"Jeanie London - Retrieval" - читать интересную книгу автора (London Jeanie)

be on any thirty-year-old's face. Yet when she smiled, a caring heart and generous spirit shone through the world weariness. A smile like hers brightened a room, impossible to ignore.
Luke Robinson seemed as transformed by that smile as Katie. His gaze clung to her face as if he'd been waiting to see her, and he rushed ahead to open the door, eagerness in every step. His smile didn't fade even after Katie said a warm good-bye and disappeared inside Fairwinds Women's Center.
"Go ahead, gentlemen." Roman motioned Gray and Damian to follow. "See what she's up to. I'll be there."
His two new compatriots took off, leaving him on the portico to consider the security guard. He assessed Luke Robinson, who appeared to be close in age to Roman himself. Forty. . . maybe forty-two on the outside. His neatly-pressed uiriform displayed a quiet pride in his vocation. He wore no wedding ring.
That was what Roman wanted to know.
Heading into the facility, he found Gray and Damian inside the legal department, while Katie talked with a woman behind a desk. Gray stood just inside the doorway, arms folded over his chest. Damian sat on the desk, nearly close enough to brush the secretary's elbow when she reached' out to accept the file folder from Katie.
From Roman's newly-dead perspective, the scene was surreal to say the least. Two men so solid they could have been alive, who seemed a part of the unfolding events, but weren't.
Except for the way they hovered over Katie McGuire, watching her as if they sensed the woman harboring inside.
Could they?

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35

Roman stared hard. He'd only seen images of Nina when she'd been alive. What would she be like after spending nearly three hundred years dead? And why was he so taken with the thought. He'd never obsessed about a target before, and could only assume that death had changed things. Since death had robbed him of the physical, Roman thought he might be paying more attention to the mental, much like a man who has lost his sight and finds his remaining senses sharper.
Gray caught sight of him. "Our host is filing divorce papers. She doesn't look too upset."
"Did you miss the sign on the door?" Damian commented dryly. "Happily married women don't usually spend time at women's shelters. Who's the bum?"
"Shea McGuire," Roman said. "Thirty-four. Welder. Married fifteen years. Two children."
"Not what you might consider your typical candidate to host a lost soul," Gray observed. "You'd think a demon would want someone a little less. . . normal." ''Maybe he specifically wanted normal," Damian suggested. "Someone who wouldn't be quickly noticed." Frowning at Katie, he added, "Or cared about."
These men seemed to be grasping the concept of situation assessment. Roman was pleased. They'd formed a team--albeit a grudging one--but it was a start.
"We have to fill in some blanks about Katie McGuire," he said. ''That's the only way we can determine how best to infiltrate her life to retrieve Ms. de Lacy. And while we're at it, we need II!ore information on Luke Robinson."
"Who the hell is Luke Robinson?" Damian asked.
''The security guard outside."
Roman instinctively stepped away from the door when a small woman slipped into the room, earning a


36 JEANIE LONDON

snort of laughter from Damian. "Afraid she'll bump into you, dead man?" Roman ignored the sarcasm and watched the woman as she smiled absently at Katie and the secretary before dropping a stack of mail on the desk and departing with as little fanfare as she'd arrived.
Katie and the secretary went back to their conversation, and Roman said, "I've spotted a potential point of entry."
''The security guard?" Gray asked.
Roman nodded. "He's interested in our target, andI want to know why. How do we get this information?"
''We eavesdrop on conversations like we're doing," Damian said. "You're dead now, Barrymore. You can be a fly on the wall just about anywhere. And if that doesn't turn up anything good, you can always shift into the living world and snoop around." He bit back a smile. "Well, we can anyway."
Damn straight, Roman thought. Shifting between the realms aside, death sounded better than any listening device he'd ever had at Sanctus, and he'd possessed the very top of the line technology had to offer.
''We need to know everything we can about the people impacting Katie McGuire's life. Like Luke Robinson." Waving a hand, he indicated the office surrounding them. "About what these people do for her here."
"I don't know a damn thing about Luke Robinson, but 1 can tell you that Fairwinds Women's Center is funded by Humanity United, a non-profit organization with a worldwide presence." Damian pointed at a brochure on the desk then continued reading. "Humanity United funds women's centers and offers resources to regions tom by war or catastrophe. They

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also establish programs to feed, clothe, and educate starving children in poverty-stricken countries. Serious do-gooders."
"Indeed they are, Mr. Hart," Roman said. "And you've just provided our first item of note. Humanity United supports human rights of the any-race-or-creed variety. This organization is run by a man whom I happen to know about--Nathanial Rush."
''These two were talking about him." Damian motioned to Katie and the secretary. "People call him 'the angel.'"
"Not to his face." That earned a laugh, but Roman didn't reply as he considered Humanity United.
A coincidence, or a connection?
Once, he might have considered coincidence, but death seemed to be proving chance a purely human device.
In the days preceding his death, Roman had uncovered a connection between apparently paradoxical organizations--a well-funded terrorist cell and Humanity United, Whose influence had skyrocketed in recent years. The connection had been tenuous, but had left him with a question.
Was charity the only reason Nathanial Rush wanted a foothold in so many regions around the world?