By Paths Coincident

Chapter 9

The Present

Bridgeport Brew Pub, Portland, OR

Eliot Spencer allowed himself one slightly deeper breath of relief. From the moment he had seen that Colonel Baird both recognized his name and knew that he was the one who had slaughtered her team and done his best to kill her eleven years ago, he had not been sure whether she was going to launch a frontal assault or stand down. For now, at least, it seemed she was willing to settle for reconnaissance. He had no illusions that the confrontation was over.

Hell, he wouldn't blame her if she called in all of NATO to take him out.

Perhaps it was a good thing Parker had lifted her phone and her gun.

Baird's one hand still hovered where her Glock would have been, but the other touched the nearly invisible scar at her throat—a scar that represented so many other unseen wounds. He did not think she was aware of that telltale gesture.

Eliot knew exactly what he had done to this woman. He had left her not breathing, with no detectable pulse. The fact that she was here, alive, spoke of an unbelievable will to survive in the face of incredible odds. But he also knew that she would count all the years of recovery from such major trauma as nothing in comparison to what he had done to her team.

He owed her a debt oceans deep in blood.

But this was not the moment, nor was he the one to set the terms.

She watched him, his victim in life rather than dreams, her eyes as beautiful now as they had been eleven years ago—and as angry. Wrath rose off her like smoke from an inferno. And beneath that anger, so much fear and sorrow. These were not fragments of memory and imagination excavated by his guilt to torment him. These were her real emotions.

His responsibility.

The knowledge carved into his heart like knives.

Their frozen tableau drew out to an awkward eternity, only he and Baird understanding why, the others merely worried and confused.

Miss Manners had provided no script for polite conversation with a woman one had left for dead nor for how she should respond to her murderer.

It was Hardison, bless him, who unthawed first. With all the panache gained from his childhood years sporting a bowtie door to door selling salvation, the young man flashed a brilliant smile, extended his hand in patented Sophie-subverting-an-entire-nation fashion, and said, "Pleasure to meet you, Ms. Baird. My name is Colin Hartnell."

Oh. Damn. Right. Aliases. At the moment, Eliot could not have told what names they were running the Brew Pub under if his life depended on it. Whatever rational fragment of his mind remained noted that he hadn't been this shaken in . . . he could not remember how long. There had been no point in his giving a false name, since Jake would know the truth, but there was no need to blow the others' cover stories.

As though she had to come back from a great distance, Colonel Baird drew her hand from where she had no weapon to draw and took Hardison's hand briefly.

"And this," Hardison continued, pulling Parker forward, "is Martha Tyler."

Parker moved as though she had forgotten her knees bent. In situations of intense personal emotion, their thief still had a tendency to go a bit wooden.

"Oh. Yes. Of course. I'm Martha." Parker smiled. At least her smiles no longer left people the impression that they did not ever want to meet her alone in dimly lit places—unless, of course, they really didn't.

Jake joined in the heroic effort to diffuse the situation, shaking first Hardison's and then Parker's hands. "Great to meet you Mr. Hartnell, Ms. Tyler."