"Nothing happening here, Lieutenant," Roberts responded. "No lights since you and Mr. Steele left. I think he went back to bed."
"You might have company out there before long- I want you to cooperate with them if they show up."
There was a pause. "Company company?" Roberts asked.
"Exactly. I'll explain later. Just stay at your post. I'm en route to Steele's office."
"Yessir."
"Company company?" Remington repeated.
"Code for CIA," Jarvis confirmed. "Never know who might be listening in," he said, putting the microphone back in its holder.
"Ahh."
Walter Johnson stood in the darkened living room, watching out of the window. So far, the same car had driven by six times. Probably local police on a stake out. The CIA wouldn't have been quite so open in their surveillance.
With a glance at the Eastern sky, Walter sighed. It would be daylight in another couple of hours. He picked up his small suitcase, and then took a final look around the room, refusing to allow himself the luxury of pain at leaving the small house that he'd called home for the last five years.
It was time to go. To move on, as he had done before, five years ago.
He made one stop in the kitchen on his way out of the house via the back door. He passed silently through the garden, making his way to the back gate and into the alleyway. Staying in the shadows, his steps took him unerringly to the public telephone on the corner, where he dialed a telephone number and let it ring four times…
"We'll take over now," the dark suited man informed Roberts and Davidson. "You can report back to your Lieutenant that -"
"Look, Lt. Jarvis told us to maintain our position," Roberts insisted. "Not that there's much going on here-" he said; only to have his words trail off as the house exploded in a ball of flame. "My God," Roberts breathed, then leapt for the radio. "This is Roberts, unit 543. We need fire trucks out here ASAP!" he snapped out to the dispatcher. Glancing at the stunned Davidson, he added, "And get me a landline to Lt. Jarvis. He's at Remington Steele's office."
Mildred and Eileen were talking when Remington and Jarvis entered the office. Both women gave Remington a concerned look. "Mr. Steele. Hello, Lt. Jarvis."
"Mildred," Jarvis said, smiling at the other woman beside the desk..
"You look all in, Remington," she said, her blue eyes searching Remington's face.
"I'll be all right as soon as we find Laura," Remington assured her, placing a hand over hers at it lay on his arm.
"Would you like some coffee?" she asked. "I just made a fresh pot."
"Thank you," he said, smiling at her as she turned toward the coffee room door. Then, he sat down on the edge of Mildred's desk. "What've you got, Mildred?" he asked.
"Well, I got that information that your friend Sheldon sent over about Walter Johnson/John Walters," she confirmed. "And it only made what I found that much more plausible," Mildred began, clearly ready launch into yet another explanation of the thread she had unraveled to find her treasure. "I did a title search for Walter Johnson, and came up with zilch. But for some reason,-"
Eileen returned with the coffee, handing a second cup to Jarvis. "Thank you, Miss-?"
Mildred, Remington and Eileen all went still. "This is my mother," Remington said, making the introduction.
"Mrs. Steele?" Jarvis asked, and Remington was sure he knew that it wasn't the woman's name.
Eileen smiled, never missing a beat. "Oh, please. Call me Eileen. Anyone who's enough of a friend to my son that he would help him out during this crisis should be on a first name basis. And what's your given name, Lieutenant?"
"Jimmy," Jarvis responded automatically. "James."
"Go on, Mildred," Eileen said, sitting in the chair she'd vacated moments before. "Forgive me for interrupting."
"Oh. For some reason I decided to do a search for variations on his name. Since you said he might be one of Tony's CIA buddies, it only seemed natural that he would use an alias."
"And you found something?" Remington asked, trying to hurry her along.
"You got it," she announced, handing him a computer printout. "John Walters bought a cabin twenty years ago- it's isolated enough for Tony's purposes-"
"But Walters lived in the Midwest, Mildred," Jarvis pointed out. "Roselli wouldn't have taken her that far."
"The cabin is north of LA- an hour's drive in good traffic." She glanced at the clock. "A little longer this time of day, I'd guess."
The telephone rang, and before Mildred could reach it, Remington grabbed the receiver. "Steele here…Yes, he is." He held out the telephone. "Detective Roberts."
Jarvis took the telephone. "Yeah, Roberts?…What?!…Da-" he stopped, seeing Eileen. "Darn it, Roberts…No sign?…Have the Company boys shown up yet?…I see. Yeah, we have a lead- you can go on home- but tell the company boys that you have a message from me before you do…If they're smart, they'll be watching the airports out of town and back to Russia…No, I don't think he's dead. He faked his death once, he's probably done it again…Look, tell them that we're on our way out to-" he held out a hand for the printout, "Chambers Canyon. There's a cabin up there that Walters bought ten years ago- before Roselli supposedly killed him. He might be heading up there, for all we know. And even if he's not, we could use some back up to get Laura Steele out safely…" Jarvis sighed deeply. "Tell them I said thanks for the help." He slammed down the phone, and then gave an embarrassed grimace in Eileen's direction. "Sorry, ma'am."
