Protected Secrets Read online

  * * *

  Bruce had never considered himself a vain man, but the white socks and black shoes still got to him. His own dad, not one to care a bit about his public image, had worn a similar outfit on Sunday afternoons. It was one of the few memories he had of his father, since he’d passed away when Bruce was ten.

  Would this moment be a memory Winnie held of him?

  Hopefully she’d remember him as a man who did the right thing, fought for justice and made the best mac and cheese that didn’t come from a blue box. Delaney handed him a navy cap and placed one on her own head, which looked adorable with her wavy hair draped through the back.

  He glanced down at her shoes. “Hey. How come you get short navy socks and matching shoes? I think I’d like to file a complaint.”

  She shrugged. “I didn’t pick out the clothes.” She grinned at Winnie and their eyes seemed to twinkle at the same time. Their expressions looked so similar, it caught Bruce off guard for a second.

  Winnie scrunched her nose up. “Daddy looks so funny.” Her laughs, a little extra boisterous for his sake, grew louder.

  He picked her up. “Are you ready to go in the mail truck? You want to pretend to be a letter?”

  “No. I want to be a present.”

  “I agree. You are definitely the best present I’ve ever received.”

  He grabbed his own mock mailbag and placed all of Winnie’s favorite items inside to help keep her busy in the truck and at the courthouse.

  In the parking garage, a mail truck and two other package delivery vans waited. Delaney pointed at the other two drivers. “Remember. No radio unless necessary.”

  The metallic benches in the back of the postal vehicle had hooks where tethers to the car seat had been attached. Bruce sat on the bench opposite Winnie while Delaney sat in the driver’s seat. The openness of the vehicle allowed him to hear her as easily as if he’d been sitting next to her.

  “Be glad it’s early. The windows are staying rolled up and there’s no air-conditioning.”

  His heart beat faster as the truck sped down the parking ramps. Let this time be different. He felt a little more at peace, but it might’ve been self-assurance since he’d played a part in their travel plan by suggesting they use vehicles without vulnerable technology. The truck was so old it didn’t have any way to be hacked, and after hearing Delaney explain that the Marshals used to deliver witnesses in mail trucks in the “olden days” of witness protection, it seemed a fitting way to travel.

  Delaney didn’t lean back into her seat, and from Bruce’s vantage point, he could see that she was constantly glancing in all directions, alert for any signs of trouble.

  Winnie settled in with an activity book, placing princess stickers all over the car seat, oblivious to the knots forming in her dad’s stomach and neck. Without radio or conversation, the hum of traffic and the vibration from the tires on the road did little to quiet his mind. He wanted to talk to Delaney to get out of his own head, but he didn’t want to distract her. The minutes crawled, interspersed with a few requests from Winnie for juice, a snack or more stickers.

  The attorneys would want him to relive every detail of Max’s death at the pretrial interview, and again at the trial, as if it didn’t replay every time he closed his eyes. He didn’t need any practice. Maybe the pretrial interview was more for the attorneys than him.

  The radio crackled but Bruce couldn’t make out the words. Delaney looked over her shoulder for a split second. “We’re here but driving around the area until they’re finished with the first witness.”

  “How is Mrs. King doing?” If he used Nancy’s first name, Winnie would get hyped-up and start looking for her. It’d been a while since Winnie had had time with her honorary grandma.

  “I don’t get communication updates on anything more than her safety.” The static returned and Delaney answered. “Two minutes. Over.” The sound of the turn signal clicked on and off as she took a sharp right. The hum of the road changed. Bruce leaned forward as they crossed the bridge over the Des Moines River.

  Fast approaching on the right-hand side, he spotted the stone building that housed the US District Courts. Delaney didn’t slow down until she turned onto 2nd Street. Cars were parked along the side streets with few empty spots available. A fenced parking lot connected the stately courthouse and the glass-walled bankruptcy court on the other side.

  She slowed the mail truck down to a crawl but passed by an electronic gate while looking in the opposite direction.

