Page 14 of Caught
“Oh, I’m in.”
Leilah switched her gaze to Marielle.
“Please,” Marielle said with a pout. “Don’t insult me. Of course, I’m in.”
“Thank you. All of you. I owe you.”
“You do,” Chelsea told her. “And you can pay us back by telling us all about what’s going on with you and Ryan on the way to Fort Detrick. We all saw the way he kissed you.”
Leilah’s face heated.
“You’re blushing,” Chelsea told her.
She fanned herself.
Olivia cleared her throat. “Not to be the killjoy, but we should get on the road. We can torment Leilah in the car.” She looked around the table. “Nobody other than me is armed, right?”
Leilah, Chelsea, and Marielle murmured confirmations that Olivia was, in fact, the only one packing heat.
“Okay, good. I don’t expect we’ll find ourselves in a situation where it’ll matter. But if we do, you all have to follow my lead, got it?”
“Got it,” they chimed.
“Let’s do this, then.” Olivia pushed back her chair, and the others followed.
Leilah’s heart thumped with anticipation. Reuben Cowley was important. She knew it in her gut, and Leilah’s gut never steered her in the wrong direction.
6
Ryan shifted his weight on the cold concrete bench. Omar paced back and forth across the overlook, his hands jammed into his coat pockets. Trent checked the time for the eighteenth time since they’d arrived at the appointed meeting place.
“This guy’s almost fifteen minutes late,” Trent observed.
Jake, who’d been staring across the Beltway at the three soaring steel spires of the Air Force Memorial, turned around. “He’s not going to stand us up.”
Prospect Hill Park was, as its name suggested, built on a rise. In addition to the memorial, the Pentagon building was visible from their perch. The small urban park was notable mostly for its view of the city. Ryan imagined their contact had selected it for its proximity to the Pentagon. Even so, it made him uneasy.
“We are pretty exposed here,” he noted.
Jake exhaled sharply. “Look, people, a skosh of paranoia is a good thing. But in this case, we’re going to have to trust the DCIS. We don’t have a lot of other options.”
“Easy to say when you aren’t wanted for murder,” Ryan muttered.
Whatever retort Jake was about to make died in his throat when Omar jerked his head. “Someone’s coming up the trail.”
They gathered at the railing and watched the thin Black man fight the gusting wind as he climbed the hill at a rapid clip. He wore a camel dress coat over a charcoal gray suit. When he reached the overlook, he raised a hand in greeting.
“Sorry I’m late. I had to wait to slip out without being noticed,” he panted.
Trent stepped forward to shake his outstretched hand. “Thanks for coming. I’m Trent Mann.”
“Reggie Slidell.”
Trent introduced everyone else in turn. “This is Jake West, Potomac’s CEO, Omar Khan, and in-house counsel Ryan Hayes.”
As Slidell offered each of them a brisk handshake, he commented, “Former PJ, former DEA agent, and former AUSA.” He eyed Trent again. “And, of course, a former SEAL. Quite a team you have at Potomac Private Services.”
Ryan realized Reggie Slidell probably had more to be paranoid about than he did. Four-on-one was never a fair fight. But this would be a particularly lopsided dustup if it came to that. He cleared his throat. “Did Charlie mention why we wanted to talk to someone at DCIS?”
