“Frost here.”

“Hey, Peter. It’s me.”

“Jesus Christ, it’s good to hear from you, you son of a bitch! Hold on, let me get away from the crowd.”

“The crowd? What crowd?”

“The one at your client’s cabin. One more second, I don’t want Peak or either of his deputies hearing anything if I can avoid it.”

I waited a moment, figuratively twiddling my thumbs. I sat in an office empty of everything but the small desk in front of me. It didn’t even have one of those crappy inspirational quotes hanging on the wall. There’d been a laptop when Simon showed me in, but it went right out the door with the security agent who left so I could use the phone. Before he excused himself, Simon had assured me the room had been swept for electronic surveillance.

Not that it mattered. I wanted to keep things brief and vague. No telling who was listening in, since Peter’s phone hadn’t been checked in a while.

“Alright, I’m clear. Speak, O’Dwyer. What the fuck’s going on here?”

I laid it out for him as simply, but fully, as I could. The cartel, the shootout, the rescue by Simon from the cabin.

“Where have you been?”

“Can’t say just yet. Guys I’m with are worried about electronic surveillance. I’ll tell you when I see you next.”

He grumbled. “This phone should be clean.”

“They’ve asked us not to use anything unless it was swept this morning. Was it?”

Peter grumbled again. “Fuck. These cartel guys mean business, don’t they?”

“Yup. How bad is the place?”

“What do you think? You and the girl got shot at by four armed gunmen with automatic weapons.”

“Figured they might’ve cleaned up after themselves, is all. Not a chance though, huh?”

He chuckled. “Exact opposite. One of the two guys you wounded, at least I’m going to assume it was you unless you tell me Ms. Maxwell is a crack shot, dropped a line of rope and a set of cuffs. Guess they didn’t count on you being there.”

“A smash and grab?”

“Looks like it.”

I mulled over his words for a minute. What did they want with her? Ransom? But all the way up here? Not sure how much we should discuss over the phone, I changed the subject. “Any word on the other deal? The guy at the hardware store?”

“Shook our tail.”

I raised an eyebrow and spun around in the chair. “No shit? That good?”

“Yes, sir. That good. We might have something else on him soon, though. I’ll fill you in when you get back.”

“Anything else?”

“Peak wants to talk to you.”

“Fuck.”

“And the girl.”

“Motherfuck.”

“I’ll put him off till morning, but it’s pretty clear from the way we laid out the evidence, though. You guys weren’t the aggressors, that you’re just on the run because, well, all this. We shouldn’t need to bring in the lawyers or anything.”

“Got it.” If Peter said not to worry, I knew not to worry.

“I’m thinking of bringing Matt home earlier than planned. We may need all paws on deck.”

“I wouldn’t worry about it, Pete. These guys, I think, have it handled on the cartel side of things. Whatever the guys want or whatever’s going on, it’s bigger than us. We just need to worry about the client, and between the four of us, we should have it handled.”

“Alright, I’ll keep that in mind. We’ll talk more when you get back home. You staying radio silent till then?”

“Yep. Make sure Lacy stays in the office till we’re home. I want her to go over my phone.”

“Don’t worry, after her little adventure out to the cabin to help Richard this last spring, I’m keeping her close on this one. Strictly, of course, out of my own personal interest in self-preservation.”

“Good idea. Gen’ll have us both neutered if anything happens to that girl.”

“Anything else?”

Tons. But nothing I could talk about over the phone.

“Not yet. See you when I see you.”

“As you were, then.”

We both hung up.

I leaned back in the chair, my elbows propped on the armrests like Peter did sometimes. As I sat there, waiting for the meeting to be over, I began to consider Ashley. I didn’t think she had anything to do with this. Even though she’d fibbed a little in the beginning, she’d been honest the rest of the way through. And now, as I thought about her, I found myself thinking about more than just the case.

I started to think about her. Her laugh. Her smile. Her new-found confidence. And not just confidence in her good looks, but in her actions as well.

No, I couldn’t get entangled in thoughts like this about a client. I needed to push these little musings from my mind.

The way she’d worked with non-profits in the past.

Stop it, Frank.

The way she smelled in the forest as we ran from her would-be kidnappers. The way her body had felt pressed against mine, how she’d felt beneath my hands as I carried her into the house.

I shook my head. No, I needed to keep my distance. This couldn’t happen, not with her. All the other times I’d become entangled with a woman like this, something bad happened. Look at South America. I let my guard down there because I was more focused on the client, and not the job.

A knock at the door jolted me back to reality. “Frank?” Simon asked. “You finished?”

“Yep. Reckon I am.”

The doorknob clicked and Simon stepped inside and shut the door carefully behind him. “Good. Figured we could talk in private while our clients finish up their sit-down.”