by Karen Rose
Mistake two—uploading the security guard’s route to their server. And mistake three, not hiring a five-year-old to try to hack in. They’d left the door into their system wide open. It had almost been insulting. We took every precaution. Nobody saw us.
Except the girl and she was dead. He could see her face, every time he closed his eyes. Screaming, her hands sliding down the window.
Eric narrowed his eyes. The guard was inept—he should have known the girl was there. It’s not our fault. She wasn’t supposed to be there to start with.
“It’s not our fault,” he said out loud, and thought maybe if he said it another million times he might actually start to believe it. We killed her. It was the truth. The ugly truth.
But no one knows. Unless Joel tells them. Eric thought about Albert’s whispered words as he’d left the apartment. I should have hit him harder. I still can.
Eric had told him no, in no uncertain terms. But if Joel didn’t pull himself together, then what? His stomach churning, he sank into the chair next to the television.
What a mess. What a goddamned mess. All because of some stupid waterfowl.
“To hell with the birds,” he muttered, turning the television on. The anchorwoman stared into the camera and Eric bet she secretly got a charge from the excitement.
“Firefighters are in cleanup mode at this time. Damage to the condo is estimated to exceed fifty million dollars. But the true loss is in the two victims.”
Eric snapped to attention. Two? What the hell?
“Sources tell us that one of the victims was a female who was discovered on the fourth floor.” The screen switched to show the picture window where the girl had stood, screaming. A large jagged hole had been cut on the far end. “The second victim is a male in his midfifties. Police are withholding his name pending notification of his family. But our source tells us the man was shot to death.”
For a moment Eric was too stunned to do anything but stare. Shot to death? No. Albert hit him. Just hit him. None of them had guns. What the fuck was this?
He jumped when his cell phone buzzed on the table next to him. He stared at it, waiting. For what? Hell if he knew. But his heart was pounding, hard, slow and his hand moved as if through molasses. He flipped the phone open and his pounding heart stopped as his lungs froze at the text that popped up.
i know what you did.
Eric continued to stare and the phone vibrated again as a new text popped up.
need proof?
There was a link and, dread mounting, Eric clicked it. It was a video. He saw himself and the others staring up at the burning condo. Then the camera panned up to the girl in the window, her mouth open on that silent scream that still filled his mind. Then it was back on them and he was nodding at Albert as they held the struggling Joel. Albert struck Joel and they dragged him away. The video lasted only thirty seconds.
But it was enough. They’d been seen. They were fucked.
Hands shaking, Eric’s thumbs somehow hit the right keys. Who are you?
your master.
His whole body shook now, violent trembles. What do you want?
don’t worry. will tell you soon enough. will text address when im ready. be waiting. tell no one. yes or no?
He couldn’t think. Couldn’t breathe. Could only stare.
A minute later another text popped up. im losing patience. you think prison will be fun? ur awful cute. dont drop the soap. yes or no?
Eric took several deep breaths, nausea mounting with each one. There was only one answer. Yes, he typed, then closed the phone. He stood, carefully placing the phone back on the table. Then he ran to the bathroom and threw up.
He sat back in his easy chair, the grin nearly splitting his face when Eric’s reply popped up. Yes. Of course he’d say yes. “Take that, rich boy. Your ass belongs to me.”
Monday, September 20, 3:30 a.m.
Austin Dent froze, one leg over his windowsill, the beam of a flashlight blinding him. His hand sliced through the air. “Stop.”
Austin climbed through the window, closing it behind him. He was in no mood for his roommate’s stupid questions, but it didn’t look like Kenny was going to let it go.
Kenny’s finger wagged, side to side. “Where were you?”
Austin climbed into bed, ignoring him, but Kenny wouldn’t leave him alone, sniffing. “What is that? Smoke? Fire?”
“Shut up.” Austin buried his face in his pillow. He could smell the smoke on his skin. The dorm staff would smell it tomorrow. They would know. Everyone would know.
It didn’t matter. Tracey was dead.
