Master (An Impossible Novel) (Impossible #6)

by Julia Sykes

  Reed was fully dressed. He was going to leave me. He leaned down and dared to brush a kiss across my lips.

  “This doesn’t change anything,” he told me firmly. “You stay at the safe house. I’ll keep working the case remotely.” The tension in his face told me it was killing him to leave me alone in Chicago, but he couldn’t defy Frank. Not if he wanted to keep his job. And without his job, he wouldn’t have access to the information he needed to hunt The Mentor. “Dex will help out here,” he assured me.

  “Dex will do what I tell him to do,” Frank snapped. “I’m not letting either of you near her. You think I don’t know what Dex wants from her? I’ll work with her personally until this case is over.”

  Reed squared his shoulders. “Katie is a woman. She can make her own decisions.”

  “Get out!” It was the first time Frank had raised his voice. He collected himself immediately, but rage still boiled through his words. “If you’re not out of Chicago within the hour, you’ll find there’s not a position waiting for you at the New York field office by the time you get back.”

  “Frank! Stop it! You’re not being fair!” I sounded like an angry teenager who was being told she couldn’t go to prom.

  His attention returned to me. His eyes were hard, forbidding. The light in them told me he knew what was best for me. “I’m doing this for you, even if you don’t see it. You can’t have relations with your partner. It clouds your judgment. You could have been shot today trying to protect him. I won’t allow that kind of reckless behavior to get you killed.”

  “But he would have died if I hadn’t pushed him out of the way!”

  “If he cares about you so much, then he should have died to keep you safe. He’s not good enough for you.” His glare returned to Reed, who stood stiffly at my side. “Leave. Now.”

  Reed’s eyes were pained when they turned to mine. “I have to go, Katie. But I meant what I said. This doesn’t change anything between us.” He gave my shoulder a light squeeze. “I’ll call you when I get to New York.”

  With that, he strode away from me. His shoulder brushed Frank’s as he stepped past him, not in a show of overt aggression, but he was clearly asserting himself by not skirting around my dad.

  When he was gone, Frank turned away from me. “Stay here tonight. I’ll come by to pick you up in the morning.” He didn’t look back at me, but his voice softened. “You’ll thank me for this one day. He’s not right for you.”

  You don’t think anyone’s right for me. I kept the petulant words locked behind my lips. I knew if I released them, they would heave out on a sob, and I didn’t want to cry in front of Frank. Especially not when I was naked beneath the sheets. Naked and alone. Mortification and grief and anger all swirled within me, a rising tide that came leaking out from the corners of my eyes.

  The next morning, my eyes were red-rimmed from crying, but Kathy didn’t comment on it when I stepped into the interrogation room. I didn’t like having her in here, holding her like she was a criminal, but Frank wanted to watch through the one-way mirror. He wanted to see her reactions to the photos I was about to show her.

  After Kathy had told us about The Mentor killing a man, Frank had compiled a list of men who had been reported as missing in and around Chicago in 1978. Now he wanted me to see if Kathy could ID any of them as the man who had tried to rape her before The Mentor had murdered him.

  I found it sick that she thought of The Mentor as “saving” her from her attacker, when he was the one who raped her repeatedly and broke her mind. But I had to work with what I had, and Kathy was our one solid link to The Mentor.

  “Thanks for coming in, Kathy,” I said as I settled down across the table from her. “I’d like you to look at a few photographs for me. We’re trying to identify the man who assaulted you. The man who your captor killed.”

  Kathy leaned forward, her eyes sparking with new life as they honed in on the file I placed on the table. Her tongue darted out to wet her lips. It was a nervous gesture, but there was something eager about her posture. “I’ll do anything I can to help you find Him.”

  I suppressed a shudder at the emphasis she placed on Him. Even after all these years, she couldn’t see him as an ordinary man. He was a twisted, sadistic man, but a man nonetheless. The way she spoke about him made him seem like some kind of god.

