“I’m figuring that phone is the one the kid picked up in the library. If she hadn’t gone after it, we would have been screwed. I would have been looking for Foster inside the library while someone picked her up outside.”
“But you’d still have her case, laptop and papers.”
Albert acknowledged that with a silence of his own.
“You’ve lost our only bargaining tool.”
“We can trade your belongings for her life,” Albert said. He offered the idea to Ortega with the tone of a man who wouldn’t hesitate to carry out the threat, but Albert only killed killers and men who hired killers. The innocent women and the feisty kid were in no danger whatsoever, at least not from him.
Ortega didn’t say anything.
Albert waited a moment, then cleared his throat. “Mr. Ortega, what am I looking for? Papers? Drugs? How will I know if I have everything that belongs to you?”
This time Ortega answered right away. “We’ll talk about that when you catch up to her. You said you had a license number. Give it to me. I’ll contact my tracker and find out which way they’re headed. I’ll call as soon as I know.”
“Fine. I’m heading for the emergency room to get my elbow checked.”
“Keep your phone on.”
Albert drew a deep breath as he ended the call. He’d been working for Ortega for five years, trying to find something that he could turn over to the Feds so Ortega would spend years in prison. He wanted him to suffer the same pain and humiliation Albert’s brother had experienced when Ortega set him up in a drug deal gone bad. Albert’s brother, the innocent owner of the body shop where the raid went down, died in prison. Albert walked out on his teaching job, adopted a new identity and went to work for Ortega. Being a hit man wasn’t such a bad gig. He got to kill plenty of slimeballs, and that didn’t bother him one bit. And he made big bucks. He’d already earned enough to retire on, but he had one more important thing on his to-do list—take down Benito Ortega.
Albert made two more phone calls before he turned off his phone, the first to Sammy Grick’s number. He left a message for Lynnette that he’d been ordered to collect all of Sammy Grick’s possessions. He said he would be in touch very soon.
After a short chat with the Information operator, Albert started his car and drove to the nearest emergency room. He didn’t tell the nurses about the painkillers he’d already taken before they removed his jacket and shirt for the X-ray. By the time a nurse hooked him up to an IV so the orthopedic surgeon could realign his elbow, Albert’s pain had brought him to tears. He didn’t care what they did to him or how long he slept afterward.
As Blue maneuvered her car out of the city onto I-25 and headed north, no one spoke. Lynnette was still shaken at how close Grace had come to getting caught by the man in the tweed jacket. Had he replaced Sammy Grick? If so, he sure seemed a different sort of thug than the fat man.
Or could he be a cop? Lynnette caught her breath. Oh, hell, what if he was a cop? She’d kicked him twice. Assault? On a police officer? What next?
The man had watched them leave, probably had their license number, certainly knew what they looked like. And he had called her by her name. She blew out a big breath of air and slumped in her seat. Whether he was a good guy or a bad guy, he knew her name.
“Blue, will your license number lead the guy in the library to your house on campus?”
“No. My dad transferred the car to me before I moved out. It has my dad’s address on it.” Blue reached over and patted Lynnette on the shoulder. “It’ll be okay.” She glanced in her rearview mirror and added, “At least, it’ll be okay if we can keep that one under control. Hey, Grace, if you ever pull a stunt like that again, I’ll personally skin you alive. From now on, you don’t even wiggle unless Lynnette or I tell you to. Got it?”
“Got it.”
Lynnette thought the girl sounded unusually subdued, but she couldn’t see her because of the headrest. “You okay, Grace?”
“Yeah. I just wish my dad was here.” Her voice shook.
“Me, too,” Blue said. “He’d whip your butt for pulling a stunt like that. You know how lucky you are?”
“Yeah. Thanks, Blue.” Grace’s arms encircled Blue’s neck in a hug before sliding out of Lynnette’s view.
Blue patted Lynnette’s shoulder again. “Guess I owe you one.”
“And I owe you about ten. Where are we going?”
