Brace For Impact. Janice Johnson Kay

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      WILL DIDN’T LIKE a single thing she’d said. If she hadn’t been so obviously scared out of her skull, he’d have discounted a story so unlikely. Sure, he was climbing in the backcountry of the North Cascades when a bomb took down a plane carrying a now-dead United States marshal and a woman fleeing...who? What?

      He muttered something under his breath he hoped she didn’t make out and rubbed a hand over his face. He didn’t care if he sounded brusque when he said, “You need to tell me everything.”

      Now she was unhappy, showing the whites of her eyes. Either deciding how much to say or dreaming up lies.

      As he waited, he watched every shifting emotion on her pinched face. For the first time it struck him that she might be pretty or even beautiful when she wasn’t injured and in shock. So much of her face was banged up, he wasn’t sure, but...she did have delicate bone structure and big, haunting eyes, mostly green-gold. Calling them hazel didn’t do the rich mix of colors justice.

      She bit her lip hard enough that he almost protested, but then she started talking.

      “My name is Maddy... Madeline Kane. I’m an attorney with Dietrich, McCarr and Brown in Seattle. I was sent to talk to a potential client at her home in Medina. Um, that’s on the other side—”

      “I know where it is,” he interrupted. Medina was a wealthy enclave on the opposite shore of Lake Washington from the city. Was Bill Gates’s house there? He couldn’t remember for sure, but it wouldn’t be out of place.

      “While I was there, I had to ask to use her restroom. I wouldn’t usually, but—” She shook her head. “It doesn’t matter. The thing is, I heard the doorbell ring, and the client let someone in. She screamed. I started to come out just as she said, ‘Please, I don’t understand.’” Maddy’s eyes lost focus as she went somewhere he couldn’t go. “She was on the floor, trying to scoot backward. He... I only saw him in profile. He said she was a problem for Brian Torkelson. And then he shot her. Twice. It...was sort of a coughing sound, not very loud.”

      Suppressor. Tense, Will waited for the rest.

      “And he said, ‘Problem solved.’ He started to turn, but—” She’d begun shivering again. “I stepped back, made it into the bathroom. If he’d walked down the hall—”

      Will covered her good hand clutching the blanket to her throat with his hand. “He didn’t.”

      “No.” She looked away. “I keep having dreams where I hear his footsteps approaching.”

      “Yeah.” If he sounded gruff, he couldn’t help it. “That’s natural. I have nightmares, too.”

      Gratitude showed in her eyes when they met his again. “Do you know who Brian Torkelson is?”

      The name rang a bell as if he’d seen it in the news recently. But he had been making an effort since he got out of rehab not to follow the news, so he shook his head.

      “He’s—well, he was—a Superior Court justice here in Washington. Back when this happened, he’d just been appointed to become a federal circuit court judge, which is a big deal.”

      “But he had some dirty laundry.”

      “Apparently.”

      “And you’re the only witness.”

      “Yes. I came very close to being run down in a crosswalk only a few days before Torkelson was arrested. It might have been an accident, but I don’t think so. I ended up going into hiding. I’ve spent the last year in eastern Washington, living under a different name.”

      “Witness protection.”

      “I haven’t talked to my family or friends in thirteen months. It’s been hard, although at least I knew it wasn’t forever.”

      “So Torkelson’s trial is coming up.”

      She shook her head. “Not his. The hit man’s.” She made a funny, strangled noise. “I can’t believe I’m even using that word. But I guess that’s what he is. I sat down with an artist, and the police recognized him right away.”

      “That can’t be enough to convict him.”

      “The police watched surveillance cameras and those ones at stoplights. I’d gotten to the window to see him drive away. I couldn’t see the license plate, but I described the car. It turned out the next-door neighbor had cameras, too. He’s a big businessman who’s really paranoid. Anyway, once they had a warrant, they got his gun.”

      “Ah.” Hell. “So you’ll have to testify in two trials?”

      Looking almost numb, she nodded. And that was when she got to the kicker. The dead marshal had told her not to trust anyone in his office except a friend who also served as a US marshal.

      “I think I can trust the two detectives I worked with, but word might get out. I’d rather hide until I can talk to Scott’s friend.”

      This was a lot to take in, but Will was reluctantly convinced. “The handgun the marshal’s?”

      She bobbed her head, although doing so made her wince. “I thought I might need it.”

      “Have you done any shooting at a range?”

      Maddy nibbled on her lower lip again. “No, I’ve always been kind of anti-gun.”

      Will’s laugh didn’t hold much humor. Man, he was lucky she hadn’t accidentally pulled that trigger.

      “Good thing I do know how to use one,” he said. “I didn’t see any extra magazines in your bag. Did you grab some?”

      “No. I didn’t think of it. I hated the idea of going through his pockets. It was all I could do to make myself unsnap his holster and take the gun. He had a duffel bag, too, smaller than mine, but I never found it,” Maddy concluded.

      “All right.” Will rose to his feet, not surprised by the stab of pain in his left thigh and hip. It was sharper than usual, probably because he’d climbed a mountain this morning followed by the difficult traverse and downhill scramble to get here. He wasn’t done for the day, though, not even close. “We need to move,” he said. “I’d like to scavenge anything I can from the plane, and I want you tucked out of sight while I’m doing that.”

      And verifying the truth of her story, given how wild it was. He didn’t really doubt her, but he wasn’t good at trusting strangers.

      “I thought...here...”

      He shook his head. “Nope. I spotted you from a quarter mile away. We need to descend to better tree cover.” Her attempt to hide her dismay wasn’t very effective. “I’ll help. I can carry you if I have to.”

      Her chin rose. “No. I СКАЧАТЬ