  I flipped open the file and pushed it toward her. “Are any of these men familiar?” The photographs had that slightly faded look of the era, and some of them were grainy images, cropped and blown up from family photos. Her green eyes skated over the faces, pausing at some to consider more carefully. There weren’t many to study. After a minute, she stopped and pointed to the face staring back up at her from the CPD mug shot. The man had been arrested in 1976 for domestic violence.

  “Richard Kimbrell,” I identified the man. “Does that name sound familiar?”

  Kathy shook her head. “I never heard his name. He was only with me for a few minutes when Master came back and pulled him off me.” Her eyes glassed over at the memory.

  Master. This time, I did shudder. The movement brought her out of her reverie, and she blinked. She leaned away from me and crossed her arms over her chest, her stance becoming almost defensive.

  “That’s the man He killed. That’s all I know about him.”

  Crap. I had messed up by letting my own feelings show. Reed had helped me see that I didn’t have to live the life of a cold hunter, and now I couldn’t keep up the act. My heart ached at his distance. He was back in New York now, and I wasn’t sure when I would next feel his embrace.

  I forced out what I hoped was a neutral, professional smile. “Thank you, Kathy. This is very helpful.”

  Her lips pursed, and her only response was a stiff nod. There was nothing more for me to do but walk her out of the building and thank her for her time. IDing Kimbrell was a big win, even if I had messed up by offending Kathy.

  Frank was gone by the time we stepped out of interrogation, likely off to do more research on Kimbrell. Or he had left so he wouldn’t have to face me. Things had been tense and silent between us all morning, both of us full of righteous anger. Just as thoroughly as I thought he had made the wrong call in sending Reed away, Frank was sure he had done what was best for me. It made it that much harder for me to be angry with him. When all this was over, I was going to have a long talk with Frank about not chasing off every man in my life. Especially not Reed. I wanted him to be the man in my life.

  Once we got to the elevator, I thanked Kathy again and passed her off to a junior agent to see her safely to her car. She had refused a protective detail, but we would at least watch her every step while she was in our field office. After the shooting the day before, all my illusions that I was safe here had evaporated. I wouldn’t feel safe anywhere until The Mentor was behind bars for life.

  “Sparrow. I need to talk to you and Frank.” Dex’s hand closed around my elbow, and he ushered me toward Frank’s office before I could come up with an excuse to escape him. With Frank on the warpath against the men in my life, it would have been best to keep Dex at a distance.

  “Come in,” Frank called when Dex knocked on his door. Wisely, he released his hold on my arm before he opened it. Once I was clear of the threshold, he shut it firmly behind us.

  Frank didn’t even look at me, and his eyes were less than friendly when they met Dex’s. “What is it, Scott?”

  “I looked into the text Katie received just before the shooting yesterday,” Dex said in a thoroughly professional tone, as though Frank wasn’t staring him down. “It came from another burner phone. He knows how to cover his tracks.”

  My shoulders slumped. “He always knows everything.” I hated the thought, but it had to be said. “Do we still think it’s one of us?” I asked in a low voice.

  Dex’s jaw clenched, but he kept his attention on Frank rather than me. “I’m almost positive it is. I went over the transcript of Katie’s first conversation with Kathleen Parker. She said
The Mentor drugged her and she woke up in his basement. If she was abducted from Notre Dame, that means he can’t have taken her far for her to have not woken up along the way.”

  Frank nodded, following his line of thinking. “Kathy just IDed Richard Kimbrell as the man who was killed by The Mentor. He owned farmland close to the university.”

  “Well, I went back and looked over Lydia Chase’s statement. She also reports waking up in Martel’s basement, and not remembering anything between then and when she was abducted. He used Acepromazine Maleate on her rather than something like chloroform that seems to have been used on Kathy, but he still couldn’t have given Lydia enough to keep her out for a drive from Chicago to New York. Not without risking killing her.”

  “But he had the van,” I interjected. “We found hair and blood in it.”

  “I think he used the van to transport his victims from Teterboro Airport. It would only be a half hour drive from there to Martel’s house. There’s a small airport, DeKalb Taylor Municipal, which is an hour’s drive from Dusk. There was a flight from DeKalb Taylor to Teterboro Airport the night Lydia Chase was abducted, in the right timeframe. The aircraft was a private jet. It belongs to Kennedy Carver.”

