The Triple Threat Collection

by Lis Wiehl

  “I’m FBI Special Agent Nicole Hedges.”

  Nic shook the woman’s hand. Her name was Sara McCloud. Leif came up behind Nic and introduced himself as well. Nic nodded in his direction without actually focusing on his face.

  “And this is my son, Noah,” Sara said.

  Leif gave him a little wave.

  Nic bent down a little to look into the kid’s eyes. “Hello, Noah.”

  “Hi,” Noah mumbled, suddenly shy.

  “They told us what you needed to talk about,” Nic said as she straightened back up. “Given the subject matter, before we begin, let me get someone to watch your son.”

  Dixie wouldn’t appreciate being turned into a makeshift babysitter, but no kid should have to hear what they needed to discuss.

  Sara gave her head a short, sharp shake. “No. I won’t let him out of my sight.”

  Nic recognized a mama bear when she saw one. She wouldn’t be any different with Makayla. She exchanged a look with Leif.

  “I understand,” Nic said. “Let’s see if our large conference room is available. That would give us some space to have him in your sight and still give us some privacy.” Maybe she could get the boy a pen and some paper from the printer, find a radio and set it to something that would mask their words.

  The conference room was free. Not only that, but in the corner sat the rolling cart that held the TV they sometimes used to watch the news or a press conference. Nic turned it on, getting FOX, and then flipped through the channels until she found a Little Bear cartoon.

  Leif tugged one of the black padded chairs from under the table. He parked the chair right in front of the TV, then leaned down to address Noah. “Why don’t you hop up and watch cartoons?”

  Noah’s eyes widened. Nic followed his gaze. Leif’s jacket was unbuttoned, and the kid could see the holster on his hip.

  Leif buttoned his jacket closed. “It’s okay. I’m an FBI agent. Like a police officer. I’ll keep you safe.”

  Noah gave a tiny nod and then climbed up into the chair and turned to look at Little Bear. As he did, he gave the kind of sigh a man might make after coming home from a long day of work and cracking open a beer.

  “So tell us what happened,” Nic said as the three of them sat down at the far end of the table. She took her notebook from her pocket. Leif did the same.

  In a low voice Sara told them about going to the park, seeing a man, and then not paying much attention to him until suddenly he was pushing a gun into her ribs as she unlocked her front door. “He said he had to kill me or someone would kill him. He looked—desperate. But also like he didn’t really want to do it. He didn’t even seem to know how to hold the gun.”

  And, Sara related, the man had eventually decided not to kill them. Instead he had used his cell phone to snap a photo of them playing dead and sent it to someone.

  “I thought hired killers were supposed to be nondescript. You know, someone who could blend into a crowd.” Sara shivered. “No one who saw this guy would ever forget him.”

  “What do you mean?” Leif asked.

  Sara ran the fingers of her right hand over her face and then held out her left hand, stiff and twisted. “He has burn scars on his face, and his left hand had been burned too. It looked more like a claw.”

  Nic made a note. “Were these burns recent, do you think?”

  “No. They looked old.”

  “You’re right about those scars,” Nic said. “They should make him easier to track down. Do you have any idea who did this?” She had heard that doctors made better diagnoses if they simply asked patients what they thought was wrong with them. It was the same with victims. They often had a better idea about what had happened and why than the professionals. “Who do you think is behind it?”

  “Someone burned my house down a couple weeks ago. And I think it was this guy. That would make sense, right? Those were burn scars on him. You know, like he was someone who was used to fire. But this thing with the gun, it clearly wasn’t his idea. He just kept saying if he didn’t kill me, they would kill him.”

  “Who’s they?” Leif asked.

  “He wouldn’t say.” Sara’s eyes were suddenly wet. She glanced sideways at Noah. He was watching Little Bear walk on a log across a stream. Sara lowered her voice even further, so that it was a near whisper. “But it has to be my ex-husband. The thing I can’t believe is that he wanted Noah to die.”

