Jack kissed them until his face was wet with her tears. “Weep no more, my love. Weep no more, I beg of you.”
And she did.
Epilogue
Special Agent Cynthia Deming wheeled IT tech Vivian O’Grady down the hall toward her hospital room, and couldn’t wipe the smile off her face. She was so happy for Benton. It wasn’t easy to find the love of your life, and he had, and he was so damn lucky. She almost felt envious, until she thought about all that would entail. Making someone else a priority. Putting your life on hold to fill their needs. Relying on them to feel as strongly about you as you did about them… She shook her head, trying to push past the knot of anxiety such thoughts created.
Ahead, the elevator binged and opened. Special Agent Gilroy stepped off, looking harried and confused. When he saw her and Vivian, he immediately relaxed. He zeroed in on Vivian. “I went to your room first and saw you were gone, Miss O’Grady.” He glanced at Cynthia and frowned. “What’s this about Cambridge waking up?”
Cynthia nodded. “It’s true, but don’t go in there yet.”
Vivian nodded and blushed. “They’re having…a moment,” she said.
Gilroy’s expression softened even more as he approached, and Cynthia had to bite her lip not to rib the agent. He and Vivian had gotten closer these last three weeks. Opposites attract, she supposed. Vivian’s softness to Gilroy’s hardness. Vivian’s overflowing emotionalism to Gilroy’s… Cynthia struggled to describe Gilroy. He hated drama of any kind and was the first to run if something resembling an emotion was aired in his vicinity. Yet the man had glommed onto Vivian.
Gilroy tilted his head to the side and gave Cynthia a look. “I’ll bring Vivian back to her room.” Then he took the wheelchair handles and pushed Vivian on to the elevator. When Cynthia attempted to step on the elevator, too, Gilroy shook his head. “We’re heading up.” He widened his eyes, signaling he didn’t want her to play fifth wheel, so Cynthia stepped back into the hall, no longer able to repress her laugh. She was face-to-face with a scowling Gilroy and a blushing Vivian as the elevator doors closed them inside.
And then she was alone. It felt weird.
Cynthia pressed the elevator button.
There were three elevators, and the numbered lights above them made clear that none were anywhere near her floor. Smoothing down her perfectly pressed Christian Dior suit jacket, she glanced left and right down the hall. There were uniformed police officers milling in front of Hannah’s room. Now that she’d woken from her coma, Cynthia suspected there’d be a long stream of visitors checking in on her, needing to reassure themselves that she was okay. It was nice. Cynthia was happy for her. Happy for the couple.
She pressed the elevator button again, and then impatiently tapped her Louboutin pump against the floor. Benton was still on family leave, but Cynthia was supposed to meet Special Agents Modena and Gilroy after lunch, downtown at FBI headquarters. Apparently, an old case was rearing its ugly head again, and they were to be debriefed.
An elevator binged, she turned toward it and when the doors opened, Charlie stood front and center inside, a huge bouquet of flowers gripped in his right hand.
“Charlie.” Cynthia’s jaw dropped. Why she was surprised to see him was beyond her, but she was. “You brought flowers.” That was sweet. And so like Charlie. She swallowed hard, pushing down the myriad of emotions that always swirled inside her when she was anywhere near him.
He stepped off the elevator. “I heard she’d woken up.”
The doors started closing. She reached for it like a lifeline, then stepped on the elevator. “Yeah. I’d give the happy family a moment or two, or you might walk in on something you can’t unsee.”
Charlie frowned, taking a step closer until his large frame walled her into the elevator, trapping her. “Why are you doing this, Cynthia?” He seemed truly puzzled, and it drove her insane.
Why was she avoiding him? Why did she turn into someone totally different whenever he was around? Why did she take a job that ensured being away from Boston for long stretches of time? A normal man wouldn’t have to ask. He’d know. But Charlie wasn’t normal. He was perfect. Damn him.
As the elevator doors began to close again, Charlie seemed poised to reach for her to force a confrontation. Instead, his fist clenched around a bouquet he’d bought for another woman. They stared at each other, their gazes holding until the doors closed with a clang and she was alone again, the elevator moving down to ground level.
“Damn.” Cynthia took a quick breath and looked up, blinking tears away. She would not feel these things. She refused to feel these emotions.
If Charlie found out she’d fallen in love with him, it would ruin what was left of their friendship, and other than her job, Charlie was all Cynthia had left.
