by Cynthia Eden
A muscle flexed along Malone’s jaw.
“And by the way, is that your truck parked down on the corner?”
Malone gave a grudging nod.
Kenton smiled, and he knew it wasn’t a pretty sight. “Thought so.”
“Yo, guys—I think you’d better come in here!” Max’s voice cut through the rattle of conversation in the conference room.
Lora glanced at Garrison. His bushy brows were pulled low, but he was already shoving back his chair and leading the way out of the room.
Everyone scrambled behind him. They hurried down the hall and crowded into the lounge, settling right in front of the big-screen TV.
Max hit the remote, and the volume screamed out.
“FBI agents are mum, but sources say this man is the latest victim of the arsonist who has made our city his playground.” Elle Shaw’s face filled the screen.
“What the hell?” Garrison demanded.
“Another one?” Lora whispered. “But we—we didn’t get the call.”
“The guy was lit. Not the scene, the guy.” Max shook his head. “We couldn’t have done a damn thing for him.”
“They said that?” Lora shoved her finger at the TV. The cameraman had panned back to show the mouth of an alley and lines of yellow tape.
“Nah… I heard the report on the scanner.” Max spent most of his time listening to the police scanner. His eyes narrowed on her. “The FBI was supposed to protect this guy, but he wound up torched.”
Garrison glanced over at her. “They’re supposed to be protecting you.”
They were protecting her. The two cops on her current watch duty were right there at the station, less than ten feet away. She rubbed her arms and stared at the screen. Torched. There weren’t many worse ways of going. That poor man. Oh, Jesus.
“We look after our own here,” Max said, his voice loud and clear, probably for the benefit of the nearby cops. “We’re sure as hell not letting anything happen to Lora.”
They protected their own. Their motto.
You always brought your man out of a fire. The team worked together. Survived together.
But when you died, you were buried alone.
Kenton tossed Malone into the first open interrogation room he found and put two uniforms on guard in front of the door.
“Where did you find him?” Sam asked, shifting a bit as she craned to see their suspect.
“Lora’s house.” His hands were clenched. Kenton took a breath and forced himself to relax. “His truck’s there, too. I want it hauled in and searched.” If there were trace amounts of accelerants in that truck, the crime techs would find them. “Get us a warrant and make sure every step is legal.”
“I’m on it.” Sam turned away and hurried down the hall.
He yanked out his phone and punched in Monica’s number. One ring. Two. Three.
Come on…
“Agent Davenport.” But that was not Davenport’s voice. Not unless she’d had one serious testosterone shot in the last few minutes.
Hell. He cleared his throat. “Sorry, but I need her.”
Silence.
“Where?”
“The station. As soon as she can get here. We’ve got Malone in Interrogation. Sam and I will be heading in, but—”
But Luke would understand.
If they wanted the suspect to break, fast, they needed Monica. No one could get into a killer’s mind like Monica.
“We’ll be there.”
He didn’t argue. This wasn’t Luke’s case, but if the guy wanted to play tag-along and watch over his lover, that was his choice. A choice Kenton respected.
Luke hung up the phone. Monica rolled toward him, a sheet around her breasts. “I told you I was going to answer it.”
He shook his head. She’d drifted to sleep, just for a moment, and then the call had woken her. “You heard everything?” Being so close, it would have been hard not to.
“Yes.”
He caught her chin and kissed her, thrusting deep with his tongue as he tasted her. They hadn’t been given nearly enough time.
His mouth lifted. “I want you to move in with me.”
Her breath caught. “Wh-what?”
I want you to move in with me. No, what he really wanted was marriage. Forever. But Monica was skittish. She’d run from him before, and he knew better than to rush her too much now.
Besides, he had a plan. The woman wasn’t the only one who knew how to profile. He’d lure her into the right spot, get her where he wanted her, and have her, forever.
“When we get back to D.C., I want you to move in with me.” No, he hadn’t told Hyde yet, and if the big boss man got pissy and had him transferred, so be it. He wanted Monica with him, in his bed and in his arms as damn often as he could get her.
