by Marie Force
“I know,” Tyler said, looking much younger than his seventeen years as tears streamed down his face. “I can’t believe what happened there after we left. It’s like a bad dream.”
It was a nightmare that would stay with the kids who’d gotten out alive for the rest of their lives. Sam didn’t feel the need to share that thought with Tyler, who’d already been through enough. She asked him to write down his name, address and phone number in case she needed to follow up with him. As they were leaving, she shook hands with Tyler and his parents.
“Thanks for coming in. I appreciate it.”
“We asked for you because we know you’re fair,” Pauline said. “I’m glad we did.”
“That’s nice to hear. Thanks.” She walked them out and returned to the interrogation area to see where they were with Brody Mitchell and found Gonzo and Freddie leaning against the wall outside the room, both messing around with their phones while they waited.
“They’re still in there?” Sam asked.
“Yep,” Gonzo said. “What was that about with the visitors?”
Sam updated them on what she’d learned from Tyler. “I think our next move is to track down Billy Springer and figure out where he was on Friday night. If what Tyler said is true, Hugo helped himself to his brother’s stash. Maybe Billy came to his parents’ house with vengeance on his mind.”
“Christ,” Gonzo muttered as Freddie scowled at his derogatory use of the Lord’s name. “Can you imagine Bill Springer on that case?”
Sam rolled her eyes. “That’ll be fun. How do you want to proceed?”
“Does it kill you to ask me that?” Gonzo asked with amusement.
“It causes me physical pain.”
The three of them shared a laugh.
“You and Cruz go find Billy Springer,” Gonzo said. “I’ll get Arnold to help me finish up with Brody.”
“Got it,” Sam said. “We’re on it. I’m also going to follow up with Archie to see if he’s been able to track Hoda Danziger’s cell phone.”
“Sounds good. Keep me posted.”
Sam glanced at the closed door to the interrogation room. “You do the same.”
“If he’s the guy, you’ll be the first to know.”
“Thanks.” As she and Freddie went to the detectives’ pit to gather their belongings, it occurred to Sam that knowing for sure who the fourth guy was wouldn’t change anything for Brooke. She’d still be injured and broken in ways that might never be fixed.
“Hey, Sam,” Archie said as he appeared at her door. “Hoda got curious and fired up her phone, so I’ve got GPS coordinates on her.” He handed her a slip of paper with an address near American University, right where Brooke predicted her friend might be.
“This is great. Thanks so much.”
“No problem.” He took a closer look at her. “How ya holding up?”
“Pretty good, all things considered.”
“And your niece?”
“On the mend.”
“Glad to hear it. Let me know if I can do anything else to help.”
“I appreciate what you’ve already done.”
“That’s what friends are for,” he said with a smile as he took his leave.
“What’ve you got?” Freddie asked when he came to the door wearing one of his signature trench coats. He had white powder on his lips that was indicative of an afternoon snack.
“If you’re going to eat doughnuts on the sly, you might want to get rid of the evidence,” she said, pointing to her own lip.
“Whoops,” he said with an adorable grin as he wiped the powder off his lip.
“Archie found Hoda for us. Let’s go there first.”
“Want me to text Gonzo and let him know?”
“Yes,” Sam said with a smile. “I keep forgetting.”
“We made a bet you couldn’t do it, so I’m impressed at how well you’re doing so far.”
“You actually bet against me?” Sam asked her partner as they headed for the parking lot.
“Not technically. No money exchanged hands, but I might’ve nodded ever so slightly when someone else said they didn’t think you couldn’t do it.”
Sam scowled at him. “I expect better from you.”
“No, you don’t,” he said with a laugh as he nudged her with his elbow. “Come on, admit it. It’s funny.”
“Hardy. Har. Har.”
“I’d think you’d be complimented by the fact that your squad knows you so well.”
“Yes, it’s very flattering,” Sam said in a tone that dripped with sarcasm.
The address Archie had given her was on 47th Street Northwest, a couple of blocks from the American University campus. Upon arrival, they discovered a duplex.
“It’s the one on the left,” Sam said, consulting the paper Archie had given her. She took a look around at the quiet street where nothing seemed to move. Even the leaves on the trees were perfectly still.
“I’ve got an itchy feeling about this,” Freddie said. “Do you think we should call for backup before we go in there?”
“I’d hate to tip her off, but I’ve got the same itch.” Sam reluctantly called for backup and sat tight until two patrol officers arrived in a marked squad car. “You two take the back,” she said to them as she and Freddie got out of her car and proceeded to the front door, where she rang the bell.
When there was no answer, she opened the storm door and pounded on the inside door. “Metro PD. Open up.”
“What do you want?” a male voice asked.
“I want you to open this door before I blow it open.”
“We haven’t done anything.”
“Then you’ve got nothing to worry about. Open the goddamned door.” She and Freddie simultaneously retrieved their weapons and took position on either side of the door.
“Let me see your badges.”
