The Rapids

“Rob Dunnemore. He’s here?”

“He’s freshening up at his hotel. He’s a marshal. We’re not supposed to think of him as Poe’s surrogate son.”

Kopac grinned. “Says who?”

“Says me. Anything I can do for you? Or do I get to do a little work before Dunnemore gets here?”

“Nothing you can do for me, Special Agent Spencer.” He leaned in toward her, adding in an amused conspiratorial whisper, “I’ll be in my office if you need a place to scream. It’s in the bowels of the building. No one’ll hear you.”

“Very funny.”

He laughed. “I thought so.”

When she got back to her desk, Maggie checked her e-mail, hoping for another tip, something that would force Bremmerton to find someone else to stick Rob Dunnemore with. The guy put her nerve endings on edge. It wasn’t the Poe connection, she decided. It was the gray eyes.

But there was nothing.

Her mobile phone rang, almost as if it knew she was looking for distractions.

A private number.

“Maggie Spencer—”

“St. John’s Cathedral is the finest example of Gothic architecture in the Netherlands.”

The voice was male, the accent East Coast American, and the words had her sitting up straight. St. John’s was in ’s-Hertogenbosch, the same city where Dutch police had picked up Nick Janssen yesterday.

“Who is this?”

“I’ll be there tomorrow afternoon. It’s important that we talk.”

“I understand, but I need more information—”

“Just trust your instincts.”

“My instincts tell me this is a crank call.”

She thought she heard the start of a laugh. “I doubt that. Do people still call you Magster? Your father did when you were small, didn’t he?”

Magster.

Her stomach flip-flopped, but she warned herself that using her childhood name could just be a good guess, a way to manipulate her. It didn’t mean he knew anything about her father’s death. She couldn’t let herself think it was anything more.

“Who are you? I need a name.”

It was as if she hadn’t spoken. “Come alone. If you don’t, I’ll disappear, and you’ll have missed an important opportunity.”

“An opportunity for what?”

But he was gone, the connection dead.

A meeting. Was the guy out of his mind?

He must have prepared every word in advance. Of course her father called her Magster. What father with a daughter named Maggie didn’t?

Some days she couldn’t believe it’d been eighteen months since his murder; other days, it was as if her father was more a dream than anything else, lost in a fog of memories and lost possibilities.

Had the caller known him?

Maggie felt a sudden rush of tears that she immediately fought back, impatient with herself.

But Rob Dunnemore materialized behind her, startling her with his good looks. The ends of his fair hair were still damp from his shower. He hadn’t wasted any time in getting cleaned up and settled in.

She smiled quickly, hoping there was no sign of even one damn tear in her eyes. “Have a seat, Deputy. We can get started.”

“Bad day?”

“What? Oh.” She made herself smile. “No, not yet.”

He didn’t seem to believe her. “That’s good.”

Maggie wished she’d indulged in chocolate sprinkles that morning, because it was going to be a very long day.

Magster.

She’d figure out what to do about her anonymous caller when she didn’t have Deputy Dunnemore’s gray eyes on her.

Wide awake despite his overnight flight and long day, Rob sat on a wooden chair at a small table in his room on the top floor of his hotel, a renovated eighteenth-century building. It had low, slanted ceilings and no air-conditioning, but it wasn’t a hot night, at least by middle Tennessee standards.

He heard laughter through his open window and looked down four floors at a young couple standing under a linden tree, its branches carefully trained.

Rob turned away from the scene.

His eyes were heavy, scratchy, from fatigue and jet lag.

Maggie Spencer had walked with him back to his hotel, turning down a quick after-work drink.

A woman with things on her mind, Special Agent Spencer.

He’d gone into the dark, quiet bar by himself, but in a few minutes another man joined him, introducing himself as Tom Kopac, an embassy employee. Maggie’s friend.

They’d had a beer together. It was clear word had gotten out that the wounded marshal from the Janssen mess in May—the marshal who was friends with the president—was in town and Maggie was stuck with him.

Kopac had decided to check him out.

Their conversation was cordial but superficial. Rob had smiled at the older man. “Maggie’s a DS agent. She protects you. You don’t protect her.”

“She’s also a friend.”