Grunting as much for show as from any real need, Simon hopped from tire to tire, up the ragged edge of the mountain. A foot into each and every one, before shimmying up the tree at the end of the rubber trail. He’d been hard at it all morning—a bit of an alternative to his usual Saturday-morning regime of lying around bored out of his skull and not caring enough to do anything about it.
“Not bad for a first run.” Leonard Diamond, the most perfect specimen of manhood Simon had ever seen, nodded from the base of the tree. “Amanda was right to send you to me. You continue to work like that and I’ll have you ready to tackle any strength or skill exam they can give you—on skis or off—by the end of November, but it’ll cost you. I only work with the best and I don’t come cheap.”
Agent Scott Olsen, and his convoluted FBI expense accounting, was paying for this—so what the hell. The sweat felt damn good.
Simon nodded. And tried not to think about the young woman who—after he’d paid three more visits to the Museum Club—had put him in touch with this acquaintance of her boyfriend’s—who’d been an ex but no longer was, he’d discovered. If Leonard Diamond, the independent trainer, turned out to be providing his services to terrorists, as the FBI suspected, Amanda Blake was running with a very dangerous crowd.
With instincts that weren’t quite as dead as he’d told himself they were, Simon had garnered more about twenty-five-year-old Amanda than he’d wanted to. The girl was back with her too-mysterious boyfriend, but she wasn’t all that happy about the relationship. In fact, the beautiful young lady seemed more resigned than in love. And more than a little afraid, as well. Olsen, who’d received his tips from her through intricate channels, had had the same impression. Simon had practically had to give her his birth certificate before she’d agreed to get him this trial with Diamond. She said that his time was premium and he was hit on by every quack parent in the world who wanted his kid to be a star. Thankfully, compliments of Scott Olsen’s connections, Simon now had a fake identity. A guy with the same name, who had been born and raised in Alaska and was a first-time visitor to Flagstaff. His alter ego even had a new apartment. If he needed a place to receive visitors.
The fact that this new game might be dangerous didn’t faze him a bit.
Simon wasn’t afraid to die.
An hour and a half later, after showering, securing a locker and filling out a minimal amount of paperwork, Simon turned onto his street just in time to see Jan pull into her driveway next door. When she didn’t enter the garage, he wondered if she was still a bit gunshy from the brick incident earlier in the week. Then he slowed to a stop, gawking when he saw the elflike child who climbed out of the passenger seat.
Who the hell was she? In the four years he’d been living next door to Ms. Janet McNeil and in the three or so years he’d been meeting her at her mailbox, he’d never once seen or heard mention of a child in her life.
A widowed mother in Sedona, check. An unmarried salesman brother, right. No ex-husbands. No cousins or aunts or uncles or grandparents. No friends he knew of, with or without children.
The woman worked. Took care of her mother. Her home. Was friendly to her neighbors. And talked to him a few minutes every day.
She waved and Simon could feel the heat under his skin, a rare occurrence for someone who didn’t care enough about anything to get embarrassed. He waved back and continued on to his driveway, but stopped just over the curb and got out.
Jan was down at the mailbox, letters in hand, just standing. Almost as if she was waiting for him.
Not good. Not good at all.
He walked over, even though he knew it was a big mistake to do so. The woman, her welfare, her guests, didn’t matter to him, other than for the distant role she played in the passing of his days.
“Hey, neighbor,” he greeted her, including the girl in his grin. About seven, he’d guess, based on her size. And it’d been a hard seven years. The awareness in those eyes, the chin that held back expression rather than softening in response to a friendly smile—they told a familiar story.
“Simon, I wanted Hailey to meet you.” Jan’s voice was higher than it usually was. She was too perceptive to be humoring this child with false cheer. Which told him she was tense about something.
“Hi, Hailey.” He held out his hand. Her grip was tiny, but firm.
“Hi.”
“How old are you?” Wasn’t that what you said to kids you weren’t rescuing from hell—or arresting?
“Eight.”
A year off. Not bad for a guy who’d been off the streets for almost a decade.
“Hailey and I are in the process of becoming a family.” Jan moved a bit closer to the girl.
“She’s trying to adopt me, but I keep telling her they won’t let it happen,” the child said.
“Hailey’s a little short on faith at the moment, and I thought I’d bring her to see her new home so she can start visualizing our future together.”
Simon slid his hands into the pockets of the sweats he’d changed into after his locker-room shower. Jan with a child? The idea threw him. And that didn’t happen often.
Why should it matter to him if she wanted to take on the responsibility, the guaranteed heartache of parenthood?
Why would picturing her as a mother affect him at all?
It didn’t. He was just suffering a bit of an adrenaline letdown after the morning’s workout. Mixed with a little altitude adjustment.
“Are you a cop?”
While he swallowed the need to choke, Jan chuckled. “Simon writes schoolbooks, sweetie.”
Those shrewd, knowing eight-year-old eyes studied him—whether in assessment or disbelief, he didn’t know. Simon smiled, slouching, completely alert.
“Nope, just a writer,” he told her, his voice more relaxed than the rest of him.
“You sure you aren’t a cop?” Hailey frowned. “’Cause my mom taught me to spot ’em.” Her curly hair was almost in her eyes as she peered up at him. “She says you can always tell a cop by the way his eyes see everything going on, when most people just see what they’re staring at. Your eyes look all over. They don’t stare.”
Observation duly noted. How had he survived years undercover, if he was that obvious? he wondered wryly.
“Sounds like your mom was a smart lady,” he said, cognizant of the fact that the little girl had obviously lost the woman prematurely. “And I’m sorry to disappoint you, but rather than running around the streets catching bad guys I just sit home all day and type stuff that college kids read for class.”
“I’m not disappointed,” Hailey said, nodding. “I don’t know if I’d like living next door to a cop. I’d have to worry about him finding out that I’m not good.”
Simon did choke, then. And glanced up in time to catch the pained look on Jan’s face. There was a lot going on here that he didn’t understand. And that was fine by him.
Except for that small, curious part of him that wanted all the answers.
“Hailey Miller, you are good,” Jan said firmly, sounding much more like the woman he’d been meeting at the mailbox. “And I’m glad to hear that you’re planning to live next door to Simon, because I’m pretty determined on this matter and once I set my mind to something I make it happen.”
The white supremacist she was attempting to prosecute crossed his mind. And left him feeling tense.
“Do you have