Cold Snap

by Allison Brennan

  Lucy’s responsibility was to keep eyes on Kate, and she wasn’t going to let Tessa get close. She was in the best position to do so.

  “It’s running,” Kate said into her mic, which was wired to the Denver PD network, and earpieces for Sean and Lucy.

  Sean’s voice came through. “I see it. Waiting.”

  No one spoke for several minutes. Then Sean said, “I got her. Third floor. She’s on a smartphone. Give me a sec.”

  Harris said over the mic, “Beta Team, third floor. Await location of suspect.”

  Sean said, “I got her GPS. She’s moving. In the elevator.”

  They all waited for the Beta Team from Denver PD to report in. They went radio silent on their approach, so Lucy couldn’t hear what was going on. She kept her eyes on Kate and the immediate area. She didn’t like that there was no word about Tessa.

  Five minutes later, Harris broke the silence, “Negative. She’s not on the third floor, or in the elevators.”

  “How can that be?” Lucy said.

  Sean reported, “The trace isn’t instantaneous. There’s a short lag time. I’m trying to reestablish the connection; I lost it when she entered the elevator.”

  But for the next ten minutes, while they were all tense and waiting, Sean couldn’t get the phone up again. “She shut it down. Maybe she realized there was someone piggybacking on her connection.”

  Kate snorted. “And I thought you were the best, Rogan.”

  “Touché.”

  Lucy was doubly tense. Tessa Gilliam wanted to kill Denise. She’d already proven she’d use whatever she had at her disposal—a knife, a blunt object, her hands. Lucy had the distinct impression of being watched. Not her, specifically, but as if someone were surveying the entire lobby. Waiting. She scanned the balcony but didn’t see anyone who matched Tessa’s description. She didn’t see anyone who looked to be watching the room.

  But this feeling was very familiar.

  “Harris,” Lucy said, “ask James if he’d be willing to come down to the lobby. We’ll cover him.”

  “Too risky,” Harris said. “She’ll go after him.”

  “No, she’ll go after Kate,” Lucy said. “She’s waiting—I can feel it.”

  “Don’t tell me you’re a damn psychic.”

  “No, I just have experience with psychopaths.” Far too much experience. “Tell James to go right up to Kate and kiss her. I guarantee that Tessa will make her move.”

  No one said anything for a minute. Then Harris said, “He said he’d do it. Are you sure about this, Kincaid?”

  “I’m positive. She’s watching. But I can’t see her.”

  “I’m putting a vest on him. Give us two minutes.”

  “Put a plainclothes officer right behind him, a man, not a woman. If it’s a woman, Tessa will look twice to make sure they’re not together. If it’s a man, she won’t notice him.” Lucy hoped her instincts were right.

  A moment later, Harris said, “He’s on his way. Elevator four.”

  Lucy kept her eyes on the elevator. There were too many people in the lobby, too many people milling around waiting for shuttles or taxis, because it was too cold to wait outside. The snow still fell, but in quiet sheets, not with the driving force of last night.

  Maybe this was a bad idea.

  Don’t second-guess yourself. Tessa Gilliam has killed three women. She’ll kill again if she isn’t stopped.

  James emerged from the elevator. He hesitated, just a moment, then spotted Kate. He strode over. He looked nervous and scared, but didn’t take his eyes off Kate. He gave her a large smile.

  Ten feet behind him was a plainclothes cop. Lucy looked across the lobby, behind the cop, everywhere she could see without making it obvious. Checking faces, trying to see if anyone was giving James undue attention.

  Harris said in her ear, “Suspect spotted on the second-floor balcony heading down the main staircase.”

  Lucy turned in time to see Tessa, walking with purpose down the stairs. She wore a black catering uniform, her freshly dyed hair pulled sharply back into a net and her face devoid of makeup.

  “I see her,” Lucy said.

  To Lucy’s left, James embraced Kate. As they kissed, Kate turned James away from the threat so her body was between him and the approaching killer. Then she whispered something in his ear.

  Lucy turned back to Tessa. Her face was a mask of fury and purpose. She was so focused on James and Kate that she didn’t see Lucy as she rose from her chair and walked right into her path.

