Page 81 of The Agent
“That is correct. This can be construed as an attempt to communicate with her since he is threatening me. I have it recorded, by the way.”
“Good man.” Tully wasn’t surprised. Alastair knew his legal stuff. “How did you leave it?”
“That I would consider his proposal and get back to him.” There was a note of black humor in Alastair’s voice as he said, “The response was, er, explosive, so I hung up. And called you.”
Tully understood Alastair’s desire to cut the call short but an enraged Van Houten was a dangerous animal.
Which meant Tully needed to warn Jenya to be extra-vigilant. In fact, he would send another trained guard over to Natalie’s house, just to be safe.
“Call him back and stall him for a while. Push to get a reason for the contact. I need to check in with a couple of people before we proceed. And thanks for calling me right away.”
“You know more about this situation than I do,” Alastair said.
And it gave Tully something to think about other than how he’d scared Natalie away.
He hit speed dial for Jenya’s cell, knowing his call would trigger a specific ringtone that she would answer no matter what the time.
Except his call went to her voice mail. He texted her a terse message to call him ASAP and he waited exactly sixty seconds. No response, so he redialed. Voice mail again.
“Shit!” He dialed Natalie’s number. “Pick up, Nat, pick up!”
Voice mail.
He bolted for his home office, where he could track the location of the phones. His fingers flew over the keyboard as he launched the program and keyed in the numbers. The software quickly traced both devices to Natalie’s address.
“So why aren’t they answering?” He started to pull up his staff members’ home addresses when he remembered Deion. He found the young man’s number on his cell phone.
“Thank God!” he said when Deion answered, sounding sleepy but coherent. “How fast can you get to Natalie’s house? Jenya isn’t answering her cell phone.”
“I’m dressing now.” Deion’s voice was wide-awake. “On my way in three minutes.”
“Wait! You approach with extreme caution. No heroics. Just scope out the situation and report back to me. Got it?”
“Yes, sir.”
Tully felt the surge of adrenaline that came with doing his job. For once, he didn’t welcome it, because he was positive that Natalie was somehow involved with Van Houten’s midnight phone call. Which meant that Regina was going to have to talk to her husband.
He texted Alastair:Call me ASAP.
Leaving his cell phone free, he used his computer to call Leland, his lips curling into a grim smile at the thought of waking up his partner yet again.
“This is getting to be a bad habit of yours,” Leland said, his voice thick with sleep.
“I knew you’d whine.” He explained the situation. “I hate to do this to Regina, but we need to know what Van Houten wants.”
“Agreed. I’ll get Dawn to wake her. I’ll load the listening software on Regina’s phone and you can tie in from there.”
“And bounce her cell signal around so Van Houten can’t trace it back to your place. I don’t want you and Dawn in the crosshairs.”
“I appreciate that,” Leland said.
Tully’s cell vibrated with Alastair’s name in the ID. “Gotta go.” He swiped in the call. “Any more information?”
“No, just a great deal of verbal abuse,” Alastair said. “I’m not sure why he thinks that will change my mind.”
“He’s not rational. I’m concerned that Natalie has gotten caught up in this, because neither my bodyguard nor Natalie is answering her phone. So I’m afraid Regina will have to speak with Van Houten.”
“Bloody hell!” Alastair exclaimed. “I hate to subject her to that.”