Meet the Author
Kris Rafferty was born in Cambridge, Massachusetts. After earning a bachelor’s in arts from the University of Massachusetts/Boston, she married her college sweetheart, traveled the country, and wrote books. Three children and a Pomeranian/Shih Tzu mutt later, she spends her days devoting her life to her family and her craft.
Don’t miss the next book in
Kris Rafferty’s wonderful series,
SECRET AGENTS.
DEADLY PAST
is about Cynthia Deming and Charlie Foulkes…and their
romantic, suspenseful story.
Coming to you in
December 2018!
If you enjoyed CATCH A KILLER
by Kris Rafferty,
make sure you read the first book
in the
Secret Agents series:
CAUGHT BY YOU
available at your favorite e-tailer
Turn the page for a quick peek!
Chapter 1
“Deming? Are you insane?” Special Agent Vincent Modena was in the back of the FBI’s surveillance van, kneeling knee to knee with Special Agent Cynthia Deming, the task force’s profiler. It wasn’t Deming who was the problem; it was the five-pound flounder she held by the gills. It was staring at him, and smelled hideous.
“Your cover is a week-long fishing trip. You’re too clean.” Deming narrowed her blue eyes, and then slapped the fish against Vincent’s chest.
“Stop!” He grabbed her wrist, processing the moment. Rich, blond, gorgeous Cynthia Deming, in a black Dolce & Gabbana suit and heels, was on her knees swinging a fish. Nope. He was living it and still didn’t believe his eyes. Meanwhile, the flounder hung limp in the air between them. “I’m supposed to keep Avery Coppola in the diner, Deming. Hit me with that again, and the smell will chase her out.” She broke his grip, seemingly teetering between agreeing and having another go at him with the fish.
Special Agent Jack Benton, FBI task force team leader, jumped from the van’s passenger seat into the back. “What the hell?” He grimaced, glaring at the profiler and Vincent, as if Vincent had anything to do with the fish. He didn’t.
“Exactly,” Vincent said. “What the hell, Deming?”
“What’s with the fish?” Benton’s black hair hung in his face, obscuring the intensity in his blue-eyed gaze. His yearlong deep embed with Dante Coppola’s syndicate crashed and burned yesterday, requiring the task force to extract him. His split lip hinted at the bruises and abrasions hidden beneath his conservative black suit and tie, but it was the banked rage that made his team nervous. Benton hadn’t taken time off to shake his role of gunrunner, and some deep embeds needed more recovery time than others, but he’d escaped with a lead, so Benton wasn’t going anywhere. The lead was, Coppola hired contract killers to find and kill his ex-wife and her little sister. Rumor had it, when she’d divorced him three years ago, the ex-wife left with incriminating files. Now, Coppola knew where the ex-wife was, and so did Benton. It appeared as if the task force lucked out and got here first.
“The fish is necessary for authenticity,” Dem
ing said. “Modena’s too…” She waved a hand at him. “Handsome.”
“Hey, Benton.” Vincent held Deming gaze and then winked. “Deming thinks I’m handsome.”
She shook her head, barely paying attention to Vincent. “Maybe clean is a better word. After a week of backcountry camping, he wouldn’t be this clean.” She used the back of her wrist to nudge a blond lock off her cheek. “No one sleeps outside for a week, lives off fresh catch of the day, and doesn’t suffer from puffy face and bad hair. Avery’s clever and distrustful. She’s had to be to escape detection for three years with a sister in tow. With contract killers on her scent, she’ll smell a rat if Modena doesn’t commit to his backstory.”
“She’ll smell something.” Special Agent Harris Gilroy was the task force’s official driver. Blond hair cropped to his head, brown eyes, mid-thirties, he looked like an Irish bare-knuckle fighter, crooked nose and all.
“His backpack is enough of a prop,” Benton said. “Get rid of the fish, Deming.”
“Fine.” She tossed it into a Styrofoam cooler, and then stripped off her latex gloves, throwing them inside, too. She seemed on edge. Yesterday’s violent extraction of Benton had notably rattled her, rattled them all, as did the dead bodies the team left behind. And when Deming was rattled, she distracted herself with details—like Vincent’s backstory and a fish—so Vincent tried not to take the fish assault personally.
“Our warrant is to surveil Avery Coppola’s apartment,” Benton said. “Unfortunately, I couldn’t convince the judge that rumored files containing alleged evidence is grounds for a search warrant, so we watch and wait for Coppola’s men to make their move. If the files are in her apartment, she either surrenders them, or we need probable cause to take them. If Coppola’s men find her, maybe make a move on her at the apartment, we’ve got them and our probable cause, so cross your fingers. Modena, you keep an eye on her at the diner while we set up the cameras outside of her apartment. I want any potential attack on video. Let a judge and jury see who these monsters are, and if we’re forced to bust into her apartment to save her, and happen to find evidence, they’ll be forced to make our findings admissible in court. Time is short, folks. We have no idea when Coppola’s men will show, but this isn’t rocket science. If she has files, which my contact assured me she does, it’s probably hidden in her apartment. Coppola’s men have to know that.”