  I sucked in a breath. Reed’s boss. Smith had sworn that Kennedy wasn’t capable of being The Mentor, but his name was on the client list at Dusk, and now there was a record of his private jet on a flight path from Chicago to New York on the night Lydia Chase was taken.

  It could be coincidence. Maybe he had flown into Chicago to visit Dusk that night. But if that was the case, why wouldn’t he have told us he was there when she was kidnapped?

  “But Kennedy’s in New York,” I said. “How could he have sent me the notes? How could he have been the one to attack me? And what about the sniper? He’s running the New York unit. There’s no way he could leave that many times to come terrorize me in Chicago.”

  “I thought about that too,” Dex said. “If it is Kennedy, he must have an accomplice. The Mentor worked with Martel. He might have another mentee.”

  I paled. There could be more than one sadistic psycho still out there hurting women. What if it didn’t end with The Mentor? How many others had he taught?

  “I think it’s Parnell,” Dex continued. “The shooter left a shell casing in the hotel. It had Parnell’s print on it.”

  “This is good work, Dex,” Frank praised. He looked from my former partner to me, his eyes taking in my sickened expression. “I need to talk to Katie for a few minutes.”

  “Of course. Just tell me what you need me to do next.”

  “I’m not ready to move on Kennedy just yet. Katie and I are going to discuss our next move, and then I’ll let you know the plan.” It was a clear dismissal.

  I longed to follow Dex out of the office. Things were so tense between Frank and me, and all I wanted to do was escape. But where would I run? Not to Reed. Frank had sent him away. And the further I went from other agents, the closer I got to danger. Frank’s office was probably the safest place I could be right now.

  “What did you want to tell me?” I asked in as confident a voice as I could muster after the door closed behind Dex.

  “I already suspected Kennedy before Dex came forward with this evidence,” Frank informed me. “But we can’t go after him until we’re sure. I’ve been putting together my own file on him. He used to own a farm not far from Kimbrell’s. I’m going to go check it out, and I want you to come with me.” His hard face softened in a way it only ever did for me. “I don’t trust your safety to anyone else.”

  My head spun. In the space of a few minutes, we had gone from not having a suspect to compiling strong evidence against the director of the New York unit of the FBI.

  “Of course I’ll come with you,” I heard myself say. I wanted to end this, and if answers could be found at Kennedy Carver’s old farm, I would go out there with Frank. Even if I did wish I was going with Reed instead.

  Reed. He had to know. He wasn’t safe in New York.

  “I just need the bathroom first,” I quickly excused myself. I didn’t think Frank would approve of me calling Reed to warn him. But if The Mentor was in New York, then that was the last place I wanted Reed to be.

  When I got to the ladies’ room, I locked the door behind me and pulled out my phone.

  “Hi, gorgeous,” Reed sounded tired, but he still had a sweet greeting for me.

  “Reed, you need to get out of New York.”

  “What? Why?”

  “I think Kennedy is The Mentor. And he has an accomplice in Chicago. It’s Parnell. Dex figured it out, and the evidence is there. You can’t be in New York. He still wants to kill you.”

  “Wait. I don’t think it’s Kennedy, Katie. Smith’s right. He’s not capable of doing those things. If you knew him-”

  “He owns a private jet. It flew from Chicago to New York on the night Lydia was transported to Martel’s house. And he’s a patron at Dusk. We know The Mentor is one of us, Reed. Please. You have to get out of New York.”

  There was a pause. “Okay, Katie, say it is Kennedy. That still leaves Parnell in Chicago to threaten you.” He let out a low curse. “I never should have left you there. Kennedy can’t leave the New York field office without someone noticing, but Parnell could be anywhere in Chicago. The CPD couldn’t get any charges to stick even after he threatened you, and they had to cut him loose.”

  “Frank and I are going to check out a farm Kennedy used to own. It’s near Notre Dame, where Kathy was abducted. I really think he’s the one, Reed. Please stay away from him.”

