Final Sins

by Michael Prescott

  It occurred to her that this answer might be enough to push Abby entirely over the edge. All she had to do was tighten her grip by another pound or two of pressure and Tess’s airway would close. She stared into Abby’s brown eyes and waited.

  “Right,” Abby said. “I don’t, either.” She relaxed her grip on Tess’s throat just a little. “So don’t tell me about your motivations and your perspective and your good fucking intentions. You got Vic killed.”

  Every instinct shouted at Tess to agree, play along, tell this woman what she wanted to hear. Somehow she couldn’t do it. “No, I didn’t,” she heard herself say.

  “You did.”

  “No, Abby. You did. You’re the one who went to work for Faust, when you should have known better. You’re the one who shot Brody after allowing him to put you in a vulnerable position. You’ve gotten reckless and sloppy, and that’s why Vic Wyatt is in surgery right now.”

  She counted ten heartbeats while Abby took this in. Then slowly Abby released her throat and turned away.

  “Maybe you’re right,” she said in a deflated tone. “I’ve been on the job a long time now. Maybe I’ve gotten too sure of myself. Too willing to take risks that don’t make sense. Maybe I’m not making the right choices anymore.”

  Tess rubbed her throat and thought about drawing her weapon now that her hand was free. But she knew there was no point. She wasn’t going to shoot Abby. And Abby could probably take the damn gun away from her anytime she wanted. “Nobody makes the right choices all the time.”

  “I’m supposed to. When I slip up, people die.” She was silent for a long moment, and Tess knew she was thinking of Wyatt. “How did you get him to call me, anyway?”

  “We appealed to him as a fellow law-enforcement officer.”

  “It had to be more than that. Did you tell him he’d be investigated for passing info to me?”

  “Yes.”

  Abby nodded. “That’s nice, Tess. Very nice.”

  “One of our own people got killed. We weren’t interested in playing around.”

  “Why wasn’t he wearing a vest? You and Hauser had Kevlar. So did the others.”

  “We knew you’d spot a vest under his shirt the minute you saw him.”

  “You could have given him a sweatshirt or a windbreaker to conceal it.”

  “And that wouldn’t have raised your suspicions? Besides, we didn’t expect it to work out like this.”

  “No. You just expected to put me in handcuffs and have me frog-marched to the nearest federal penitentiary.”

  “It wasn’t something I wanted to do.”

  “But you would do it, anyway. Duty, honor, country. Right?”

  “I suppose so.”

  “Loyalty, decency, friendship—those things don’t factor in.”

  “You’re the one who said we weren’t friends anymore.”

  “So it’s back to me again. Great.”

  Abby was quiet for a while. The TV chattered about domestic crimes and foreign intrigues, politics and weather. Tess hardly heard it. She was thinking of Paul Voorhees. Thinking that what she had gone through, when she found Paul dead in the bedroom, was very much like what Abby was going through now. And the worst of it was that this was only the beginning. The first pains of a hurt that would never die. It would fade a little, with time, but it would always be there, trailing her like a shadow, haunting her nights.

  Abby’s voice broke the silence between them. “You know, you wouldn’t last a day in my job. Not a single day.”

  Tess bristled. “I wouldn’t want your job.”

  “Because you couldn’t handle it.”

  “Because I don’t believe in sleeping with the enemy,” she snapped, then regretted it.

  “Brody, you mean? You knew about that, huh?” Abby frowned. “Let me guess. The woman in the main house, Brody’s landlady—she told you.”

  “That’s right.”

  “I had a bad feeling about her. I waved to her, and she didn’t wave back. Mrs. Hunter, that was her name. Brody sent her and her husband out of the house so he could have me alone last night. He ...” The words trailed off as a new expression crossed her face. A look of disappointment so deep it bordered on disgust. “You told Vic, didn’t you?”

  Tess said nothing.

  “Of course you did. More gamesmanship to turn him against me. A nugget of info like that is just too juicy not to use.”

