Unwitting Alliances - Hunter Blake Series

  * * *

  Karen sat quietly in the cockpit of the helicopter watching out the window at the farmland below. It was early evening and Frank was at the controls. “You okay, honey?” he asked.

  “Not really,” she said. “I don’t know what to think. A week ago I thought I had a pretty good life. A nice home, comfortable surroundings, friends... all of that. And a husband I loved and could trust.”

  “Karen,” Frank began.

  “Did you have to shoot that man? Couldn’t you have tied him up or something?”

  “The pilot? He was going to shoot you!” Frank looked at her. “He wasn’t interested in negotiating with us. Would you have rather I let him shoot you instead?”

  “I guess not.”

  “You guess not.” Frank looked at her in disbelief.

  “Okay, no!” she replied. “But all this killing. I can’t handle what’s happened. I can’t believe I killed someone and I can’t handle what you’ve been doing behind my back, Frank.”

  “I know. And I’m sorry.”

  “Why didn’t you quit and get out?”

  Frank laughed uncomfortably. “You don’t just get out. Not with these people. You’re either in or you’re dead. That’s it.”

  “But...”

  “Daniel told the truth. I really didn’t know what I was getting into at first. I met him at an event. A fund-raiser in Los Angeles. I was investigating a drug trafficking ring as part of my work with the FBI and we suspected the event was somehow involved but Daniel wasn’t on the watch list. He and I struck up a conversation and he found out I was an attorney. We stayed in touch over the next couple of months and when I ended up back in town, he invited me to dinner. That’s when he broached the subject of wanting to set up a couple of corporations to handle his business affairs, as well as a couple of charities.”

  Frank looked at her then continued. “Everything thing he showed me... all the documents, the paperwork... everything looked legitimate. I checked everything myself. I double-checked everything. But he was so clever. By the time I figured out what was really going on, it had been almost a year and my name as his attorney was plastered all over everything.”

  Karen looked at him. “So now what?”

  Frank didn’t respond right away then finally said, “I’ll have to turn myself in. If I’m lucky, they’ll let me turn state’s evidence. Maybe serve some time. They may even put us into witness protection. I don’t know. We’ll see.”

  “And if you’re not so lucky?”

  “I could probably end up spending the rest of my life in prison,” he said.

  Karen nodded soberly. “Not a rosy prospect.”

  “No. It isn’t.”

  He suddenly took the helicopter down and found a place to land. Shutting everything down, he removed his headset and let out a tired sigh.

  “I had to protect you, honey, and the kids, and our grandchildren. Daniel had photographs of all of you that had been taken in various places over a period of six months or more. He’d had people watching all of you and threatened to harm every one of you if I talked. I couldn’t let that happen.”

  “My god, Frank,” Karen replied. “Well, that explains the few times I thought I was being followed.”

  “I wish you had told me,” he said.

  “I thought I was just being paranoid. But even recently I was sure I was being watched. That’s how I ended up with the Wesleys. Jim and Hunter were afraid for me.” She sat staring out the window at the growing darkness. “Our kids and their families were being watched.” She tensed up. “Frank! Are they safe? What if someone...”

  “Calm down,” he said. “I don’t know how much of that information Daniel shared with anyone else. You talk about being paranoid? He was definitely that. So was Gerry. Heck, I was becoming more and more paranoid.” He paused. “My guess is Daniel kept a lot of that to himself as part of that so call ‘insurance’ he mentioned. His ace-in-the-hole, so to speak. I don’t think he would have wanted the information readily available to anyone else, who might have tried to exploit it or use it against him. And right now, I have no way of finding out where that information might be because I don’t know who I can trust anymore... not that I could really trust anyone before now.”

  Karen teared up. “Why do people have to be so evil?”

  Frank reached for her hand. “Daniel was obsessed with his empire. He wasn’t about to let anyone get in his way or interfere in what he had been building up for the past several years.”

  They both sat in silence staring out the cockpit windows. Finally Karen asked. “So are we just going to sit here all night?”

  He squeezed her hand. “I want to find a place I can take you where you will be safe.”

  “What about our kids and their families? How are you going to keep them safe?”

  “I don’t know. I just don’t know.” Frank sat caressing his wife’s hand. A moment later he turned on the master switch and tuned the radio to a particular frequency, then tapped out a message hoping for a reply.