“First, we’re going to stop and get gas while I call my dad and tell him we’re in deep shit. Then, we’re going to his house so we can all be in deep shit together.”
“I’m sure he’ll appreciate that.”
“Yeah.” Blue didn’t flash Lynnette one of her sassy grins. She turned into the parking lot of a gas station connected to a convenience store and a fast-food restaurant and pulled up to one of the pumps. “I’m going to fill it up. Get me a burger, fries, and a small chocolate shake, will you? And better hurry. That creep might be right behind us.”
CHAPTER 21
* * *
I-25 north of Denver
Thursday, January 23
Lynnette and Blue ate in silence, Blue waiting until traffic had thinned a bit north of Denver before she tackled driving and eating at the same time. Lynnette noted the girl was a good driver, alert and watchful. She glanced back once to check on Grace and saw she’d wadded her jacket under her head, leaned against the window, and was fast asleep.
The day had turned gray and the clouds hung low over the mountains to the west. They passed shopping malls and industrial complexes before leaving town. There was little to see after that except farmland, brown and barren until spring. She didn’t intend to think about Carl, but when an image of her husband lying dead in their bed sprang into her mind, tears came unexpectedly. She sniffed, searched her jacket pocket for a tissue, and blew her nose.
“What’s wrong?” asked Blue.
Lynnette took a deep breath and let it out. “I’ll tell you later.”
Blue leaned forward and peered through the windshield. “Lots of brake lights going on and off up ahead. Wonder if there’s been a wreck.”
Lynnette looked outside. What next?
They were a few miles north of Boulder when it began to snow and the wind picked up. Traffic slowed as the visibility dropped. Still, Blue seemed confident. Even though they saw a couple of vans that had slid off the road, Blue kept her car under control. Lynnette stayed awake and watchful. She welcomed the excuse to be alert and focused on traffic instead of dwelling on the horrible events that had altered her immediate plans. Her whole life, for that matter.
This time it was Lynnette who saw the brake lights come on in rapid succession in a line of cars ahead. “Look out!” she yelled. “Someone got rear-ended up there and cars are sliding all over the place.”
Blue eased off the accelerator and moved further to the left in an effort to see up ahead. In minutes, traffic had come to a complete stop. Hazard lights flashed all around them.
Grace stirred in the back seat and sat up with a yawn. “Why are we stopping?”
“Looks like a wreck,” said Blue.
“There must be an off-ramp ahead,” Lynnette said. “You can see cars going off to the right.”
“They’re heading for the frontage road,” Blue said. She edged to the right, trying to pull around the traffic, but the snow made it too difficult to see where the interstate stopped and the ditch began. A pickup truck ahead of her tried the same maneuver and successfully drove all the way to the exit. Blue followed in his tracks. At the top of the ramp, Blue turned left and stayed close behind the truck, all the way into the parking lot of a truck stop.
“I need to go inside and find out what the road conditions are like the rest of the way to Fort Collins,” she said. “We might as well get coffee while we’re here.”
“And eat,” said Grace. “I want a grilled cheese.”
“Girl, you can’t be hungry already,” Blue said.
Lynnette said, “It’
s okay, Blue. We might get stuck here for a while, and Library Guy’s probably too far behind to catch up, especially if the roads are getting this bad around Denver.”
“You want something?”
“No, but let Grace have whatever she wants.”
After learning which roads had been plowed and sanded, they piled into the car and continued north. Because of the icy packed snow, they made slow progress. A jack-knifed semi blocked their path at one point, forcing them to backtrack and take another route. It was well after midnight when Blue drove into Fort Collins.
Glades, Florida
Thursday, January 23
By evening, after Maggie Gutierrez had worked her butt off for seventeen straight hours, she couldn’t wait to go home, take a hot bath, eat a peanut butter sandwich, and go to bed.
She had started the day with the grisly discovery of Carl Foster’s body and reveled in the unexpected chance to help Detective Prince investigate a murder. Her partner had been ignored. She felt guilty about that, until she found herself acting as gofer instead of assistant to the homicide cop with an ego the size of the Hindenburg.