“Luke…”
“Think about it.” He knew she would. The woman thought about and analyzed everything. Sometimes he didn’t even believe she really rested when she slept. Her mind was always working, maybe because if she was busy plotting and probing, then she didn’t have to look at her past.
He could understand that.
Just as he understood her.
Her head moved in a slow nod.
Luke didn’t even try to control his grin. Her hand came up and smoothed over the light scar on his cheek. Monica’s mark. His heart had been marked by her for years.
“Good, baby, but now I’m afraid we’re gonna have to haul ass.” And he did love her ass. Sweet and heart-shaped. So fine.
He kissed her shoulder and rolled away.
“Are you sure about this?” The worry in her voice stopped him and squeezed his heart.
He forced a smile. “When it comes to us, baby, I have no doubts.”
“I’ve had enough of this shit!” Peter Malone jumped to his feet as soon as Kenton and Sam entered the interrogation room. “My captain should have thrown your asses out the minute you came up with this crap—”
Kenton crossed his arms over his chest and studied the guy. Flushed face. Tousled hair. Eyes that were slits of blue fire. “If you’d told us about your relationship with the victims, maybe we wouldn’t have needed to do things this way.”
Sam headed for the corner. She didn’t usually work interrogations. Sam was more of a behind-the-scenes woman. She spent her time working with her computers, breaking into protected systems, and tracing criminals across the United States with a few keystrokes.
But Kenton wanted her there. Ramirez wouldn’t work for this one. If Malone had to face off against Kenton and Ramirez, the guy would have been too defensive. But Sam, with her soft eyes and nervous hands, well, Malone would think she was the good one.
Yeah, the good agent/bad agent game was played every day. Not just TV bullshit.
Only in this case, Sam wasn’t the good one. She was the one looking for some hard-and-fast vengeance of her own—like Lora. And if Malone was guilty, Kenton had a feeling that the guy would be seeing just how bad Sam could get.
Because unlike Monica, Sam’s control was weak, and he suspected her rage was very, very strong.
“What? Relationship?” Malone shook his head. “I didn’t have a relationship with any of them.”
Kenton tossed the files down on the table. “Really?” He flipped open Tom Hatchen’s folder. “Why didn’t you say you arrested him for domestic abuse?”
Malone’s eyes widened a bit. “Is that what this shit is about? Yeah, I arrested him, and he walked, so it didn’t make a difference. The wife changed her story, for the fifth straight time. A broken nose, broken ribs, black and blue all over, and the woman says she fell down the steps.” His hands slammed down on the table. “Do you know how many times she’s fallen in the last two years?”
Real fury burned in Malone’s voice. Because he was a cop who was tired of seeing a victim hurt? Or more? “Guess she doesn’t have to worry about falling anymore,” Kenton said.
Hit. He saw that on Malone’s face.
Kenton flipped
through another folder. “And when we had Larry Powell right here in front of us, in this very room, you never mentioned that the two of you had… well, brushed paths before.”
“ ’Cause we didn’t—”
“Seven years ago, you were working the Narcotics division.”
“So?”
“You busted him then.” Kenton raised his brows. “How much did it piss you off when he was on the streets again just a few months later?”
The hands on the table balled into fists. “I don’t even remember that! Man, do you know how many drugheads I arrested back then? There’s no way to keep track of them all, not after all this time!”
Maybe. And if it had just been one link, Kenton probably would have let it pass, but—
“How do you explain Charlie Skofield?” Sam asked quietly.
“Who? Skofield?” Malone shook his head. “No, no way! You’ve got this wrong—”
“Do I?” Kenton let the doubt roll in his voice.
Malone’s fists pounded onto the table top. “I’m a cop! Not a damn criminal!”
Kenton crossed his arms and waited.
“Does Lora know what you’re doing? What you’re thinking?”