“Yeah, about that, Benton,” Deming said. “I think I should go in the diner instead of Modena. Look at him. He looks dangerous. She’ll think he’s a contract killer, maybe run, and ruin the whole operation. We can think of a different backstory for me.”
“Deming, you’d be walking into a backwoods diner wearing Dolce & Gabbana,” Vincent said. “Do you really think you’ll get anywhere near her without making her suspicious? And Benton knows I have advantages you don’t have.” He allowed a slow smile to crack his lips. “Leave the ex-wife to me.”
She shook her head, still not convinced. “But—”
“I know. I know. I’m handsome, clean, and dangerous.” Vincent winked, trying not to enjoy Deming’s annoyance too much. Being on the sidelines was twisting her in knots. She wanted in on the action, and he didn’t blame her, but he’d waited too long to meet Avery Coppola to just give this moment away. “I think you’re crushing on me.”
“Blow me, Modena.” She turned toward Benton, waiting for his decision.
“We stick with the plan,” Benton said. “Modena, go.”
Gilroy reached into a console between the two front seats and produced a bottle of Febreze. He aimed it into the back of the van and sprayed with no concern for whom he doused. Between the fish smell, and being gassed by Gilroy, Vincent found it a relief to spill out into the parking lot, backpack slung over his shoulder.
As the task force sped off in the van, heading down the street toward Avery Coppola’s apartment, Vincent walked toward the diner, passing a multitude of beat up SUVs and trucks, listening to his hiking boots crunch gravel underfoot. The chirping of birds, the breezes rustling through maple and oak leaves, it was a nice change from the city. August in the North Country of New Hampshire, mountainous. Vincent was enjoying himself, and the diner’s aromas wafting through the air. His stomach growled as he approached the door, but his thoughts were all on the woman inside.
Avery Coppola. Damn. Her name had been popping up in the Coppola case for a year now, but Vincent had only actively studied her for the last few months. He was a little ashamed to be this excited about meeting her…Dante Coppola’s one vulnerability. Avery was the crime lord’s ex-wife, so probably poison, without conscience. Totally his type. Vincent’s ex-wife taught him a thing or two about women like that. On his second tour in Afghanistan, she’d sent him a Dear John letter paper clipped to divorce papers. It had a way of changing a man’s paradigm real quick. It certainly forced Vincent to see things more clearly. Women were mercurial at best, self-serving at worst. It was weird to know he had something in common with a murderous crime lord. Both he and Coppola married women who’d betrayed them.
He’d memorized Avery’s pictures. She had the look of an innocent, red-headed imp, and seemed younger than her years. She certainly didn’t look like someone who could inspired an ex-husband to hire contract killers to off her. Not a sterling personal recommendation, and yet, the contradiction tickled Vincent’s curiosity. What would she be like? Or rather, how best to bend her to his will?
Benton wanted to try and flip her, see if they could convince her to give up the goods on her ex, rather than make the Feds slog for the evidence, but they didn’t have enough intel to know how best to approach her. Deming, the task force’s profiler, suggested they feel her out with some casual conversation. Benton had tapped Vincent, and he’d report back to the team after they’d finished installing security cameras around her apartment.
Just meeting her would probably answer most of the questions his team had. Then, if all went as planned, they’d find the leverage they needed to flip her, and she’d help break open the task force’s RICO case against her ex-husband. If that went south, she’d either face jail time or risk a bullet between the eyes. Dante Coppola wasn’t pulling his hit on her anytime soon, and now that he knew where she was, she had a target on her back. The FBI would offer her protection, if she was willing to deal, but they couldn’t make her accept their help. No, that would take persuasion. And that was where Vincent came in.
He smiled as he opened the diner’s door. A bell chimed overhead, announcing his arrival. It was old-fashioned and kitschy, and he liked it. As he stepped inside, he finally admitted to himself that he’d been anticipating this meeting with Avery Coppola since he’d first seen her photo nearly a year ago. He was excited, and when his gaze zeroed in on her behind the diner’s counter, his chest tightened because he knew… This was going to be fun. Lots and lots of fun.
Catch a Killer Page 25