By afternoon, however, Prince had stopped barking orders. When Maggie threw out an insulting comment about his caffeine and sugar intake aggravating an already obnoxious personality, Prince acknowledged her presence. “You got balls,” he said.
She drew herself up to her full height of five foot eleven inches. “Yes, I do. I also have brains and common sense. If you’re not going to assign me to do any real work, I’d like to go home and get some sleep so I can work my normal shift tonight, during which my partner and I will fight crime.”
“I can’t assign you to do real work, Gutierrez. You’re a patrol cop. You want to work Homicide, you need to pay your dues first, then pass the test. If you do that, you get to do ‘real work.’ ”
“Like what?”
“Like tracking the wife’s whereabouts.”
“Lynnette Foster? You want me to find Lynnette Foster?”
“What did I just say? No. You’re not Homicide. No, no, no. Do not touch this case.”
He means yes, but he doesn’t want anyone to know. Maggie looked at the clock on the wall. Seven o’clock. She walked away. She’d be lucky to get the job done by Friday noon. She sure as hell wouldn’t accomplish anything in the next few hours, at night, with some departments closed and others manned by a skeleton crew, with no normal businesses open. And she couldn’t even get a good start until she had gathered a little more information from the Foster home. If by some miracle she could turn up Lynnette Foster’s Social Security number and credit card numbers, it would help.
Screw Prince and his no that meant yes. She needed a meal and a nap.
After the ten-minute drive home, over her peanut butter sandwich and a cup of coffee, she had second thoughts. Fifteen minutes later she parked in front of Foster’s house and showed her badge to the officer assigned to keep the neighbors away from the crime scene.
Getting the information she needed was easy. There were three file folders in the drawer of a small desk in the bedroom, labeled Lynnette, Carl, and Joint. The Joint folder contained very little except the pages that had accompanied two new credit card applications.
Lynnette’s folder held copies of her investment account statements, credit card invoices marked Paid on a card in the name of Lynnette Hudson, photocopies of her Social Security card and her Florida driver’s license, and a printout of her email contacts with her own email address handwritten at the top of the page.
Maggie wrote down all the information she thought she’d need, lingering for a moment over the healthy balance in Lynnette’s investment account. Then she tucked her notebook and pen into her pocket and went back to the station. When she returned to her desk in the squad room, she sent Lynnette Foster an email:
This is Maggie Gutierrez of the Glades Police Department. I need to speak with you on an urgent matter. Email me at this address, or call me.
Maggie added her telephone numbers and her police department signature. When she hit Send, she wondered whether Lynnette would answer.
With a cup of the vile black liquid the night shift called coffee in front of her, the list of credit card numbers, and the phone book open to the cab companies listed in the yellow pages, Maggie began making calls. Then she turned to the list of airlines. Occasionally, she reached for her mouse and refreshed her email Inbox.
“You been working all day?” Dan said as he approached her desk.
Maggie glanced up and grimaced. “In a manner of speaking. You can probably guess what I did for the first few hours—toted coffee and donuts to Homicide and ran errands.”
He grinned, the little lift at the corner of his mouth telling her he enjoyed seeing her chopped down to size. With a tilt of his head, he indicated her computer monitor. “What now?”
“I’m making calls, catching up on paperwork.”
“No more errands for Detective Prince?”
“Hell, no. He dumped me. I wanted to try and track the wife, but he said no.”
Dan edged around Maggie’s desk. “Don’t mess with him or his case, Maggie. He’ll kill your career.”
She clicked the box to minimize the screen. “What if Lynnette Foster doesn’t know her husband is dead? What if she’s visiting friends, or went to a spa. Maybe she hasn’t—”
Maggie grabbed the phone when it rang, then listened to a surly cab driver tell her about the bruises all over the face of the female passenger he’d picked up at the Foster residence the day before. She thanked him, then placed the phone in its cradle and rested her head in her hands. She was so tired.
