Feeling a bit like a puppeteer master about to pull the strings, Colonel Carl Garrett shifted in his roomy first class seat and gratefully accepted a tumbler of Kentucky bourbon from the pretty flight attendant currently smiling down at him. “Thank you,” the Colonel murmured.

Brian Payne, his puppet de jour and a former Major under his command sat next to him, his face an impassive mask of patience...but Garrett knew better.

Payne might appear patient, but that was the extent of it.

In exchange for pushing Payne’s end-of-service papers through--when Garrett just as easily could have made things very difficult for them--Payne and a couple of his other friends had agreed to grant him one favor. Garrett had already collected from former Major Jamie Flanagan. His lips quirked.

And gotten way more than he bargained for.

He’d sent Flanagan to Maine to prevent his granddaughter from marrying the wrong man and Flanagan had ended up marrying her himself. Though that hadn’t been the Colonel’s original intent, he had to confess that he’d been secretly pleased with the outcome. If he’d searched the world over he couldn’t have found a better man--a better partner--for his granddaughter. In seven months she’d be delivering their first child--his first great-grandchild--and if the child was a boy, they’d promised to name the baby after him. He didn’t know when anything had delighted him as much.

Of course, if Payne succeeded on this next “favor”--and considering the man had never failed at anything, Garrett had no reason to suspect that he would start now--he’d be equally delighted, though for completely different reasons. Even the recent commendation for meritorious service--his expert handling of a hostage situation, specifically--as rewarding as it was, wouldn’t compare to owning a piece of history, a piece he had secretly searched for and coveted for years.

He’d let him stew long enough, Garrett decided. Besides, waiting Payne out was a futile effort. Garrett instinctively knew he’d lose.

“I’m a big Civil War buff,” Garrett told him conversationally, a mild understatement. He wasn’t merely a “buff.” According to his wife, he was obsessed, but there were worse obsessions. “Did you know that?”

Though he hadn’t so much as blinked, the Colonel felt Payne go on alert. “No, sir.”

“Oh, yes.” Garrett lifted his glass and studied the amber liquid within. “I’ve walked every battlefield, studied every strategy, read hundreds of letters from soldiers-- mostly Confederate, of course--and even collected many. It was a fascinating time in history,” Garrett ruminated. “Fascinating time...and yet, there’s no man who was a part of it who is more fascinating to me than General Robert E. Lee.” Another mild understatement. Lee was brilliant, possibly the best strategist and tactician in history, American or otherwise. We he able to walk the valleys of time and had the liberty to choose to meet any of the men who’d gone before him, with the exception of Jesus, Robert E. Lee would be first on his list.

Payne quirked a brow, a silent indicator which told Garrett to continue.

“Did you know he was asked to lead the Union army first, but turned it down?”

Payne inclined his head. “I seem to recall hearing that.”

“In a letter written to his sister he said, ‘With all my devotion to the Union and the feeling of loyalty and duty of an American citizen, I have not been able to make up my mind to raise my hand against my relatives, my children, my home.’” Garrett sighed. “No one talks that way anymore. Lee had passion, Major. He was a great man.”

Payne acknowledged this proclamation with the usual silent nod.

“You’re going to Gettysburg,” Garrett announced without further preamble.

Gratifyingly, the first notable flicker of interest sparked in Payne’s annoyingly impassive gaze. “Gettysburg? What will I be doing in Gettysburg?”

“I want you to find something for me.”

He waited, presumably for him to elaborate, Garrett concluded, quite perturbed. Payne was supposed to be more interested than this, dammit. Garrett frowned. It was quite unsporting of him. “Don’t you want to know what I’m wanting you to find for me?” he asked, swallowing an impatient huff.

“I’m assuming at some point you’re going to tell me,” he replied mildly.

