She was at a loss for what she could do to get ready for the onslaught of people who were on their way to Sandy’s house. As she looked around helplessly, her thoughts went to the two men who’d shown up at the graveside service, dressed in clean, pressed slacks and shirts and yet looking out of place. Sandy had told her they were a local fisherman and his son, Murray and Patrick Cho. What bothered Maddy about them hadn’t been their looks or their clothes. It was their attitudes that had worried her.
They’d avoided eye contact, seeming uncomfortable and yet almost defiant, as if they were expecting someone to ask them to leave. The son, Patrick, had stared at Sandy a lot. Once or twice his father had whispered something in his ear and Patrick had reacted with a sharp retort.
Thinking about them made her think about the other man who’d shown up at the graveside service but hadn’t been at the funeral. The man with the sunglasses and the intense green eyes. She’d noticed him as soon as he’d taken his sunglasses off, while he was still standing next to his car. He was one of those people who command attention no matter where they go. He was tall, with dark hair and a lean runner’s body. Just the type of body Maddy preferred in a lover. At least in a fantasy lover. She’d never dated a man with a body like that.
She blinked and shook her head. What had made her drift off into la-la land? She was on assignment—her first assignment. She hadn’t anticipated that babysitting a pregnant widow and serving pounds of food would be part of the job, but she was a professional and she could handle anything that came her way.
Maddy glanced at her watch. Speaking of her job, maybe she had time to check in with her handler before all the people started arriving. She pulled out her phone. As she waited for Brock to answer, she spotted several stacks of red plastic cups someone had brought and left on the counter. She pulled one of the stacks toward her and twisted the tie that held the wrapper closed, but she couldn’t get a good grip on it with one hand, so she stuck the package under her arm to hold it steady.
“Maddy, hi. How’s it going?” Brock said. She knew very little about him, other than after military service he’d been in the CIA and had worked for an antiterrorist undercover agency for several years out in Wyoming after he retired from government service. She didn’t know how he’d gotten from Wyoming to Washington, DC, or how he, as a federal retiree, could be working as a handler for Homeland Security undercover agents, but she did know she could trust him with her life, and that was enough.
“Hi. The funeral’s over. That’s the good news. The bad news is I have to be hostess for the entire town while they eat all the food they brought to Sandy’s house.” While she talked, she grasped the cups’ packaging in both hands and tried to rip it, since she’d failed at getting the twist tie open.
“Right,” he said. “You grew up in New Orleans. You ought to know Southern traditions,” Brock said.
“I know them. I don’t necessarily like them.” With a frustrated grunt, Maddy ripped the plastic bag with her teeth. It tore straight down the middle and sent red cups rocketing across the kitchen island and onto the tile floor.
“Damn it,” she whispered.
“What is it?”
“Oh, sorry, Brock. I was trying to open a bag of plastic cups and they just went sailing across the room.”
“Do you have a report?”
“Yes, sir,” she said, then took a breath. “Of course, I don’t know everyone in town by name, but I do know their faces. I saw four people at the funeral that I’d never seen before.” She bent over and snagged a small stack of cups that had landed right side up next to the refrigerator.
“Your assessment?”
“Sandy knew them. They were all members of the DuChaud family. She introduced me.” Maddy rubbed her face and neck with her free hand. Tristan DuChaud’s death hadn’t left her unaffected. Although he was working undercover for Homeland Security just as she was, she’d never met him prior to coming to Bonne Chance.
After Tristan had reported that his cover may have been compromised and requested backup and protection for his wife, she’d been sent to arrange a spot inspection of the oil rig the Pleiades Seagull and slip him a secure satellite phone. But when she’d approached the rig’s captain, he’d put her off, claiming a stomach virus outbreak making them too shorthanded.
While it left Maddy with her hands tied, it worked in Tristan’s favor, as he could stay on the rig and work as much overtime as he could get, thereby having more time to eavesdrop on transmissions between the captain and his superiors and verify their conversations against the chatter the Department of Homeland Security had picked up about planned terrorist activity in the Gulf of Mexico.
It had already been established that much of the chatter originated from the Pleiades Seagull. On a rare week home with Sandy, Tristan had talked to his handler, citing several specific matches between unidentified chatter and telephone conversations that took place between the captain and an unidentified satellite phone.
His reports had prompted sending Maddy. By the time Maddy got there, Tristan was working practically nonstop aboard the rig. Once it was obvious that the captain was not going to allow Maddy on board, Brock had given her the alternate assignment of bodyguarding Tristan’s wife, Sandy, cautioning her and Tristan not to let Sandy know that she was anything more than a new friend.
Maddy had been there nearly four weeks by the time Tristan finally got a week off. Between them, they’d convinced Sandy to let Maddy stay with her while he was working offshore. Tristan was happy because he wanted protection for his pregnant wife.
Maddy was not as happy. This was her first field mission and she wanted to be on the oil rig, in the middle of the action. She approached the captain a second time about a spot inspection. But again, he’d put her off.
Now Tristan was dead, and Maddy felt responsible. She blinked angrily at her stinging eyes. Stupid tears. She had always struggled with her weak side. The side of her that sniffled at funerals and weddings, and sometimes even Hallmark commercials.
“Maddy?” Brock said. “Continue.”
“Right,” she replied, blotting the dampness from her eyes with her fingertips, then grabbing for two cups that were slowly rolling toward the edge of the island. “There were fewer people at the graveside service. I saw three men who were not at the funeral. Two are Vietnamese fishermen, a man and his son, whom I had not seen before. Nor had I ever seen the third man.” She stopped.
The third man. Once again, his image rose before her inner vision. His runner’s body unfolding from the BMW. The sunglasses that he’d removed to reveal green eyes. According to Sandy, his name was Zach.
“Assessment?”
“Oh, right,” she said, pushing thoughts of Zach out of her mind. “As I said, two of them were local fishermen, according to Sandy. Their names are Murray and Patrick Cho. They were respectful and dressed appropriately but seemed uncomfortable and somewhat belligerent, as if they were expecting to be grilled about why they were there.”
“Did you get a photo of them or their vehicle? A license? Make? Model?”
“They didn’t have a vehicle, at least not at the grave site. They walked back to town. And the entire time they were there, they didn’t speak to anyone. They just stood and watched. A time or two they whispered to each other. Once, the younger one, the son, pointed at Sandy.”
“Okay. Text me their names. I’ll have them traced. What about the third man?”
“He was well-dressed and driving a BMW. I suspect it was a rental.”
“So we can get ID on him.”
“Absolutely. His name is Zachary Winter and apparently he’s an old friend of Sandy’s and Tristan’s.”
“Did you get a photo?”
Her hand tightened on the phone. “No. He was watching me the whole time. Sandy obviously