  “Why do you think it was your—” Leif interrupted himself. “What’s your ex-husband’s name?”

  “Ian McCloud.” Sara pressed her fingers against her lips, and her eyes got wider and wetter. A few seconds ticked past before she could continue.

  “And the reason I think it has to be Ian is because this guy insisted I couldn’t tell anyone where I was going. Not my friends, not my family. Why would he say that if it wasn’t Ian? You’re going to tell me my mom or my stepdad or my brother or my best friend wants me dead? No way. So who did this guy think they would talk to? Ian.

  “Lately he has been telling me he wants to adjust the terms of the divorce settlement. He makes almost a million a year, but he says he can’t afford to pay me what he agreed to. After our home burned down, I told him we needed more money until the insurance paid out. We needed to find a rental, but instead Ian suggested we should move back in with him. Temporarily.” Sara’s voice began to break. “I thought he was just trying to save money. Now I think he really just said that so he would know where we were when he sent this guy after us.”

  “Wait.” Leif looked up from the notes he was taking. “You’re saying you’re divorced but living under the same roof ?”

  Sara shrugged one shoulder. “It’s a little weird, I know. We were building our dream house when we got divorced. I moved into the new house, but Ian kept the old one. It has a guest bedroom with its own bath. And Ian said it would be good for him to spend more time with Noah. It was just going to be for a couple of months, until our house was rebuilt. I got the new house in the divorce. Maybe he was mad about that too.” She scraped her fingers through her untidy hair.

  “How long have you been divorced?” Leif asked.

  “Two years.”

  “Whose idea was it?” Leif asked.

  Nic followed up. “Was there another woman?”

  Sara’s laugh was bitter. “There was always another woman, and there always will be. Ian’s good looking, he’s well known, he works long hours, and he likes to blow off steam at bars.”

  “If you don’t trust him,” Leif asked gently, “then why did you move back in with him?”

  “Well, obviously, I never thought he would kill me. Never!” Sara glanced at Noah and lowered her voice. “Sure, Ian can be a jerk. But he loves Noah. At least I thought he did. Now I guess I’ve learned he just thinks of both of us as nothing more than a drain on his finances.”

  If Sara was right, Noah’s dad had tried to have his own son gunned down in cold blood. Nic glanced at Noah again, but the child was totally absorbed by the TV. Could you even understand that when you were five? How would you make sense of it?

  Leif said, “We are going to need to keep you out of sight until we can get this guy with the burn scars locked up and find out who’s really behind what happened.”

  “I told you,” Sara said. “It’s got to be Ian.”

  “You could be right. It could be your ex-husband. And if it is, he’ll have figured out by now that you’re not dead, photo or no photo.” Leif paused. “But what if it isn’t him? We need to make sure the scenario of you being dead remains believable.”

  “We could put something out in the media,” Nic suggested. “Say the bodies of a woman and child were found, and that the police aren’t releasing the names until the next of kin are notified.”

  Leif nodded. “If Ian is behind it, he’ll know it’s a lie, because he never found any bodies. But anyone else could well take it as proof.”

  Sara shivered, and Leif patted her hand with his big square one. Some of the tension
left her shoulders.

  Nic wasn’t aware that she had been watching Leif until his eyes caught hers. Her chest hurt, like her heart was being squeezed. Biting her lip, Nic looked away. This was work, and this was professional, and that was all it could be.

  She forced herself to the matter at hand. How could they keep Sara and her little boy safe while they figured out who was behind the would-be hit man? The FBI had a couple of safe houses available, but they were usually used for undercover agents and prosecutors to get together. Not the kind of place where you could indefinitely put up a woman and her kid.

  “Do you know anyone in Seattle?” Nic asked.

  “Seattle?” Sara shook her head. “No. Not really.”

  “Good,” Nic said. “You should drive up there and stay in a motel until we can figure this out. Find a place off the Interstate with a microwave and a little refrigerator. Stay inside the room as much as possible. And don’t contact anyone. Not your friends, not your family, not anybody.”

