Cover Me - By Catherine Mann Page 0,48

O’Brien brothers rode with one of the Everett twins.”

And others had left, close to as many as filled the screen now, their faces unaccounted for. Were they frozen out there too? What else would the National Guard uncover?

The coffee mug rattled against the metal table as her hands trembled harder.

Agent Lasky shoved his chair back. “That’ll do for now, Miss Foster. If you’ll sit tight, I’ll be back in ten minutes or so.” He started for the door.

“Am I under arrest?”

He glanced back over his shoulder. “Why would you ask that?”

“Because it feels like I’m being held prisoner here.”

Those too-perceptive piercing eyes had her fighting the urge to fidget in her seat.

“We ruled you out as a suspect early on. Your survival knife doesn’t match the wounds. And all the cuts were made by a right-handed person.” He nodded to her hold on her mug of coffee. “You’re obviously very left-handed, something we determined the second we had you sign in.”

His words reassured her and chilled her at the same time. Everything he’d said and done had been an interrogation technique. What else had he ferreted out of her without her realizing it? “Thank you. I think.”

“You’re welcome. You’re free to go. With Deputy Smith out of the picture, there’s nothing to fear. Is there?”

God, she was beginning to really hate those open-ended probing questions of his. “I appreciate your help, Agent Lasky.”

Scratching over his cigarette pocket again, he nodded brusquely. He opened the sealed metal door with a sinister hiss, leaving her completely alone in the freaky small room.

Could the deputy really have been a serial killer as Agent Lasky seemed to believe? If so, how had he figured out where she was, much less followed her all the way to Wade’s so quickly?

The car crash appeared to have been an accident at least. The driver of the car shouldn’t even have been behind the wheel at fifteen years old. He’d said Chewie running out in the road freaked him, then he’d lost control of his car and hit the deputy.

The deputy, someone in uniform she should have been able to trust, had pretended to be her ally for the past two years as she passed over dear friends into his care. God, was there anyone she could she trust anymore? Certainly not some slick-suited agent she didn’t even know.

Acid frothed in her stomach as she thought about how close her sister had come to being among those dead faces. What if Misty tried to strike out on her own before she could get back? Sunny pushed aside her coffee. She couldn’t risk putting anything in her stomach anytime soon. At least the deputy had been stopped, and their friends would receive a proper burial. If he’d acted alone as the authorities seemed to believe, her sister was safe.

However, the longer she sat here, the more she feared there could be something more, some terrible threat still lurking in their closed-off community. Sure, those dead bodies, the retrieval, the questions, would eventually lead authorities to investigate her village.

But she was more concerned with the here and now.

Lasky had requested she stay silent about everything for forty-eight hours while they looked into the matter further with the Alaska police and National Guard searching the area. They wanted to keep a lid on things so as not to create widespread panic and miscommunication of details.

Where did that leave her?

No way in hell could she just sit around on her hands waiting, hoping nothing bad would happen. She was a woman of action. Yes, she could email her brother a warning, but she couldn’t simply hope that email arrived in a timely fashion. How often had she seen a post come in three days after it had been sent? At least she knew email was working somewhat, since he’d sent word about the money transfer and a contact number for a flight home.

Her eyes darted nervously toward the one-way window. In the spooky bowels of a military intelligence unit, it felt as if they could hear her thoughts as well as watch her every move. Were there body language experts on the other side of that pane of glass, reading her nerves, sensing her need to run?

Was Wade there?

Everything had happened so quickly once he’d told her they needed to go to the base—ASAP. He’d scooped up her dog so carefully, so tenderly, her heart squeezed in her chest. She’d raced after him, half expecting police to tell them to stop, but