Page 28 of Ford
“I’m beyond worried,” Ford said. “She’s missing, and she works for the CIA, clearlynotas a travel agent, and…and the last time I talked to her, she was in a weird place, like…Russia.”
Now he got a look, and he was the villain of the story. “I didn’t figure it out until— Listen. She was sitting in a café, and the words were definitely foreign, and I thought it might be a hip place in DC, but then I saw…a bone frog.”
“A what?” Kelsey asked. She had been watching them all with a quiet worry on her face, her dark hair pulled back into a ponytail.
“A bone frog tattoo. It’s something that guys in the teams sometimes get to honor a fallen teammate. It’s the outline of a frog in bones. The guy she was meeting reached for something and his arm flashed across the screen. I saw it but didn’t think anything about it. She hung up after that.”
“Is she in danger?” Gerri asked, her voice shaky.
Um, good bet, but he didn’t want to add to her worry. “She’s smart, Ma. Probably smarter than all of us. After all, she did graduate with a minor in Russian. She speaks it fluently.”
“She would never kill anyone…” Gerri pressed her hand to her mouth.
And probably it was precisely that look that had kept his brothers silent.
“Don’t worry. I’m going to find her. I’m going to get her back.” The words just spilled out, but yes, that wasexactlyhis plan. And he’d do it with or without his brothers.
“Ford, let’s be serious. How are you going to do that?” Wyatt said. He walked over to the island, stood behind a stool. “She’s in Russia, for Pete’s sake—”
“Really, Wyatt?Really? What the heck do you think I do for a living? It may come as news to you, but SEALs are often used for hostage recovery.”
“Is she a hostage?” Gerri said.
He turned to his mother. “No—of course not.” Or, he didn’t think so—
“But you don’t know that.”
Now he just wanted to restart his morning, maybe grab Tate for a private powwow in the garage.
“We could ask Isaac White,” Hardwin said quietly. He had slowly worked his way over to Ford’s mother, put his arm around her. “Isaac is a presidential candidate. He’d get access to briefings all over the world, even if he isn’t yet president. We could ask him.”
Ford blinked at him a long moment, then he turned to Tate.
His brother was already tracking with him. “I don’t know, bro. I mean, we could ask Glo’s mother to hook us up—theyarerunning together.”
“Maybe my mother knows something,” Glo said.
“Oh, for cryin’ out loud. I’ll just call him.” Hardwin pulled out his cell phone.
And then, as the family stared at him, the man connected with the candidate for president. “Zac. It’s Hardwin, how are you doing? Say, we have a small family incident and need a favor. I’m cashing in on that fly-fishing trip thing.”
Hardwin listened, chuckled. “Right. What happens in Montana…you got it. My lips are sealed.”
Ford managed to close his mouth.
“Perfect. So, Gerri’s little girl has gone missing, and we need to track her down. Can you help?” A pause. “Super.”
And for the first time in what felt like a week, Ford stopped drowning.
York really didn’t want to like her.
Ruby Jane Marshall haddisasterwritten all over her in big neon I-AM-CIA letters. He should have seen it the moment he’d spotted her. The woman had stood under a stinkin’ streetlamp, for heaven’s sake, dressed like a spook, from her black suit jacket to her sensible black flats.
And it wasn’t just her clothing—Russian women, at least the ones younger than babushka age, knew fashion. Wore clothes that came off the runways of Milan.
At least in Moscow.
Yes, Ruby Jane, CIA analyst, was a tragedy waiting to happen. Probably to him.