Brain Storm, Cat Gilbert [read books for money TXT] 📗

She smelled like home and Mama D, and I found myself hugging her back, despite my fear and anger at the risk she was taking by being here.

“Why are you here?” I asked quietly, sure Lars would hear us. “How did you know I would be here?”

“Lars told me to come.” She nodded at my look of astonishment. “He’s working with Mac.”

“Wait a second.” I stole a look at the door, certain that it would be ripped open at any second and Lars would be standing on the other side. “How do you know that?”

“He caught me on the mountain. Scared me to death.” She turned and started sorting rapidly through the clothes. “He’s talked to Mac and Mac told him where to find us.”

“I haven’t even talked to Mac. How did he manage it?”

“I don’t know, but he has. Mac called him when he started getting suspicious. Wanted him to check things out at the Agency. That’s what Lars is doing there. He’s helping Mac.”

She was pulling out clothes as she talked and putting some of them into a separate pile. I just stood there watching her, trying to make sense of what she was telling me.

“Why are you here, then? Why did he tell you to come?”

“He can’t talk to you. Hughes is watching him all the time. He said to tell you he’s here. He has your back. He also wants to know about someone named Connors?” I nodded at her that I knew what she meant. “Who’s he?”

“The Director at the Agency. You’ve seen him. Short guy. Red hair.”

“The leprechaun?” she asked, pausing with a leather jacket in her hand. “He’s the Director?”

I nodded at her. I hadn’t thought of Connors in terms of a leprechaun, but I guessed the description was as good as any.

“I never would have guessed that.” She went back to sorting through the clothes.

“You haven’t met him. Connors is clear. He knows about Hughes, and he’s on board. I’m pretty sure a woman named Jenny is okay too.”

“He mentioned her. Said she was the one that got him in to see Mac.”

“Everything okay in there?” The voice came floating through the door. “Anyone need anything?”

“I’m fine,” I told the clerk, my heart going a mile a minute. “Just making my way through everything.”

“Me too,” Trinity called out.

“Okay, ladies. Just ring if you need something.”

We waited for a moment to be sure we were alone. Then she motioned for me to try on the leather jacket.

“Okay, everything in this pile should fit. The jacket’s big, so get a small in that. You need shoes, makeup and stuff for your hair. Otherwise, you’re set.” I shrugged out of the jacket and put it back on the hanger.

“Jonas should have never agreed to this,” she whispered as she pushed the remaining piles of clothes onto the corner of the bench and collapsed onto the emptied space. “If I had known what you two were up to, I’d have stopped it.”

She sounded exhausted and discouraged, and I realized that the decision to go to the Agency had caused a problem between them. We had made it without consulting her because she was right. She would have been against it, and there hadn’t been time to try and convince her otherwise. It had been faster and simpler just to do it and deal with the consequences later. Only I wasn’t dealing with them where Trinity was concerned. Jonas was.

“Don’t blame him for this. It was my decision. He was just following orders.”

It took a moment, but she finally seemed to accept that things were the way they had to be.

“Well, at least you’re not alone in there.” She stood up, knowing it was time to go. “Lars gave me a phone. That’s how he let us know you’d be here. You think we can trust him?”

She obviously already did, or she wouldn’t be here, but I knew she needed to hear it from me. Needed the reassurance that she’d done the right thing.

Could we trust him? He’d caught her and let her go. He’d told them how to find me and was sitting out there now, knowing she was in here and doing nothing about it. It would have been the perfect opportunity to hand us over to Hughes, but he hadn’t done it.

“Yes, we can trust him. You did the right thing,” I assured her, even though I wasn’t sure myself. “We’ve got friends inside now, and that will make all the difference.”

She sat down on the floor and pushed herself through the gap.

“Be careful,” she whispered, as her head disappeared from view. Within minutes, I heard her throw open her dressing room door and call out to the sales lady as she left the area.

It had all happened so fast, it was almost as if I’d imagined the whole thing. Here I’d thought they were safe, and no one knew they were around, and now I find out Lars has been out there, snooping around, scaring her and that Mac had told him where to find them. Worst of all, I hadn’t been able to talk to Mac at all. I had to get my information third hand.

Frustrated, I kicked off the hospital slippers and stripped off the oversize sweats eyeing the pile of clothes Trinity had picked out. I was sure there was underwear in there somewhere, and sure enough, Trinity hadn’t let me down. Minutes later I was back in my hospital slippers, but now I was clad in jeans and sporting a very comfortable knit pullover. I checked the price tag on it, and my mouth fell open. Trinity had excellent taste. Gathering up the stack of clothes she’d set aside, I carried them out of the dressing room, just as the clerk was on her way back to check on me again.

“I’ll take these. I like the leather jacket, but I need a smaller size.” She took the clothes from me and dropped them at the register before heading over to hunt for the jacket.

“I need to go find some shoes,” I said over my shoulder to Lars, who had come to stand next to me. “Then I need a pharmacy and we’re done.”

He didn’t answer. Just walked past me to the register where the clerk had begun ringing up my purchases. I joined him, handing her the tags for the clothes I was wearing and stood quietly next to him.

I had never even heard him speak and yet I was supposed to trust him, not just with my life, but with everyone else’s as well. He took the bags, and we made our way out to the car to drop them off before heading down the street to the shoe store.

By the time we had finished shopping, it was dark and chilly. The wind that had kicked up while we were inside making it seem colder than it actually was. I had forgotten how the temperature dropped along with the sun in the mountains and was definitely regretting having left my new leather coat in the car. I looked down at my feet, now toasty warm in my new trekking shoes and thick socks, grateful that at least I wasn’t tromping around through the cold with nothing but slippers on.

Lars started the car, leaving me inside while he stowed the bags in the trunk. I sat there for a while fiddling with the heat settings before I realized that it had suddenly gotten quiet. I looked around to find the trunk closed and Lars nowhere in sight. The thought barely had time to register when a tap on my window had me twisting back around, ready to face Hughes, only to find Lars standing there, both of his hands full.

Coffee. He’d gone for coffee. I rolled the window down and relieved him of both cups, grateful for the heat that radiated into my icy fingers. I settled the cups into the holders and raised the window up fast, before whatever warmth the heater had managed to emit, escaped to the wind outside. A cold blast of air sailed into the car as Lars quickly got in and latched his seat belt. He picked up the cups and handed me one of them before shifting the car into gear and pulling out of the lot.

I wrapped my hands around the hot cup and took a tentative sip. Expecting the acrid taste of strong black coffee, I wasn’t prepared for what I was tasting. It took a second, deeper sip before I realized what I was drinking. A white chocolate mocha and a touch of cinnamon. My favorite coffee. Mac had made them for me. Something special. Something only Mac would know.

We pulled to a stop, and I looked over at Lars, his face bathed in red from the traffic light. He turned to me and nodded before turning his attention back to the cars around us. Mac had told him. Was telling me to trust him. Wherever Mac was, whatever condition he was in, he was on the job, and he’d secured reinforcements.

In less than a day, everything had changed. Where once I’d been alone in the enemy camp, I now had allies. Where there had been doubt and fear of failure, was the conviction we would succeed. The knowledge that if I failed, there were others who would make sure Hughes paid for what he had done. The people he had sacrificed, the lives he had ruined.

I settled back in the seat and closed my eyes, inhaling the deep scents of the coffee, chocolate and cinnamon and reveled in the moment.