  “We told him.”

  “And that’s what did the trick. He felt betrayed, so he decided to betray me right back.”

  “That isn’t how I interpreted it.”

  “It’s what happened. It’s the human thing to do. And he wasn’t wrong. I did betray him. And ... and he ended up paying for it.” The smooth flow of her speech was breaking up under a rising wave of feeling. “And the last thing ... the last thing he was thinking about me ... was how I’d spent the night with another man. That’s what was on his mind. You shouldn’t have told him, Tess.”

  “I wish it hadn’t been necessary.”

  “It wasn’t necessary!”

  “It was a judgment call. In the same circumstances, you would have done—”

  “Don’t tell me what I would have done. You don’t know me. You don’t know anything about me. You never have.” Tears stood in her eyes, reflecting the shine of the fluorescents overhead. “God damn you, how could you hurt him like that?”

  “I’m not the one who slept with Brody.”

  “No, you’re just the one who used it as a weapon. Even though you had to know how it would make him feel. Hell, you used it because of how it would make him feel.”

  “I used it because we needed to find you and take you into custody.”

  “And that worked out just great, didn’t it?” She slumped in her chair, her voice low. “I could forgive you for everything else, but not this.”

  “Abby—”

  “Shut up. Just shut the hell up. I don’t want to know you. I don’t want to see your face or hear your voice ever again.”

  There was no more talk after that.

  41

  Abby had no idea how long she sat in the waiting room. Time had stopped. A minute was an hour was a week was a year. In meditation exercises she had often tried to achieve the complete cessation of any awareness of time. She’d never quite managed it. Now she had. And all it took was for Wyatt to die.

  She didn’t want to think of it that way. She wanted to believe that he would pull through. The wound had been bad, a sucking chest wound that could easily progress to a tension pneumothorax—but miracles happened.

  He was still in surgery. The doctors hadn’t given up. She shouldn’t, either. There was a chance he would recover. A chance she could make things right.

  But she didn’t believe it.

  What she wanted more than anything was to talk to him again. To hold his hand, look into his eyes, and somehow make amends. She wanted him to know that it hadn’t meant anything, what she’d done with Brody. It had been impulsive and meaningless and stupid and wrong. She wanted him to understand and forgive.

  Even if he didn’t make it—even if she had the opportunity for just one last talk—it would be enough, or almost enough. She needed to make things right. If he died now, with things forever unresolved between them, she wasn’t sure she could go on.

  Yet she felt guilty even thinking this way. Because really it wasn’t about her. It was his life that mattered, not her feelings, her issues. She wasn’t important. The moment she’d seen Wyatt fall, she had ceased to exist.

  A few more people wandered into the waiting room, huddling in small groups, speaking a babble of foreign languages. The TV continued to prattle. As if anyone in this room cared about the news of the outside world. There was no outside world, not for her. There was nothing but blackness and heat and a pain in her gut that felt like bleeding. That was all, nothing else. Maybe there never would be anything else, ever again.

  Over and over she relived the event—that split secon
d when the gun discharged and Wyatt fell. She kept trying to reconstruct what had happened, to make some sense of it. Had she seen the gun before Hauser fired? Had she reached for her purse? If she had reacted faster, if she had stepped in front of Wyatt, could she have taken the bullet?

  The mental review served no purpose. She had no clear idea of the timing or sequence of events. She was only torturing herself by replaying them in her thoughts. Every time she saw Wyatt fall, it was as if she were seeing it for the first time. She felt the same shock, the dizzying rush of blood from her face, the spiraling terror and helplessness.

  Over and over again ...

  She recognized the symptoms of post-traumatic stress. But knowing all about them didn’t make them go away.

  Distantly she became aware of a new person entering the room. Her heart sped up with the momentary certainty that it was one of the surgeons, here to report the outcome of the operation.

