by Karen Rose
‘I assume nothing,’ she said stiffly. ‘I know there are parts of Gayle’s hard drive that I couldn’t access. I also know that she has a separate, secret email account that I couldn’t break into. She clearly has something to hide. I just want her safe. And alive.’
That Jill hadn’t been able to hack into their protected, encrypted files made him feel a little better. Unless she was lying to buy his confidence. Always a possibility.
He tossed the flash drive in the air and caught it again. ‘You said you were worried that one of these threats could be real, that I’d get killed, and that you’d lose your job. But you didn’t think to warn me?”
‘No. I figured you couldn’t be too worried. You never checked the file yourself.’
‘I thought you didn’t set out to monitor me.’
‘I didn’t. It was merely a side benefit. Are . . . are you going to fire me?’
He probably should. She was too smart and knew a little too much. But he’d keep her close for now so that he could monitor her. ‘No. You love your aunt, as do I. You acted to protect her. You shouldn’t have needed to. I should have realized I was asking too much of her, long ago. I won’t make that mistake again.’
‘Thank you.’ Her rigid shoulders relaxed and she drew a deep breath, as if she were bracing herself. As it turned out, she had been. ‘So, are you going to tell me what’s in the secret files that my aunt keeps for you?’
He gave her a cutting glance. ‘Don’t push your luck, kid.’
Her shoulders went rigid again. ‘You don’t trust me.’
‘You’re damn right I don’t.’ He pulled an ancient laptop from his desk drawer. This old beast wasn’t connected to any network, so if there were any viruses or Trojans on Jill’s drive, they’d do no damage. ‘Trust is earned. You haven’t earned mine yet.’
‘But I still can?’
‘That’s totally up to you.’ He powered up the laptop, plugged in the flash drive, then gave her a cold look. ‘Your initial instincts were good, Jill. I’m not a gentle man. I’m not always a nice man. But I try to do the right thing and I am loyal to those who have earned my trust and respect. I hired you because Gayle asked me to, but make no mistake – if you fuck with me, being Gayle’s niece won’t help you. Do you understand me?’
She swallowed audibly again. ‘I understand. Do you plan to tell my aunt?’
‘No. But I will find a way to “discover” her heart attack and make sure she takes it easy.’ He’d also make sure that he limited Jill’s access to his business. He’d get one of his other staff members – someone he truly trusted – to intercept the mail from now on.
‘Thank you,’ she said on a shuddered exhale.
‘You’re welcome. You should go home, get some rest.’ The ancient laptop had finally opened the file on the flash drive, and he shifted his attention from Jill to his screen, dismissing her. The list she’d compiled was several steps up in vitriol compared to the sanitized list Gayle had been keeping, but he saw pretty quickly that none of the threats could plausibly be behind the shooting this morning. He’d choose the ones that were most likely to set Detective Bishop’s mind at ease about him having been the target.
‘Why now?’ Jill asked.
His head jerked up, his brow furrowing when he saw her still standing in the doorway. ‘I thought you were going home.’
She crossed the room to stand at the edge of his desk. ‘Why did you check the list now, when you haven’t looked at it for the past nine months?’
He gritted his teeth. ‘None of your business, Jill. Now go home.’
‘It is my business if it affects my aunt,’ she insisted. ‘You came to check the list because you got hurt tonight. I don’t see any blood, so I guess you’ll be okay. But if you think someone on Gayle’s list or on that flash drive is trying to hurt you, they might hurt her too.’
He met her eyes, held her gaze, made his own as threatening as he could. But even though she trembled, she didn’t stand down. This girl did have courage. Whether she had honor remained to be seen.
Again she swallowed audibly. ‘Who is Tala? I heard you say her name.’
He started to swear, but hesitated, unsure of what to do. Obviously she’d heard the tape he’d been listening to. He didn’t want to tell her anything, but he knew she would figure it out. Even if he didn’t have Stone write the story of Tala’s murder, some other news source would report it, together with Marcus’s presence at the scene. She’d put two and two together.
He wanted to fire her, but he knew it was too late for that.
