The Double Man (Jack Widow Book 15) Page 23

  The stewardess told him to buckle up, which he did. She also woke up Keagan with a tap on the shoulder. She woke up. Her hair was disheveled, and there was a confused look on her face, like she forgot where she was for a moment. She sat up straight and buckled her seat belt.

  Twenty minutes later, they were on the ground, and she checked her phone. There was a voicemail from Garret. They got off the plane and started making their way over to the last plane that would take them to Kodiak. Keagan called Garret back. He told her that Tessa did call him, and he got the address to her Airbnb, but she turned her phone off after in case Voight was trying to track her.

  Keagan got off the phone with Garret. She walked alongside Widow to their next plane. She said, “Tessa is safe. She’s staying at a private bungalow down by the water in Kodiak. She’s gonna stay put until we get there.”

  Widow said, “Is she going to really wait?”

  “Garret said he thinks so because she was seeing cars cruise around her street. She said it was a private dead-end street, so there should be no one driving around it. She might just be a little paranoid."

  Widow said, “We should get there as fast as we can though.”

  “I agree.”

  They boarded their last plane and took off.

  They landed in Kodiak by nightfall. They got off the plane and headed to Keagan’s Coast Guard truck, which they left parked in short-term parking at Kodiak Airport. They got in. Keagan did her usual driving rituals—gun, holster in the cupholder, backpack in the footwell, below Widow, but she kept her jacket on because it was cold again. She put her key in the ignition and fired up the engine.

  She said, “We should pick up Tessa before we do anything else.”

  Widow said, “Agreed.”

  Keagan put the address to the Airbnb that Garret gave her into the GPS on a screen embedded in the truck’s dash. Once the coordinates were up, she drove, and they exited the airport. They drove down the highway and the main roads through town following the instructions onscreen for about thirty minutes until they were led out of the main township of Kodiak City. They kept on going, taking winding streets and two-lane roads, staying close to the shoreline. They drove west from town until there weren’t many cars on the streets. Eventually, there wasn’t much of anything. No businesses. No gas stations.

  They ended up turning on a road that led into a secluded cove. The street ended at a dead end. They took a turn onto a private drive and found the Airbnb bungalow. The lights were on. It was a small building with a front door and lots of windows. The shades were drawn on all of them. There was no car in the driveway.

  They stayed at the end of the drive for a moment and stared out the windshield at the property. The landscaping looked impressive and expensive. There was plenty of green—trees and properly cut grass and flowers and shrubbery. All of it was neat and well kept. It made Widow think about Hawaii.

  Keagan said, “What do you think?”

  Widow said, “I don’t see a car.”

  “Would she have a car?”

  “She probably rented one. She’s gotta get around somehow.”

  Keagan said, “We have this thing called Uber. Maybe you’ve heard of it?”

  Widow said, “I thought you Alaskans all rode around on bears?”

  “Ha. Ha.”

  Widow asked, “Would Uber come all the way out here?”

  “Sure, they would. They gotta make a buck too.”

  Widow said, “Maybe she’s not here.”

  “I don’t know. Garret said she would stay put till we got here. He said she sounded scared enough. I don’t think she’d leave on her own.”

  “Maybe she went out to grab some pizza?”

  “Well, come on. Let’s have a look,” Keagan said, and she pulled the truck up into the driveway all the way and drove to the end of it and parked in front of the bungalow. She grabbed her SIG Sauer, and unholstered it. She checked to make sure a round was in the chamber. They both got out. Keagan took the lead since she was the cop and had the gun.

  “Stay behind me,” she told Widow. He was unarmed.

  Widow found that if a woman with a gun gives an order, the best thing he could do was follow it. He stayed close to her. He could smell her perfume. It smelled good. He hadn’t noticed it before. They left the truck running and walked off the paved driveway and stepped onto a stone walkway. They followed it to the front door.

  They heard ocean sounds in the distance. Widow glanced back and saw waves crashing in the distance beyond trees.

