“You said something about Cash Grier’s secretary having a photographic memory, and that she saw the rogue agent,” Tank said. “Any help there?”

Hayes shook his head with a long sigh. “She had a police artist draw the man she remembered. But the nose was different, the hairline was different...” He grimaced. “The only thing familiar was the ears.”

“Now ears are a pretty good identifier,” Tank replied. “You don’t usually try to disguise those, even if you use makeup or wigs.”

“That’s true.” Hayes agreed. “Maybe we should issue a BOLO for a pair of ears.”

“It’s not so far-fetched,” Tank assured him. “I’d really like to have a look at that sketch.”

“That’s one of the reasons I asked you to come down here. Just a sec.” Hayes picked up the phone and called Cash Grier. After a brief conversation, he hung up. “He’s got a few free minutes. Let’s go over to his office and have a look at that sketch.”

Tank smiled. “Now you’re talking.”

* * *

CASH’S SECRETARY, CARLIE Blair, had wavy dark hair and green eyes and a pert smile. She greeted Tank as if he’d been her neighbor all her life. She pulled the sketch out of a nearby filing cabinet and handed it to him.

“That’s the best the artist could do,” she explained. “It’s not perfect. I think the nose was a little longer and thinner, and the chin had more of a square look.”

“How about the ears?” Tank asked.

She blinked. “The ears?” She looked at the sketch and slowly nodded. “Yes, he certainly got those right. I remember because he had sort of a notch in one, as if he’d been cut and it had healed but left a scar.”

Tank’s jaw was clenched. “Yes,” he said. “I remember now. It was his left ear. And he wore an earring in it, a small gold circlet.”

“Yes!” she agreed.

“I remember the earring myself,” Hayes said. He frowned. “Odd, I’d forgotten that.” He scratched his head. “It was overshadowed by the shirt he was wearing. It was paisley, I think.”

“I remember the shirt, too.” Tank laughed. “It must be a favorite piece of clothing, if he was still wearing it when you saw him.”

Carlie was frowning. “It was gold paisley,” she recalled, closing her eyes so that she could focus better. “With beige and brown patterns.”

“Yes,” Tank agreed. The memory came back along with the pain. He was looking at the shirt when the bullets hit.

“Well, I’ve got a favorite shirt,” Carlie remarked. “I wear it at least twice a week. Of course, it’s not paisley. It’s a black T-shirt with a green alien face and it says, They’re Coming! under it.” She grinned.

“She likes to wear it if we get visits from feds,” Cash Grier remarked as he joined them, glowering at his secretary. “She’s unconventional.”

“But I can type, I have a pleasant phone personality and I can find anything you lose, Chief.” She grinned even more broadly.

He shook his head. “Yes, and you can spell. It’s just that mouth...”

“What do you mean?” Tank asked.

Carlie looked past him and her face took on a sarcastic expression. “Well, look what walked in the door. I need to start a fire out back. Got any spare hand grenades on you?” she added.

The newcomer was Carson, Tank’s shadow on the plane.

He gave Carlie a glowering stare. “Something wrong with matches?” he asked. “Or don’t you know how to use them?” he added with a bland smile.

“I can use a Glock,” she retorted. “Wanna see?”

“She cannot use a Glock,” Cash Grier interjected. “The last time she tried, on the firing range, she hit two windshields and a tire, and the cars weren’t even parked on the range.”

“It was a horrible accident,” Carlie defended herself.

“Yes, it was. You picked up a gun.”

“Your coffee will have salt tomorrow morning in place of sugar,” Carlie assured Cash.

“If I fire you, your father will make me the subject of his next two sermons,” Cash said grimly. “But I’ll risk it.”

“Sermons?” Carson asked, frowning.

“Her father is a Methodist minister,” Cash explained.

Carson’s expression was indescribable. He narrowed his eyes as he looked at Carlie, who avoided him and went back to the drawing on her desk.

“Don’t worry, religion isn’t contagious,” she told Carson without quite looking at him.

“Thank goodness,” Carson drawled. He looked at Tank. “Did you recognize the face in the drawing?”

“Not so much,” Tank replied. “But we’ve all agreed that the ears are the one thing we all remember about him.” He turned to Hayes. “You should talk to those two feds, Jon Blackhawk and Garon Grier...” He frowned and looked at Cash. “Grier?”

“My brother,” Cash said. “He’s always been FBI. I worked with, shall we say, less structured government agencies.”

“Covert,” Carson said with a mock cough.

“Look who’s talking about covert,” Cash said pointedly.