  “I’ll stay away from him, because I’m coming back to get you. Send me the address of the farm. I’m on my way to the airport now.”

  Chapter 18

  “It looks abandoned,” I remarked as we drove down the pitted dirt road. Well, it was a driveway, really. But it was at least a five minute drive from the main road to the farmhouse, and the main road itself was nearly deserted. We really had arrived in the middle of nowhere.

  “He told me no one would hear me scream, and no one ever did.” I could see how Kathy’s description of her prison could fit this place.

  “No one’s lived here since the late seventies,” Frank answered, gesturing to the overgrown fields.

  “Do you think there will be anything left for us to find? You said Kennedy sold this place. Who are the current owners?”

  “An older man who lives in the city. We have his permission to enter the premises.”

  An odd tension built within me, anticipation mingled with dread. I was afraid of what grisly evidence we might find here, even as the growing sense of finality made me hope for an end to this case. Then I could put all this behind me and start the life I had always wanted.

  “Listen, Frank,” I began almost timidly. “When we catch The Mentor, I want to leave the FBI. I want to be a vet. I hope you can understand that-”

  “We can talk about your future later,” he cut me off. “Come on, we’re here.”

  I shut my mouth, nervous and a little hurt that Frank had so casually dismissed my dreams. I got out of the car and picked my way across the sparse gravel toward the farm house. To my surprise, it wasn’t dilapidated. The fields had fallen into disuse, but the house itself seemed updated to modern standards. The air even smelled faintly of fresh paint, and I noticed that the siding was bright white, as though it had just been re-done.

  “I thought you said the owner lived in the city?”

  Frank pulled a key out of his pocket and motioned for me to join him on the porch. “He does, but he’s planning on moving back out here.”

  When he opened the door, it swung inward to reveal a thoroughly modern home. There was a brand new plasma TV on the wall and half a dozen laptops set up on the desk in the corner. It was so at odds with the desolate landscape outside the house. I stepped across the threshold.

  “Welcome home, Kathy.” The voice was deep, with a broad accent. My heart jumped up in my throat, and I whirled. Frank
stood there, grinning. I heaved in a deep breath and then let it out in an angry huff.

  “That’s not funny, Frank!”

  He closed the door, his lips still split in a wide smile. It struck me that I had never seen Frank smile quite like that.

  “Have you ever known me to make a joke?” Somehow, that stranger’s voice came from his lips.

  I took a wary step back. “Now is a pretty awful time to start. Stop talking like that.”

  “This is my voice, Kathy. My real voice. You’ve heard it before.”

  “Stop calling me that!” My voice was high with anxiety. Why was Frank acting this way? Why did he sound like… That accent.

  “He had a broad, Midwestern accent,” Kathy had described The Mentor.

  I took another step back, my head shaking wildly from side to side. “I don’t know why you’re doing this, but I want you to stop. Maybe you’re not used to making jokes, but this isn’t funny.”

  “I think it is. This is the most fun I’ve had in years.” His eyes glittered as he reached into his pocket. My stomach dropped when he pulled out a syringe. “I could have taken you at any time, but this is so much better. I wanted you to find me. My clever little pet.”

  My body acted before my mind could process what was happening. I fell into a defensive stance, and his grin widened.

  “And so brave, too. I knew you were perfect for me, Kathy.”

  “Stop it!” I shrieked. “Stop calling me that!”

  He laughed. It was much richer, more genuine, than any laugh I had ever heard from him. “I’ll call my property whatever I choose.”

  I took in a long breath and tried my best for a steady voice. “I’m going to leave now, Frank. Just let me leave, and we’ll forget about this.”

  He shook his head at me, as though I was a child who couldn’t quite understand an adult concept. “You’re not going anywhere ever again. You belong to me.”

  His body shifted, ready to lunge. Frank had taught me to recognize the signs of an attack. I twisted out of the way of the jabbing needle and came up under his outstretched arm to catch him in the stomach. He turned his body so that the blow glanced off him, and his free hand made a grab for my shoulder. I dodged away, putting several feet of space between us. His indulgent smile let me know he had allowed it.