“Utah is not around the corner. I should know, I had that run for years when I was driving my rig,” Kathryn said, “especially at Christmastime when I used to haul Christmas trees. Let’s face it, who can we call to help us? Charles never shared his roster of contacts with any of us.” She looked pointedly at Nikki, and said, “Unless you know how to access all that secret spy stuff.”
“I can try, but Charles never…I just helped him, he didn’t share secrets. There is some guy he depended on named Avery Snowden, but that’s all I know for sure. Let me make sure I understand what you just said, Kathryn, and what I think you’re all worried about. What you’re thinking is, we can’t take on a mission without Charles. Well, if that is what you’re thinking, you’re wrong. We can make it work. We all know people, our second string know people. If we pool our strengths and our knowledge, I wager we can pull this off.”
“Does that mean we’re going to help Pearl?” Alexis asked.
“Damn straight that’s what it means,” Annie said.
Yoko hopped off her chair and danced around the room. “That’s all well and good, but what does Pearl do in the meantime? We should call her, get her to some safe haven, then kick it up a few notches. Until we formulate a plan, we let the second string kick some ass. Charles always dotted every i and crossed every t.”
“I do like the way that sounds, dear. I’m going to call Pearl right now and get the particulars. The rest of you start calling the others. Someone make some more coffee, this is going to be a very long morning. Wait! Wait! One more thing,” Annie said, drawing herself up to her full height. “This is WAR!”
“Well, damn,” Kathryn said as she punched in Bert’s private cell phone number, a number no one in the Hoover Building knew existed. Her legs felt rubbery when there was no response. She didn’t bother to leave a message.
Two thousand miles away in Las Vegas, Lizzie Fox’s encrypted cell phone rang. She reached a long arm over Cosmo Cricket’s barrel chest to snag the phone off the night table. Her sleeping partner groaned loudly enough to shiver timber. He did his best to roll over, but his bed, while huge, didn’t quite accommodate someone his size plus a partner. Lizzie stifled a laugh as she giggled a greeting. And then she listened. Before she snapped the phone shut, she said, “I’m on it and on my way.”
Cosmo Cricket, legal guru to the Nevada Gaming Commission, groaned again. “You just got here, Elizabeth! Tell me I didn’t hear what you just said.” He rolled over and the bed felt like it was tilted on two legs.
Oh, how she loved the sound of her name on Cosmo’s lips. Lizzie leaned over and kissed the big man so soundly she felt his ears radiate heat. “I know, but I have to go. The good news is, I’ll be back. I promise. We talked about this, Cricket, and you said you understood and would never stand in my way…in regard…to…certain things.”
The big man propped himself up on one elbow and stared at the woman who had somehow, magically, made him fall in love with her. “I did say that, didn’t I? Go on, do what you have to do. If you need me, call.”
Lizzie planted a second liplock on the big man that made his whiskers sizzle. “Count on it,” she said breathlessly.
“Where are you going, can you tell me?”
“Utah.”
“What the hell’s in Utah?”
“A bus full of stranded pregnant teenagers.”
“Oh,” was all Cosmo could think of to say.
Oh, indeed, Lizzie thought as she stepped into the steaming shower, her mind already on the problem at hand.
While Lizzie was showering and plotting, retired judge Nellie Easter Cummings flipped open her special phone, the phone that drove her almost-brand-new husband, the recently retired FBI director, out of his mind because each time it rang it represented a crisis of some sort. She wasn’t completely sure but she thought Elias looked forward to the ringing phone.
He sipped his coffee, his impatience showing by the way he tapped his bare foot under the table. One of Nellie’s nine cats, the one called Miss Patty, pretended to nibble at his toe so that he would pick her up. He obliged, and she purred her thanks by settling herself in his lap. He stroked the soft yellow fur, hoping he would calm down the way the cat had.
Elias forgot about the delectable breakfast sitting in front of him as he watched Nellie close the phone and shove it in the pocket of her smock, something she’d started wearing of late.
“That was Lizzie Fox. She’s in Las Vegas doing…well what she’s doing…is…”
Elias laughed. “You can say it, Nellie. I know what the two of them were/are doing. Cricket’s a great guy. I hope that marriage comes off. From what I can see, the two of them are great together. Almost as good as you and I.” He laughed.
Nellie’s face flamed because down deep she was a prude, something she always denied vehemently.
“It seems Pearl has gotten herself into a bucket of trouble out there in Utah someplace. Through no fault of her own,” she added hastily. “Pearl always travels during the middle of the night doing her…her underground railroad thing. And she always tries to use back roads with the people who help her. She came across a bus that had broken down with a load of pregnant teenagers. She needs the Sisterhood. But…according to Annie something else is going on—something with Myra and Charles; they’ve left—and she really wouldn’t talk about it. What all that means, Elias, is, the girls don’t know what to do. I imagine they are trying to figure out how to make everything work without Charles at the helm. I’m thinking we might want to take a trip to the mountain. To help. The more heads the better. What’s your feeling about that?” Nellie’s tone and words were jittery-sounding, the way they always were when her special phone rang.
Elias let his hands flap in the air to show he was okay with a trip to the mountain. Miss Patty arched her back, hissed, and leaped to the ground to show her total disdain for anything other than her own feline pleasure.
“I’m also thinking we should make a stop at the Post and have a little talk with Maggie. Will that work for you, Elias? Because you’d be doing the driving, and I know how you hate to drive in the District.”
“That will work,” Elias said as he heaved up from the table. “I guess you want me to shower, dress, and pack for us while you…uh…make some more phone calls.” He wouldn’t admit it for the world, but he always got perked up when Nellie’s special phone rang. Retirement was beyond boring.
Nellie nodded as she cleared the table and stacked the dishwasher. Then she waited until she heard her husband’s footsteps on the wide plank stairs that led to the second floor of the farmhouse. She picked up her phone and hit the speed dial, and within seconds heard Maggie Spitzer’s voice coming through loud and clear.
“I’m on it, Nellie,” Maggie said before the judge could utter a word. “Annie okayed the use of her Gulfstream, and it’s being readied as we speak. I’m sending Ted. The plane will set down in Vegas to pick up Lizzie. I’ll work the desk. Get up to the mountain as soon as you can.” She listened for a moment. “No, no, don’t waste time coming here, just hit the interstate. I’ll call Nikki now and tell her you’re on the way. Just off the top of your head, do you know how far it is from Utah to Montana?”
“I don’t have a clue. Google it, dear,” Nellie said before she hung up. She looked around the kitchen to make sure she was leaving it neat and tidy. She filled the cats’ water bowls and food bowls. She’d changed all their litter boxes when she first got up that morning. Her cats would survive for four days without her. If her stay on the mountain was longer, she’d simply call Pritzy Alouette, her cleaning lady, who would come to check on things and take care of the cats.
As she climbed