"Wouldn't miss it." Phoebe tried out her arms and legs. They worked. "I'll change while you drive."

Dewey scrambled back into the driver's seat but looked back to say, "Make sure you clean off the blood."

Phoebe grabbed a mirror. There was indeed blood, a thin line creeping down her temple toward her jaw. Not to mention a lip getting fatter and a shiner in the making.

"Great."

Dewey grinned. "There's an ice pack in the first-aid kit."

He put the van in gear and turned it toward TelTech and their hornet's nest.

HORNET'S NEST was a serious understatement, Phoebe decided. She'd think they couldn't get any more officials inside and then some more would come. Then the military. FBI. US Marshals. It was a regular law-enforcement-rich zone. Enough to make a lady thief and her accomplice a little nervous.

"What's taking him so long?" Dewey had started doing lame magic tricks with a pencil-when he wasn't using it as a drumstick against the dash. Phoebe was about ready to shove it up his nose, when a murmur of sound and the beginnings of new activity outside the van distracted her.

Light from the rising sun began a slow creep across the scene as Peter Harding's limousine nosed into the melee. It was immediately surrounded by the moderate mob of press who had been shivering over steaming cups of coffee in the predawn cold.

Exhilaration at having achieved their first objective filtered a fine clarity over the scene for Phoebe. It was as if all her senses had been heightened and expanded until she could see not only what was apparent but also what was hidden.

Because of her messy landing, Dewey suggested she play cameraman and hide her bruises behind a camcorder. She climbed out and did a slow camera sweep of the crowd as Harding emerged from his car and was immediately mobbed. Stern came around and tried to clear him a path with something less than courtesy. Phoebe hung back, going for the long view, while Dewey, as "reporter," joined the pack. As Harding topped the steps, his face loomed in her tiny horizon. She used her zoom to frame his face and record the moment of her triumph. His mouth moved, but she couldn't pick up his answers over the questions bombarding him from every side. She tightened her focus to just his eyes and felt a jolt, a sudden panic she couldn't explain.

He looked exactly as he should, exactly like any man would who'd just been burgled. So why was a cold dread spreading out from her midsection? She stayed with him until he disappeared inside, then slowly lowered the camera and slipped into the rear of their van to wait for Dewey.

What was wrong with the picture?

She stowed the camera and scrambled forward, about the climb into the passenger seat when she saw Jake come out TelTech's door, flanked by his brothers. She shrank back, but not so far she couldn't see him. He looked sad, tired...worried. About her? She tried to hope not, but she wasn't that noble. She wanted him to be worried about her. She wasn't quite ready to cut that tie, to forget this past. Maybe she knew she never would. It went deep, she realized, as deep as her sister's loss. He mattered. He...mattered.

She leaned her cheek against the cool plastic of the seat. "Oh, Jake." His name came out on a soul-deep sigh. As if he heard her, or felt her presence, she saw him stop. His gaze swept the crowd. She shrank back into the shadows, her heart pounding with bitter regret. He was never hers. She couldn't lose what she didn't have, could she?

"Something wrong?" Matt asked.

Jake rubbed his face to avoid answering the question. How could he explain the feeling that Phoebe was out there somewhere, watching the chaos she'd wrought? How to explain it when he didn't believe she'd been responsible for the carnage inside? He felt like Jekyll and Hyde. Convinced that she and Hyatt were responsible for the run on TelTech but not the deaths. It was crazy. Insane. Madness.

Now he knew how Alice had felt falling down that rabbit's hole. He needed quiet and a big pot of coffee while he sorted through the chaos, but all he was going to get was the coffee.

Maybe-he had a sudden, chilling thought-he'd never feel peace again. What if the huge rip in his heart never healed? What if the marshal never got over the lady outlaw?

It would be dang ironic, he decided, trying to lighten his mental mood. It didn't help much, but any improvement was welcome. As was any interruption. With a sense of reprieve, he met the approaching crime-scene tech halfway.

"What you got?" Jake asked.

"Their egress point."

Must have started his life as a lawyer, Jake decided as he followed the guy around the building. With the sun peeking over the mountains, there was enough light to see the rope hanging limply from the roof. The tech held up the burned end for Jake to see. "Rough landing. I'll bet that wasn't part of the plan."