"What's happened, Jimmy?" Remington asked.
"Right after the CIA's finest showed up, Johnson's house exploded in a ball of flame."
"Oh, no," Eileen said softly.
"Good Lord," Remington said, and Mildred just sat there, mouth open in surprise. "And Johnson?"
"No sigh of him yet. The Company seems convinced that he was killed in the blast."
"You mean they're not going to even check?" Mildred wanted to know. "Typical bureaucracy. Stick your head in the sand till what you're trying to ignore come up and bites you in the-"
"Mildred," Remington said in a warning voice. "And if the can't confirm Johnson's death?"
"THEN they might start a search," Jarvis said.
"What about Laura?" Eileen asked.
"They said that he was no longer working for the Company, so he's not their concern."
Remington picked up the telephone and dialed Sheldon's number at the office. "Hello?" the person who answered said.
"Sheldon?"
"I'm sorry, Sheldon's taking a few days off. Personal business. I can give him a message, if you'd like."
"No. I'll reach him later. It can wait," Remington assured the person on the other end of the line. "Thank you." He hung up, his expression thoughtful.
"What is it, Chief?" Mildred asked.
"Sheldon's on vacation," he said, looking across the desk to where Jarvis stood. "This is beginning to smell to high heaven."
"If your friend told them about Roselli's connection to John Walters alias Walter Johnson," Jarvis pointed out, "I can't see them just letting Roselli go."
"But they didn't know where he was," Remington pointed out. "They lost him before he kidnapped Laura."
"They know now," Eileen reminded them. "James just told his detective that they were in Chambers Canyon."
"Oh dear God," Remington moaned. "If they go in there after Tony- they're not going to care who they hurt to get him. And Laura's right in their line of fire."
Laura woke up to a knock on her bedroom door. "Breakfast is ready, Laura."
She sat up, trying to get her bearings in the unfamiliar room. She'd been having a terrible nightmare in which a vengeful Tony Roselli had kidnapped her, -
"Laura?" the knock came again, followed by the inquiry. "Breakfast?"
Laura closed her eyes as it dawned that she hadn't been dreaming after all. She really WAS in a cabin in the middle of nowhere, at the mercy of a man who swore that he loved her, yet was willing to keep her a prisoner until she proclaimed her love for him.
The knocking grew louder, and a touch angrier. "Laura?!"
"I'm awake," she mumbled. "I'm not hungry, Tony," she called back.
He rattled the doorknob, and Laura worried as she realized that she had failed to put the chair under it. "You can't stay in here all the time, Laura!"
He was right. Staying in here wasn't going to prove anything. She had to find some way to make him let her go. To realize that it was Remington that she loved, not him.
Sighing, she went to the door and opened it, found herself confronted by a suddenly smiling Tony. "There you are. I was beginning to wonder if you were going to ignore me."
"I just needed a few minutes," Laura told him.
"Breakfast's on the table," he said. "Nothing fancy. Just eggs and ham and toast."
"A lot more than I usually eat," Laura said. "Toast will be more than enough," she assured him.
"I have some grapefruit," he added. "I don't like it, but I thought you might, so-"
Laura turned toward the stair, hiding her wince at his attempt to be so accommodating. "Toast and grapefruit will be fine."
Tony rushed ahead of her, pulling out her chair and seating her before retrieving the grapefruit from the refrigerator and cutting it in half for her. "Here you go." Laura picked up her spoon as he dug into the eggs and ham on his own plate. "I'm sorry if I scared you last night," he told her. "But it's really not safe out there after dark right now."
"And is it safe during the daytime?" she asked.
"Sure. The cougar hasn't been spotted during the day as far as I know." He gazed at her warily. "Why?"
"I thought I'd like to go for a walk after breakfast," she told him. "I'm just not used to being cooped up this way."
Tony seemed to consider her words for a moment. "Why not? I could use some exercise myself. Do you fish?"
"I haven't fished in years," Laura told him. "Not since my father-I wasn't very good at it, though."
"Oh." He smiled. "Well, we can walk. The lake's really nice this time of day."
They walked to what Tony called the best spot on the lake, and stood there, enjoying the quiet beauty. When Tony slipped an arm around Laura's shoulders, she slid away, breaking the contact. "Tony, please."
"Why won't you even give me a chance, Laura?" he asked. "I love you."
"But I don't love you, Tony," Laura said quietly, aware that all it would take was one shove for her to end up in the water below them. "I love him." Tony's jaw grew taut as he stood there, eyes narrowed, breathing heavily.