  At the front door, Keagan lowered her weapon to keep it out of sight from anyone who might be inside. She didn’t want to scare Tessa. She rang a doorbell next to the door. They heard it chime and echo through the whole bungalow. They waited and listened. They heard nothing from inside.

  Widow said, “Ring it again.”

  Keagan rang it again. She leaned into the front door and listened. Widow stepped back and over to the nearest window. He stepped off the stone walkway and onto the grass. The house, the yard, all of it was dimly lit. He looked up and saw plenty of stars in the sky, but the moon was under cloud cover, and the bungalow was surrounded by trees. The leafy canopy above the bungalow blocked out a lot of the starlight. Widow looked east and saw the lights from Kodiak City.

  He made his way over to a large window and cupped his hands and leaned in and looked.

  Keagan rang the doorbell again but got no answer. She heard no one inside. She called out to Widow.

  She said, “You see anything?”

  He stepped back and away from the window. He said, “Yeah, an empty house. She’s definitely staying here. I can see a suitcase on the kitchen table. There’s some girly stuff hanging out of it."

  “Girly? Like what? Underwear?”

  Widow said, “No. There’s a pink scarf, and I saw a stuffed animal.”

  “Hmm. She’s thirty years old and has a stuffed animal?”

  “A lot of people keep that stuff.”

  Keagan asked, “Did you ever have a stuffed animal?”

  Widow said, “My mother’s idea of a childhood toy was a Glock.”

  Keagan stepped back and headed several meters out into the yard. She looked over the house. She saw a few other windows. There was another light on in one, but no signs of movement. She walked around the house to the back. Widow followed. She kept her weapon drawn. They found a backyard with a patio and outside furniture and a grill. But no signs of Tessa.

  Keagan holstered her gun and stared into a set of sliding glass doors. Widow joined her.

  She said, “She’s not here.”

  Widow went over to the sliding doors and tried to open it. It slid open. He looked back at Keagan.

  “Not locked,” he said. They went into the bungalow.

  “Tessa?” Widow called out. He stopped and glanced at Keagan. He said, “No signs of a struggle.”

  Keagan nodded and followed him through the rest of the bungalow. They walked around, looking in every room and every corner and every closet. The bungalow was pretty simple. There was a living room, kitchen, bathroom, and two bedrooms. Both beds were made. The place was empty. Her stuff was there.

  Keagan asked, “What now?”

  Widow said, “We should stay here and wait for her to return.”

  Keagan said, “I need to get the evidence from Garret’s files logged and locked up. It’s my ticket to get my guys off the hook. Plus, at some point, the FBI and local cops should be notified about all of this.”

  Widow said, “Okay, you take the evidence. Take it back to the base. Log it. I’ll stay here, wait for her. I’ll call you when she shows up. There’s a house phone right there.”

  Widow pointed at a portable phone in a cradle.

  Keagan asked, “Why do I get the feeling you’re ditching me?”

  “It’s not like that. You got to get that evidence logged and protected. For your guys and also in case.”

  “In case what? Something bad happens to you?”

&
nbsp; Widow said, “Don’t worry about me. I’ll be here. You can call me when you’re done.”

  Widow stepped over to the phone. There was a note by it from the owner to whoever stayed in the bungalow. It had the phone number for the house on it. He read it off to Keagan, and she programmed it into her phone.

  “Okay, but you call me as soon as she shows,” Keagan said, and she recited her number to Widow. He didn’t write it down.

  She asked, “You gonna remember my number?”

  “I’ll remember it till the day I die,” he said.

  “What is it?”

  Widow recited the number just as she relayed it to him.

  Keagan smiled and took her SIG Sauer out again. She handed it over to him and said, “Take my gun.”

  Widow waved it away and said, “No. You keep it.”

  She said, “Widow, I’m not kidding. I want you to take it. I won’t need it. I’m going to be on base surrounded by eighty-seven officers and five hundred and seventeen trained and armed enlisted coastguardsmen. I’ll be completely safe. You could be in danger here by yourself.”

