast of the city, along the Spokane River. As she was coming to realize, Foxworth’s planning genius wasn’t limited to the infamous Charlie. There was a rental car waiting for them.

“Navigate or drive?” Teague asked.

She liked that he asked, but the decision seemed obvious.

“I’d better navigate. I know where they live, but I’m not used to coming in this way. When I’ve come out to visit with Amber, we came in commercial, at the big airport.”

Laney quickly oriented herself with the map on her phone and set them on their way. She guessed he could easily have done the same, probably even with turn by turn voiced directions, judging by the high-end phones all of Foxworth seemed to have. She wondered if he’d done it just to give her something to do, something else to think about. If he had, it worked.

At least, it did until they made the last turn onto the cul-de-sac where Amber’s parents lived.

There was a police car parked in their driveway.