and leave. Instead, I force my discomfort down and show them only what I want them to see—cool confidence.
I stride toward the security desk, lean on the counter. “I have an appointment with Deputy Buchanan.”
“Name?” she asks, glancing up, then does a double take. She nips her lower lip between her teeth and stands, smoothing her skirt.
“Rob Davidson.” The name still doesn’t feel natural to my mouth.
“Davidson,” she repeats, typing my name into the computer in front of her. “And what is this regarding?” she ask, lifting her eyes toward me and batting her lashes.
“He’ll know,” I answer, holding her in my pointed gaze.
She squirms a little, chews her lip again. “I’ll let him know you’re here.” She picks up the phone on her desk and punches a button, then says something into the receiver. When she hangs up, she points me to the metal detector. “Through security to the fourth floor. Check in with me on your way out and I’ll log you out of the building.” She leans forward with her hands on the desk, enhancing her cleavage. “That way we won’t have to call the SWAT team to track you down at the end of the day.”
I feel her eyes follow me to the checkpoint. I dump my phone on the belt. The guard doesn’t give me a second look as I walk through the detector.
When the elevator doors open onto the fourth-floor landing, I push through the door in front of me marked United States Marshals Service.
“Deputy Buchanan,” I tell the older woman at the desk inside a small waiting room.
“Have a seat,” she says. “He’ll be right out.”
I don’t sit. I pace the room for the next ninety-seven seconds, then stride down the hall behind the desk when I decide I’ve waited long enough.
The receptionist bounds out of her seat. “Sir! You can’t—”
“Buchanan!” I call, cutting her off.
A guy about my age with a GQ complex pokes his head into the hall from a door three up from where I’m standing—the same guy who met us at the airport when we arrived. I stride that direction as the receptionist chases me up the hall.
“We need to talk,” I say as I push past him into the small office.
“It’s okay, Linda,” the guy says, waving off the charging receptionist. “Have a seat, Mr. Davidson.”
I drop into the leather armchair nearest me, swallowing the urge to rip him to shreds for calling me that.
He moves to the other side of a cluttered desk and lowers himself into his ergonomic desk chair. “I trust your family is getting settled?”
“Not by a long shot.”
“You’re staying out of trouble, I hope,” he says, gesturing at my black eye.
“Not possible.”
He gives me a skeptical look over his tented fingers. “What is it you need?”
“A phone that can’t be traced.”
He leans his elbows onto his desk, looks at me like I have three brain cells. “You understand contacting anyone from your previous life breaches your WITSEC memorandum.”
“It’s an emergency. I just need to make one phone call. If I can find a secure line without a Florida area code, he won’t know where I am, so it won’t compromise our security.”
He shakes his head. “I’m sorry, Mr. Davidson but—”
“Mr. Delgado,” I cut in.
He gives me a hard look. “Not anymore. If you expect our protection, there are some basic rules. Rules you agreed to when we brought you here. This program is one hundred percent voluntary, so if that arrangement isn’t working for you anymore, you and your family are free to return to Chicago anytime you choose.”
That’s what I’m trying to do, but on my terms.
I yank my phone out of my pocket, slam it on his desk. “If I make this call from my phone, they’ll see the area code and know where I am. You’ll have to move us again.”
“If you make that call from your phone, we’ll have no obligation to you whatsoever, Mr. Davidson.”
I want to put my fist through this useless bureaucrat worm’s face, but that’s not going to help my family. Instead, I spin out of my chair and slam out the door.
I check in with the brunette at the security desk on my way out. She slips me her card. “You ever feel like a night out, give me a call.”
“Sure,” I say, then toss the card in the trash can outside the front door as I stride to my car.
I stop by the address for Spencer Security that Adri gave me on my