  Tessa bumped into her, but that didn’t slow her down. She didn’t even look at Lucy, her vision was so narrowed on the object of her obsession.

  “James!” Tessa cried out.

  Lucy turned quickly, kicked a suitcase into Tessa’s path, and as Tessa tried to avoid tripping, Lucy grabbed her arm and pulled it sharply up in the back as she pushed her to her knees.

  “FBI. Stay down.”

  Tessa squirmed and with her free hand revealed a knife, which she swiped at Lucy’s leg, trying to get out of her grip.

  Lucy stepped back to avoid a more serious injury, though the knife tore her jeans and cut into her skin.

  She kicked Tessa’s wrist. The woman dropped the knife and Lucy kicked it away as she pushed her face-first onto the marble floor.

  Two Denver PD cops came out of the woodwork and held their guns on Tessa.

  “I said stay down,” Lucy told Tessa. Her thigh smarted from the cut, but she still cuffed the killer, then searched her for additional weapons. She found a nine-millimeter handgun and handed it to one of the cops.

  Other cops ushered guests away from the lobby. Tessa suddenly stopped moving—she seemed to be in shock.

  “We got her, Agent Kincaid,” one of the cops said. “You need a doctor.”

  “I’m fine,” Lucy said.

  In her earpiece, Sean said, “What?”

  “I’m fine,” Lucy repeated. She looked down. Blood had seeped into her jeans.

  “Tessa Gilliam, you’re under arrest for murder and assault of a federal agent,” the cop said as he pulled the woman into a standing position.

  Tessa’s face was completely blank. She looked at Lucy with no emotion, not pain or regret or fear.

  Then, over Lucy’s shoulder, Tessa saw James standing with Kate. Her expression changed immediately, from calm to pure rage.

  “I’ll kill her, James! I promise you, I’ll kill you both!” She ended on a screech.

  Harris came down and told the officers to take Gilliam to the station and book her. They left, though the suspect was no longer compliant. She fought and screamed while two strong cops ushered her out of the lobby.

  “What a piece of work,” Harris muttered. Then he turned to Lucy. “Good job, Agent Kincaid.” He extended his hand. “I need to talk to my men, then I’ll get a statement from you and Agent Donovan.”

  “We’ll be here until tomorrow morning.”

  He looked at her leg. “You need stitches.”

  “It’s a lot better than it looks,” she said.

  Kate and James walked over. James was shaking. “She will kill us. She’s crazy.”

  “She won’t,” Lucy said. “She’s going to prison for the rest of her life.”

  “But there’s no evidence. You don’t know that she killed those women. You don’t know that she’s done anything!”

  Harris said, “I’m interviewing her. Did you see her hands when she fell?”

  Lucy nodded. “Cut up.”

  “She nicked herself in the stabbing. That room is being processed carefully. We’ll find her blood, no doubt. She’s not going to walk away. We also have a hundred witnesses who heard her threaten you—she won’t be getting bail, either.” Harris put his hand on James’s shoulder. “Go take care of your fiancée and your baby.”

  James nodded. “Thank you all for everything.”

  Lucy said, “I’ll walk him back to his room.”

  Once upstairs, James and Denise embraced. Sean w
alked Lucy out. “Stitches?” he said and looked at her leg.

  “A Band-Aid is all I need,” she said. “I’d tell you if it was more serious.”

  “I doubt that.” He kissed her. “You did good, Princess.”

  “So did you.”

  “We have all day, just to ourselves.”

  “And Kate and Dillon and giving our statements—sounds like a lot of fun.”

  Sean put his arm around her shoulders as they went into the elevator. “Dillon said he and Kate are eating in the restaurant. Want to join them?” He hovered his finger above the lobby button.

  Lucy smiled and pressed 10. “They can wait.”

  CHAPTER 23

  Home.

  The wheels of the 747 hit San Diego at 10:47 A.M. Pacific time on Monday morning. What a whirlwind forty-eight hours! But it felt amazing to be here in San Diego, and to be here with Sean.