  Then she relaxed. It was no one important. Only Michaelson, the assistant director in charge of the FBI field office. She had met him during the Medea case. She hadn’t liked him, and she had no interest in seeing him now.

  Nevertheless, he appeared to have an interest in her. He set down his briefcase and extended his hand. “Ms. Sinclair, I’m very sorry for what’s happened.”

  She barely glanced at him. “Great,” she murmured. “Now get lost.”

  “I’m afraid I can’t leave just yet. There are matters I need to discuss with you.”

  “We have nothing to talk about.”

  He sat next to her, on the opposite side from Tess. “Agent Hauser is in custody. He has made no admission of guilt. But we’ve run his LUD—his local usage details, in other words—”

  “His phone records,” Abby whispered. “I know the lingo.”

  “Yes. Of course. Anyway, he placed a call to Peter Faust less than one hour before the rendezvous at the gas station. He has no explanation for this call.”

  Abby knew its purpose. “He wanted to know if Faust told me who recommended me for the stalker job. He wanted to know what I would say when I was interrogated.”

  Michaelson frowned at her. “That may be correct ...”

  “It is correct. When Faust admitted he’d spilled the beans, Hauser panicked and decided to kill me during the arrest. That’s why he fired without provocation. He wanted to shut me up.”

  “The way Hauser deployed his team at the arrest site was against standard procedure,” Michaelson conceded. “And there are other details that put him in an unfavorable light.”

  Tess spoke up. “What details?”

  “We found Hauser’s car parked a block or so from the gas station. In the glove compartment there were pain pills—a lot of them. Multiple prescriptions from different physicians, filled at different pharmacies. He’d been doctor shopping.”

  “I saw him swallow some pills today,” Tess said. “He claimed they were for arthritis in his knees.”

  “He lied. He’s been seriously ill for some time.”

  “How seriously?”

  “About two months ago he confided in me that he’d been diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. Inoperable, incurable.”

  “I thought he looked older,” Tess whispered. “And ... I caught him looking like he was in pain. I chalked it up to grief over Brody.”

  “Maybe that was part of it. But judging from the stash of pills he was carrying around, I’d say he’s in a lot worse shape than I thought.”

  “If you knew he was sick, why did you let him run the sting operation?”

  “It’s only because he was sick that we even initiated the op. Hauser wanted to go out with a successful operation to his credit. Wanted to balance out the black mark on his record from Medea. He lobbied me for one last shot at bringing Faust down. I should have said no. But under the circumstances, I gave him the okay.”

  Abby had been listening from what seemed like a great distance. “And then he got the chance to take me down,” she said half to herself. “He decided to go for it. Figured if he was checking out, he would take me with him.”

  Michaelson looked away. “It’s possible. But he hasn’t admitted a thing. Hasn’t said a damn word. Maybe he never will. Maybe he’ll hold his peace until ... until it doesn’t matter anymore.”

  “How much time does he have?” Tess asked.

  “A few weeks at most. Actually, I half expected he would be gone by now. He held on, I think, just to see this operation through.”

  “Or to see Abby die. He hates both of us so much.”

  “His career fell apart after Medea. And for Hauser, his career is his life. He never got married, never took a vacation. The job is all he has. Then, on top of everything, he got the diagnosis ... Maybe in some way he blames you for that, too. For his illness. I’m not saying it makes sense, but ...”

  “He thinks we killed him. Abby and I. And he was trying to even the score.”

  There was silence as they took this in. Abby thought perhaps she should feel sorry for Hauser. She didn’t. Had he been in this room right now, she would have killed him with a palm-heel strike to the larynx. Crush his windpipe, watch him asphyxiate. A bad way to die.

  Michaelson turned to Abby. “Your purse is here with me, in my briefcase. Your gun, however, is not inside. Since you have no law-enforcement credentials, you couldn’t carry it around the hospital, so it’s been left in your car. You’ll be glad to know I had your Miata driven here from the gas station. It’s parked in the hospital garage, space C-seventy-one.”

