Drake Sisters 03 - Oceans of Fire

look at it.”
    “It was a mess,” Jonas agreed. “I’ll bet that’s the cove Abbey was referring to. The caretaker, with our help, ran them off. It’s a beautiful piece of land, but private property. Abigail’s right. They could easily hide a small Zodiac there.” He pulled out a cell phone. “I’ll double-check with Abbey and alert them to where we’ll be going. If they’re that worried about Prakenskii, I’ll want them standing by to help us.”
    “Abigail’s not telepathic,” Aleksandr said. “How do they know when we need help?”
    Jonas shrugged, a faint smile on his face. “With the Drakes, you just don’t ask questions. I told you, you have to accept what you see and hear with them. And even if Abbey isn’t telepathic, a couple of the others are.”
    “Great.” Aleksandr sighed. “Let’s just get to the cove. Talking about the Drakes gives me a headache.”

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    Jonas laughed softly. “That’s because they are a headache.”
    “Well, call them and get it over with.”
    “You’re on the coast, Aleksandr. There are only a couple of places around here that a cell phone actually works.”
    Aleksandr admired the way Jonas drove along the highway, maneuvering the switchbacks and twists and turns as fast as it was safe to go. He didn’t like relying on the coast guard to try to intercept the drop, but the truth was, he didn’t believe they’d made the call in time. Prakenskii‘s delaying tactic had certainly worked. They had been forced to make a slow approach to the barn in order to assure safety. The entire plan had been conceived to burn up as much time as possible.
    Jonas glanced at him in the rearview mirror. “Think out loud.”
    Aleksandr shrugged. “I have more questions than answers.”
    “Let’s hear them.”
    “This still doesn’t make any sense to me.” Aleksandr laid his head back against the seat, trying to shut everything out of his mind but the puzzle. “Prakenskii deliberately sacrificed both Chad Kingman and Chernyshev. Why? Just to buy time? What if Sylvia hadn’t gone to the police? What if she hadn’t gone to the Drakes? Abbey says he’s like they are, that he’s capable of using magic. Is it possible that he planted the suggestion in Sylvia’s mind to go to the Drakes? Was that how he was able to set up his ruse so successfully?”
    Something nagged at the back of his mind and he suddenly leaned forward in his seat. “Why in the hell is Prakenskii working so hard to bring a dirty bomb into the United States? If the rumors are true, he despises terrorists. Nikitin deals with the terrorists, but he keeps Prakenskii around for personal protection. Everyone fears Prakenskii. Especially the terrorists. The word is, Nikitin keeps Prakenskii far away from them.”
    “He must be a valuable man for Nikitin to keep him,” Jonas mused.
    “Prakenskii has sources no one else can come close to. There isn’t much going on he doesn’t know about.” As soon as he said the words aloud another thought that had been niggling at the back of his mind leapt to the forefront. “Is it possible he handed Kingman and Chernyshev to us? Gave them up?”
    “Why would he do that?”
    “I ran into him earlier at the Drakes. I thought he was there to kill Abigail or waiting for me to show up, but he denied it. And he denied killing Danilov. Prakenskii is a lot of things, but he isn’t a liar.”
    Jonas snorted. “Believing a hit man isn’t a liar is a good way to get yourself killed. Why would he tell you the truth? What other reason would he have for being at the Drakes other than to case the place and set up to kill you or one of the women?” He didn’t like the idea of a killer lurking anywhere close to the Drake family and it showed in the snarl in his voice.
    “Carol was taking pictures of the sisters at one point and she claimed there was a light in one of the windows. Suppose someone else, such as Leonid Ignatev, was planning on killing Abigail, and Prakenskii Generated by ABC Amber LIT Conv erter, http://www.processtext.com/abclit.html
    was looking out for her. It’s something he would do.”
    “Why would Ignatev want to kill Abbey?” The suppressed anger was becoming something much stronger and much more lethal.
    “In order for me to get Abigail out of Russia, out of harm’s way, I had to take Ignatev down. He would have killed her. He had his men beating her to get her to give