Page 5 of Secret Weapon

He made a face.“Too bad.We’re meant to leave today, and there’s no way I can stretch it out any longer than tomorrow.”

“You’re staying at the Peninsula?”

“No, I was visiting a friend in Eugene, but I checked out the spa at the Peninsula this morning.The hot-stone aromatherapy massage is fandabidozi.”

Figured.The Peninsula was the town’s fancy new resort, and it catered to the type of person who could afford the outfit this guy was wearing.Designer jeans, designer shoes, designer sweater.I’d learned to size people up quickly in my former career, and this guy was a hummingbird.Colourful, harmless, and irritating when he fluttered around in the wrong place.

But he was a hummingbird with money, and money was a necessary evil.If he spent enough of it, I might finally be able to afford that new rifle I’d been coveting for so long.Those things didn’t come cheap, especially on the black market.

The craft store wouldn’t make me a millionaire, but it did turn a small profit, a reasonable achievement considering I’d started the place from scratch.Hell, four years ago, I hadn’t known my Delicas from my drop beads, but I was a quick study.I had to be.And when I’d arrived in Baldwin’s Shore with nothing—no plan, no cash, and no idea how I was going to heal my shredded soul—I’d needed weapons.A pair of good, thick knitting needles were handy in a fight, and after I’d taken the first available job—as a live-in nurse to Easton Baldwin Senior—they’d fit right in with my new life.It was entirely possible to kill a man with a knitting needle.Nastya had done it once.Plunged one of those suckers right through his eyeball.Anyhow, I’d learned to knit as a cover story, and I always had been good with my hands.Turned out that cross-stitch and beadwork and modelling with polymer clay weren’t all that different from, say, assembling an IED.You just needed an eye for detail, steady fingers, and the ability to understand which parts went where.Of course, there was noboomif things went wrong with handicrafts, but I rarely got things wrong anyway.

Measure twice and cut once, as my mentor had been fond of saying.

Most of the time, he’d been talking about sliding a knife between a man’s fourth and fifth ribs, but the same principle still applied to craftwork.

The bell jangled again, and I glanced at my watch to see if it was time for another painkiller.Sadly not.

The newcomer wasn’t one of our usual clientele.Blonde, athletic, and a couple of inches shorter than me, but she walked with a confidence that made her seem taller.She didn’t so much as glance at the shelves, just headed straight in our direction.I reached under the counter for my favourite knitting needles, a pair of size elevens that were a tiny bit sharper than normal.But the hummingbird was her target, not me.

“C’mon, champ.Time to go.We’ve got to get to Portland.”

“Wouldn’t you love to spend an extra day here instead?”

“No.”

“But Alex will be tired after his race.Don’t you think he deserves some R & R?We all know he wasn’t built for running.”

“Firstly, it’s only a half-marathon, and secondly, he’ll probably walk it.If he wants to sit in a Jacuzzi for an hour, he can do that at home.Do you seriously need more beads?Your craft room’s bursting at the seams.”

Who was the hummingbird to the blonde?Not a boyfriend—I’d put money on the fact that he was gay.A brother?An employee?She seemed to think she was in charge, notionally at least.

“I need beads and feathers for Easter.”

“Easter?But we’ve only just finished Christmas.”

“Proper planning and preparation prevents poor performance.”

True.So true.

The blonde rolled her eyes.“Just hurry up.”

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