  “Terrific,” Abby murmured.

  “I might also mention that the arrest team found some interesting documents in your vehicle. Items in the name of one Angela Marcus. They had every appearance of providing you with an illegal identity.”

  “That was the idea, all right. I suppose your guys confiscated them.”

  “Not at all. The papers are still in your car.”

  “Doesn’t matter. Now that you know about Angela Marcus, I can’t use that identity anyway.”

  “You have other ways to reinvent yourself, I’m sure.”

  “It’s what I do. Reinvent myself. You know, if you reinvent yourself often enough, you may forget who you really are.”

  Tess was watching him. “I don’t believe you came here just to drop off our stuff, Richard.”

  “Well, no. There are certain outstanding legal matters to be taken care of.”

  Abby regarded him warily. “What legal matters?”

  Michaelson hesitated, looking around the room at the other people in the chairs. Obviously he was reluctant to speak in the presence of outsiders. After a moment he seemed to come to the conclusion that no one else within earshot could speak English.

  “May I remind you that you are the prime suspect in the murder of Agent Brody?” he said in a low voice.

  “You know that was self-defense,” Tess cut in hotly. “That’s got to be clear by now.”

  “Don’t speak up for me,” Abby said. “I don’t need your help.”

  “I understand you’re claiming you acted in self-defense.” Michaelson’s tone was neutral. “But there is no proof.”

  “Then get Hauser to confess.”

  “That may not be possible.”

  “So put him on trial.”

  “He won’t live long enough. Of course, Ms. Sinclair, we could always put you on trial.”

  “I’d be acquitted.”

  “There’s never any certainty about what a jury will do. They could look at someone like you—someone who routinely violates the law, who works under multiple bogus identities backed up by phony paper trails, who obtains evidence by patently illegal methods—well, they could look at you and decide it would be better to keep you off the streets. If there is a trial. There doesn’t have to be.”

  Abby understood where this was going. She wasn’t even surprised. She was past any astonishment at the workings of the human mind. “You want me to make a deal,” she said softly.

  “I would like us to com
e to an agreement, yes.” He placed his briefcase on his knees and unsnapped the clasps. “I’ve brought some documents drawn up by our legal staff. Essentially they absolve you of any guilt in the death of Mark Brody. I am prepared to sign those documents in the presence of Agent McCallum as a witness.”

  “And in exchange?”

  “You will sign a statement pertaining to Lieutenant Wyatt’s injury.”

  “A statement,” she said flatly.

  “Yes. It will say—”

  “I know what it will say.” She was very tired. “The shooting was an accident, and nobody can be held responsible, and the FBI conducted itself with integrity, competence, and professionalism throughout.”

  “Something like that.”

  “You want me to sell out Vic.”

  “It’s not a question of selling anybody out—”

  “Yes, it is. You want me to make it impossible for there ever to be justice in this case.”

  “Justice is not always attainable in the real world, Ms. Sinclair. You know that.”

  “Maybe you ought to put that on the FBI seal. Truth in advertising.”

  Michaelson tried a different approach. “Lieutenant Wyatt is the one who lured you into an ambush. You don’t owe him anything.”

  “He took a bullet for me. That’s got to be worth something, don’t you think?”

  “If you were to go on trial, your identity would be exposed. Your work would be hopelessly compromised.”

  “You really think I give a damn about that?”

  “What about Wyatt’s reputation? Do you care about how he’s seen by the public? By his peers? If all the facts come out, it will be known that he, as an officer of the LAPD, maintained a longtime personal relationship with a ... well, with a vigilante, for want of a better word. That he passed on information to a lawbreaker, and aided and abetted her efforts. Is that how you want him to be ... to be thought of?”

  She knew he had been about to say to be remembered, before realizing that the word was premature.

  The thing was, Michaelson was right. A trial would bring Wyatt’s relationship with her into the open. No one would understand. His memory would be hopelessly soiled.