  Lucy took Sean’s hand and kissed it. “This is it,” she said. Home churned up so many different emotions that Lucy didn’t know whether to be excited or apprehensive. She’d had a wonderful childhood in many ways, but she always seemed to remember first the tragedies.

  “I think you’re more nervous about me meeting your parents than I am.” He grinned. “How can they not love me?”

  Lucy heard Kate snort from the seat behind them. “Don’t pay attention to her,” Sean said. “I promise, I’ll be on my best behavior.”

  “I’m not worried.” Maybe a little. “It’s just—well, I know they’ll love you, but we also have to tell them we’re moving in together.”

  “We could elope,” Sean said.

  Lucy’s heart skipped a beat. They’d never seriously discussed getting married, and right now she wasn’t ready for anything else on her plate. Moving halfway cross-country to a city she’d never been to before, moving in with Sean on a permanent basis and not just staying with him a couple weekends a month, starting a new job as a rookie FBI agent—the idea that she’d have to plan a wedding had her nearly panicking.

  “Hey,” Sean said, and kissed her. “I was joking. I know now’s not the right time.” Then he smiled wickedly, his dimple deepening. “But there will be a right time, and I will know exactly when it is.”

  “Oh, you will?”

  He kissed her again. “Of course I will. I love you.”

  Still smiling as the plane taxied toward the terminal, Lucy took out her cell phone and turned it on. Immediately, several messages beeped. She listened to them.

  The first was from Carina.

  “Dad’s in the hospital. He had a heart attack last night—he’s okay, but we’re all here waiting for tests. Call me.”

  Lucy didn’t check the rest of her messages. She immediately dialed Carina. “Dillon,” she said, looking over her shoulder. “Dad’s in the hospital.”

  Dillon pulled out his own phone and started dialing.

  Carina wasn’t answering. She tried Connor, and he didn’t answer. She called her mom.

  “Mom? It’s Lucy. We just landed. Dad’s okay, right?”

  “Lucia, it’s awful, baby. Come home.” Her mom started crying and Lucy couldn’t understand her.

  “Mama, we’re getting off the plane right now. We’ll all be there.”

  Her mother started talking in rapid Spanish but with the sobs Lucy couldn’t make out what she was saying. “Mama, Dillon and I are coming.”

  She hung up, fighting back tears. She turned to Dillon. He said, “I’m calling the hospital.”

  She nodded, and tried Carina’s husband, Nick. She thought he wasn’t going to answer either, but then he picked up.

  “Nick, it’s Lucy. We just landed and I got Carina’s message about Dad. Is he okay?”

  “I just saw him, he’s fine. They have him resting, and I don’t know what the plan is, but his color is back.”

  Relief flooded through her. She said to Dillon, “Dad’s okay. He’s in the hospital, but he’s okay.”

  To Nick she said, “I tried Carina and Connor, and neither of them are answering, and then I called Mom, and she was crying—I thought he’d died.” She breathed an unsteady sigh of relief. She hadn’t seen her dad in nearly two years. How could she have let so much time pass between visits?

  “Lucy, your dad is going to be okay,” Nick said. “We have another situation.”

  “What?”

  He didn’t say anything right off, and Lucy knew then that it was bad.

  “There’s been a shooting at the hospital,” Nick said. “Carina has been taken as a hostage.”

  PART THREE

  San Diego

  Monday, December 24

  CHAPTER 24

  Carina Kincaid Thomas woke up Christmas Eve morning to a kiss. Her husband nuzzled her neck and whispered, “Do you know what today is?”

  “It’s not Christmas yet,” she said with a smile. “Or my birthday.”

  Nick reached down and laid a hand on her stomach, which was still flat. “It’s been fifteen weeks.”

  Carina had had three miscarriages over the last two years, and though all tests said she and Nick should be able to conceive, her body didn’t seem to be able to carry a baby past the first trimester. Twelve weeks was the longest she’d gone. The last time she said she couldn’t go through it again. It was as if with each loss, her heart broke and took longer to mend. She was thirty-seven. She might never be able to have a baby.