The front door to the office suite opened. ‘Marcus?’ Stone called from the lobby.
Jill jerked in surprise, glancing at the clock on the wall. ‘What’s he doing here?’
‘I asked him to come,’ Marcus said, and suddenly the solution was clear. ‘You want to earn my trust?’
Her expression faltered. ‘Yes,’ she said slowly, uncertainly. ‘How?’
Stone’s heavy footsteps got louder, then he stopped abruptly in the doorway, filling it easily. He blinked in surprise. ‘Jill? What are you doing here so early?’ He lifted his brows at her appearance. ‘Or should I say late?’ He gave Marcus a questioning look.
‘I want Jill to assist you in investigating the story I called you about.’
Stone’s eyes grew huge and displeased. ‘What the hell?’
Jill’s eyes grew even larger. ‘Me?’
‘Yeah, you. You said you wanted to be trusted. Do you still?’
Her eyes narrowed. Smart girl. ‘I don’t know.’
Marcus pointed at the door. ‘Go get us some breakfast while you’re thinking about it. When you come back, Stone can bring you up to speed.’
Jill skirted around Stone, who looked stunned and annoyed. ‘I’ll be back,’ she promised.
‘I figured you would,’ Marcus said pleasantly. When she was gone, he lowered his voice to Stone. ‘Watch to make sure she actually leaves, then lock the door. We need to talk.’
Cincinnati, Ohio
Tuesday 4 August, 5.50 A.M.
The ringing of the phone pulled Kenneth Sweeney out of a very nice dream. Scowling at the abrupt loss of the quiet beach and the beautiful, faceless woman who’d been servicing him quite nicely, he patted the nightstand, searching for his cell phone. He squinted at the caller ID, then sat upright in bed, fully awake now. The security office was only to contact the CEO directly when there was an emergency. Since an emergency usually involved a police raid of some kind, he braced himself for the worst. ‘Yes? What is it?’
A hesitation on the other end. ‘Mr Sweeney? This is Gene Decker.’
Ken blinked hard, recognizing the voice. Gene had been one of his bodyguards until the younger man had been injured on the job the month before. He’d performed admirably in the line of duty, taking a bullet in the leg while saving Ken’s ass from a trigger-happy wannabe competitor – a small-time hood who’d wanted a slice of Ken’s OxyContin clientele. It turned out that Decker had studied to be an accountant in college, so they’d placed him in the business office while he recuperated.
Gene Decker had proven himself a damn fine accountant in the interim, but that didn’t come close to explaining why he was calling now – and from security’s command central.
‘Why are you calling, Decker?’ Ken asked harshly.
‘There’s some kind of alarm going off on the computer here in the security office.’
‘Where’s the security man on duty?’
A slight hesitation. ‘He appears to be asleep, sir.’
Ken’s temper blew, sending his blood pressure skyrocketing until he could feel the pulse in the top of his skull. ‘Asleep?’ he asked, very quietly.
‘There appears to be alcohol on his breath.’
Ken counted backward from ten. ‘All right. First, where is Reuben Blackwell?’
‘I already called him at home, sir. I got his voicemail, so I left a message for him to call back, that it was an emergency. I hope tha
t was okay.’
No, it was not okay. His chief of security was supposed to be on call 24/7. So where the fuck is he? ‘Tell me what happened, Decker, starting with why you are in the office before normal business hours.’
‘It’s fiscal year close, sir. We submit our financials on the fifteenth. I’ve been working through the night for the last week.’
‘Where is your boss?’
‘I assume Joel’s at home, asleep.’
Leaving the junior guy to crunch numbers, Ken thought, which made sense. But Joel Whipple was responsible for all of Ken’s accounts, most of which Gene Decker had not been authorized to see. Ken knew that Joel was most likely not home asleep, but crunching numbers himself. ‘So what about this alarm?’ he asked.
‘I took a break, took a walk through the hallways to clear my head. I heard the alarm through the door to the security office. I knocked hard, but nobody answered, so I went in.’
‘The door was unlocked?’ Holy shit, Reuben was going to have hell to pay for this.