  “There are trees on the other side. I’d rather use that gate since it offers more protection,” Delaney explained, but Bruce wondered if she had seen something suspicious. She turned onto Walnut Street and stopped at the mailbox in front of the bankruptcy court for a brief second, opened and closed the box, most likely to keep up appearances. She sped around 1st Street to the gated entrance set between two oak trees.

  She held out her hand, presumably holding a badge, to a black box and the black metal gate slid to the left in response. A man stepped into the sunlight in the parking lot. He spotted the mail truck and turned in a way that kept the woman behind him blocked from view. “That has to be Nancy,” Bruce said.

  Delaney smiled. “Her appointment is over. It’s your turn.”

  “Nancy?” Winnie perked up, hopeful.

  A shot rang out and the deputy lurched forward, blood spraying upward. Another shot and Nancy crumpled. Screams rang out from the courthouse steps and uniformed men ran out from the safety of the overhang, hunched beside cars, looking up, weapons in hand. The drivers from their escort vehicles ran through the gate, toward the danger.

  Bruce reeled as the mail truck spun backward. A metal crunching sound reverberated through the truck. “Have we been hit?”

  “Everyone okay?” Delaney shouted at the same time. He had a feeling the truck had been shot at, but he didn’t see where the bullet had landed. Bruce launched himself out of his seat and sat next to Winnie, both shielding her and frantically checking for any injuries. Her activity book had fallen out of her hands and slid to the back of the truck.

  Delaney picked up her radio and spoke rapidly. “Shots fired. Two down. Origin appeared to be roof of the southeast building across street. Walnut and 1st. Two hundred yards from victims. Over.”

  Bruce groaned, hung his head and kissed Winnie’s forehead, all while praying for protection for Winnie, Nancy and the deputies. Someone had been waiting for them.

  The radio blared with affirmations that the Marshals were after the shooter. Orders were directed at other deputies until a man’s voice shouted, “Delaney! The quiet place. Do you understand? Go to the quiet place! Alone.”

  Delaney didn’t waste a second. She hit the gas and sped down the street. A moment later, she took another sharp turn. Winnie’s eyes filled with unshed tears as she released a shaky laugh, unsure whether the wild ride was supposed to be fun or scary or both. The reaction broke his heart. He’d brought her with him to protect her, not to put her in more danger. He kept his arms and body around her car seat, as close as he could manage. “It’s okay, honey. Daddy is here, and Delaney is taking us somewhere safe.” The lack of air-conditioning was taking its toll. Winnie’s hair hung limp and her cheeks looked flushed.

  “The quiet place. Where’s that?”

  Delaney swerved around a car on the bridge. “I honestly have no idea.”

  “We need the windows open. It’s getting too hot.”

  “Agreed. Give me five minutes.”

  Five more minutes... Did Nancy have five more minutes of life left? Or had she died instantly? Nancy was more than an honorary grandmother. She’d been his right hand, his encourager and a friend. First Max, now Nancy. When would it stop? If they kept going, would he see Winnie meet the same fate? Bruce fought tears at the thought.

  Raising Winnie in the witness protection program had been his biggest f
ear, but the moment the deputy and Nancy hit the ground, a new worry took first place. He’d do anything to keep Winnie safe, and while he couldn’t walk away from the case without justice for Max, and now Nancy, his concerns about starting over with Winnie seemed trivial.

  Saying goodbye to his identity was a price he was finally willing to pay. But his heart still ached at the thought of it. Disappearing from the lives of the people he cared about and the life he’d built would be painful. Bruce glanced at Delaney. The hardest part about leaving would be saying goodbye and knowing he’d never see her, and everyone else, again.

  EIGHT

  The quiet place? Delaney drove across the river, searching for any kind of clue or escape, all the while checking to make sure they weren’t being followed.

  They needed a new vehicle right away, preferably one better equipped. She cracked the windows but didn’t roll them all the way down. It wasn’t safe for Winnie to drive much farther without air-conditioning with the temperature and humidity increasing by the hour. How far would they be driving? She had no idea—not a single notion of where to go. The quiet place... What could he have meant?

