Lonesome Lawmen

Seven-1

Seven

Matt could tell from Alice’s demure expression as she wove her way between desks that she had more bad news for him. He stood up and stretched his back. It eased the painful kink from another long night spent in the office, made him feel like he was doing something besides pushing paper.

“What?” What now, is what he meant.

“Dani answered your email.” The amusement in her eyes told him it was personal.

Matt looked past her. “I thought Sebastian was in charge of email?”

“He was afraid.” Alice handed him the sheet, then put her hands on her hips, a look on her face that reminded him of his mother when she was about to deliver an improving lecture. “We’re all afraid of you, you know.”

“Yeah, I noticed you shaking in your high-heeled shoes.” He unfolded the sheet. Under the usual email header gibberish were four words: I don’t think so.

He rubbed the bridge of his nose. It didn’t bring enlightenment. “What does this mean?”

Alice shrugged elegantly. “Uh, no...”

Matt dropped into his chair, tossed the note onto the desk top, picked it up again and scowled at it for the sweep of a second hand, then threw it down again. “What’s her problem?”

Alice looked amused. “Maybe you shouldn’t have told her to get her ass back in here—“

“Why not?” He shoved his hands through his hair, trying not to tear it out. Didn’t have that much to spare and didn’t want to waste it on a capricious romance writer. “Don’t you think she should get in her?”

“Yes, but—“

“No. No buts. Right is right. Right?”

“Not if she doesn’t know it. For Pete’s sake, Matt, she doesn’t know us from Neuman.” Alice sat down across from him, her expression sympathetic but still openly amused. “To her, we’re just a new set of Feds who may or may not get her killed.”

He knew that. No, he didn’t. If he was feeling some weird connection, she should be, too. He rubbed his face. “I need coffee. Has anybody made any?”

Alice started to get up, but Matt stopped her with a shake of his head. “I’ll get it.

Wouldn’t want to be accused of committing a non-politically correct act. Besides,” he stretched his back, twisting his shoulders left and right, “I could use the exercise.”

It felt good to be in motion, however brief the duration. Back at his desk, he handed Alice a steaming cup, before settling in his chair again. His back protested, but subsided a bit after he’d downed half his mug. Calmer, he asked, “So how do we convince her we’re the good guys?”

Alice took a careful sip before she said, “The good news is, Carolyn Ryan came down on our side. She emailed Gwynne shortly after we left.”

“Let me see it.” Matt held out his hand, unease returning at the slight, though obvious, reluctance with which she handed it over. He read it. His brows arched. He looked at Alice.

“Cute-assed Fed? Fine hunting hound dog? Is she talking about me?”

Alice grinned. “I don’t think she’d call me a cute-assed Fed. And you do hunt people, Matt.”

“I hunt a lot of things, but last time I looked I only had two legs and don’t howl—very often. What is this stuff?”

He turned the sheet so Alice could see the strangely configured punctuation at the end of the letter: :-).

Alice craned to look. “I wondered about that, too. Sebastian says it’s called a smiley—“

“A what?” He barked the question at her.

“A smiley. You have to tip your head to the side—“

Matt’s eyes narrowed sharply.

“—or not.” Alice got her grin under control before adding, “They’re called emoticons—emotional punctuation used to add emotion to plain text. Sebastian’s getting you a dictionary.”

“There’s a whole dictionary of these things?” He leaned back. The one good thing about computers, in his opinion, was their total lack of emotion. So someone gets the bright idea to add emotion? What a world. “If being called a cute-assed Fed is the good news, what’s the bad news?”

“Hayes has emailed Gwynne, too.”

“What?” Matt straightened in his chair, but it wasn’t enough. He jumped up and paced to her side of the desk, grabbing the last sheet she had in her bag of tricks.

Death hath many doors to let out life, Dani.

Soon I’ll open yours and send you through.

How are you sleeping nights?

Still dreaming about me?

“Nasty, isn’t it?” Alice said.

“Not nice.” Urgency sent his heart racing. “Any indication she’s picked this up?”

Alice shook her head. “And, no, we can’t stop her getting it. I already asked. Sebastian says that, based on Hayes’ record as a computer whiz, he’s probably reading her mail, too—including what we send her.” She hesitated. “We’re going to have to let her know our communications with her aren’t secure, Matt.”

“Re-enforcing her belief that we can’t be trusted.” Matt leaned against the edge of his desk, thinking about Dani. About Hayes. Instead of a lover’s triangle, they were a killer’s triangle. The hit man, the Marshals’ tracker, and the romance writer, bound together by the greed and ambition of Richard Hastings, accused murderer with some still unknown tie to the mob. When the hit man was Jonathan Hayes, it was weird enough to make a guy wax philosophical. If he had the time or inclination for it. He looked at Alice. “Do it. Tell her Hayes is listening in. Hell, she’s probably already figured it out. Maybe we can get some points for honesty. You women like that, don’t you?”

“Yeah, we just love it,” Alice said dryly as she stood up, “especially when you’re so sincere about it.”

“I don’t have time to be sincere. Have Riggs give a copy of this to Sebastian’s identity friend, what was his name?”

“Boomer Edison?”

“Yeah, him. Maybe he can find Hayes out there, too.” He crossed round to his chair and leaned back, steepling his hands into a triangle. As Alice walked away, he brought two points of his triangle together. The action pushed the last point away. Good thing he didn’t get off on symbolism or believe in bad omens.

Riggs poked his head in long enough to say, “Boomer Edison called. Says he’ll have something for us right after lunch.”

Matt nodded, leaning back with his hands clasped behind his head and rocking the chair in time with his thoughts.

See, no good or bad omens. Just patient hard work by people following a time-proven process. He could do patient. He picked up a report and leaned back, his body carefully relaxed in the chair.

His fingers, in pointed defiance, beat impatiently against the arm rest.