Fine, Garrett thought. There was no point in playing cat and mouse with a mouse who didn’t want to play. “Lee might have surrendered at Appomattox, but scholars agree the battle was really lost at Gettysburg. The Confederacy never fully recovered from that defeat. Furthermore, Lee lost more than the war there. It’s rumored that he lost a pocket watch as well.”

“Rumored?” Payne repeated, seemingly interested now. “You’re cashing in your favor on a rumor?”

It was a gamble, Garrett had to admit, but one he was willing to make. After sifting through countless letters--though none in Lee’s own hand--Garrett was convinced that the watch did exist. It reportedly was engraved with the inscription “Lighthorse”, meaning that it had most likely belonged to Lee’s father, Harry.

If it existed--and he thought it did--then Garrett wanted it.

And if anyone could find it, then Brian Payne--aka The Specialist--could.

Operating on the belief that the watch had never made it out of Gettysburg, over the years Garrett had kept feelers out at various antique dealers and pawn shops and, while up to this point they’d yielded frustrating leads which had arrived at dead ends, Garrett thought he’d finally received a viable clue. He scowled.

Unfortunately, so had another rival collector.

And this rival collector was also a friend, one who’d had the nerve to bet him--only one of many wagers over the years--that his rebel rule-bending girl could find it before Garrett’s Specialist could.

Hogwash.

Granted Garrett knew enough about Emma Langsford and her service in the military not to completely discount her, but a worthy opponent of Payne? One of his Project Chameleon protégés? Hell, Payne had been part of a secret unit that couldn’t be found in any file, computer-generated or otherwise. He and his friends had been the best. Emma Langsford a match for Payne? He thought not. Since Emma had recently left the service as well, he imagined that he wasn’t the only person cashing in a favor, so to speak. No doubt Emma owed Colonel Martin Hastings as well. He couldn’t imagine any other reason the woman would agree to go and look for the watch.

Garrett had debated whether or not to tell Payne about Emma, but ultimately decided against it. In the first place, Payne needed to stay focused and if he was worrying about keeping up or even one step ahead of Emma, then he wouldn’t be able to properly utilize that eerily pragmatic brain of his.

And secondly, somehow he didn’t think Payne would appreciate being the object of a bet between friends. He’d undoubtedly take exception to his manipulated part in this wager. Naturally Garrett wanted to win, but he wanted the watch more.

Luckily, he had every confidence that he’d have both.

“I have what I believe is a solid lead in Gettysburg,” Garrett finally told him. “According to a local auctioneer, a watch with the same inscription as what’s rumored to be on the one Lee lost at Gettysburg was recently sold in an estate sale of an elderly woman who was an avid collector of well...junk. She most likely didn’t know what she had.”

“What was the inscription?”

“Lighthorse, after Lee’s--“

“--father,” Payne finished, displaying a gratifying knowledge of Confederate history. “So if you know it was sold at auction, then there should be a record of who bought what and for how much, and you shouldn’t need me to go find it.”

Garrett grimaced. Yes, he’d originally thought it was going to be that simple as well. “Evidently this was a ship-shod job and most of the items were sold in lots. The woman owned dozens of watches and they were sold off in lots of three.”

Payne sat there for a moment, seemingly absorbing what Garrett had just shared. Predictably, he came to the same conclusion Garret himself had. “So the watch--provided it even exists--could be anywhere.” He shrugged. “It could have been given as a gift, auctioned off on eBay, hoarded away. It could be anywhere.”

Exactly, Garrett thought. He looked away and quaffed the rest of his bourbon. “I’m confident you can find it.”

 

*   *   *

 

Then that only made one of them, Payne thought, resisting the pressing urge to grind his teeth. Given Jamie’s favor, Payne had known that trying to anticipate Garrett’s next request was an effort in futility, but he had to admit, never in a million years would he have expected Garrett to send him on a freaking treasure hunt for a fabled pocket watch.

Which had supposedly belonged to Robert E. Lee.

Which may or may not even exist.

It was madness. Payne inwardly frowned. And it was going to be extremely time-consuming.