  Never before had she realized how much she relied on technology. Delaney made fun of people who kept their heads bent down in unnatural positions all day long, staring at their phone screens. To be fair, she kept her head down for large periods of time as well, but only because she had a voracious appetite for devouring books, which was totally different.

  She knew the Ames region like the back of her hand, but Des Moines wasn’t as fresh, though she’d spent much of her free time there in high school and college. If she found a familiar landmark, maybe it would all come back to her.

  Sirens blared and an ambulance passed by so fast she wouldn’t have had time to pull over to the side of the road even if she’d wanted. Were they going to help the courthouse victims?

  The way the deputy and the witness had collapsed in the parking lot attempted to replay in her mind. Her training kicked in and she breathed deeply and purposely relaxed her shoulders. The small changes helped her focus on the present moment.

  A sign pointed in the direction of a hospital up ahead to the left. Her mouth dropped at the sight of the building that sat kitty-corner. She whispered a prayer of thanks and slipped into the employee parking lot of the United States Postal Service, right in between four other mail trucks.

  She dropped her head onto the steering wheel for a brief second until she realized that might appear to Bruce as if she’d given up hope. She straightened up and prayed with her eyes open as she glanced around the facility. Give me wisdom about the quiet place.

  The man with the gruff voice who’d issued the command over the radio had to be her former police chief—now US Marshal Bradford. A vague memory of him sitting in a chair next to her hospital bed, when she was in recovery after her emergency surgery, came into focus. He’d told her that when he had bypass surgery he’d found he needed to get out of the house while recovering to keep his head on straight. He’d recommended a visit to Reiman Gardens.

  No offense, Chief, she’d told him, but I don’t think I’m going to want to be around other people. She’d kept her eyes closed so she wouldn’t cry in front of him anymore. He’d already seen her torn apart so much in the past few weeks.

  Which is exactly why you need to be around them, Bradford had answered. Not to talk to other people. Just to be present. Remind yourself that there is a world out there, and you’re still a part of it. There are a couple benches on the west side, out of the way of foot traffic, among trees and flowers and birds. It’s still my favorite quiet place.

  She felt her eyes widen and spun around in her seat. “I know where the quiet place is. Get her out of the car seat. I’ll secure a ride.” Reiman Gardens would also be the last place that anyone would suspect they’d go, as long as they didn’t leave a digital footprint.

  Bruce wiped away the thin layer of perspiration from his forehead. “Hopefully the next vehicle has air-conditioning.”

  “As long as the CryptTakers can’t figure out our origin point, we can use a more updated car, right?”

  “Yes.” His fingers worked to disable the many latches holding Winnie inside the seat. “How did they find us in the first place?”

  Would it discourage him even more if she told him she had no idea? “All I can figure is they knew you and—” she glanced at Winnie and made sure to omit Nancy’s name “—the other witness would have to go to the court sooner or later.”

  “I find it hard to believe that someone has been waiting and watching the courthouse this entire time without one of the marshals noticing. They couldn’t just watch remotely with electronic surveillance, because they’d have to be there to act as soon as one of us arrived.”

  She shared the same doubt, but she didn’t know how else to explain it unless they had a mole among one of the court employees or within the US Attorney’s Office. It could even be an unintentional leak. No matter the amount of training and policies, people still made mistakes. The Marshals tried to account for human error in their protection detail plans but maybe she needed to face facts that they were no match for the CryptTakers. At least she wasn’t. If she could get Bruce to Reiman Gardens, she’d ask Bradford for a new deputy to be assigned as lead, someone more experienced.

  Another postal truck pulled up and a woman in her late fifties with curly blond hair and kind eyes stepped out of the vehicle. “Stay here a minute,” Delaney said. She hopped out of the truck and smiled at the lady. “I’m new here, and it turns out my friend isn’t able to pick me up for lunch. I’m wondering if you’d be able to give me a quick ride?”

