by Lisa Harris
Another thirty seconds passed. Paige was right. Something was wrong.
He pulled out his phone. “Wonderful. No signal.”
He glanced at the emergency button and hesitated. He’d give it another thirty seconds. Paige hadn’t moved from the corner of the elevator.
“You okay?” he asked.
“Of course.”
“You don’t look okay.”
“Just for the record, I hate elevators,” she said, jamming her finger against the button for their floor. “But that piece of information never leaves this tiny box.”
He watched her punch the button again. “You know that’s not going to make us get there faster.”
“Like I said, this is why I take the stairs. That’s how you get there faster.”
“So . . . you have some kind of elevator horror story from your childhood?”
“When I was twelve, I got stuck in one of these for two hours in the middle of summer. Alone.” Paige leaned back against the wall, staring at the doors. “Never realized I was claustrophobic until I couldn’t get out of that metal box.”
Another half minute went by.
“You think this is a coincidence?” he asked.
“The fact that I hate elevators, and our elevator is possessed?”
“I was thinking more along the lines that we’re stuck in an elevator on our way to do an interview with someone who claims to know who our killer is.”
“Oh, that.” She leaned against the wall, taking deep breaths. “You really think it could be connected?”
“I have no idea.”
It was clearly a reach. This was probably nothing more than a coincidence, but still . . .
He reached for the emergency call button as the bottom of the elevator dropped. His shoulder slammed against the wall.
“Nate.”
The elevator stopped a second later. Nate managed to catch his balance before sprawling across the elevator floor.
“You okay?” he asked, righting himself.
Paige braced herself against the wall. “For the moment, but now I have another reason to hate elevators. How many floors up are we if the brakes fail?”
“Don’t even think about falling.”
But that was easier said than done. They’d just been at eleven. The elevator felt like it had dropped at least one floor. Paige stayed glued to the wall. “How hard would it be to hack into one of these things?”
“I have no idea. I should never have brought it up.” He opened the door to the elevator phone and picked up the receiver.
He dialed the number printed on the inside of the door and waited for someone to answer.
“Something’s definitely wrong.” Paige jammed her finger against the emergency button again and again.
The lights flickered and went out, leaving them in total darkness.
“Hello . . . this is Frank with security.” A man’s voice boomed through the phone. “Sorry, folks. There seems to be a glitch in the system, but there’s nothing to worry about. Hang in there, and I’ll have you out in a few minutes. I promise.”
“‘Nothing to worry about,’ he says. Never thought I’d die because of a glitch in the system,” Paige murmured.
“We’re not going to die.”
“If this box drops again . . . if the emergency brake or whatever is holding us up here breaks and we drop a dozen floors, then yeah. We’ll die. There was this woman riding an elevator at New Year’s when it dropped five stories and—”
“I have a feeling our odds of death via an elevator are far less than, say . . . getting struck by lightning,” Nate said, trying to lighten the conversation.
“Not funny.”
The elevator jolted again, but this time it went up rapidly, then stopped.
There was a ding and the doors opened.
Half a dozen people stood in front of them as they walked out. A woman wearing a pink suit and high heels rushed across the tile toward them.
“Detectives . . . I am so, so sorry about the elevator. I don’t know what happened, but are you both okay?”
Nate looked to Paige for an answer.
“We’re fine,” she said, pressing her shoulders back.
“Nothing like this has ever happened since I’ve been here,” the woman hurried on. “Can I get you some water? Or coffee?”
“No, thank you,” Nate said. “We have an appointment with Stephen Shaw’s boss.”
“Of course. She’s expecting you.”
A minute later they were ushered into a large office with windows overlooking an incredible view of downtown in the distance.
“I heard what happened on the elevators. I hope you’re both all right.” A woman who looked to be in her early forties stepped across the room and held out her hand. “I’m Marge Potter, Stephen’s boss. I called management myself to ensure that our technicians look into the situation immediately.”
“We’re fine, Ms. Potter,” Nate said, speaking for both of them. “Thank you for calling.”
“Of course. But please . . . call me Marge.” She pointed to the two chairs in front of her desk and motioned for them to sit down. “We just got the terrible news about Stephen. He was well liked around here, and I can’t believe he’s dead.” Marge sat down across from them, then held out her hands. “I can’t stop shaking.”
“I know it must be quite a shock,” Nate said. “We’re here because we were told you know who killed him.”
“I don’t know exactly who killed him, but I do think I can help.”
“Can you explain?” Paige asked.
“I can do better than that.” The woman dug into her desk drawer and pulled out a plastic bag filled with smashed electronic pieces. “I can show you. Stephen’s office was bugged.”
“Bugged? Did he know it?”
“He’s the one who discovered it. He came into my office last night, furious. Apparently, he’d bought some kind of bug detector that finds hidden cameras and bugs.”
“And this is what he found?”