“Takes one to know one,” Carson shot right back. But he grinned. So did Cash.

“I’ve already talked to Blackhawk and Cash’s brother,” Hayes told Tank. “Which reminds me, they wanted me to tell you that they can’t set up that hypnotist they wanted you to see. He had a family emergency and is out of town. Maybe another time.”

“Another time,” Tank agreed, secretly relieved.

“It turns out that he—” Cash indicated Carson “—worked with an associate of mine from Brooklyn, New York.”

“Should we ask what sort of work?” Hayes mused.

“It would be safer not to,” Cash told him.

Tank shook his head. “I’ve never been in a place where so many people were ex-feds.”

“Or ex-mercs,” Cash added. “We’ve cornered the market on them.”

“It’s a good place to retire, or that’s what Cy Parks always says.” Hayes chuckled.

“He’s a nice fellow,” Tank remarked. “I was perfectly happy to stay in a hotel, but he insisted.”

“He knows you’re in the market for a new bull,” Cash said with a big grin.

“Well, I am, actually,” Tank had to agree.

He went back to Carlie’s desk and took another look at the man. “He really is a chameleon,” he remarked. “But why is he so worried about what we might remember? I couldn’t pick him out on the street. Well, maybe that scarred ear would give him away, but there’s nothing else really memorable about him.”

“Maybe it’s something that doesn’t readily show,” Carson remarked, joining him. “Or maybe he’s just paranoid.”

Hayes shook his head. “He killed a computer tech who tried to restore his image on my computer.”

Carson’s black eyes narrowed. “Yes. He was a friend of mine,” he said tautly. “Sweet kid. Never hurt a fly. Knew everything about computers.” His face set in hard lines. “I’d like to meet the man who popped a cap on him.”

“He feeds people to crocodiles,” Cash said in a mock whisper, jerking his head toward Carson.

Carson glared at him. “It was hungry. Poor old thing hadn’t been fed in days.”

“So it was an act of charity. I see,” Hayes mused.

Carson shrugged. His expression went even tauter. “The man tortured Rourke’s friend, a female photojournalist covering the assault on Barrera. She’ll carry the scars for the rest of her life.”

“I don’t doubt that Rourke helped you feed the croc,” Cash replied.

Carson’s black eyes met his. “Sometimes you do what feels right, even if it’s not quite legal.”

“Well, it wasn’t in my jurisdiction, so I’m not concerned,” Cash told him. He wagged a finger at him. “But you feed anybody to a crocodile in my town, you’re looking at life behind bars.”

“No problem,” Carson said. “I like whiskey.”

“Life...behind...bars. Whiskey.” Tank burst out laughing. It was a play on words that almost got by him.

Carson actually grinned.

“And it would be nice if you stopped wearing that damned knife in public,” Cash told the younger man, indicating the huge Bowie knife strapped to his hip. “It makes people nervous.”

“Makes her nervous, you mean,” Carson replied, jerking his head toward Carlie.

“I don’t like knives,” she muttered under her breath.

“Men with guns walk around in here all the time, you don’t mind them,” Carson retorted.

“I’ve never seen a gunshot wound. I have seen the result of a knife fight.” She gave him a long look. “I had nightmares...”

He frowned. “When was this?”

She averted her eyes. “My father was attacked a few months ago by a man with a knife. We don’t know why. He was lucky, because it went in just at the waist and didn’t even nick a vital organ.”

“Who would attack a minister?” Hayes asked, shocked.

“We don’t know,” Carlie replied sadly. “Just some crazy guy, we think. Sometimes, I think the whole world’s gone mad.”

“It does seem so, from time to time,” Tank had to agree. “Did they catch the man?”

“Not yet,” Cash answered for her. “But we’re still looking.”

“I don’t like knives,” Carlie reiterated, glaring up at Carson. “Especially that sort.” She indicated the Bowie. “It’s scary.”

“I’ll start wearing a suit so I can conceal it from you,” Carson promised dryly.

“Why would you carry something that big?” Hayes wondered.

“Snakes,” Carson said, deadpan.

“Good luck going after a sidewinder with a knife,” Tank told him. “You’d get bitten before you could reach him with it.”

“Not if it was thrown,” Carson returned. He looked so confident that the others just shrugged and let the subject go.

“Do you remember anything else about the man?” Tank asked Carlie as he studied the sketch. “Anything you didn’t tell the police artist?”

She was thinking, hard. “I’m not sure. That’s basically what he looked like,” she added, nodding at the portrait. “He was very friendly. Personable. I remember he talked to me about sharks.”