Oh God. A sob built in his chest and he fought it back, but it burst out and his shoulders shook. She’s dead. Oh God. I promised I’d take care of her and she’s dead.
The bed shifted as Kenny slid down to the floor, patting his shoulder. Austin lifted his face and stared his friend in the eye. Kenny looked scared. “What did you do?”
Austin rolled over so that his hands were free. “You can’t tell anyone.”
“Tell them what?”
“That I wasn’t here. That I came in through the window. That I smell like smoke.”
Kenny looked more scared now. “What the hell did you do?”
Austin shook his head hard. “You’re my friend. You have to help me.”
Kenny stared a minute, then pushed the window open. “Get rid of the smell.”
“They’ll smell it tomorrow.” Panic grabbed Austin’s chest. “What do I do?”
Kenny lifted his mattress and pulled out a flattened pack of cigarettes. “Is what you did worse than getting caught smoking?”
Austin thought of Tracey, trapped. He thought of the dead guard and the man who’d shot him. Miserably, he nodded and in the darkness saw Kenny flinch.
“Smoke one,” Kenny said. “Breathe out the window or it’ll set off the sprinklers. Tomorrow morning, smoke another. They’ll think the smell comes from these. You’ll get busted for cigarettes and nobody will know.” Kenny produced the matches he’d hidden. “Give me a cigarette, I’ll light it for you. Your hands are shaking. You’ll drop the match and burn the place down.” Kenny’s brows crunched. “It’s okay. It’ll be okay.”
No, Austin thought numbly, flinching as the flame flared. It’ll never be okay again.
Chapter Three
Monday, September 20, 4:30 a.m.
Olivia pummeled the bag with a barrage of short jabs that left her knuckles aching, but pain was easier to deal with than the howl she’d kept restrained since walking away from Mrs. Henry Weems’s heartbreaking sobs. I’m sorry for your loss, ma’am.
The grunting bodybuilder next to her paid her no attention as he did his reps, which was why she came to the gym this time of the morning. People who were here at this hour came to work out, not to be seen. There was a certain anonymity in that.
There were days she craved anonymity, especially from herself. Especially after telling another grieving family she was sorry for their loss. She’d done that a lot in the past months, walked away from a lot of sobbing parents, brothers, sisters.
We found your daughter’s remains in a bone pit. No, you can’t identify her. I’m sorry for your loss. Such inadequate bullshit. And it never ended. Your husband is dead. He was shot to death by an arsonist. I’m sorry for your loss.
Frustration surged and Olivia tore into the bag again, then collapsed against it. “I’m sorry for your goddamn loss,” she muttered, spent.
“Easy, tiger.”
Olivia shuddered at the calm voice. “What are you doing here?” she asked wearily. Paige Holden wasn’t on duty till eight. Which was precisely why Olivia had come now.
“Making sure you leave some of Jasper for everyone else,” Paige said dryly.
Olivia pushed away from the bag that took the name of Paige’s old boyfriend after each breakup. “He’s Jasper now?” Olivia had lost count of all the names Paige’s punching bags had borne in the fifteen years they’d been friends. “What di
d Jasper do?”
“Left me with the check as he ran off to a client for the very last time.”
Olivia once again marveled at how smart women could be so stupid when it came to men. Present company totally not excluded. “Filet and a hundred-dollar bottle of wine?”
Paige shrugged. “Close enough. Speaking of dinner, when did you eat, Emo-girl?”
Olivia shot her a dirty look. “Dinner.”
“Which was?” Paige pressed.
Olivia closed her eyes, digging deep for patience. “Salad.”
Paige pulled a PowerBar from her pocket. “You need protein, even if it’s not meat.”
Olivia took the bar, knowing it would taste like cardboard. All food tasted like cardboard since the Pit. Meat was especially hard to stomach. Just thinking about it brought the memories back. Flesh falling off the bone. She shook her head to clear it.
“What are you doing here?” Olivia asked again.
“A little bird told me you were here, knocking the stuffing out of Jasper.”
Olivia looked over her shoulder to the man behind the counter who had muscles on his muscles. Caught watching them, Rudy suddenly developed an interest in the sign-in sheet. “Son of a gun,” Olivia muttered. “Freaking little weasel.”