  Sara’s eyes looked lost. “But how will I pay for it? I used most of my cash last night getting a room, and it wasn’t easy finding a place that wouldn’t run a credit card. But I didn’t want Ian to be able to find us.”

  “We have a protection fund for witnesses and victims,” Leif said gently. “Even a special credit card that can’t be traced back to you. Do you have a cell phone and a charger?”

  “Yes.” Sara closed her eyes and pinched the bridge of her nose. “I keep one in my car.”

  “Good,” Leif said. “Keep it charged and on you at all times. We’ll give you our cell numbers. But if it doesn’t say Leif Larson or Nicole Hedges or FBI on the caller ID, then don’t answer.”

  CHAPTER 46

  Portland Fitness Center

  Cassidy was actually early to boot camp class. There she channeled all her energy into squats, jumping jacks, and triceps kickbacks. Being on the trail of a hot story was nearly as good as being in love. She didn’t need sleep. She didn’t need food. All she needed was lots of coffee, her cell phone, and a few leads.

  Elizabeth was wearing the Nike jacket that Cassidy had bought for her. After class, Cassidy waited for her to say something about paying her back for all the clothes she had bought at Nordstrom.

  But instead she patted Cassidy’s shoulder. “I saw you on the news last night. The story about that Jenna was scary. Are you friends with her?”

  “Friends? With Jenna? I guess I’m more like her mentor. But it’s starting to look like she was trying to get more airtime by covering stories on her own. Stories she didn’t tell anyone else about.”

  Elizabeth’s eyes went wide. “What do you mean?”

  “I found a recording on Jenna’s voice mail of a guy telling her to meet him at the motel where her purse and keys were found.”

  “Are you kidding?” Elizabeth’s blue eyes got even bigger. “Oh my gosh, it must have been a message from the guy who killed her!”

  Cassidy was a little put out that Elizabeth had figured it out so fast. “It sure looks that way.”

  “Did he say his name or anything?”

  “No,” Cassidy said. “But the cops are tracing the call to figure out what number it came from.”

  “And you’re the one who realized it was on Jenna’s voice mail?” Elizabeth said as she leaned over to retrieve her jacket.

  Cassidy nodded. “I figured out how to hack into the system.”

  “Wow! You’re like a regular Nancy Drew.” Elizabeth slipped her toned arms into the jacket’s sleeves. “They don’t even need the police with you on the case.”

  Cassidy grinned. It wasn’t until she was in the shower that she remembered that Elizabeth hadn’t said one word about paying her back.

  Two hours later, Cassidy was sitting at a long table along with the rest of the Channel Four staff, waiting for the nine a.m. story meeting to begin. Normally Eric Reyna, the assignment editor, would already be standing at the whiteboard, juggling a handful of colored dry-erase markers as he led them in planning out the noon broadcast.

  But Eric was late. Cassidy couldn’t remember the last time that had happened. Or if had ever happened. But she guessed everyone was human. Even Eric.

  She took advantage of the time to jot down some interview questions for her next story on Jenna. Jenna’s parents and boyfriend had flown in the night before, and they had tentatively agreed to meet with her this morning. They had told Cassidy they were turning down all media requests, but she had managed to frame it as an exchange of information. Now she was impatient for the meeting to get started, because the sooner it started, the sooner it would finish. And then she would grab a cameraman and go.

  But when Eric finally came in, he wasn’t carrying copies of compiled story ideas to pass down the table. Instead, his hands were empty and his thinning gray hair stood up in tufts as if he had been tugging at it. All eyes went to him.

  “I was just listening to the police scanner,” he said.

  Like all the other Portland radio and TV stations, Channel Four monitored police, ambulance, fire, and public utilities transmissions. Everything from traffic warnings to big breaking stories could start with a staticky transmission heard on the scanner.

  “A canoeist just found a body on the Washington side of the Columbia River. According to the scanner, it’s a woman in her twenties with long blonde hair. Fully clothed. And with a gunshot wound to the chest.”

