by Lisa Harris
23
December 14
7:25 p.m.
Nashville
Garrett tossed the empty takeout box into the trash next to his desk, then glanced at the clock. He should be home by now. He’d already worked over forty hours this week, and it was only Thursday. But he really didn’t feel like going home to an empty house. He’d spend a couple more hours working on his notes for tomorrow’s meeting, then more than likely end up crashing on the couch in his office. It wasn’t the most comfortable place to sleep, but it beat driving home just to turn around and be back again in the morning.
He glanced at the doorway that led into the small reception area of his office space. If Libby knew what he was planning, she’d tell him he needed a life, or a girlfriend, or at the least a good night’s sleep. And sleeping on the couch wasn’t exactly restful.
He picked up the file he’d been working on before dinner, then studied the framed photo of Sarah Boyd he kept on his desk. He tapped his fingers against the folder. Not a day went by that he didn’t think about them. Marissa Dillinger, Sarah Boyd, and the other four girls. Their cases had changed him. Forced him to question his faith. Reminded him that while he didn’t want to be like his father, neither could he simply walk away from trying to bring justice to the world. The photo of Sarah had become a constant reminder of what he’d left behind, but also of what he had no intention of going back to.
His secretary popped her head in the doorway. “Anything else you need me to do before I leave?”
“Not tonight. Go home, Libby. I’ll be done here in a couple of hours.”
She nodded at the like-new leather piece of furniture he’d picked up at a secondhand store. “You work too hard. Make sure you go home and get a good night’s sleep. And sleeping on the couch doesn’t count.”
He shot her a sheepish smile at her predictable words. “It’s not so bad.”
She shook her head and smiled back. “See you tomorrow, boss.”
He dove back into the file as she locked the front door behind her. It was a familiar scenario. A child custody battle turned violent. It was a situation where no one ever completely won. Especially the children who were caught in the middle, along with the mom who was working three jobs just to keep food on the table while she feared for her and her children’s lives.
His cell phone buzzed on the edge of his desk. He picked it up, glanced at the screen, then hesitated. Unknown caller. He wasn’t in the mood to talk to whoever was on the other end of the line, so he put the phone on silent and ignored the call.
Ten minutes later, a knock on the front door pulled him out of his thoughts. He frowned and pushed back his chair. This wasn’t the kind of neighborhood where girl scouts made the rounds selling cookies. Still, he walked into the tiny reception room. The day after Thanksgiving, Libby had strung up lights on the barred window, and set up a tabletop tree with fiber optic lights and red and gold ornaments in an attempt to add a bit of festivity to the tired office space. A couple weeks after that she’d started playing Christmas music, leaving him with “I’ll Be Home for Christmas” constantly running through his head.
Garrett checked the security camera on the desk, then stopped short.
Sam Bradford?
He hurried to the front door and unlocked it. “Sam?”
“I heard you were working in the neighborhood. Thought I should check it out for myself.”
“It’s good to see you, but wow . . . I’m speechless.” Garrett gave the man a bear hug, then took a step back. A decade-plus had filled in the gray hairs that had once peppered his hairline, but other than that, he hadn’t changed much.
“Speechless isn’t exactly the reaction I was expecting,” Sam said.
“Sorry, it’s just that you’re about the last person I expected to see today.”
“I should have come sooner. I’ve been hearing good things about you and this place.”
“Then it wasn’t from my father.” Garrett laughed.
“I always hoped that relationship would turn around.”
“Me too. Instead, he just gets more cantankerous as the years pass, if that’s possible. But I stopped letting it bother me years ago. I had to.”
Sam took off his jacket and hung it on the coatrack Libby had picked up at a flea market last summer. “I hear congratulations are in order for a public service award you’ve now won for the second year in a row. I guess you turned out to be quite a lawyer after all.”
“Thanks, but all I know is that I’m lucky to do what I love and not have to worry about money.”
“What does your father think about your throwing away your trust fund?”
“He keeps reminding me that one day the money will run out, and he won’t be there to bail me out.”
“I can see his concern. You’re not exactly working in one of those posh downtown offices like he is.”
“Never cared much for the view,” Garrett said as he ushered Sam into his office.
He glanced around the room, trying to see it from Sam’s eyes. The paint was beginning to chip on the ceiling. He’d bought the majority of the furniture secondhand. A couple of the pieces of art on the wall were drawings from kids whose families he’d worked with.
“Besides,” Garrett said, “rent is cheap here, and clients are plentiful. And I’m doing what I love, so I can’t complain.”
“Is that why you’re sleeping here on the couch most nights?”
Garrett chuckled “You always were a top-notch investigator.”
“Just a good guess actually,” Sam said. “So what exactly do you do?”
“I work primarily with nonprofit organizations to make sure they’re complying with state and federal laws, along with local childcare centers and volunteer centers. I also take on individual cases depending on the need.” He walked up to the coffeepot behind his desk. “Can I get you some coffee? It’s probably lukewarm and stale.”