‘Uh . . . well, yes, sir. I found the man on duty on the floor. I shook him, asked him what I should do, who I should call. He woke up and seemed like he was lucid for a few seconds. He told me to dial “one”, then went back to sleep. “One” was Reuben Blackwell’s voicemail. When he didn’t answer, I decided to take a chance and dial “two”. That was you, sir.’
‘All right. But I don’t hear any alarm.’
‘I muted the computer so I could hear what the security man on the floor was trying to tell me. Do you want to hear it? It was just a klaxon. The screen says “501 in progress”.’
Shit. One of the trackers had been tampered with. This was definitely not anything that Gene Decker needed to know about. ‘I’ll take care of it, Decker. Leave the man you found on the floor. Go back to your area and do whatever that thing was that you were doing before.’
‘Fiscal year close, sir.’
‘Yeah, that. And, Decker? I expect discretion on your part.’
‘Lips are sealed, sir.’
Ken hung up, then dialed Reuben’s cell. His security chief answered on the first ring. ‘Ken, what’s wrong?’
Ken had known Reuben for fifteen years – ever since the former Knoxville cop had caught him with a trunk full of Oxy that he’d been moving up I-75 from Florida. Ken had thought his goose was cooked that day, but Reuben had let him go, wanting only a piece of the action. After gaining their trust, Reuben had become the fourth partner in the business, eventually moving his wife up from Tennessee to Cincinnati.
Ken had known his other two partners – accountant Joel and purchasing manager Demetrius – since their freshman year in college, thirty very long years ago. Only Reuben had a wife anymore, the rest of them divorced at least once. Wives were a distraction at best. A vulnerability at worst, especially if they got too curious about the business side of things.
Which Ken’s second wife had done. She’d actually tried to blackmail him with what her curious self had learned. Now Ken was a widower, sleeping alone in his big bed, having shown his late wife the error of her ways by taking a knife to her throat.
It had been Reuben’s quick eye that had caught Ken’s ex-wife hatching her plot, Reuben who’d regretfully shown him the proof. Reuben who’d helped Ken get rid of her body after they’d eliminated her as a problem. Ken trusted Reuben as much as he trusted anyone – which wasn’t a hell of a lot.
‘Where are you, Reuben?’ he asked evenly. He used his CEO voice and not his let’s-grab-a-beer voice so that Reuben would know this wasn’t a social call.
Reuben’s answer was cautious. ‘On my way into the office. What do you need?’
‘Did you get a call from the security office?’
‘Yes, but I was in the shower at the time, and when I tried calling back, no one answered. Which is why I’m headed in. Why?’
‘I also got a call.’ As Ken explained the situation, Reuben swore under his breath.
‘Jackson isn’t a drinker. I don’t know what happened, but I’ll get to the bottom of this.’
‘See that you do. I’ll be in the office at my normal time. I want a full report when I arrive. On both your staff and the tracker alarm.’
‘Yes, sir.’
Four
Cincinnati, Ohio
Tuesday 4 August, 6.10 A.M.
Scarlett sat down at her desk and fired up her computer, grateful that the squad room was relatively deserted. She’d showered and even put on makeup, but her eyes were still puffy from her crying jag. She needed another cup of coffee. Hell, she needed a whole pot. But what she really needed was never to have heard that Michelle’s killer had scored a job with the most successful defense firm in the city. No, she told herself firmly, you need to do your job. Michelle’s killer had escaped justice. Tala’s killer could not be allowed to do the same.
Footsteps behind her had her tensing. ‘Morning, Scar,’ a male voice said.
Scarlett fought the urge to hide her swollen eyes as Detective Adam Kimble dropped into his desk chair, right next to hers. ‘Good morning, Adam.’ The detective had recently returned from personal leave after a particularly difficult case had emotionally wiped him out.
Just seeing Adam was enough of a motivation to keep her own emotions locked down. She didn’t want to be forced into taking a mental-health leave. Couldn’t stand the thought of her family knowing she’d cracked from the strain. ‘You’re here early,’ she offered.
Adam gave her an annoyed look. ‘Yeah. I got called to a crime scene this morning and was halfway there when Dispatch said, “Never mind.” Another detective had taken over.’
