Darkness pressed into him. He resisted. He felt his phone vibrating. Couldn’t lift his arm to get it. Joe kept yelling at him, but Kurt couldn’t process the words.
The door burst in as Kurt lost his balance and dropped over on his side. Darkness beckoned him.
It occurred to him that Dani would be glad to hear of his death. She would finally be free of him. The thought made him vaguely sad. He wanted to see her beauty just one more time.
Then he couldn’t seem to think as heavy hands pressed on the wound in his chest.
Hot, so hot. Suffocating. Terror sliced through him at the smell of … sulfur? No! I don’t want to die! I’m not ready! God—
Breathing became a memory and the world faded to black.
4
Stuart growled his frustration and watched the Navigator disappear, merged with the flow of the school traffic. He raced back to his white Lexus and gunned the motor. He’d finally checked under the hood and found the loose wires, which caused him to lose precious minutes as he reconnected them. He couldn’t believe Dani had done this. For what? All he wanted to do was protect her from Kurt, because as soon as Kurt found the empty safe and his family gone, he’d kill them.
And Stuart couldn’t let that happen.
Dani was running from Kurt and he had to stop her.
He’d figured she would go after Simon, he’d just been about two minutes too late. All eyes in the carpool line were on him now, including the school resource officer. He flashed his badge at the man, who nodded, but gestured for him to keep it slow in the school zone. Stuart gritted his teeth and nodded back.
He kept his speed right at the maximum allowed, gripping the wheel and steering into the traffic. He went as fast as he dared, having no desire to be pulled over and waste precious time showing his ID. However, he was determined not to lose her. It was time they had a serious conversation about her and Kurt.
His phone rang. “Hello?”
“Stuart? It’s Peter Hastings.”
“Yeah?” He knew he sounded distracted. He was. But he had to fight to keep Dani in his sights. His gut said she was running from Kurt. From him. “What is it? I’m busy.”
“Kurt’s dead.”
Stuart slammed on the brakes and pulled into the nearest parking lot. He let Dani go. She wouldn’t get far and he could always find her later. And she would have no reason to run once she learned Kurt was dead. She’d be back. “What happened?”
“He was shot at the hotel where the conference is. He died at the scene.” Peter blew out a breath. “Man, I’m sorry.”
Surprisingly, Stuart felt a huge hole in the vicinity of his chest. Then the feeling fled. He still had one more thing to accomplish.
He still had to make Dani his.
Completely and in every way. If he didn’t, then Kurt would win. “I’ve got to go.”
“You going to be all right?”
“Yes. Thanks for letting me know.” A deep sigh overtook him. “I guess I’ll need to let my parents know. Or has someone already called them?”
“I think the ASAC called them.”
Patrick Kline, the Assistant Special Agent in Charge. “Good. Good. I’ll, uh, head over there.”
“Let me know if I can do anything.”
“Yeah.” He hung up, his mind still on Dani.
One thing bothered him. She’d cleaned out the safe. Why? What was in the box Kurt had sent him over there to get?
Stuart punched through the red light, a small smile curling his lips. Now he really needed to find Dani.
To tell her Kurt was dead and that she belonged to him now. That he was ready to step in and take care of her from now on. The thought made him smile. “I won, Kurt. I beat you. She’s mine.” Now he just had to find her and tell her.
Dani had checked and rechecked her rearview mirror all the way to the hotel. At the library, where she’d spent as much time as possible when Kurt was gone and Simon was at school, she’d googled and mapped and planned her route. They’d made it to the first stop.
Inside the hotel room, Simon questioned her nonstop, his hands flying at warp speed. “Where are we going?”
“A long way from here.”
“Across country?”
“Yes.”
“To see your mother?”
A pang hit her. “No, that’s the first place your father will look.”
His shoulders drooped. “I want to meet my grandmother.”
“I know, hon. And maybe one day that’ll be possible. I know she’d like to meet you too.” Dani kept her contact with her mother to a minimum. She was too afraid of what Kurt would do if he found out she was in touch with the woman.
Simon flipped on the television and picked up the remote. “I hope they have closed captions here.”
“I’m sure they do.” She didn’t offer to see if she could get them working. Simon knew better than she did how to do that.
The room was nice. Nothing fancy, but it wasn’t a dump either. The money from the safe would carry them for a while as long as she wasn’t extravagant. But she refused to stay in a dangerous area. She’d had enough of danger for the past twelve years. It was time to find out what it felt like to feel safe again.
“Mom?”
She turned to find Simon’s gaze fixed on the television screen.
And she saw why.
“Two FBI agents have been declared dead at the scene of the Crown Vista hotel. We don’t have any more details at the moment …”
“That’s where Dad is, isn’t it?”
“Yes.” She sank onto the bed beside him.
Simon looked at her. “You think it could be him?”
Dani signed that she didn’t know. “Let’s watch.”
As time passed, she and Simon stayed glued to the screen, pausing only to order supper. Finally, a reporter came on the screen. “Alan James has been identified as one of the dead agents. The other agent’s name has not been released yet because his family hasn’t been notified. We’ll be back with more news after this break.”