It’s not him. Her voice drifted through his mind. So sure. So very certain. But she didn’t understand. Sometimes it was really hard to see evil. Especially when it hid behind a friend’s smile and stared you right in the face.
Malone’s right hand lifted, and his index finger pointed toward the two-way mirror. “My captain’s in there, watching, isn’t he?” He heaved out a hard breath. “He’s pissed because I kept working this case. I didn’t get his permission so he’s letting you have a go at me. But I’m not a criminal, dammit! I didn’t set those fires!”
Kenton lifted a brow. “I never said you did.”
Sam eased closer.
Understanding lit Malone’s gaze. “This is about Lora, isn’t it? Man, look, that was one time. One time. Okay? The lady made it clear she didn’t want a repeat performance, so you don’t need to fuck up my career just because you’re a jealous prick!”
Kenton just stared back at him.
Malone ran a shaking hand over his forehead. “That’s it, right? You called me in because—”
“Detective Malone,” Sam’s voice. Gentle and husky. “You were at the scene of Skofield’s car accident. The accident in which Rhonda Myers, a mother of two, was killed last spring.”
His gaze flew to her. “I was on my way home. I saw the lights. That was just chance.”
Kenton leaned forward. “Did you smell the alcohol on his breath?”
He flinched. “I wasn’t working the case! There were other units already there, and he was being loaded into the ambulance by the time I—”
“You smelled the booze. You knew what he’d done.” Kenton flipped open Skofield’s file. “And he got away, didn’t he? Got away with murder.”
“He was paralyzed, stuck in that chair, trapped in his house—”
“But he was alive.” Sam again. “That’s a whole lot more than we can say for Rhonda.” She crept to the table. “And you know it, don’t you? I bet you pulled his file as soon as you got back to the office. You saw all the DUIs. You knew what he was. He killed that woman. He should have been rotting in jail, and that ate you up, didn’t it?”
“The DA’s office had the evidence,” he snapped. “They’re the ones who take the cases. If they didn’t want to press for a murder conviction—”
“Then there wasn’t anything you could do,” Sam murmured.
A nod.
“Well,” Kenton drawled slowly, “there actually were a few things you could do.” He waited for Malone’s gaze to come back to him. “Or rather, a few things Phoenix could do.”
“I am not fucking Phoenix.”
Monica shut the door behind her. “What have I missed?”
Ramirez shook his head. “Not much yet. It looks like the show is just getting started.”
Her eyes narrowed when she caught sight of Sam. In interrogation? Since when?
“Did it piss you off to see them all get away with it? Breaking the law, hurting innocents—did that just make you furious?” Kenton’s voice fired at the cop.
Monica edged toward the viewing window to get a better view of Peter Malone’s body language. Definitely pissed. And nervous. His eyes darted back toward her, or rather, to the two-way mirror. Then he looked back at Kenton.
“I’ve been working this case with you, man. I’ve been trying to find him! I’ve been here.” Peter leaned forward now. “Maybe you’re the one who’s pissed. Your witness is dead and you’re looking to blame someone.”
Beside Ramirez, Captain Lawrence flinched.
Kenton just stared back at Malone.
The cop’s eyes narrowed. “Sure hope you plan to do a better job of watching Lora’s ass. I’d hate to see her wind up like—”
Kenton sprang to his feet and lunged across the table with his arms out and his hands fisted.
Oh, hell. “Ramirez… get in there!”
But Sam had Kenton. She grabbed his arm. “Kenton, easy.”
Monica could tell by his face that easy was the last thing Kenton was feeling.
“Are you threatening her?” Kenton demanded in a voice that was barely human.
“I’d never threaten, Lora. She’s my friend. I want her safe.”
“Do you?” Still that low rumble. “Or do you just want her to pay? Is she guilty, too? Because she rejected you? Just once, right? That’s all you said she wanted.”
Monica saw the cop’s hands flex, as if getting ready for a punch. Kenton was pushing all the right buttons.
Let’s see what happens when Malone’s control breaks.
“I wouldn’t hurt her!”