They held them up to the peephole and waited until they heard a series of locks disengaging. The door swung open to reveal a man with brown hair in his early twenties. Dark eyes stared back at her in a surly glare.
“Are you Nico?” Sam asked.
He seemed stunned that she knew his name. “Yeah. So?”
“I’m Lieutenant Holland. My partner, Detective Cruz. We’re looking for Hoda Danziger. Is she here?”
“I don’t know anyone by that name.”
“Are you seriously going to stand there and lie to my face?” Sam asked.
He had the good sense to squirm under her glare.
“Where is she, Nico?”
Releasing a deep sigh, he stepped aside to admit them.
Sam was about to reholster her weapon when a clicking sound had her removing the safety and keying the receiver on the radio attached to her hip.
“Stay right there,” a female voice said. “Don’t come any farther.”
“Hoda, you’re making a huge mistake pulling a gun on cops,” Sam said.
“What do you want?”
“We’d like to talk to you.”
“I have nothing to say.”
“I think you do. I think you have a lot to say, and we can do this the easy way or the hard way.”
“Hoda,” Nico said. “Don’t do this. Don’t make it worse than it already is.”
“How can it get any worse?” she asked, her voice cracking with emotion.
“It can get a lot worse if your finger slips and you shoot a cop,” Sam said.
“I don’t want to shoot anyone, but I don’t want you here.”
“If you put down the gun right now and come talk to us, we’ll forget you pulled a gun on us.”
“No, you won’t! Cops say stuff all the time to get people to do what they want them to do, but I don’t believe you!” Her gun disch
arged, and a bullet whizzed by Sam’s head. If she hadn’t dropped to the right when she did, she’d be dead.
“Take her,” she said into her radio from a crouch on the floor.
Upon hearing what was transpiring inside the house, the patrol officers had entered from the back and apprehended Hoda.
“No! Don’t touch me!”
“Clear,” one of them said on the radio as they dragged Hoda kicking and screaming out of the bedroom into the living room. The girl was strikingly gorgeous, even with a tearstained face and wild-looking dark hair. With a quick glance, Sam could see how she might’ve successfully passed as Brooke’s sister. She wore a revealing tank top that showed off impressive breasts and a pair of barely there panties that left little to the imagination. Her outfit gave Sam a pretty good idea of how she’d passed the time while hiding out with Nico.
“Lieutenant,” a dispatcher said over the crackling radio. “Report.”
“Active shooter neutralized,” Sam said. “No injuries. Send another car for transport.” She slapped cuffs on Nico.
“What’d I do?” he asked as he resisted her.
“Where’d she get the gun?”
“I didn’t tell her to shoot at cops!”
“You made sure she was armed, which makes you eligible for attempted murder charges too. How old are you anyway?”
The words “attempted murder” seemed to have sobered him somewhat. “Twenty-four,” he mumbled.
“And she’s just turned eighteen. Hmmm.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means, scumbag, that the U.S. attorney is going to be really interested in whether your relationship with her began when she was still a minor, and how she ended up in possession of a gun. Her mother has been looking for her for days, and all that time she’s been here. You could be looking at kidnapping charges.” That last part wasn’t true, but he didn’t need to know that.
“Kidnapping? I gave her a place to stay and kept her safe! I didn’t kidnap her!”
“Tell it to the judge.”
“Nico, do something!”
“Shut up, Hoda! I helped you out, and this is the thanks I get?”
She seemed more upset by his harsh words than she did by the fact she was being arrested.
Freddie recited the Miranda warning, advising them to remain silent lest anything they said be used against them in court.
“Nico, please don’t be mad at me. I can’t handle that.”
“Shut up,” he growled.
“I love you! I never meant for any of this to happen.”
“Hoda, I said to shut the fuck up before you make this worse for both of us.”
“How could it be worse? They’re taking me away from you. I need you!”
Sam let them air it out in the hope that they might say something incriminating. She sniffled and wiped at a pretend tear. “This is so heartbreaking, isn’t it, Detective Cruz?”
“I’m positively decimated,” Freddie said, making Sam smile and Hoda cry harder, if that was possible.
“Let’s get crime scene here to go through the place to see what other secrets our friend Nico has been keeping besides his teenage lover,” Sam said.
“I’ll make the call,” one of the patrolmen said. “And we’ll wait for them.”
“Appreciate that,” Sam said. “Make sure they get the bullet she aimed at me.”
“You have no grounds to search my house,” Nico said with growing agitation. “I didn’t do anything. She did.”
Hoda let out a wail that made Sam cringe. “Nico!”
“The minute she pulled a weapon on cops this became a crime scene, pal. Perhaps if you chose playmates your own age, none of this would be happening. Let’s get them to HQ.”
“Keep your fucking mouth shut, Hoda,” Nico growled on the way out the door. “I mean it.”
“Nico, please. I love you. Don’t be this way.”
“I see she has trouble with basic orders,” Sam said with a wince. “That could be a problem when I get her into interrogation.”
“You’re enjoying this, aren’t you?”
