Shane bet there were intelligence officers more talkative than Yael Brooks. He wanted to know more about her. Figure out what made her tick. Plus, the last thing he needed right now was some jealous ex turning up. Especially not when Billy had been busy kissing Betty on the front step of her new home.

“Who was it who actually uncovered the Zenko connection?” He changed the subject because drawing her out was obviously a full-time job. Thankfully he excelled at stubborn persistence.

“Laura Bay, you know, my friend from Friday night?”

He nodded.

“She’d flagged some cryptopayment information in regard to Evi1Geni-us. The crypto appeared online again yesterday. Alex and I went through the blockchain information and I set up a web crawler that tracked the payment to a shell corporation in the Caymans. Alex somehow managed to identify Zenko from there. I’m not sure exactly how he did it so quickly. I didn’t ask.” She shot him a look from under her lashes.

“I’m not about to rat him out.” But he understood how easy it was for a case to fall apart because someone hadn’t followed lawful procedures. Alex Parker wasn’t FBI but he did consult for them so they had to be careful.

They drove down increasingly narrower roads with fewer and fewer houses visible, and an ever-increasing number of trees whose limbs overhung the asphalt and made him feel like he was traveling through a tunnel into another world. Shane followed the directions on his Satnav as he was unfamiliar with the area.

“There’s a hiking route on the hill behind Zenko’s mother’s cabin. I plan to park on the other side of the ridge and hike the trail until we are above Zenko’s place. Then we can cut down through the woods and find a position in the trees to observe the cabin. I have some binoculars so we don’t have to risk getting too close. If it looks like the place deserves a closer look, I’ll go ahead and check it out and rendezvous back with you in the woods.”

She stared at him silently. He wished he knew what she was thinking.

“It won’t be dangerous. We will both wear ballistic vests under our rain gear just in case.”

“Do you really think he might be here?”

The niggle between his shoulder blades had started itching as soon as he’d seen that cabin listed in Zenko’s mother’s name.

“Honestly?”

She nodded.

“I do. Or he’s on a beach sunning himself in Mexico. What he likely isn’t doing is sleeping late in some shitty apartment in Fayetteville.” Shane tamped down on his anger at the fact this fucker had killed his friend. Emotions clouded his ability to do his job and he wasn’t about to screw up.

She rubbed her forearms as if cold and he turned up the heat.