She nodded. “He told me he’d take care of it, but when he didn’t show up for work this morning, I started getting nervous. When I saw a report on the news about a murder, I just . . . I knew it was Stephen.”
“Do you know who planted the bugs?”
“No, and I don’t think he did either, but it makes sense to me that whoever planted these bugs killed him. I don’t know specifically what they were looking for, but our company deals with security, so we take any breach of our own security extremely seriously.”
“What exactly was his job description?”
“As I said, our company deals with security, primarily cybersecurity. We work with all kinds of clients to protect them from email hacks and viruses and also to ensure that they have secure storage on their cloud service. The bottom line is that we design security portfolios for our customers to guarantee their protection in the digital world. Stephen was in charge of coming up with new, innovative security solutions. He sometimes monitored a client’s defenses by breaking into their system, enabling us to give them a thorough briefing on ways they could better protect their company’s data.”
“What kinds of companies seek out your services?” Paige asked.
“We work with everything from small businesses to banks to Fortune 500 companies. Anyone who is concerned about cybersecurity. Because of this, you can understand the importance of this breach of our security not becoming public knowledge. To be honest, it was why I hesitated coming to you, but in the end I felt as if I didn’t have a choice.”
“You did the right thing. Do you know anything about Stephen working on the side for someone else? Possibly for the government?”
“Like what?” The woman let out a slow chuckle. “The FBI or something?”
“Actually, yes.”
“You’re serious.”
“Very.”
Her smile vanished. “Not that I know of, but I suppose it’s possible. He worked a lot of hours here, though. Not sur
e he’d have the time to work a second job. But I don’t exactly know what the guy did during his free time. He was friendly and all, but for the most part he didn’t associate with his coworkers off the clock. And the stuff he did . . . to be honest, as crazy as it sounds, he was smart enough that I could see the FBI coming to him. And I suppose that could explain why someone would want to bug his office.”
“How had he been acting lately? Anything you noticed out of the ordinary?”
“Definitely jumpy, which wasn’t normal for Stephen. Just yesterday, for example, I was in the break room and he spilled coffee all over the counter while pouring a cup.”
“Did you ask him what was wrong?”
“He mumbled something about being followed, but then he said forget it. That he hadn’t been sleeping well lately, and the lack of sleep and too much caffeine must be affecting him.”
“Was that like Stephen?”
“To be paranoid? Not at all. He was very levelheaded. Very focused. But it was as if something had spooked him lately. And that was before he showed me these things.”
“Was there anything else that stood out to you? Any enemies he might have made?”
“No. That’s what makes all of this so strange. I just can’t imagine someone trying to kill him.”
“What about friends and family?” Paige asked.
“I honestly don’t know. I never heard him talk about family.”
Nate slipped the bag of electronics into his coat pocket, then handed her his card. “We’ll take these in and have them processed. I’ll also send a team to sweep his office to see what else they can find. And if you think of anything else, please give me a call.”
Marge shook their hands, then walked with them to the door. “Thanks so much for coming. Please let us know if there’s anything else we can help with.”
Nate headed toward the elevator, then stopped when he realized Paige wasn’t following.
“Do what you want, but I’m taking the stairs.”
Nate frowned as they started down the stairwell. How had she roped him into taking a dozen flights of stairs? “So you’ve decided that whole elevator scenario wasn’t a coincidence?”
“The bad guys are probably hackers as well, so this would have been a piece of cake.”
“Don’t you think that might be stretching things a bit?” he asked.
“Where elevators are concerned, I prefer to err on the side of caution.” She looked back at him. “Now we know that Stephen was smart enough to be approached by the FBI, or at least his boss thinks so. And even though he believed he was working for them, the FBI claims not to have any knowledge of him.”
Nate turned the corner and started down another flight. “It’s always possible that the FBI is lying. I’m sure there are a dozen reasons why they wouldn’t want us to know who was working security for them.”
How were they supposed to solve this crime if both the bad guys and the good guys had something to hide?
13
Grace tapped her pen against the table in a corner of the second floor in the precinct’s interrogation room, stretched her back, then started rubbing her neck. She needed a break from staring at the yellow legal pad the past thirty minutes—and simply thinking too much, for that matter—but she also wanted to make sure she didn’t leave anything out of her statement. She might have been too late to keep Stephen from being murdered, but she could do everything in her power to bring his killers to justice.
A chill swept through her, and she pulled her sweater tighter around her shoulders, realizing how blessed she was to be alive. She still had no idea what Stephen had stumbled into, other than the fact that it had gotten him killed. And now she’d somehow gotten tangled up in the same web. It was a situation that terrified her.
She glanced through the doorway into the open room where several of the detectives were working at their desks and let her mind shift to Nate. She hadn’t planned to share with him about Hannah or even Kevin, for that matter. And yet for some reason talking to him about her losses had seemed . . . natural. It was hard to believe she hadn’t seen him for so many years.