Jake frowned. Another wrong note. Phagan and Hyatt's ops were meticulously planned, right down to any surprises. "Where's the other end?"

The tech led Jake to a stand of trees where the other end of the rope trailed from a rather battered tree. Jake picked up this burned end, but he was studying the broken branches. "Looks like someone made it down before the rope burned through. Any footprints?"

"We got two sets heading toward the road. Tire tracks toward the highway. And at least one set, maybe two, heading off into the hills. No sign of transportation that direction yet."

Jake frowned. "We got a stolen cleaning van in the parking lot out front. I wonder why they split up and..." Why two cars? If they were planning to come out this direction, which the get-away vehicle seemed to indicate, then why the messy landing? Surely they'd have prepared for it?

Jake straightened. It was almost as if they were dealing with two separate events. But that was crazy. Or wishful thinking. If he peopled TelTech with two sets of thieves, that let Phoebe and her cohorts off the hook for murder.

He saw Luke crossing the lawn with Bryn and knew it would take more than gut feelings for him to let Phoebe off the hook for this. He'd need hard proof. Facts, not fancies. When the pair got close enough for him to read their eyes, he could see neither looked particular happy, and an air of tension clogged the air around them.

"What?" Jake asked, giving them both a wary glance before looking to Bryn for enlightenment.

"This just doesn't add up," Bryn said, her voice tight and tense.

"To?" Jake prompted, ignoring a frustrated sigh from his brother.

"A Phagan op." She massaged her temples, either because they hurt or to clear her thoughts.

Or maybe both, Jake thought wryly. Either way, he understood. His head hurt and his brain did, too. Iron bands squeezing inside and out.

"It's like-" she began.

"-We're dealing with two different operations?" Jake finished when she didn't.

She gave him a relieved nod. "That or our perps were a couple of Jekyll and Hydes."

"Do we know what they got?" Jake asked.

Luke answered this one. "Some kind of super chip and all relevant research files. A total wipeout. Folks were pretty closemouthed but did admit that it was something in development for the military and was due to be turned over in a few days. All very hush-hush and very, very bad it's missing."

"Not something you'd want to go missing so close to announcing your candidacy for governor," Bryn said. "That part of the crime scene, the research lab, is pristine. Clean as a whistle. No indication of how they got into the room, let alone how they able to log on to the computers. From what we can tell, the files were downloaded to someplace offsite, then a virus was introduced. And the one scientist who held all the pieces of the chip puzzle seems to have disappeared."

Luke looked thoughtful. "That ought to up the street value on the chip."

"If Phagan did this hit, it probably won't show up on any market, local or worldwide. He uses the non-cash take for leverage against his target." Bryn's frown was puzzled. "I just wish we could connect Harding to Nadine Beuleigh. So far, he's still squeaky clean. He thinks his scientist is the one who stole it, because he's gone missing. Said something about the instability of genius."

"You said they never go in shooting," Luke said, -but we've got four dead guards and a missing genius." He looked at Jake, his shoulders rising in a frustrated shrug. "What put you on to TelTech in the first place?"

"I got a tip," Bryn said, with obvious reluctance.

"Reliable source?"

"Has been up til now." Bryn looked at Jake, not at Luke, warning him to keep his mouth shut.

As if Luke sensed the holding back, his face turned grim. He opened his mouth, but before he could ask, they heard Matt's voice on Luke's radio. "Get in here. You gotta see this."

Back inside TelTech, they stood back until the last bagged body was rolled out, then entered the security office. The row of televisions that had been monitoring activity in the various hallways and offices were all playing the same picture, so they didn't have to crowd around one monitor to see.

The time/date stamp in the upper right-hand corner of the picture showed it was taken at two a.m. The silent alarm had gone off at 2:08 AM, according to the security company. On the monitor, Jake saw the guards watching the Broncos game on the television in the corner, putting the angle it was shot from in the opposite upper corner.

Jake looked up and saw a tech removing the A/C grill from that area and returned his attention to the last few moments of the guards' lives. When it was over, he inhaled shakily. It had been a particularly nasty little scene.