“I’ll get on it right away,” Drisson promised.
* * *
Late that night, a message appeared in Julia’s phone via its special channel, giving a number and instructions to ask for “Laredo.” She called the number, and shortly afterward drove out through roads busy with military traffic to a rendezvous not far from LAX, Los Angeles International Airport. Laredo gave her a heavy black suitcase, which she stowed in the trunk of the Cadillac.
* * *
Next morning, in the residential quarters of the Hyadean mission in Lakewood, Wyvex took a call from Julia on his personal number. “Mike Blair and Dee gave me the news,” she told him.
“I’m sorry it couldn’t have been better about Roland,” Wyvex replied.
“It’s one of these things we have to learn to live with. They’re due in today, right?”
“Yes. At five this afternoon.”
“What’s the plan? Were you planning on collecting them?”
“Yes.” Wyvex hesitated, unsure of the correct Terran etiquette in view of Marie’s presence. “Why? Did you want to be there?”
“I’d rather see them later. But look, I know that with the way things are, Hyadeans are trying to keep a low profile and stay out of sight. I could arrange for Luke to pick them up instead.”
“Well . . . that would probably be a good idea. You’re sure it’s no trouble?” Wyvex said.
“Of course not,” Julia told him. “No trouble at all.”
CHAPTER FORTY-TWO
BETWEEN QUITTING THE NAVY and running into Cade, Luke had been a professional bodyguard and security consultant. That meant he was suspicious of anything that didn’t quite feel right. The seeming matter-of-factness with which Julia had accepted Cade’s disappearance, and the little inclination she had shown to try locating or contacting him since had seemed unusual even before Cade’s call warning that Julia might not be what she appeared to be.
What did it mean?
Because she’d been installed into Cade’s life around a year ago after a romance that had bloomed too smoothly and easily, a clear possibility was that she had been planted. With Cade commanding a growing social circle of influential Hyadeans and Terrans who did business with them, and then having a former wife connected with CounterAction, it was the kind of thing they should have expected. And then the broadcast had told of his almost being killed after going off with Rebecca, who had been introduced by Julia. It reeked of “setup.”
Midway through the day that the flight bringing Vrel and the others from Quito was due to arrive, Julia asked Luke to have the limo ready to collect Wyvex and Dee from the mission and then go on to LAX to meet them. She explained that it would avoid the Hyadeans having to venture out in public at a time when hostility was being shown from some quarters.
Luke would normally not have thought twice about it, but the present circumstances caused him to question everything. Why was Julia showing such concern, when nobody from the household would be among the expected arrivals? It felt odd. Had the Hyadeans asked her to arrange for the party to be collected? Luke called Wyvex to check. No, Wyvex said. Julia had called him to suggest it. Even odder. If it were merely to keep the Hyadeans out of the way, why not use any of the commercial limo or shuttle companies at the airport? Why did it have to be this limo? His suspicions fully aroused, Luke went out to the garage and checked over it from end to end. And concealed in a cardboard carton in the trunk, he found a heavy black suitcase that shouldn’t have been there. He took it out and stood it out of view between the wall and the rear of Julia’s Cadillac. By now it was almost three in the afternoon. Luke went out the back of the garage, across the rear yard to the dock, and boarded the yacht. Warren Edmonds, the Sassy Lady’s skipper, was in the main cabin, taking in a movie with Charles, the boat’s cook. “Warren, I need to talk to you,” Luke said. They went out onto the foredeck, Luke closing the door behind them.