Back in college it felt as if she could tackle anything and come through unscathed. Then over the years of being a therapist, she’d watched other couples and individuals walk down painful roads, all the while congratulating herself that her life was nothing like theirs. It had taken Hannah’s death for her to face the fact that no one was immune to the heartbreak of devastating loss.
That’s where she was today. Hanging on to reality by a thread as she worked to keep her emotions stable until she could find a moment alone to deal with her own haunted memories. But she couldn’t delve back into the past. Not now.
Paige walked into the room and set a cup of coffee on the desk beside her. “Thought you might need a pick-me-up. Nate dropped me off, then went to grab lunch for us. I hope you like barbeque.”
“Sounds great. Thanks.” Grace took a sip of the rich brew, then held it up. “This is a lifesaver. I’m starting to feel cross-eyed.”
“I’m guessing you didn’t get any sleep last night.” Paige leaned against the edge of the desk, her eyes filled with concern. “How are you doing?”
“Please don’t tell me you’re going to start worrying like your partner.” Grace shot her a smile. “I’m shook up, I’ll be honest, but I’ll be fine. I’ve already spoken to the victim counselor, and she offered me the same advice I’d give one of my patients.”
“Which is?”
“That one of the best things you can do after a traumatic occurrence is to take action and do something that can in turn help to overcome the fear and vulnerability. So that’s what I’m doing.”
“You’re exactly right.”
“I won’t let myself end up feeling like a victim.” She took another sip of coffee and focused on the warm sensation. “Finding Stephen’s killer is helping me challenge that sense of vulnerability.”
Because she’d gone that route before. Caught in the role of a victim, and while she legitimately might have been one, it wasn’t a place she was going to let herself stay. Not this time.
“Just remember that knowing what advice to hand out doesn’t automatically make it easy to put into practice,” Paige said. “Trust me. I know from experience with this job. And you’ve gone through a lot over the past twenty-four hours.”
“I know. But I’ll be okay. We need to find whoever’s behind this.”
“Have you come up with anything you think might help?”
Grace looked down at the notes she’d organized into a makeshift spreadsheet on the yellow pad. “I’ve been trying to remember everything I know about Stephen. Things he told me during our sessions that might be a key to figuring out what he was working on, as well as a list of family and friends, which, unfortunately, I don’t know much about. He was quite reserved, and even in our sessions rarely shared anything about his personal life. He was there primarily to work through his anxiety issues.”
“Apparently, he had reason to be anxious,” Paige said. “We just returned from talking with his boss, and someone had bugged his office.”
Grace tapped her pencil against the desk again. “That would fit. He was certain someone was following him. Like they knew in advance where he would be. And it explains why he left such a cryptic message on my phone.”
“Do you know if he had a girlfriend?”
“No girlfriend that I know of, but he does have a sister here in the Dallas area. Kelli’s trying to track her down. I figure there might be a chance she knows who the Colonel is.”
“That’s a good place to start. His boss didn’t know much about his family either.” Paige pulled up a chair and sat down next to her. “Can I ask you a question, totally personal and off topic?”
Grace cupped her hands around her drink and sat back. “Of course.”
“I know it’s none of my business, but from what I understand, you and Nate have a . . . history?”
“A history?�
� Grace let out a low laugh. “Not romantically, if that’s what you’re implying. He and my ex-husband were close back in college, and we were friends. But it’s actually been years since I last saw him, so when he showed up at my door today . . . well, it was quite a surprise, though it was good to see him. I can’t believe so much time has passed since I saw him last. We totally lost track of each other, which seems almost impossible in today’s social-media-saturated world.”
“I was just curious. He’s not exactly one to spill his feelings, and I guess I worry about him. Especially with all he’s gone through these past few months.”
Grace took another sip of her drink. “Now can I ask you about that?”
“Sure.”
“This isn’t any of my business either, but what you just said might be the answer to something I’ve been wondering about. There’s something different about him. Granted, it’s been a long time since I’ve seen him, but it’s like he’s been through some kind of trauma. He tried to hide the scars on his arms, but I’m guessing they’re connected somehow.”
“You know about the hotel bombing three months ago?”
“Of course. Several police officers were killed along with a number of civilians.”
“That was his team. He lost his partner and several other close friends that day. And he was left with those scars on his arms. Today’s his first day back on the job. He took the losses pretty hard.”
“Wow.” Grace sat forward in her chair. “I had no idea.”
“It’s been a rough recovery for him, both physically and emotionally.”
“That explains a lot, actually. We were pretty good friends back in college. I remember how protective he was back then, but today . . .” Grace let out a huff of air. “At least I understand where he’s coming from now.”
“It’s been a hard comeback for him. Part of me isn’t sure he’s ready to be out in the field, but he’d never admit it. And he’s been officially cleared for active duty. On the other hand, maybe being back on the job is exactly what he needs. I heard rumors that being off was driving him crazy. He was spending most of his time working out at the gym.”