“Just how I like it,” Sam said, making himself at home on the couch. “I always felt like it was partly my fault that you left. I should have tried harder to talk you out of it.”
“Forget it, because you couldn’t have. And besides, that was over a decade ago. I’ve moved on. No regrets.”
“Even with Jordan?”
Garrett heated up the coffee in the microwave for thirty seconds, then handed Sam the mug before leaning against the edge of the desk across from him. “That’s a subject I’d rather not delve into.”
He kept up with her through other people. She’d stayed on with the FBI and had slowly climbed the ranks. Which didn’t surprise him one bit. She’d always been good at what she did.
“Have you seen her lately?” Sam asked.
“You never could take a hint that a topic was off-limits, could you?”
Sam just smiled.
Garrett sighed. “Not for a long time. I ran into her once . . . four . . . maybe five years ago. She seemed to be doing well.”
He’d been invited to a fundraiser in Memphis, and she’d been there. Even after all this time he could remember exactly what she looked like that night. That silky, light brown skin, curly hair, wearing a dress that made his jaw drop. She’d come with a date, but he noticed there was no ring on her finger. He’d walked up to her like a school kid and said hi. They’d spent the next few minutes talking about nothing at all, while he remembered everything that had ever happened between them. Somehow forgetting her had become impossible, even after all this time.
“You let a good one get away,” Sam said. “You should have married her.”
“Maybe, but it turned out she didn’t exactly think the same about me. She wanted a career more than a family.”
“That might be up for debate. I have a feeling she might have stuck around if you’d run after her.”
It wasn’t the first time he’d questioned his decision to walk away, or thought about picking up the phone and calling her. But after everything that happened, it was time to move on. Besides, his job kept him b
usy and that was the way he liked it. There was always someone who needed his help.
“So you haven’t found someone else?” Sam asked.
Garrett frowned at Sam’s persistence. Like Jordan, his love life—or lack thereof—was a subject he’d prefer to avoid. Especially when his mother was around. On his fortieth birthday he’d stepped into a room full of her influential friends and a dozen single women—all daughters of wealthy families, most a decade or more younger than him, and all very interested in the only bachelor in the room. He wondered what his mother had told them to get them to come.
Available: Handsome, single man with large trust fund.
But he hadn’t connected with any of them. For some reason—even after all these years—he still found himself comparing every woman he met to Jordan. And so far no one had lived up to his expectations. Or at least what he felt toward her. Which wasn’t fair, but tell that to his heart.
“And what about you?” he said, changing the subject. “Heard you have a second career.”
If Sam noticed Garrett’s shifting the conversation away from himself, he didn’t say anything. “I started a private investigation agency. It keeps me out of trouble after retirement, since I’m not sure I’ll ever be able to walk away completely from that life. The cases that refuse to let go. Especially those that went cold.”
“How’s Irene?” Garrett asked.
“Still keeping me in line. She talked me into going somewhere warm for our fortieth.”
“I was always jealous of the two of you. You made marriage look so easy.”
“Ha!” Sam sipped his coffee. “Forty years of marriage is hardly easy. Three miscarriages, two boys, and a handful of bumps along the way. But I’ll admit it was completely worth it.”
It was what Garrett had once wanted, but instead, he’d managed to build a life here. And while he might not have the name of his father’s firm behind him, he didn’t need that either. He was doing what he’d always wanted. Making a difference. He’d made his choice and was happy with it.
“As good as it is to see you,” Sam said, “I’m not here just for personal reasons.”
“I’m all ears.”
“Another girl’s dead.” Sam pulled a folder from his briefcase and dropped it onto Garrett’s desk. “We think the Angel Abductor is back.”
“What?” Over ten years had passed, and Garrett had heard the rumors that the man who’d killed the girls was dead. “Who is she?”
Sam laid a Polaroid photo of a girl on Garrett’s desk. “Her name is Chloe Middleton, and she was sixteen years old. She loved volleyball, music, and photography.”
Garrett shook his head. He didn’t want to see this. Didn’t want to see her. “I’m really, really sorry to hear that, but I don’t know what I have to do with this.”
“My agency’s been working with some of the victims’ families, but so far we still haven’t been able to discover the identity of their abductor and murderer. Another girl is dead. We need this to end.”
“We tried that before. Remember? And in case you happened to forget, I blew it big time. Marissa Dillinger is dead because of what I missed back then.”
He’d never been able to completely put Marissa’s death behind him. He still had nightmares every once in a while about finding her warm body buried in a deserted grove of trees.
“Marissa’s death was never your fault. You made a call with the evidence we had. You couldn’t have known what was going to happen.”
“Tell that to her parents.”
Sam shook his head. “Is that why you’re stuck in this shoddy neighborhood? Atoning for what you think you did wrong a decade ago?”
