“Part of my job here is figuring out connections. I saw you were with ski patrol and wanted to find out what you knew about the protestors.” She obviously felt no guilt at all over having played him for a fool.
Aware of Doug watching, Connor reined in his anger.
“Stacy is investigating the theft of the explosives,” Doug said. “I need you to show her the magazine and also familiarize her with the resort.”
He took a step back. “I don’t have time to escort her around,” Conner said. “Not if you want me to inventory the munitions and get through that stack of paperwork on my desk.”
“I won’t take up any more of your time than necessary.” Stacy stood. “It’s critical that we find who stole those explosives before they put them to use.”
“I don’t see how I can help with that.” He avoided looking at her, focusing instead on Doug.
“I think you’re exactly the man to help.” She moved toward him.
He thought she was going to take his arm and took a step to the side to put more distance between them.
“You heard the agent,” Doug said. “Go with her. I’m sure you’ll figure out how to do the rest of your work, too.”
Chapter Three
Stacy led the way from the office. Connor took a deep breath and headed after her. He followed her to the elevator, even though he almost always took the stairs. As soon as the elevator doors closed, he turned on her. “I don’t appreciate being lied to.”
“I didn’t lie to you. But it would have been foolish, even dangerous, for me to reveal who I was before I was certain you weren’t involved with a terrorist group.”
“These protestors are a terrorist group?”
“Not all of them. Not most of them, even. But we believe there are people involved who have terrorist leanings. We’ve seen this with similar groups all over the United States and Canada.”
He put a hand to his forehead. “Do you mean at other ski resorts?”
The elevator dinged, and the doors slid open. “We’ll talk on the way to your office, but keep your voice down.”
As they exited the elevator, he fell into step beside her, shortening his stride to match hers. “I don’t understand any of this,” he said.
“First, let me fill you in on what we know so far,” she said. “The group of people I’m interested in—the ones we’ve been tracking for two years—go by several different names. The Freedom Fighters, the Society to Save America, the Sons of the Revolution—half a dozen others. The names don’t matter. There are key figures at the top of the group and a lot of little cells, whose members don’t know each other. Their usual mode of operation is to find a group that’s protesting some issue, join the group,get into leadership positions, then advocate violence. The issues involved don’t really matter to them. They’ve learned how to harness people’s passions to wreak havoc.”
“Why?” he asked.
“Their stated goal is to remake society by first breaking it down. They talk about it like a cancer—it starts small, then spreads outward. They aim to disrupt businesses, pit community members against each other and leave as much damage as possible in their wake.”
“And you haven’t caught up with these people yet?”
“We’ve identified some but not all of them. We’ve had the best result infiltrating small operations like this one. We take out as many of their cells as possible in hopes of eventually finding the people at the top.”
“Did you really think I was a part of them?” The idea made him sick to his stomach.
“The organization works by recruiting locals. Someone like you, who works for the resort and has access to keys to a munitions magazine, would be a real asset.”
“I would never do something like that.”
“You might be surprised at the people who get sucked into things like this.”
“So you decided to, what—seduce me?”
She stopped and put a hand on his arm. “As enjoyable as that might have been, I’m a professional. That’s not how the FBI does things.”
Was it her hand on his arm, or the sexy way her voice dropped on the wordenjoyablethat sent a current of heat through him? He swallowed and stepped back. “You think there are people here in this town who are part of this group?”
“I believe so.” She started walking again, and he fell into step beside her. “We have intelligence that a couple of people we’ve been tracking have been spotted here in town.”