“Then tell us where you were,” Sam said. So calm in the face of that male storm. “For every kill, give us an alibi.” Her quiet voice seemed to settle Kenton.
Kenton took a deep breath and slowly eased away from her and back into his chair. “That’s right, that’s all you have to do. You’re innocent? We’re wasting our time? Then tell us where you were and all this goes away.”
“Start with Jennifer.” Sam pushed her file across the table. “Where were you on the eighteenth of October?”
“I’m supposed to remember that?”
“Yeah,” Kenton told him. “You are.”
The guy spun away and faced the mirror.
Monica studied him and noted the tense lines on Malone’s face. A lot of rage. And some fear. Now why would the fear be there? Phoenix didn’t strike her as a man who was afraid.
More like desperate for attention. Fame. He’d called the news station because he wanted his fifteen minutes. He’d demanded them.
Then attacked Lora because he hadn’t gotten them.
“You’re not gonna believe this, but I was fishing at my uncle’s cabin near Pontlock Lake.”
“And I’m not going to believe it because?”
Malone’s shoulders drooped a bit. “I was alone. I remember—I remember the date because my captain had to call me in.”
“Called on his cell phone,” the gravelly voice of Captain Lawrence told her. They were the first words he’d said the whole time that she’d been in the room.
Monica glanced over at him, brows rising. “He didn’t have a direct line at the cabin?”
The captain shook his head. Deep grooves bracketed his mouth and eyes. The captain looked older today. Much, much older. And that arrogance she’d seen before? Gone.
“What about the others?” Sam asked, flipping through the files. “Tom Hatchen? Charlie Skofield—”
“Dammit, I was here!”
“Um, no.” Sam looked up at him. “I checked the station log. You were off-duty for all those attacks.”
“No, no.” He turned, giving Monica a side profile view as he ran his hand through his hair again. “Wait, wait! I was here, don’t you remember? When the call came in from Phoenix? I was here, so the
re’s no way it could have been me! We’d just finished up that damn briefing and—”
“You weren’t in the bullpen when the call came in,” Monica murmured even though she knew that he couldn’t hear her. Because as soon as she’d heard Phoenix’s voice, she’d turned and scanned the area. She’d talked to Peter just moments before, but he hadn’t been there.
“It would have been easy enough to duck outside, find a quiet place, and make a sixty-second call.” Kenton cocked his head. “Or did you think we hadn’t considered that possibility? You were there before he called, there after, but no one remembers seeing you exactly when the call came in.”
“This is bullshit!”
“So you’ve said.” One shoulder lifted. “Just give us an alibi. That’s all we need.”
“How about today?” Sam circled around the table and headed toward him. “Tell us where you were when Bob Kyle was killed.”
His lips pressed together.
“You went to the fire station.” Kenton gave him the reminder, not that Monica thought the guy actually needed one. “You left. Where’d you go?”
“Lora’s. You found me there. You know exactly where I was.”
“You’ve got some time unaccounted for there, Malone.”
Killing time?
Malone swallowed. “After I left the fire station, I went straight to Lora’s place.”
“Shit.” The curse came from the captain. “I’m getting him a union rep. We’re not doing this—”
“I’m not gonna stand by and let a friend die.” Malone’s chin was up again. “I went back to search her property, and I was there the whole damn time!”
“Then you’d better hope a neighbor saw you.” Kenton’s body was bow tight. “Because, Malone, it’s not looking good for you. Not good at all.”
“This is one hell of a mess.” Those were the first words Kenton spoke when he and Sam entered the viewing room.
“That’s my cop you’re trying to tear apart in there.” Captain Lawrence finally tried to defend Malone. Right. Too little, too late. “He’s cooperated and answered your questions—”
“And didn’t give me a single alibi,” Kenton snapped. He wasn’t in the mood for any of the captain’s bull. Not then. Not when he could still picture Bob Kyle’s charred remains. “Your detective is the picture of cooperation.” His eyes never left Monica’s face. “What did you see?”