"Then what was all of that in Ireland, huh? All of that about how my kissing you 'confused' you? About-"
She remembered those words, and regretted them deeply. "I'm sorry if I gave you false hope, Tony. When I said that, I was confused. So many things were happening- I'd just found out about Daniel, I wasn't sure how Remington was going to react to that, and everything else was going on-I did mean the part that if I'd met you earlier- before I met him. But I didn't. And it took use five years of working side-by-side, learning to trust each other for us to finally feel comfortable enough to tell each other how we really felt. I couldn't just toss all of that aside, Tony, even if I wanted to. Which I don't. I'm sorry if it hurts you to hear it, but I don't love you. Not in that way.
Tony moved away a bit, his dark gaze on the water. "And if he wasn't in the picture anymore?"
"He will be," Laura said with a certainty she'd never felt until now.
"What if he decides to go back to Ireland with Eileen?" Tony suggested. "Get to know his mother?"
Laura smiled. "He'd be more likely to ask her stay here in Los Angeles," she said. "But if he did decide to go back with her, I'd go with him."
Tony turned to look at her. "And give up the agency?"
"I can be a detective anywhere," Laura pointed out. She met his look squarely, hoping that he couldn't see the false bravado in her words. "Even in Ireland." She expected him to react to her words. But he seemed to be looking past her, so Laura turned to follow his line of sight. "What's wrong?" she asked.
Tony frowned, pulling a gun from his pants pocket. "I thought I saw that cougar up on the ridge." Laura searched the ridge again, but saw nothing. "Get back to the house and stay inside till I get back," he ordered.
"Maybe you should come back, too," she said, sure that a handgun wasn't going to be much good against a big cat.
"Get back to the cabin, Laura," Tony said again, this time giving her a slight push in the direction of the path. Laura continued down the path, toward the cabin, glancing back every now and then to see Tony still there, watching her departure.
Stopped, waited a moment, then retraced her steps. Tony was no longer by the lake. Moving forward, she caught a glimpse of him as he made his way toward the ridge at a hurried pace.
Curious now, Laura followed his trail, keeping far enough back not to be seen.
Jarvis brought the car to a stop just beyond the clearing around the house. "Nice setting," he commented.
"Hmm," Remington agreed as his blue eyes scanned the house and surrounding area for any movement. He opened the car's door. "Let's go." He wanted to find Laura as soon as possible- preferably before all Hell broke loose.
"Good idea," Jarvis said, opening his own door. "The others probably aren't far behind us."
From behind a tree, Laura watched as Tony stopped, looking around, as if waiting for something to happen. IF there was a cougar, and she was beginning to think that it was a BIG if, he was taking a foolish chance by just standing there.
She felt her jaw tighten in anger as a second man appeared from behind another tree. He and Tony began to talk, and Tony was becoming more and more agitated as the man spoke. From here, she couldn't hear what was being said, so she chanced getting closer, ducking from one tree to the next, taking advantage of Tony and his friend's distraction to get close enough.
"You think they found this place?" Tony was asking.
"Maybe. I bought it ten years ago, remember. If they're smart enough to do cross checks, it's possible that they know about it and if the look on Steele's face last night was any indication, he's not going to give up. If I'd known that you were going to do this, Tony, I would never have agreed to let you use this place. I thought we agreed-"
"I told you that I'd think about it," Tony insisted. "I did. And I decided that Laura was worth the risk. What will you do?"
The man smiled crookedly. "Start over again. It's not as if I haven't done it before. What about you? What are you going to do?"
"That's a good question, Tony," Laura said, coming from behind the tree. "What ARE you going to do?" Tony lifted the gun toward Laura in surprise. "You're going to shoot me?"
"No," Tony said, running a hand over his face as he lowered the gun. "I thought I sent you to the house?"
"I'm not one to do as I'm told," she reminded him. "And you are?" she asked, looking at Tony's friend.
"Walter Johnson, Laura Holt," Tony said. "Walter owns this place."
"Laura Holt-Steele," Laura corrected, shaking Walter's hand briefly. "You didn't answer the question, Tony. What are you going to do?"
Remington met Jarvis outside of the cabin. "Nothing in there."
"The battery's been taken out of the car," Jarvis informed him. "Maybe they went for a walk?"
"I'm going to have a look around back," Remington said. Jarvis nodded as he turned away, toward the lake side of the cabin. The view would have been wonderful, but at the moment, Remington's only thoughts were on Laura, and where Tony might have taken her.
Finding nothing, he started back around to join Jarvis and suggest a search of the lake area, but was brought up short by the sight of two dark suited men talking to Jarvis. The CIA had apparently arrived. He backtracked to the lake path, and then started down it.
Time had run out.