“I prefer to think of him as my confidential informant,” Paige said archly, then sniffed. “You smell like an old fireplace. What happened tonight?”
“Fire. Two dead,” Olivia said briefly, sharing no more than the reporters knew.
But Paige had known her a long time. “You had to inform the families.”
“Just one. So far anyway.”
Paige winced. “The other’s a John Doe?”
“Jane.” Olivia swallowed hard, remembering the girl’s ashen face. “Just a kid.”
Paige squeezed her arm. “I’m sorry, honey.”
“Me too.” She cleared her throat. “I’m not going to have time to work out later, so I stopped by on my way home for just a few minutes. I was going to call you.”
“You’ll call me. Famous last words of Jasper.” Paige pointed at the Nautilus equipment. “You’re warmed up already, so let’s get started.”
Olivia hesitated. “That’s okay. You don’t have to stay.”
“I know. But if I don’t, you’ll keep avoiding me like you have for the past few months. So get to the leg press, Detective.”
Sulking, Olivia obeyed, giving Rudy a dirty look as she passed him. “Traitor.”
“Leave him alone,” Paige murmured. “He’s worried about you. So am I.”
Olivia flopped onto the first machine. “Let’s get this over with.”
Paige said no more of a personal nature, simply counting reps. They moved through the rotation as they had a hundred times before, Olivia mindlessly going through the motions. It wasn’t until they were near the end that the wall crumbled.
“She was expecting us.” Olivia was lying on her back, staring at the tiled ceiling.
Paige was sitting on her heels, next to the bench. “Who?” she asked, unsurprised.
“The widow.” Olivia never gave names and Paige knew not to ask. “The daughter saw the fire on the news, knew it was dad’s shift. She went to sit with mom and wait for us, the bringers of great joy to all people.” Her words were bitter. “He’d been a cop.”
“Oh no. Liv.”
“Yeah. Did his twenty-five years and retired. Never took a bullet. Tonight he did. And all I had to say was ‘I’m sorry for your loss.’”
“What else could you say?” Paige asked logically.
“I don’t know. All I know is I’m damn tired of saying it.”
“You’re just damn tired. Your boss offered you a vacation. Why don’t you take it?”
A vacation. Right. “I tried,” Olivia spat. “It was too quiet. All I could see was…”
“The bodies in the pit,” Paige finished for her.
Olivia sat up, glared at Paige through narrowed eyes. “And then he shows up.” Which was what she’d wanted to say all along and been afraid to, all at once.
Paige’s black brows went up, surprised now. “Who?”
“That guy. From Mia’s wedding.”
Paige blinked. She was the only one who knew the story which had only been pried from Olivia’s margarita-numbed lips. “You mean your sister’s wedding? No way. That was two years ago, in Chicago. He just showed up, after all this time? What a jerk.”
Olivia flicked her gaze back up to the ceiling. Paige hadn’t been updated recently. “Two and a half years, and actually, he lives here now. Moved here seven months ago.”
“Lots of stuff happened seven months ago,” Paige observed quietly. “Why did he move here?”
“His friend lives here. You met her. Eve.”
“The one you saved from Pit-Guy? Rest over. Another set. Go.”
Olivia winced as she pumped. “Pit-Guy” had killed dozens of people, most of them women. Eve had come within a hair of being his thirty-sixth victim. “Another cop saved Eve, not me. I got there after all the killing was done, just in time to clean out the pit.”
Paige sighed. “Two more. One, and you’re done. So what about Wedding-Guy?”
“Came to visit Eve, ended up buying a place. She told me. He hasn’t said a word.”
Paige winced. “Not a word? So, does Wedding-Guy have a name?”
Olivia’s throat closed and she swallowed harshly. “David.”
“And what does David the wedding-guy do?”
“He’s a goddamn firefighter.” And from the corner of her eye she watched Paige’s black eyes flicker. “What?”