Simon signed. “We need to find out.”
Dani nodded. “Yes, you’re right.”
“Who can you call?”
“Your dad’s boss.”
5
SIX MONTHS LATER
FRIDAY, DECEMBER 5
SC FBI RESIDENT AGENCY, SATELLITE OFFICE
GREENVILLE, SC
Special Agent Joseph Duncan stepped through the doors and made his way to the small square room he called an office.
“Yo, Duncan, welcome back. Nice job on that last assignment. Took you long enough, though.”
Joe turned and waved at Ralph Thorn, who nursed a cup of coffee on his way to his own desk. “Thanks, man.”
“Six months is a long time.”
“Too long, but not as long as I thought it would be.” He tried to force a smile, but was sure it came out more in the form of a grimace than anything else.
“You been home yet?”
“Nope. Had to stop by here and get caught up a little. Then I plan to go home and sleep for about a week.” Home. He should call it his hovel. Bitterness nearly engulfed him. Two years ago his father had died and left everything to Joe’s older brother. The shining star. The Wall Street executive. The one who already had more money than he knew what to do with.
And Joe? He inherited a trailer park where no one paid the rent unless you hounded them or threatened eviction. Like he had time for that. It was one reason he liked the long undercover assignments. Actually six months wasn’t all that long. He’d been hoping for a year or longer. Maybe next time.
“Sounds good. Let’s get together for lunch when you surface.”
“Right.”
Thorn took a gulp of his brew and disappeared into his office across from Joe’s cubicle.
Joseph Duncan. He shook his head. The name sounded weird. He’d used so many names over the past six months he wasn’t sure who he was anymore.
His phone rang and he sighed
. Word traveled fast. “Duncan.”
“You’re back.” Peter Hastings’s low voice rumbled in his ear.
“I am.”
“Are we on for tonight?”
He frowned. “Tonight?”
“We’ve got a shipment coming in. And we have a buyer for the plates. So bring them.”
Joe sighed and rubbed his eyes. “Tonight. I can’t tonight.”
“We need you there, Joe.”
“I promised my sister I’d help her with something.” He’d told Cheryl he’d bring her some cash. Her bum of a husband had left her with three small kids, and she was struggling just to put food on the table and hold down a part-time job that paid squat. Of course their older brother didn’t care about that. He had only disdain for his two siblings who hadn’t had what it took to make the big bucks. And their father?
No sense in going there, Duncan. “Never mind, I’ll be there.” Joe rubbed his gritty eyes. “I need the money.” His sister needed the money. “Wait a minute. What plates?”
“The plates that Kurt hid and only you know where they are? We’ve been waiting for you to come out from under so we could get them, but it’s been a long, hard wait.”
“Dude, I don’t have the plates. Kurt had ’em, but he didn’t give them to me.”
Silence. “What?”
“He didn’t give them to me.” Joe repeated himself, enunciating each word as though talking to someone who didn’t understand English.
“Joe—”
“You going to make me say it again?”
“Don’t mess with us, Joe. You know what happened to Trennen.” Raw anger filtered through the line.
Joe shook his head in disbelief as his adrenaline gave a sudden rush. He sat up, the weariness of the last six months falling from his shoulders. “You threatening me?”
“Should I?”
Joe felt his blood hum and the anger start to boil in his belly. “You don’t want to go there. I said I don’t have the plates and I don’t.”
A long stretch of silence. Joe waited him out. “Right. Of course. Sorry.”
“Yeah.” Another stretch of silence. “Why would you think I had the plates? Kurt had them last time I heard.”
“Kurt talked about giving them to you for safekeeping.”
“What? Why?”
“I don’t know, man, I’m just telling you what he said.”
“Right. Well, he didn’t give them to me.”
“So you said.”
“Maybe he was planning on it and got killed before he could do it.”
“Maybe.”
Weariness pressed in on him. “Tonight. I’ll be there. We’ll talk more about this when I see you. You’ll have to tell the buyer that the plates are unavailable and we’ll contact him when we have them ready.”
“Right. Like that’s going to go over well.”
“Look, just tell him there was a glitch in one of them, something that needs to be tweaked. He doesn’t want faulty plates, does he?”
“I’ll tell him.”
Joe hung up and sat back, his mind spinning.
He reached for the stack of mail as he thought. Anything business related would have been opened by his designee. Anything personal would have been left alone. Also by his request. When he went undercover, he cut off all ties with any personal life. Which wasn’t much anyway. The only thing he requested was that his paycheck be split in half. Half went to his sister and half went into a savings account.
Anger boiled beneath the surface. Why would Pete think Joe had the plates? Why would Kurt talk to Pete about giving the plates to Joe? That didn’t make any sense.
Joe blew out a frustrated breath. He picked up the phone and dialed Cheryl’s number. He’d called her the minute his plane landed, telling her he’d watch the kids for her while she had some much needed time to herself. And now he was going to have to renege. He hated it for her, but it couldn’t be helped. The phone rang three times. “Hello?”
“Hey there, Princess, is your mom home?”