  “You need a personal fan.”

  “Excuse me?”

  The lady pointed at her hair. “That’s what I call wet noodle hair. Sure sign of a rookie, but don’t you worry. I hear we’re getting new trucks soon with both heat and air. The prototypes have been seen in Virginia.” The woman blinked. “And I don’t drive a car here, hon. I take the bus.”

  “The bus?” Iowa had a network of bus systems and if she remembered correctly, there was a regular route from Des Moines to Iowa State University. “Where is the closest stop?”

  She pointed over Delaney’s shoulder. “Right across the street at the hospital.”

  Delaney smiled. “Thank you.” She said it aloud, intending her gratitude for the Lord as much as the lady. She stepped back into her truck, and as soon as the lady had gone inside the mailroom, she waved Bruce forward. “Leave the car seat.” She knew from her time as a police officer that most public buses didn’t have seat belts or lower latches for installation.

  She took off the postal cap she wore and gestured for Bruce to also hand his over. The knife on her multi-tool keychain made short work of the patch. It left holes in the hat, but if someone were to drive by on the street, they wouldn’t notice. “Put it back on and keep it low over your eyes. Flip open the mailbag flap so no one can see the USPS logo and sling it across your chest so it mostly covers up the post office logo on your shirt. And fold those ridiculous socks down so they semi resemble crew socks.”

  She drew in a deep breath while Bruce sprang into action without complaint.

  She turned to Winnie. “Sweetheart, is it okay if I hold you?” On the street, she and Winnie needed to look like a mom and daughter out and about instead of a deputy packing heat and a child under protection. With Winnie draped over her, it would be hard to tell she was wearing a postal uniform. Bruce simply needed to look alone and keep his face as covered as possible.

  Winnie surprised Delaney by reaching her arms out for her. Her little body was like a giant hot-water bottle. The humidity made Delaney’s clothes moist and sticky, and the little girl radiated heat, too.

  Bruce straightened and the small modifications he’d made to his clothes served their purpose.

  “We’re headed for the hospital
. Let’s go.” She purposefully walked closer than normal to a family on the sidewalk that was about to cross the street, in hopes she and Winnie looked like part of the group.

  The walk sign illuminated. Delaney shifted Winnie to her opposite hip and stepped in front of Bruce so she would be the only one exposed to traffic, one hand ready to grab her weapon. They needed to look like different people to blend into the public, but she wasn’t about to stop taking her job seriously.

  She stepped to the side of one of four bus stops that surrounded the medical complex and peeked at the schedule. Perfect. Their ride would arrive in twenty minutes, which meant they had time for another wardrobe change. “Who wants to go clothes shopping at the hospital?”

  * * *

  Bruce assumed that when Delaney said they were changing clothes, they would do a cloak-and-dagger maneuver where he’d end up walking out in a surgeon’s scrubs. And maybe that was the plan after all. Delaney didn’t share with him what she had in mind as she sat them down in a waiting room on the second floor and then headed off on her own.

  At first, he’d guessed she’d chosen the location because it was the safest place for them to linger, but the waiting room was also quite far from the emergency entrance. Did Delaney want to keep them from seeing Nancy covered in blood? Or was it because she wouldn’t be there? Had they taken her straight to the morgue?

  Winnie ran from empty chair to empty chair, tapping the seat covers as if in the middle of an invisible game of tag. Shaking off his morbid thoughts, he focused hard on the contagious joy pouring from his daughter.

  He blinked and realized Delaney was standing in front of him. He’d be lying if he said he wasn’t disappointed when she held up a green T-shirt with the hospital logo on the pocket. She’d already changed into a maroon polo with the same emblem.

  She frowned. “The green doesn’t exactly go with the navy shorts and black shoes, but it’s better than nothing.” She pointed to the restroom before she hitched a thumb over her shoulder. “We’ve got ten minutes to get to the bus.” She slipped a bag full of snacks into the mailbag he’d left on a chair. He sped through the motions of changing and met them back in the hallway.