Free Bodyguard of Lies by Bob Mayer Page A

recognized this was more than coincidence.
    Neeley knew time was of the essence. The Cellar had to know that Gant was dead by now. Which meant that whatever ace he had held up his sleeve to protect both of them from the Cellar now had to be up her sleeve. But John Masterson held part of that unknown card.
    Gant had told her, and she had known from her own experience, that a person never truly retired from the covert world, no matter what part you played or who you worked for: government spy, contract worker, terrorist, hit man, it didn't matter. Once you were in the only way out was death. Or having a lot of money to be able to cover one's trail, which was why Gant had kept a line into his Uncle Joe in New York City for so many years. Even the money though, wouldn't be enough. You needed ‘leverage’ as Gant called it and he'd had it. He'd never shared it with her because that was part of his provision with the Cellar to keep his end of the deal in balance.
    Neeley didn't know much about the Cellar because Gant hadn't known everything and he’d been reluctant to talk much about it with her. He understood that knowledge could be a very dangerous thing in the covert world. He had told her that he'd been contacted by the Cellar while he was still in the army, working in the Special Forces, well before he met her in Berlin. He'd done occasional, outside the line of military duty, jobs for the Cellar.
    When they'd disappeared out of Berlin, Gant had left the army behind. And Gant's leverage had bought them not only that freedom but a monthly paycheck from the Cellar in return for his silence.
    And now she was on her own and she needed to know what Gant and John Masterson had shared. Neeley felt foolish on the hill, directional mike in the briefcase at her side, earplug in, standing in the shadows. Worse than foolish, she felt vulnerable. She didn't have a very good cover story for her presence.
    Neeley stiffened. Hannah Masterson looked straight up the hill at her. Neeley felt a shiver as they made distant eye contact. Neeley turned and walked away, out of sight. Returning to her truck, Neeley drove it to a point where she could wait, unobserved, for Hannah to leave the country club.
    After forty-five minutes, her wait was rewarded as the black BMW pulled out. Neeley followed at a discreet distance and, when she was sure Hannah was returning home, she drove in another direction. She parked the truck over three kilometers away from Hannah's house.
    Hannah lived in Manchester, a wealthy suburb to the west of St. Louis. The neighborhood was a juxtaposition of forest and development. Neeley had parked just off the main strip, Manchester Road, in the lot of a small shopping center where the truck would not stand out. The forest started right behind the stores.
    Neeley turned on her hand-held Global Positioning Receiver. A flashing question mark appeared in the center of the screen for about ten seconds, then the receiver triangulated on the closest three global positioning satellites and locked in her position. Neeley entered Hannah’s address in the hand-held GPR. Then she punched the ‘go-to’ button. An arrow went from her position toward the house. Using the GPR Neeley moved unerringly through the woods to come out right behind Hannah's house.
    The street Hannah lived on, Cedar Creek, was a dead end. Hulking, brick houses lined the way, evenly spaced apart, separated by the price of a lot of land. On Neeley's side, behind the Masterson house, the backyards ended in a tree line that extended back to a creek almost half a kilometer away from the shopping center. Neeley had followed that creek most of the way coming here. She'd climbed up over the bank and moved forward until she could see the back of the house.
    Neeley had gotten the address from the phonebook. She’d checked it the previous night with a drive-by. That exercise had been dangerous, dead end street and exclusive neighborhood, but she was from out of town, and as