Someone To Protect Her

Wisps of thinning white hair sticking out from the brimmed hat pulled low over his sun-leathered face, Patrick dumped a sack onto the ground. “Are you gonna stand there so you can tell me every move to make, woman?”

“Only if I want you to get it right the first time,” Dale said, fists on her ample hips.

“If you don’t like the way I do things—”

“I know. Do it myself. But if I don’t participate, you’ll think I’m ignoring you.”

“We could try it that way and see for sure,” Patrick suggested slyly.

Frank figured they’d keep things lively for his boss—if they didn’t drive the man crazy with their bickering.

Dale spotted Frank. “I don’t know why I’ve put up with this old buzzard for nearly forty years. He can’t keep a civil tongue around me.”

Patrick mimicked her. “If I did, you’d think I was ignoring you.”

“Sounds to me like true love,” Frank said, pushing back painful memories of his own.

Before the McMurtys could respond, a shrill voice came from the other direction. “No, Daddy! No!”

Carrying his cranky daughter from the cabin area, Kyle Foster, one of the other agents, spoke to her in a low, soothing voice. “Mrs. Mac is going to take good care of you for just a little while.”

The blond moppet screwed up her face and began to wail “Da-a-a-d-dy!” as she fisted his shirt. She looked so fragile pressed against her father’s broad, solid frame.

“Shh, honey. You be a big girl and I’ll let you ride your pony later. You want to ride Ribbons, don’t you?”

Molly rubbed her eyes with balled fists. Even to an old bachelor like Frank, it was evident the three-year-old needed a nap. He caught Kyle’s attention and indicated he was heading for the house. Looking as if he were about to tear out his sandy brown hair, Kyle nodded.

“You take a nice nap for me,” Dale chimed in, “and when you wake up, I’ll have some homemade oatmeal cookies with lots of raisins for you.”

Frank didn’t know if it was the promise of the pony ride or the cookies that sealed the deal, but Molly finally allowed the housekeeper to take her from her father. Kyle caught up to him at the long porch that fronted the main house.

“I don’t know if I was cut out for this—not the job, but being a single father.”

“Being a responsible parent takes more work than any profession, that’s for certain. But I’m sure you’ll get the hang of it.”

Frank knew all about Kyle Foster, bomb specialist. He’d been a hero until a bomb scare had gone wrong and his partner had died in the explosion. Guilt had plummeted Kyle out of the L.A. force, but law enforcement was obviously in his blood, for he hadn’t resisted Daniel’s recruiting tactics. Frank didn’t envy Kyle’s having to balance a dangerous job with parental responsibilities, but, unfortunately, his wife had left him no choice when she’d dumped her child as well as her husband for a Hollywood film producer.

They entered the house. The big open living area bespoke its past as “Dude Ranch Meeting Central.”

The former lounge and lobby rose two stories, as did the massive fireplace constructed from local river rock. A moose head balefully looked down at them through glass eyes. Over the middle of the room hung a chandelier of elk horn. And a cast-iron bighorn sheep challenged them from the windowed area where Daniel stood, back to them, phone to his ear.

“Yeah, Mitch, so far, so good. The locals don’t suspect anything.”

Frank knew Daniel was talking to Mitchell Forbes, who had run the Texas Confidential operation. Daniel had worked as an agent there, and though he had retired from active duty, he’d been asked to start a branch of the agency in Montana where a serious terrorist threat had the Department of Public Safety worried.

“They just figure I’m a crazy man for wanting to become a rancher at my age in this economic climate. They treat me with friendly tolerance.” Daniel turned and silently greeted his two agents. He indicated he’d only be a minute. “Uh-huh.”

Frank threw himself onto one of the club chairs upholstered in a Navajo pattern and appreciatively gazed at the framed photographs lining the opposite wall—a turn-of-the-century chronicle of the railroad, rodeos and roundups of the area.

“I’m not looking forward to baby-sitting her, that’s for certain,” Daniel was saying. “I’m only doing it as a favor to the director. Listen. Frank and Kyle are here, and I want to meet with them, fill them in and make sure that we have what we need.”

The Montana Confidential operation was just getting off the ground. So far, the men had been busy building their cover. Frank didn’t mind working with the horses—a side benefit of the job, actually—but he was eager for an assignment.

When Daniel hung up, Frank asked, “So who are you baby-sitting?”

“Whitney MacNair.”

“Of the Washington and Martha’s Vineyard MacNairs?” Kyle asked.

The nation’s second family of American politics, Frank knew. As a MacNair, Whitney had grown up privileged and pampered and in the spotlight. Her face was better-known to him than any cover girl’s.

“The same,” Daniel agreed. “Her family was furious when the press ran with the story about her accepting gifts from her boss and they quickly yanked her out of the limelight.”

Her boss being the very married Senator Ross Weston. Frank mused, “Odd that she’s being sent here, to Weston’s home state.”

“Her father asked the Director of the Department of Public Safety for a favor, and since I needed an assistant…” Daniel ran a hand through his blond hair and shrugged. “We’ll make it work somehow. Weston’s not from these parts, anyhow, so I don’t imagine him showing up on our doorstep anytime soon. Now, gentlemen, let’s get down to business.”

“Down” being a secret room built below the study.

They followed Daniel into a room off the main living area. It appeared to be a typical if spacious office with a computer desk and seating area and a spectacular view of the mountains. The walls were lined with builtin bookshelves. Daniel went to an inner wall and reached behind a book of Montana photographs. A click and the section of bookshelf swung open.

“Gentlemen…”

Frank led the way into an elevator car, Kyle following, Daniel bringing up the rear. He slid the bookshelf unit back in place and hit the down button. The machinery no more than whispered its presence as the car descended to the secret “war” room below.

“I haven’t even had time to check out the equipment,” Daniel said. “I’m sure we’ll have to shake out some bugs in the system before we’re operating smoothly.”

Computers, fax machines and telephones awaited in the communications center. The men split up and for the next hour or so thoroughly checked out the electronics.

Frank put one of the computers through its paces. Once satisfied all was as it should be, he left the area to check out the rest of the quarters. Locked cabinets—weapons and ammunition—lined one of the lowceilinged walls. Another work area held listening devices and cameras. He noted a red warning light perched over a nearby closed door. Lab for surveillance photography, he guessed. They had everything they would need to do their jobs and then some.

Daniel and Kyle caught up with him; they took seats around a large conference table where materials were already laid out. Enough for four men, Frank noted, when only the three of them were present.

He asked, “So are we it for now?”

“For however long it is until Special Agent Court Brody arrives,” Daniel agreed.

“FBI,” Kyle muttered. “Suit-and-tie law enforcement. Yeah, he’ll blend in with the locals, all right.”

“Actually, he’ll blend better than any of us.” At the far end of the table, Daniel fiddled with what looked to be one of several dossiers spread out in front of him. “Brody grew up in this neck of the mountains—a positive for us. And he’s only on loan from the FBI until I can recruit another permanent agent.”

“As long as he doesn’t think he’s in charge and doesn’t get in our way,” Frank said.

He had no fondness for special agents, not after the Bosnia debriefing.

“Don’t worry, I’ll do my best to stay out of your way.”

As one, all three men at the table turned toward the deep voice coming from the other side of the room.