  Anne Forster, the business reporter, sucked in her breath. Otherwise, the room was silent as mouths dropped open and eyes went wide with shock. News was something that happened to other people—not to the folks who covered it.

  Jeff Caldwell, the political reporter, finally gave voice to what everyone was thinking. “So it’s Jenna, then?”

  Eric sagged into a chair. “It will be awhile before it’s official, but I would say you’re right.”

  People’s eyes automatically went to the corner of the table where Jenna normally sat, bouncing a bit on the blue exercise ball she would roll over from her cubicle and then roll back.

  Cassidy began rapidly recalculating what this would do to her story. The chance that she would actually get to talk to Jenna’s parents or boyfriend had probably dwindled to near zero, unless she got really lucky. And what would the discovery of the body do to the story? Make it bigger—or smaller?

  She finally broke the silence. “Eric, did you send out a cameraman in case we can get footage of Jenna’s body being recovered?”

  It felt a bit cold to ask, but the B-roll—film without narration— of a body bag being loaded into an ambulance would add depth to the story.

  “Andy’s on his way out there now.” Eric’s mouth twisted. “I still can’t believe this is happening.”

  “I think we should cut in,” Brad declared.

  Normally, the station only interrupted regular programming for national emergencies or crazy weather. Then again, at this time of day, Channel Four broadcasts a string of game shows.

  “Let the viewers know. Jenna deserves that. As far as we know, she died in the line of duty.”

  “We don’t know yet that she has died at all,” pointed out Alissa Fontaine, Brad’s new coanchor. She smiled at him with teeth that seemed too big and too white to be real. Veneers, in Cassidy’s opinion.

  Cassidy felt the mood shift, from shock and sadness to anger. Directed at Alissa. The outsider.

  “There aren’t a lot of murders around here, Alissa,” Eric said. “Maybe two a month, and 90 percent of those are related to drugs. Something like this—a beautiful girl slaughtered—it’s practically unheard of.” He took a deep breath and seemed to gather himself. “That reminds me, Cassidy. The scanner also said a guy was found shot to death in Forest Park. No ID yet on the body, but it sounds like it won’t take long. They said it looked like he had pretty bad burn scars, old ones, like from a fire.”

  Forest Park was Portland’s crown jewel, a 5,000-acre forest in the middle of the city. It attracted trail runners, hikers, bird-watc
hers— and the occasional serial killer.

  This meant Cassidy’s beat would be the big one today and for several days to come. Viewers would want to know everything, not only about Jenna, but also about this dead guy.

  If it bleeds, it leads had never been more true as local TV news struggled to stay alive and relevant in a world where anyone could immediately download the latest headlines to their phone and no one had to wait around for the five o’clock news.

  People had shorter attention spans and didn’t care for reams of dry facts. An exciting or heart-tugging story would always get more airtime than a story about an international trade agreement that would affect millions of people. Leaping dogs at a dog show or leaping flames at a house fire trumped coverage of a city council meeting any day.

  And when two bodies—one belonging to a beautiful young woman—were found in one day? Jackpot for the local news.

  “I’ll see what I can find out from my sources,” Cassidy said. “About both of them.”

  CHAPTER 47

  Southeast Portland

  There was so much blood,” Clark said. For the millionth time. He was lying facedown on the couch in his apartment, his voice muffled by his arm.

  “I know, baby. I know.” Absently, Elizabeth rubbed the small of his back. She was watching the local evening news with the closed-captioning turned on. A minute ago Cassidy had been on, and Elizabeth had paid rapt attention.

  She’d had to bite her lips to keep from smiling when she read on the screen that a woman and her child had been found murdered in Northwest Portland, but that police were withholding more information until they notified the next of kin. She gloried again in the idea that her rival was dead, as was the child who would always have competed with Elizabeth for Ian’s time, attention, and money.

  There had been no mention of Joey, or of an unidentified body found in a park. But Clark had said it had been in the back part of the park, the part where few people ventured.