“Hey, Uncle Joe. She’s here, but I want to talk to you first.” His five-year-old niece loved talking on the phone. Joe closed his eyes. As much as he loved his sister’s kids, he didn’t have time to talk.
“Can’t talk right now, kiddo, get me your mom.”
“Say please.”
“Please.”
“Pretty please?”
Joe bit his tongue on the words he really wanted to say. “Pretty please, Gina. Now get your mom.”
“Well, you don’t have to be mean about it.”
Joe winced and shook his head.
“Brat,” he muttered, but couldn’t help the smile. His sister and her kids were the only people on this earth that he cared about. And he needed money to take care of them.
“Hey. You’re backing out on me, aren’t you?” Cheryl sounded weary and run-down.
“Yeah. But when I’m done, I’ll come spend the night and you can sleep in and get up and go do whatever you need to do.”
“Okay, thanks, Joe.” The relief in her voice hit him hard. “Thanks.”
“Sure.”
He hung up and rubbed his eyes. A rap on the side of his cubicle brought his head up. “Hey.”
“Hey.” Stuart slipped into the chair across from him. “Welcome back, partner.”
“Yeah.” Joe snorted. “Welcome back to me. It never stops, does it?”
“Nope.”
Joe gave his eyes another scrub. “So, how’s it going?”
“Got a lot to tell you about.”
“Like?”
Stuart snickered. “Like the case that landed on my desk this morning.”
“What case?”
“Some old woman thought her kid was growing pot in her basement, so she called us.”
Joe rolled his eyes. “And?”
“I rode out there. He’s not growing pot, he’s growing a garden and selling the vegetables.”
“Inside?”
“Yeah. It’s like the perfect greenhouse down there. Said he was desperate to get out from under his mother and found he can do this and make pretty good money.”
“How old’s the kid?”
“Fifteen.”
Joe snorted and Stuart laughed. “I know.” He leaned forward, wondering if Stuart knew anything about the plates. “So, did Kurt ever talk to you about his cases?”
“Kurt?” Stuart shrugged. “No. We didn’t talk if we could avoid it, you know that.”
“Right. Right.”
Stuart leaned back and crossed his arms. “Why would you even ask that? What are you after?”
Joe stood. “Nothing.” If Stuart had the plates, he didn’t want to press the issue. Not yet. He’d just wait and watch. “I’ve got to go. Catch you later.”
Stuart frowned, suspicion glinting. Joe ignored it and left, feeling Stuart’s gaze drilling holes in his back.
Not all plans worked out, the watcher knew that. In fact, most of the time, plans fell through because they weren’t thought out to completion. The planner was too hasty in his need to put it into action.
However, the watcher had prepared for this. Planned, schemed, lied, and done whatever it took to make sure all the players were in place. Like chess pieces on the board, they only moved where the watcher guided them.
There were a good many players. Too many almost, but the plan would work. No doubt about that. It had to.
Ironically enough, the watcher had enjoyed putting the plan together and manipulating the players in this deadly game. However, it was time for everything to come to a head.
Time for the pieces to take over and do their job.
Revenge was the ultimate goal and no one would stop the watcher from achieving it.
6
SATURDAY MORNING
DECEMBER 6
Stuart tossed the file onto his desk and sat with a thump on the faux leather chair. Saturday mornings at the office were usually slow. Normal business hours during the week were from
8:15 to 5:00, but no agent actually kept those hours, so when Stuart came in on Saturday, he usually had company. This morning seemed quieter than usual. Just the way he preferred it. But he couldn’t concentrate on what he needed to get done.
All he could think about was Dani. And the fact that she wasn’t cooperating with him at all. He wasn’t sure what her problem was, but he’d about had enough of it.
He had to show her she needed him. It had been six months since Kurt’s death. Long enough for her to grieve. Or at least put on the appearance of grieving. He wasn’t sure she was actually sad Kurt was gone, but he’d allowed an appropriate amount of time to pass before suggesting they start dating.
And she’d turned him down flat.
He attributed that to the fact that she just didn’t know what she wanted. After all, Kurt hadn’t let her hardly think for the past twelve years.
A rap on the door brought his head up. Joseph Duncan, his partner. Stuart decided if he had someone to call a friend, it would be Joe—even if the man had also been friends with Kurt.
“Hey man, can I talk to you?” Joe asked.
“Yeah. Sure. Have a seat.”
Joe settled himself into the chair opposite Stuart and leaned forward. “How’s it going?”
“It’s going. What are you doing here on a Saturday morning? Figured you’d be with your sister and her kids.” Joe tried to reserve Saturdays for them. He couldn’t do it every week, of course, but Stuart couldn’t think of anything the man had to take care of that couldn’t wait until Monday morning.
Joe waved a hand of dismissal. “I wanted to talk to you and make a few phone calls.” He took a deep breath. “So … how are you handling Kurt’s death?”
Stuart narrowed his eyes. “You know Kurt and I were never close. More competitive than anything.”
“Yeah. I know.”
“So I guess you could say I’m handling his death just fine.”
“How about that pretty wife of his?”
Nowhere to Turn Page 3