from the guy. At least for our sakes I hope you did. You could’ve
lost yourself in a million different places. Why come here?”
“I got you both into this. I intend to get you out.”
“Well, whatever plan you have better include saving my daughter or else
you can count me out. I’ll park myself inside her skin for the next
twenty years if I have to.”
Faith said, “I thought I could call the FBI agent I was working with,
Brooke Reynolds. We can tell her what’s going on. She could place
Lee’s daughter in protective custody.”
“For the rest of her life?” Buchanan shook his head. “No, that won’t
work. We have to cut the hydra’s heads off and then burn the stubs.
Otherwise were’re just wasting time.”
“And exactly how do we do that?” Lee asked.
Buchanan opened his briefcase and pulled out the tiny cassette tape
from a hidden crevice. “With this. I was able to record the gentleman
I’ve been talking about. On this tape he admits that he had the FBI
agent killed, among other incriminating things.”
For the first time Lee looked hopeful. “Are you serious?”
“Trust me, I would never joke about this man.”
“So we use this tape to keep the hound at bay. He hurts us, we destroy
him? He knows that. Then we’ve pulled his fangs.”
Buchanan slowly nodded. “Exactly.”
“And you know how to contact him?” asked Lee.
Buchanan nodded. “I’m sure that he’s figured out what I did and is
right now trying to deduce what my intention is.”
“Well, my intention is that you call up this asshole right this second
and tell him to stay the hell away from my daughter. I want it in
blood. And I don’t trust the sonofabitch, so I still want something
like a company of SEALS outside her dorm room for good measure. And I
still plan on heading up there myself. Just in case. They want Renee?
They go through me.”
“I’m not sure that’s a good idea,” Buchanan said.
“I don’t remember asking for your permission,” Lee fired back.
“Lee, please,” Faith said. “Danny’s just trying to help.”
“I wouldn’t be in this nightmare if this guy had been straight with me
up front. So excuse the hell out of me if I don’t treat him like he’s
my best buddy.”
“I don’t blame you for feeling that way,” Buchanan said. “But you
called me for help, and I’ll do whatever I can to help you. And your
daughter. That I swear.”
Lee’s guarded manner relaxed somewhat in the face of this seemingly
frank declaration.
“Okay,” he said grudgingly. “I admit you get points for coming here.
You’ll get more points when you call off the assassins. And then after
that we should get the hell out of here. I’ve already called this
psycho once on my cell phone. I’m assuming that at some point he’ll be
able to narrow our location down from that. When you call him, it’ll
give them even more info to work with.”
“Understood. I have a plane at my disposal at a private airstrip not
too far from here.”
“Your friends in high places?”
“Friend. Senior senator from this state, Russell Ward.”
“Good old Rusty,” Faith said, smiling.
“You’re sure you weren’t followed?” Lee glanced at the front door.
“No one could have followed me. I’m not sure of much anymore, but I am
certain of that.”
“If this guy is as good as you seem to think he is, I wouldn’t feel too
certain of anything.” Lee held out his cell phone. “Now please make
the call.”
CHAPTER 47
THORN HILL WAS IN HIS STUDY AT HOME when Buchanan’s phone call came in.
His communication link was such that the call was not traceable to
Thornhill, if Buchanan was perhaps sitting at FBI headquarters. And
Thornhill’s phone also had a voice scrambler that would make voice ID
impossible. On the other hand, Thornhill’s people were working on
tracing Buchanan’s location, but as yet they hadn’t been successful.
Even the CIA had its limits, what with the explosion in the field of
communications technology. There were so many electronic signals
flying through the air, it made it damn near impossible to trace a