  They weren’t even trying anymore, but she’d conceived Labor Day weekend when she and Nick had rented a cabin in Big Bear. She’d spent the first three months waging an emotional battle against loving the tiny baby, but it was impossible. She wanted this baby more than anything else, and she knew Nick did, too.

  She didn’t think she was completely out of the woods, but the doctor said if she made it through the first trimester, the odds were in their favor that the baby would come to term. So she and Nick agreed that they wouldn’t tell anyone about this pregnancy until Christmas, because Carina couldn’t handle the pain in her mother’s eyes, or the sympathy from her sister-in-law Julia.

  “We’ll tell everyone tomorrow, at Christmas dinner,” Carina said. Her phone rang. Then she noticed that it was after eight—she never slept in this late!

  “Hi, Mom,” Carina said. “I just—”

  “Carina?” Rosa Kincaid interrupted. “I need you to come to the hospital. It’s your dad.”

  Her heart raced. “Dad? What’s wrong?” She swung her legs over the side of the bed. Nick immediately jumped up.

  “They think it’s a heart attack. They’re running tests, but his doctor says he’s going to have to have surgery. Mi muñeca, I need you.”

  “I’ll be right there, Mama.”

  “Call Patrick, Lucy—they need to know, but I have to be with your father.”

  “Of course. Mama, Daddy’s strong. He’s going to be fine.” As she spoke, tears leaked from her eyes. Her dad … she couldn’t imagine her life without him.

  She hung up. “Nick—”

  “I heard. Get dressed. I’ll drive.”

  * * *

  “Your mother shouldn’t have worried you.”

  Colonel Pat Kincaid tried to sit up in his hospital bed, but the nurse who was writing on his chart admonished him.

  “Of course she should have,” Carina said. She glanced at her brother Connor. Tell him!

  Connor said, “Don’t try to make Mom feel guilty for calling us.”

  “I’m just having a few tests.”

  “A few tests because you had a heart attack!” Carina exclaimed.

  Nick put his hand on her shoulder. He could usually calm her down when she was agitated, just by his touch, but this was her dad. He’d been an army colonel, a military man for forty years before he retired. For the first fifteen years of her life she’d moved from base to base with her family. That’s one of the reasons she was so close to her siblings, particularly Connor and Patrick. The three of them were born a year apart, with Carina in the middle, and they had done everything toget
her. When you moved every two years—or less—you depended on your family. Your brothers. Your mother.

  Your dad.

  He was sixty-nine years old but had only retired a few years ago. He was still fit and strong. But seeing him here, in a hospital bed, with all the machines, she thought he looked older than she’d ever imagined he could be.

  Carina couldn’t lose him. Not now.

  She caught his eye and realized that he was as scared as she was, but he was trying to be the tough soldier, to be strong for his family. Like when she was seven and they’d moved to Fort Bragg and almost immediately her dad was deployed to command a unit in Grenada. He’d been gone before, but this was the first time she understood that he was going to be in danger.

  “Cara.” He’d spoken her nickname, the one reserved only for her daddy, that last day before he left. “I need you to be strong for me. I have good men I serve under, and good men who serve under me. Trust that God will watch out for me just like He watched out for your mama when she escaped from Cuba. If I see you scared, I’ll be scared. But if I see you’re brave, I’ll be brave.”

  “I’m brave, Daddy. I love you lots. I’ll miss you so much.”

  He opened his wallet to reveal pictures of her and her brothers and sister. “I always miss you, that’s why I keep these close to my heart.”

  Carina reached up and touched the small pendant around her neck. It was that deployment when he’d given her the pendant with his picture and hers.

  She walked over to the side of the bed, leaned over, and kissed his cheek.

  She whispered, “If I see you’re brave, I’ll be brave.”

  He squeezed her hand, recognition in his eyes. Carina kept the tears at bay until she left the room, Nick close on her heels. As soon as her father’s door swung shut, she turned to her husband.

  “Nick,” she managed to whisper before the silent tears fell.

  He held her tight; she needed him, but she also needed to pull herself together. For her mom, for her dad, for her family. She took a deep breath.

  “I’m going to get some air,” Carina said.