“Just that he was at the fire tonight and you got the homicide. Helluva coincidence. So he’s been here, in Minneapolis, all this time? And he didn’t, like, call or anything?”
“Not once.” And that hurt. A lot.
“Pig.”
“I know, right? Except…” Olivia closed her eyes. Be truthful, at least to yourself. “Except he’s a nice guy. He likes cartoons and dogs and loves his mother. He cooks and fixes cars. We’d read the same books, liked the same music, dreamed of traveling to all the same places. He volunteered in shelters for women and teen runaways, fixing plumbing and roofs and whatever got broken. He did karate, too. Like you.”
“Oh? Really?”
Olivia nodded. “He was a brown belt, practicing for his black-belt test. He also taught a class at the Y in Chicago, to kids. For free. I’d have thought he was lying, that nobody could be so perfect, but Mia had already told me he was a nice guy.”
“Wow.” Paige looked stunned. “I thought you’d only met him that one night.”
“Two, actually. We met at Mia’s rehearsal dinner. It was spring, and I guess I was wide open for getting swept off my feet. A weekend fling. How cliché.”
Paige frowned at her disparaging tone. “Liv. You’d gotten dumped by your ass of a fiancé just a few weeks before the wedding. I’d still like to use him for a punching bag for what he did to you. Going back to his old fiancée. Who was a ho.”
“I remember,” Olivia said dryly. “I was there.” Paige’s punching bag had been named Doug for quite some time after that.
“Then, not a week later, finding out the father you’d never known was dead? Then finding out you had two half sisters?”
“The cop and the con,” Olivia said affectionately. “Meeting Mia and Kelsey was the only good thing to come out of all that.”
Paige’s scowl relaxed a little. “I’m just saying that you’d been through a lot that winter. To fall under the spell of a sexy, nice Mr. Perfect could happen to any of us. He took advantage of you.”
Olivia shrugged. “Probably. The day of the rehearsal dinner, I was kind of a mess. I was late. I’d just come back from meeting Kelsey for the first time.”
“At the prison,” Paige murmured.
Where Olivia’s half sister was serving eight to twenty-five for armed robbery. “Yeah. The prison’s about an hour away from Chicago, and I hadn’t been
able to get out there before then. I was kind of shaken up, meeting my sister that way, behind the glass. I got to the church late for the rehearsal and was running up to the steps on these stupid high heels, and then I saw him sitting there.”
“This David guy.”
“Yeah.” Olivia closed her eyes. “It was like getting kicked in the gut. I was mesmerized. His face… just, wow. He’s got this face, Paige. And the shoulders. And the rest of him… You can’t forget him. I was staring at his face when my heel hit a rock and I tripped. Flew right into his lap. I was too star struck to even be embarrassed.”
“I don’t think I’ve ever known you to be star struck,” Paige said quietly.
“I never was before. Not with Doug, not with anyone. I’d skinned my knee and he patched me up.” Her lips curved bitterly. “He had me at hello. It’s a wonder I got through the rehearsal and the dinner. All the women looked like they wanted to gouge my eyes out because he stayed with me. And we talked. We talked all night.”
“Did he know about Doug?”
“God, no. I didn’t want to look pathetic. I didn’t tell any of them. Mia didn’t even know. And frankly, sitting there with David, Doug was the last thing on my mind. He never took his eyes off my face. I felt… important. Sounds stupid now.”
Paige’s brow creased in sympathy. “It sounds normal to me.”
“I guess I really wanted to feel important to somebody, you know?”
Paige squeezed her hand. “Yeah, babe. I know.”
Olivia’s eyes stung and she willed back what would have been mortifying tears. “It wasn’t all bad, though. I told him about Kelsey. He’d known Mia for a long time, knew about our father. About the abuse. I was so sad to see Kelsey there, in prison like that, even if she did do the crime. David suggested volunteering with teen runaways, to help give them a chance. To help them not turn out like my sister.”
“And you do. It’s good work, Liv. You make a difference in those kids’ lives.”
“Thanks. So like I said, it wasn’t all bad. The rehearsal dinner was wonderful. It was the night after the wedding that went wrong.”