“Sure, it makes my day to nearly get my head shot off by an eighteen-year-old girl who’s been allowed to run wild. Are we going to find evidence that you’ve been having all kinds of sex with her while she was holed up with you? Oh, holed up. What a great pun. Did you catch that, Nico? Holed up? Were you holed up in her?”
“You’re a bitch,” he growled.
“It absolutely makes my day when scumbags bring out the B word. Doesn’t it, Detective Cruz.”
“One of your favorite things, Lieutenant.”
They stashed Nico in the back of the second patrol car that had responded to the scene and sent him to be processed.
Hoda, still ugly crying, was put into the back of Sam’s car. When they were on their way to HQ, Sam said, “I hate to see these teenage love affairs go bad.”
“I do too,” Freddie said, rolling with her as he always did. “You never forget your first love, especially when he gives you a gun and encourages you to shoot at cops.”
“He didn’t do that! You don’t know what you’re talking about! I know who you are. You’re Brooke’s aunt. I saved her life! You could be a little more grateful!”
Bingo, Sam thought. Even though she was dying to get into it with Hoda, she would wait until they were at HQ and could record the conversation.
“She knows you gave her parents the money to send her to that school, and she hates you for it.”
While that news was hardly a surprise to Sam, it still hurt to hear that Brooke had expressed hatred toward her. Everything they’d done had been with her best interests in mind, and that it had gone so very wrong...
Hoda sobbed and wailed all the way to HQ, and by the time they got there, Sam felt a headache coming on. “Let’s put her through the paces on the gun charges,” she said to Freddie before they got Hoda out of the car. “Maybe that’ll take some of the starch out of her before we get her into interrogation.”
“Good plan. I’ll take her in.”
While he marched Hoda in through the front door and past the media that was still camped out waiting for news about the case, Sam walked around the outside of the building to the morgue entrance. The smell of snow hung heavy in the damp air. Thick dark clouds hovered over the District as daylight gave way to an early night.
Sam couldn’t wait to get this case closed and hopefully salvage some time with Nick and Scotty during the holiday. With that in mind, she headed straight for the pit looking for an update from her team.
“Hey, LT.” Gonzo took a measuring look at her. “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine. She missed by a mile. Where are we with our friend Brody?”
“He admits to videotaping the rape, but he flatly denies participating.”
“Was he willing to name the fourth guy?”
“Nope. We’re charging him with felony rape, video voyeurism and cyber-porn.”
“Good. I guess the truth about his participation in the assault will be in the DNA. Any word on that?”
“Lindsey put a rush on it, but nothing yet.”
“We got sidetracked in looking for Billy Springer when the shit hit the fan with Hoda and her boy toy.”
“I figured as much. I’ve got his address in Georgetown. We can check it out after the four-thirty meeting.”
Sam would never admit to having forgotten about the meeting. “Sounds like a plan. I need a couple of minutes, and I’ll be right there.”
“Sounds good.”
“Close the door, will you?” The minute she was alone, Sam popped a couple of pills, hoping to put a stop to her headache before it blew up into a migraine. She washed the pills down with an old bottle of water that sat on he
r desk and then reached for her cell phone to call Nick.
“Hey, babe. What’s up?”
“Are you getting ready for your big meeting?”
“All showered and shaved and about to suit up.”
“Wear the dark gray suit with the cranberry tie. I like that one. You’ll look very vice presidential in it.”
“I like how you can joke about this when I feel like I’m going to be sick.”
“I don’t want to add to your stress or anything, but because I’m far more evolved in the marital sharing department than you are, I need to tell you I got shot at earlier. She missed by a mile, but I was the intended target.”
His deep exhale was the only sound Sam heard on the other end of the line for a long, long moment. “Who shot at you?”
“Brooke’s BFF, Hoda.”
“What the hell is a teenage girl doing shooting at a cop?”
“That’s a very good question and one I fully intend to ask her as soon as we’ve broken her spirit a bit with processing, fingerprinting, strip-searching and other fun cop stuff.”
“Here I am just going about my day, and you could’ve been killed.”
“I was nowhere even close to being killed. She’s a bad shot.”
“Good thing she isn’t a lucky shot.”
“I didn’t want you to hear it through the grapevine the way I heard about the VP thing.”
“Your not-so-subtle digs are not so subtle.”
That made her laugh. “I’m just pointing out how much better I am at the sharing stuff than you are lately.”
“I gotcha, babe. Your point has been made over and over and over again.”
“I’m just getting started. Call me the second you leave the White House.”
“I will. Scotty is with Abby and Ethan at Angela’s for dinner. When Spencer gets home, she’s going to run to Tracy’s to get more clothes for Abby and Ethan so they can stay there tonight. I’ll pick up Scotty after my meeting.”
“Thank you so much for helping out with the kids today. I know Tracy and Mike appreciate it, and so do I. In fact, when I get home, I’ll show you how much I appreciate it.”
“I think we need some loft time tonight.”