  Widow frowned and stayed quiet. Keagan walked over to him and placed her gun on top of the bar in the kitchen near the cradled phone. She brushed her hand across his chest after.

  She said, “Please. Take it for me. You’ve got to protect this girl at all costs. She’s our proof and our witness. I’ll be in my truck and at my desk in thirty minutes. I won’t need a gun. Besides, I have a spare in a desk drawer.”

  Widow nodded, stayed quiet.

  Keagan pushed up onto her tippy-toes and kissed him on the cheek. Widow reacted and put a single hand on her waist. He held her up and kissed her on the mouth. She kissed him back. It wasn’t an earth-shattering kiss like in the movies. That sort of thing is rare, like a unicorn. But there was a spark. They both felt it.

  Keagan backed off, and he removed his hand. She had her eyes closed but stepped back and opened them.

  She said, “That was nice. When this is all over, maybe I’ll let you take me out.”

  Widow stayed quiet.

  Keagan said, “What’s a matter, Commander? Cat got your tongue?”

  He smiled at her and said, “When this is over, I might have to stick around.”

  Keagan smiled and turned to the sliding glass door. She shut it and locked it. She headed to the front door, opened it, and walked out. Widow followed her back out to the truck. She got in, closed the door, and buzzed the window down. She leaned out and looked at him.

  Widow stood inches from the door. The wind blew a cold chill. He was glad he had his coat on.

  She said, “Kiss me once more before I go.”

  When a woman with a loaded gun gives him an order, Widow follows it. So he kissed her again. Another kiss that wasn’t earth-shattering, but it was definitely on the Richter scale.

  Afterward, he pulled back and stepped away. Keagan smiled at him, buzzed the window back up, and K-turned and drove back out the driveway and back down the dead-end road.

  Widow stood there watching her taillights until they were lost to sight. He went back into the house and shut the door behind him. He started searching through Tessa's stuff but didn’t want to be too nosy. He just wanted to make sure she had left on her own volition and not at gunpoint. He already established that there was no sign of a struggle. He just wanted to be sure.

  He looked through all the rooms again. He checked all the windows to make sure they were locked. Everything seemed normal. Everything but the sliding glass door at the back. It had been unlocked. But that didn’t mean anything necessarily.

  Widow went to the kitchen and picked up the SIG Sauer. He checked it and tucked it into the waistband of his pants.

  He went back to one of the bedrooms, the one he assumed Tessa slept in because she had stuff in it, and he looked it over. He found a laptop under the pillow. Maybe she had been watching something on it and stuffed it under the pillow.

  He took it to the kitchen and sat at the table and opened it. He tried to access it, but it was password protected. He decided he didn’t want to be sitting in her house and searching through her stuff when she got back. Seeing a giant strange man who looked the way he looked might be terrifying for a young woman.

  He grabbed the portable phone out of the cradle, took it with him, and went out the front door. He left it unlocked so he could get back in and sat in an outside chair set up near the door. He listened to the ocean surf crashing in the distance and waited.

  29

  Keagan raised the driver’s side window back up before she left Widow back at the Airbnb that Tessa Garret was supposedly staying at. She was glad she did, because by the time she passed through the guard checkpoint and drove past their hutch at one of the gates to get onto Base Kodiak, the rain started. It was drizzle at first, but by the time she parked her Coast Guard pickup in the lot behind her station, the rain started pounding like the sky was engaging in a liquid bombing raid on her base.

  She didn’t make it to the door dry. She stopped under a covering and shook her head, ran her hands over it, but it was no good. Her hair was completely soaked. Her jacket was wet. She was grateful that her socks were dry but more grateful that Garret’s file on Ruffalo and this Voight guy was also dry.

