Inside Out

9

Leaving Mrs. Devlin's things in the dining room, the marshals passed the security room and the closed door to the Devlins' room. Greg showed Martinez the front suite of three rooms, their windows facing the ocean. The Devlins' room, he explained, had windows on the north wall, but there were locked hurricane shutters on them.

The overstuffed couch was large enough for a man to sleep on comfortably. A solid door opened into the large bedroom, which contained a king-size bed, chest of drawers, writing table and chair, and two closets. Another door opened into the bathroom. Martinez approved, adding that the suite was larger than her apartment.

The team was bunking in the servants' quarters, four rooms located down a hallway behind the kitchen. The largest one belonged to the cook. The second was where Greg and Winter would be staying. The other four deputies were split up between the third and fourth rooms.

The servants' rooms might have been a Motel 6 in Kansas. Each bathroom was located directly to the right of the entry; the closet hangers were locked to the rod, as though the military's servants, like transients, needed coat hangers badly enough to steal them. Each twin headboard was attached to the wall, and the mattresses looked like sushi plates.

Winter unpacked, placing his things in the bottom two drawers as Greg sat watching him from the edge of the nearest bed.

“Sure good to see you, Win. Brings to mind better times.”

“So why don't you tell me what I'm doing here?” Winter replied.

“I was given carte blanche in putting this team together and I wanted the best group in the history of WITSEC. I got a sniper can shoot a fly off a can at a quarter mile: Robert Forsythe.”

“I saw him shoot in competition a few years ago.”

“I got Bear Dixon, the strongest son of a bitch I know. He could throw Devlin over his shoulders and run ten miles. Dave Beck and Bill Cross would eat cobras from the tail forward with their hands tied behind their backs to keep a witness safe. And Martinez ain't here because I needed someone to hand Mrs. Devlin tampons. She earned a black belt in tae kwon do before she was ten. Nobody's as good with a handgun, or reacts faster, or sniffs out trouble like you. Dylan Devlin is a huge package, Win. And the payoff at the end can be massive.”

“Payoff?”

“It'll look great on our sheets, and when we cash out it'll bring in clients who won't spare any expense to have a piece of us. We'll keep Devlin safe when every professional hitter and connected lowlife with a gun or a bomb is after his hide. Word from the Justice Department is that the contract for Devlin is for millions. Know what that means?”

“World-class talent.”

“If we handle this one without a hitch, we're set for life, Winter. We'll be able to open the doors of Massey and Nations Security International and fill the place immediately. I can get plenty of investment money. Tell me you wouldn't dig thousand-dollar suits, a checkbook you don't have to balance. Don't you want to live some, Win? I sure as hell do. The idea of surviving on a pension in a trailer holds no appeal for me. I plan to be stupid rich, and I am taking you with me even if it kills you.”

“We'll see.” The company again- Greg's dream. He had grown up poor and thought material possessions were more than the temporary distractions Winter believed them to be. Winter preferred his own life simple.

Winter took the SIG from the shoulder rig and slid a high-rise holster onto his belt, pushed the handgun into it, and snapped the thumb release. He clipped on the dual magazine holder that added twenty-four shots. “I appreciate your confidence and I value your friendship, but your timing sucks rocks,” he said. “I need one big favor.”

“Anything in my power.”

“I need to be home Sunday, even if it's just for the day.”

“Why?”

“I promised Rush I wouldn't miss his birthday this year. Your request forced me to break it.”

“You're serious?”

“When it comes to that boy, I'm always serious.”

“I'll do what I can.”

“Way I see it, Greg, is you brought me here, I expect you can get me back home. You want me back on Monday, I'm all yours for as long as you need me, but I need to be home on Sunday.”

The kitchen seemed scaled to accommodate the woman who ran it. The space had commercial appliances, and the table easily fit eight chairs. There were doors on three of the four walls. Just through an open butler's pantry was a swinging one that led into the formal dining room; a second opened to the main hallway, and the third out onto the porch.

“Jet Washington, greatest cook on the face of the earth, I want to introduce to you the number-one greatest deputy marshal, Winter James Massey.”

“Don't get in my way, now,” the cook said, without turning from the huge stove. “I'm at the crossroads with this gumbo.” She was dressed in a starched white uniform, an eye-popping contrast to her skin, which was the color of damp mink. “Okay, here comes the other side of it.” She held a spoon to her lips, sampled the liquid, and murmured gratefully, “Thank you, Jesus! Okay, it's safe now.”

Only then did she turn and eye Winter with some degree of suspicion. The skin on her face was stretched so tight that he couldn't judge her age within a fifteen-year span. She had an amazingly warm smile and her eyes were so bright that they seemed illuminated, like dials in a dashboard. The rich scent of the food was making his stomach growl.

“Glad you finally got here,” she told him. “Mr. Gregory been driving everybody crazy with all this talk 'bout Winter this and Winter that and jus' y'all wait till Winter Massey gets here. From the way that man's been going on, I figured you'd be ten feet tall, with a halo made of lightning bolts.”

“He exaggerates a little,” Winter replied, grinning.

She wagged a finger at him. “I got three rules nobody breaks, unless they want to be broken. One is, keep your nose out my fridge and your hands off my cookin' utensils. Two is, nobody ever goes hungry in this house. And three is, you want something to eat, you tell me and I'll fix you something filling. Don't matter what time day or night. I'm not in here, just tap on my door. You got all that, Deputy Winter Massey?”

“Yes, ma'am.”

Placing her hands on her hips, she countered, “Uh-huh. Then tell it back to me.”