Scarlett winced. ‘Sorry about that.’
‘You should be. I put on a tie and everything.’ He studied her face. ‘You okay, kid?’
They’d known each other for years and she genuinely liked him. That he was Deacon’s first cousin meant she and Deacon had been able to stay in touch with him while he’d been on leave. Adam had seemed relaxed, but there were still shadows in his eyes.
‘Yeah. I’m okay,’ she said. ‘You?’
‘Just peachy. Came in and did some paperwork since I was all dressed up anyway.’
Scarlett made herself smile. ‘You can’t let a tie like that go to waste.’
‘Exactly. Now I’m gonna take my mother to breakfast.’ Rising, he hesitated, then squeezed her shoulder. ‘This morning was a rough one, huh?’
‘Yeah.’ She’d let him think that because she didn’t want to admit to anyone that she’d lost it, sobbing in her own foyer as she thought about Michelle. Besides, any case involving the discovery of a body in an alley was a rough one. ‘But I’ll be fine, thanks. Say hi to your mom.’
Waiting until he was gone, she logged into her email account and felt her shoulders relax. The top email in her inbox was from Marcus O’Bannion. The newsman had come through.
There was no attachment, but there was a link followed by a short note.
Detective Bishop,
At this link you can download the video files we discussed earlier. Please do not hesitate to call if you have any further questions.
M. O’Bannion
Publisher and CEO, The Ledger, Inc.
There was no mention of the list of those who’d threatened him either in the email or the link he’d provided. There were, however, eleven video files, each labeled with a date. The first file was dated two weeks before, the last with today’s date. That would be the murder in the alley.
Still raw from her conversation with Bryan, Scarlett decided to put the murder video off for a little while. Just until the memories of Michelle’s crime scene receded a bit more. She didn’t want to taint her first impressions of Tala’s murder with memories of Michelle’s. That was simply good investigative procedure. At least that was what she told herself.
She downloaded the first video and hit PLAY. It was in color, but the quality was grainy, the angle odd. It was Marcus’s visual perspective, she realized, the camera planted on th
e edge of the bill of his cap.
‘Easy, old girl.’ Marcus’s voice came out of her speakers, rich and lovely, sending a shiver down Scarlett’s spine and licking across her skin. He looked down, bringing into view his feet, the sidewalk, and a slightly limping Sheltie on a leash. ‘Come, BB. Let’s sit here.’
His dog, she thought. He’d said the dog was elderly and couldn’t run fast, that he’d gathered her in his arms when he’d run after Tala the first time, but that incident had not been recorded. On the screen, the dog curled up at his feet and blew out an exhausted sigh before resting her muzzle on her front paws.
‘I know,’ he murmured. ‘I miss him too.’ Then he switched to a companionable tone. ‘So, BB, do you think the girl will show up tonight? The one with the prissy dog? I sat here and waited last night and the night before, but she didn’t come.’ The camera slowly panned in a circle as Marcus checked the woods all around him. ‘I’m going to try one more time, and if she doesn’t come back, I’m going to have to drop it. I can’t help her if she won’t come close enough for me to find out what’s wrong.’
Nearly two minutes passed with no activity except for the few times Marcus leaned down to scratch BB behind the ears. ‘Maybe it was the singing,’ he murmured to the dog. ‘I suppose it can’t hurt to try.’
Scarlett had expected the Vince Gill ballad, had braced herself for the memory, but what came out of the speakers hit her far harder. ‘Ave Maria’. Her heart stuttered, her breath backing up in her lungs. The last time she’d heard it had been at her nephew’s christening, which was the last time she’d set foot in a church. She could only hope that none of her single brothers would get married and that the married brothers would have no more children who had to be christened, because weddings, christenings and funerals were the only times she forced herself to enter a church. To kneel. To grit her teeth while everyone around her prayed.
Marcus’s ‘Ave Maria’ was the most beautiful rendition she’d ever heard – clear and pure and strong. Still, she was relieved when he suddenly broke off, the camera on his cap swinging in a wide arc as he twisted to look behind him.