“If it exists, then I will find it,” Payne said, bristling at having his Ranger training squandered on such a frivolous task. “However, I cannot afford to devote more than a week away from work.” Not altogether true, he supposed, but Jamie had set a precedent and frankly, Garrett wasn’t getting anymore out of him than absolutely necessary. He’d agreed to one favor and he would deliver to the best of his ability. It was not in his character to do otherwise. But clearly the Colonel had been on this quest for many years and Payne had no intention of getting sucked into an indefinite search.

“I’m a reasonable man, Payne. If you can’t find it within a week, then you can give me what information you’ve gathered up to that point and I’ll take it from there.”

Fair enough, Payne thought with an internal shrug. For reasons he couldn’t begin to explain, he got the distinct impression that the Colonel was holding out on him. “Is there anything else I should know?” he asked, more to gauge Garrett’s response than to mine for a real answer.

“Just this,” Garrett replied after a blinking hesitation. He pulled a folder from his briefcase and handed it to him. “This has the necessary information. Contacts, a map of the area, your plane ticket and reservation. I’ve booked you into a bed and breakfast rather than a hotel. Better service at a B&B and the owners are generally more informed of local history and whatnot. This particular one is called The Dove’s Nest and has been in the same family for several generations. Oral history is becoming a forgotten art, but by all accounts this family is one of the better-informed in the area.”

Be that as it may, he’d have more anonymity at a hotel than a B&B. Furthermore, what about modern conveniences? He had no desire whatsoever to share a bathroom with anyone and he grimly suspected he’d be forced to depend upon a dial-up connection versus the high-speed cable version he could expect from even the cheapest hotel chain. Because he’d mastered the art of keeping his emotions completely in check--easier to keep a potential threat from using them against him--Payne didn’t so much as grimace at this idea, though internally his organs were beginning to twist with dread.

He did not want to do this.

It was a pointless waste of time--his--because if the damned pocket watch existed at all, he was certain some other Civil War Robert E. Lee buff would have snatched it up ages ago and would currently have it on display for other Civil War Robert E. Lee buffs to salivate over.

Though many collectors would probably state otherwise, the purpose of possessing items worthy of collecting wasn’t to satisfy some personal need, but to showcase what other collectors wanted but didn’t have. A cynical view? Probably. But it was his opinion and he was certainly entitled to it.

Furthermore, that telling pause he’d noticed when he’d probed for more information told him that Garrett wasn’t being completely honest with him. Something else was at work here. He didn’t doubt that the Colonel wanted the watch. Clearly adding it to his cache of Confederate Memorabilia would be a coup. But he wanted something else as well.

The million-dollar question, of course, was...what?

Oh, hell. What did it matter? Payne thought, his lips curling into a vague smile. So long as he wasn’t guarding another grand-daughter, he should thank his lucky stars. Women, he knew from personal experience, tended to complicate things and he’d just as soon avoid complications.

And since women and complications tended to go hand in hand, other than to scratch an occasional itch, he typically avoided them as well.

Too much trouble, too little reward, too little time.

Furthermore, women tended to make the men in his family do stupid things, like forego prenuptial agreements and crash their cars and drink too much. They made them miserable and weak and out of control. And for what? Good sex? A handy dinner companion? Another body in the bed? He smirked. Hell, he could get all of that for free, usually in the course of one night and, other than a paying the tab for a meal, his portfolio was still in good standing, not to mention his pride.

Payne had watched both of his parents barter their pride for the so-called sake of being in love to the point where he wondered how they had any respect for themselves left at all. He certainly didn’t, that was for damned sure. All he had left was pity and contempt, limited fond memories of a lonely childhood and a snarled up obligation of parental devotion he wished he could let go of.

Both Guy and Jamie--his brothers of the heart, comrades and current business partners--called him a cynic, but what the hell.

Being a cynic was better than being stupid any day.