Free Liars & Thieves by Stephen Coonts

shows up,” I said, and rolled down my window to let some air in—and so I could hear a chopper overhead, if one showed up.
    After two or three minutes, she calmed down. At least she stopped squirming, trying to get loose. I ignored her facial expressions, just watched the street. I had about decided that everyone in the neighborhood had burrowed in for the night when a hardy soul wearing a raincoat came along walking his dog. Apparently the dog needed a potty break rain or shine. The man paid no attention to us in the car, didn’t even look our way.
    Ten minutes passed, then fifteen. I checked my watch occasionally. After twenty minutes had gone by, I remarked, “These Virginia cops are certainly Johnny-on-the-spot. Good thing you weren’t getting murdered or raped, huh?”
    After twenty-two minutes a ten-year-old rattletrap rolled down the street—woofers thudding—and parked in a driveway two doors away from Erlanger’s house. The driver went inside.
    The bad guys arrived in two unmarked cars twenty-seven minutes after I parked in the driveway. I pushed her down and ducked my head as they went by. The cars went slowly down the street, one behind the other. At least two men in each car. They stopped in front of Erlanger’s house, doused the lights.
    “Doesn’t look like cops to me,” I remarked. “Plainclothes, no cruisers.”
    She was watching intently. Although the distance was about seventy yards, the streetlight beyond her house limned the men. One of the four men stayed by the cars while the others went toward the house, out of our line of sight.
    “Seen enough?” I asked her.
    For the first time she looked my way. There was fear in her eyes.
    I started the car, snapped on the lights, and got under way toward the subdivision entrance. No one followed me.
    When we were rolling out on the freeway, I ripped the tape from her mouth. She screamed.
    “Hurts like hell, doesn’t it?”
    “Who are you?”
    “I told you, lady. Tommy Carmellini, CIA.”
    “Who were those men back there?”
    “They sure as hell weren’t street cops speeding to assist an honest taxpayer in distress.”
    “They came to kill me, didn’t they?”
    “Probably.” I shrugged. “A friend of mine got your address from the telephone company. The only reason I reached you first is because I knew your name.”
    “Why me, for God’s sake?”
    “Someone doesn’t want Goncharov’s notes read by anyone. You’ve seen them. You might know too much.”
    “I don’t know anything!” she shrieked, then began sobbing.
    I was fresh out of sympathy. The ditsy broad stole my car, which was now sitting abandoned in her driveway. Whatever slim chance I once had of talking my way out of trouble had evaporated. No doubt the hit men were looking for me, too.
    The rain started again. I turned on the wipers and tried to concentrate on driving but found that impossible. What should I do now? How was I going to stay one jump ahead of hit men who showed up when someone called the police? If the police were tipping them off, intentionally or inadvertently, no doubt the FBI was also cooperating. Hell, maybe the hit men were FBI.
    I felt like a man driving to his own execution. “Get this tape off me,” she said. “You gonna bail at the first stoplight?” “No.”
    I thought a little clarification wouldn’t hurt. “Those people back there came to kill us, lady. I thought they’d show up before long looking for you, which is why I went to get you out of there.”
    “A knight in shining armor,” she said acidly.
    “You’ve been told. You want out of this car, that’s fine with me. I’ll drop you anywhere you say. Call the cops, the FBI, your boss, your boyfriend, your mama, whoever. Someone kills you, that’ll be your tough luck.”
    I pulled over to the side of the road and ripped the tape off her arms. It must have hurt like hell, but she stifled the scream.
    “You got a cell phone on you?” I asked when we were rolling again.
    She