“Of course not.” Garrett couldn’t hide the flash of anger that ripped through him.
“Then hear me out. I think you might have been on the right track way back then,” Sam said.
“What does that mean?” Garrett sat down on the arm of the couch.
“Think of that as your incentive to show up tomorrow morning, but here’s the bottom line. I’m bringing the team back together, and I want you to come work this case with us.”
Garrett stared at his old colleague. “You can’t be serious.”
“Why wouldn’t I be?”
“Because you don’t need me. You’ve closed dozens of cases without me, and you can certainly close this case without me.”
“I want the entire team. Including Jordan.”
Garrett’s jaw tensed at the mention of her name.
“The FBI is sending her in. She knows this case as well as any of us do.”
Garrett pressed his hands against his thighs, then stood up. “I’m not sure I want to come back, Sam.”
“Because of Jordan?”
“No. It’s because I don’t want to go back there.”
“Just think about it then. I won’t need an answer until tomorrow.”
“Tomorrow?” Garrett started pacing the worn carpet in front of the couch. “I’ve got clients in the morning, and a court date in the afternoon. I don’t have time off.”
“You see things uniquely. The details that often get swept over. And besides that, we make a good team. We might not have solved this case, but we did solve dozens, if not hundreds, of other cases. But if this is happening again—with the Angel Abductor—we need to put an end to this once and for all, Garrett. Before someone else dies.”
Garrett turned toward the window that overlooked the parking lot. Some of the blind slats were broken, letting in too much light from the streetlamp. The bars on the windows were rusty, and three of the glass panels needed to be replaced. Most people thought he was crazy to have stuck it out in this neighborhood for so many years, but he had found purpose again. The only hole in his life—if there even was one—was that he didn’t have someone to share it with. But most days he got home too late and too tired to care that no one was waiting for him.
He glanced at Sarah’s photo. He’d never forgotten. Never forgotten that Marissa’s family had counted on him to find her, and he’d made a mistake. A mistake that had cost her her life. Sam had to understand why he couldn’t go back.
“Meet us at seven tomorrow morning at the bureau. We’ll be working with their Missing Persons Task Force.”
“I’m in the middle of a case, Sam.”
Sam caught his gaze before heading for the door. “Just give us an hour. And see if that doesn’t change your mind.”
24
December 15
6:53 a.m.
TBI Headquarters
Garrett strode across the parking lot of the TBI headquarters for the first time in years, hoping he wasn’t going to regret his decision to show up. Sam had always been persuasive, and in many ways while Garrett had been on the force, Sam was the father figure he’d never really had. But even that hadn’t been enough to get him here. What had clinched the decision to come was the possibility of a second chance to right a wrong.
For years he’d gone over different scenarios in his head. If he’d followed the lead Sam had given him, if he hadn’t put as much manpower into investigating Fisher, maybe things would have turned out differently. On the other hand, maybe it hadn’t mattered which lead he’d decided to follow. Maybe the outcome would have still been the same. But all of that was something they’d never know. Marissa was dead, and in real life that ending would never change.
He stepped through the glass doors of the bureau and into the open atrium nestled between the two wings. A sense of familiarity washed over him as he paused in the lobby in front of the central security checkpoint. But it wasn’t the familiar building or even the sunlight streaming through the long row of windows above him that held his attention.
She was standing in front of the security checkpoint, looking even more beautiful than he remembered, if that was possible, in her black jeans, boots, and a dark-red scarf to ward off the chill of the holiday season.
I should be over you by now, Jordan Lambert, but I’m not sure I ever will be.
“Jordan.” He walked up to her, trying to ignore the intense feelings sweeping through him that seeing her again brought on. “I guess you weren’t expecting a trip here today either, were you?”
“No, but I was hoping I’d run into you before you went in.” She shoved a wayward curl behind her ear and shot him a smile. “I thought it would be less awkward to see each other for the first time out here before we met with everyone else and dove into the case.”
“That wasn’t a bad idea, though I hope there isn’t any reason for there to be anything awkward between us.”
“I hope not too, it’s just that it’s been so long.”
She looked relieved, but all he could think about was the last time he’d seen her. The last time he’d kissed her. And how he couldn’t for the life of him remember at that moment why he’d said goodbye without telling her how he’d always felt.
He shoved back the memories. “When did you get into Nashville?”
“I drove in last night and am staying with my sister. What about you? You’re still working as a lawyer?”
“Yeah.” They took the passes from the uniformed officer and headed into the secured building. “I think I’m far better suited for what I’m doing now.”
“I can’t help but wonder what your parents think,” she said.
He let out a low laugh. “Nothing’s changed there. They still think I’ve gone off the deep end. It’s pretty much a topic that is completely avoided. I bet your dad, on the other hand, is thrilled you’re in town.”
“He is.” She stopped in the middle of the atrium. “And I understand you probably see him more than I do. You never told me the two of you took up chess and watch ball games together once a month.”