“You need to get some sleep,” Dan said. “Thirty, forty-five minutes, you’ll feel better. I’ll stay here and cover for you until it’s time for me to clock in.”
Maggie studied his face, wondered if she could trust him not to run to Detective Prince and report his suspicions, realized she had a serious problem if she couldn’t trust her own partner and agreed. She slid into the back seat of her car, set her watch alarm for thirty minutes and dozed off.
CHAPTER 22
* * *
Fort Collins, Colorado
Friday, January 24
Friday morning. I should have been safe and sound at Ramona’s by now. Instead, here they were in the wee hours of the morning, driving to the home of a man who probably had no desire to get pulled into her problems.
Lynnette looked at Blue. “I don’t think we should involve your dad in this.”
“What’s the alternative?”
“You dump me at the bus station and I’ll get out of your life.”
“You’re not very good at this hide-and-seek stuff, are you?”
“What do you mean?”
“The guy you kicked the shit out of saw the license number on my car. If he has any sources at all, he can get the name and address off the registration. My address is my dad’s address. Dad’s already involved, no matter where you go. And I’ve already called him.”
“I’m sorry, Blue. I should never have let this happen.”
“True. But this is the way it turned out. We need to pick up my dad and keep him safe.”
Lynnette couldn’t help but laugh. “With us?”
Blue glanced at her sharply, then realized what she’d said. “What are we going to do, Lynnette? How do we get rid of these men? Shouldn’t we take our chances with the FBI? They’re not going to do anything bad to Grace if her father’s an agent too.”
Grace slapped her hands onto the top of Lynnette’s headrest and said, “Stop.”
Blue checked the rearview mirror and started to put her foot on the brake.
“No,” Grace said. “I mean stop talking about all that stuff.” She began to cry and talk at the same time, jumbling her words and sobs so Lynnette could barely understand her.
“Maybe you better find a place to pull off,” Lynnette told Blue.
Lynnette put her hand on Grace’s shoulder, but Grace pulled b
ack and bent over her lap, her head cradled in her arms. She cried as though her heart would break.
Blue pulled into a supermarket lot and parked under a light. Lynnette opened her door and stepped out into the swirling snow. She got into the back seat with Grace and slid close to her, then began to gently stroke the child’s back.
“What’s wrong, Grace,” she whispered. “What haven’t you told us?”
Blue stretched her arm over the seat back and put her hand on Grace’s head. “You’re okay, kid,” she said. “We’ll be okay.”
In an obvious effort to bring her tears under control, Grace sat up straight, rubbed her eyes, and took a deep, shuddering breath, then another.
Blue rummaged in the center console and produced a travel packet of tissues. She opened the package and handed it to Grace.
After wiping her eyes and blowing her nose, Grace leaned against the seat and clenched her hands in her lap.
“What’s up, Grace?” Lynnette said.
Grace didn’t turn her head to make eye contact with Lynnette. Instead, she looked at Blue and said, “I lied.”
“Join the crowd. What did you lie about?” Blue said.
“My dad.”
“You mean . . . he’s not in the FBI?” Lynnette said.
“Not exactly.”
Lynnette felt the skin prickle along her arms. The skin on her face felt hot. This was going to be something bad, real bad, she thought, almost afraid to ask. But she had to know. “What exactly does your dad do, and when is he coming back?”
As she watched Grace’s face, she saw tears welling up again in the girl’s eyes. Lynnette’s heart seemed to sink toward her stomach.
“Oh, Grace,” Blue said. “Your dad . . . he’s—”
“Dead. He’s dead. He’s dead. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry I told you he was in the FBI and you thought he might be able to help us.” Grace’s words began to mix with her hiccups and sobs and her next words were almost unintelligible. “I’m sorry I went to get your case and the man saw our license and now Blue’s dad might be in trouble, too.” She wailed the next words, “It’s all my fault.”
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