  She went to the door. It was locked, which made sense because it was nighttime. Her support staff would’ve gone home hours ago, and the other members of her unit were in jail still. So she fumbled around with her keys until she found the right one, and she unlocked the door. She jerked it open and stepped inside the long hallway. She left the light off because there were twenty-four ambient lights all along the baseboards. She walked the long hall until it opened up to her unit’s bullpen.

  She stepped in and went right for her office. She flipped the light on, dropped her keys on the desktop, and tossed the file on her desk. She took off her coat and draped it over the back of her chair. She went into the makeshift breakroom next door and switched on the light in there too. She went to the fridge and opened it and pulled a diet soda out. She popped the tab open. The can fizzed, and she put her lips to it and slurped up the fizz before it spilled over the lip of the can. She got it all up and took a pull from the soda. She let out an audible sound like one of those supermodels from the commercials after drinking a cold soda from a machine in the middle of the desert.

  Keagan caught a glimpse of herself in the reflection of a dark window to the outside world. She looked pretty good.

  Eat your heart out, Cindy Crawford, she thought, and she smiled to herself. She left the light on in the makeshift breakroom and returned to her desk in her own office.

  She sat down at her desk, placed the diet soda on the desktop, and she flipped open the files. She wanted to get a look at the details more. She had her phone on her, so if Widow found Tessa, he could call her.

  She looked through the documents and photographs that Garret gave her. There was a flash drive in the folder as well. It contained everything she had printed out, as well as more things that he and Tessa had collected on her dad and this Efrem Voight character who she was really hoping she would never meet.

  Keagan stayed in her seat for ten minutes looking through the files before she heard a door opening and closing noise from the other end of the long hallway. She heard it and stopped and listened. She realized that she had left the door unlocked. She listened and waited. She heard nothing but the rustle of hard wind on the exterior walls and the rain pounding on the roof. Dim white lights danced on the floor in the bullpen from the windows. She heard the rain pound on the glass. She waited and listened. She heard no footsteps, no sounds of someone in the hall.

  She called out from her desk.

  “Hello?”

  There was no answer. Keagan went back to looking at the papers. Seconds later, she heard footsteps. They were coming down the hallway. It was boots on tile. She called out again.

  “Hello?”

  No answer. The footsteps stopped. She paused a beat
and tried to call out again.

  “Hello?”

  No answer. She listened. Lightning struck outside, and a loud thunderclap boomed in the stillness. It startled her and she nearly jumped out of her seat. She might’ve yelped out loud. She wasn’t sure. She put a hand over her heart, a reactionary measure. She tried to breath, and she smiled at how silly she felt being startled like that.

  She listened again and heard the footsteps. They were moving closer to the bullpen. She went for her weapon on her hip holster, but it wasn’t there. She remembered she left it with Widow. She went for her key and fumbled with them and found the right one and put it into the lock on her desk drawer, where she kept her backup firearm. She got the key in the lock, but right as she was about to turn the key, she heard a voice. She looked up, and there was someone standing on the far end of the bullpen. It was a male. He wore the US Coast Guard operational dress uniform, the uniform for everyday work. It was navy-blue.

  The guardsman was of lower rank than her—she knew that—but he was too far away and too shadowed in darkness to make out his insignia and rank.

  The guardsman stood at the mouth of the bullpen at the edge of the hallway. He had his hat in his hand. He called out to her. He said, “Ma’am?”

  Keagan stopped what she was doing and stood up from her chair. She called back.

  She said, “Yes? Can I help you?”

  The guardsman stayed where he was. The top half of his face was consumed in shadow and darkness. She could see that he was tall. He was built kind of like Widow. He was taller than most. He had a thin midsection but massive broad shoulders. She saw his hands. They were big. If he had fanned them out, he could've blocked the muzzle of a tank’s main cannon.

  The guardsman said, “Are you Keagan?”

  In a stern voice, Keagan said, “Ensign Keagan to you, Seaman.”

  The guardsman fidgeted with his hat like he was nervous. He said, “Sorry, ma’am. That’s what I meant.”