She almost wished they did know. She wished the whole world knew exactly what was happening. If she was going down, she was going to take her father down with her.
Tell them everything. Why the hell not?
She composed an email, wrote it over and over until she got it just right. And then she sent it to every reporter she’d ever seen associated with a negative article about Roan Naylor. Let’s see how her tormentor reacted when she went to the press with her story. She no longer had anything to lose.
It amused her to receive three responses within three minutes of sending the email.
Two could play at this game.
Chapter 10
Springfield, Illinois
Durango Master’s Home
Durango’s thoughts were worrying about the rather long list of suspects he’d compiled in Kyle’s death from the client files at the office, people who were displeased with Mastiff’s services and made their dissatisfaction known to Kyle, or held Kyle personally responsible. He knew it was unlikely the Harrison Strangler would expose himself in such a public way, but he also knew that the strangler liked to interact with his victims in the days and weeks before murdering them. Kyle was a private person, a focused person, whose days involved very little outside of the firm. Therefore, it made sense to believe that her killer was connected to Mastiff in some way.
Clients, employees, persons involved in specific investigations, collateral damage from some of their operations. It had to be someone like that. Or maybe even the politicians and city officials she had to deal with in order to keep Mastiff’s doors open.
Durango had always suspected the strangler was some sort of playboy, someone who had a lot of free time on his hands, someone who was free to adjust his life to the schedule of the victims whenever he chose one. Or someone who worked a job that was a block on, block off sort of schedule, like a longshore man, an oil rig worker. Someone who was free to move around the city day and night for months at a time. Someone who could stalk his victims and worm his way into their lives without setting off alarm bells in their heads.
Someone who could follow Durango from Chicago to Springfield. Because, after all, he was what this was all about, right? The killer went after Sarah, because he arrested the wrong man, came after Kyle because Durango had left him behind and moved on with his life. That had to be what was happening here. Why else would the strangler show up here, in Springfield, five years after his killing spree in Chicago? Why would he go after Kyle? It couldn’t be a coincidence that the last two victims were women in Durango’s life.
Was it someone he knew?
He’d tortured himself all during his trial, trying to figure out who could have done this to Sarah. The list of suspects grew and shrank constantly as he added and subtracted people. Former cops, current cops, Sarah’s colleagues, his colleagues, the old woman who lived downstairs in their apartment building. Everyone was on the list at one time or another. But he could never find any definitive proof against any of them.
Maybe it was time to review that list again.
Durango pulled up in front of his condo and climbed out slowly, his back a little sore from his visit to Detective Hyde. He could still smell her on his skin. A shower was definitely in order.
“Durango.”
He was pulled out of his thoughts by the sight of his father pushing himself to his feet. He’d been sitting on the steps leading to Durango’s front door, leaning back against the wrought iron railing. He moved as slowly as Durango, stretching out his long legs before pulling himself to his feet.
Jackson Chamberlain.
He was a tall man, well over six foot, but thin as an adolescent boy. He’d gotten even thinner in the years since Durango last saw him, making him appear taller, but frailer in a weird sort of way, too. But his eyes were the same, dark eyes that seemed to burn a hole in Durango’s soul every time he focused on him.
“What are you doing here?”
“Why didn’t you tell anyone about your partner’s death?”
Durango crossed his arms over his chest, stepping back to put space between the two of them.
“What difference does it make to you?”
“I don’t like learning things about my only child from the news. And that article about our relationship . . . did you really think now was the time for something like that?”
“Do you think that was my idea?”
“It wouldn’t surprise me. I have a new, big project coming out. The press eats stuff like that up when my movies come out.”
“Of course, it’s all about you! How could I have missed that?” Durango dismissed his father by walking around him, unlocking his door as quickly as he could with an anger induced tremor in his fingers. “You wasted your fucking time coming all the way out here!”
“Durango.”
Jackson grabbed his shoulder and tried to jerk Durango around, but he was done with this. He jerked away from his grip, turning into the house.
“Go home, Jackson. No one wants you here.”
“What are you going to do, Durango? Push everyone away until you’re all alone? And then what? Do you really think your life will be easier without people who care about you in it? Do you think you’ll be happy that way?”
“Don’t put yourself in that category, Jackson.”
“What category?”
“The one filled with people who care about you. You never gave a shit about me. Why would I believe you do now?”
“I’m your father.”
Durango turned to look at him, his eyes moving slowly over the length of his father. “We share genetic material. That’s all.” He started to turn but thought better of it. “You took from me the only person who ever gave a damn about what happened to me. You took away the only good person in my life, the only person who mattered. What kind of person does that?”
“I’m not the one who put the pills in her mouth that night.”
Durango shook his head, too outraged to simply catch his breath. “You told her to go ahead and do it. You told her to kill herself! What did you think would happen?”
“I said some unfortunate things that night. But I didn’t give her the pills; I didn’t know she even had them! I thought her threats were baseless.”
“But they weren’t and you should have known what your words would do to her! You killed her just like you held a gun to her head.”
“I loved her, Durango. She’s the only woman I ever truly loved.” Jackson stepped forward, reaching a hand toward Durango. He stepped back, just out of reach. “She was the love of my life. You’re not the only one who lost her that night.”
“But I’m not the one who told her to go ahead and kill herself!”
Jackson’s head fell. “And you’ll never forgive me for that.”
“Why should I? I was five years old, listening to those words outside your bedroom door. And the next morning . . . my mother was dead.”
Jackson sighed heavily. Silence fell between them for a long moment, nothing left to be said. At least, that’s what Durango thought. But Jackson surprised him.
“I thought after Sarah died that you would finally understand. You lost the love of your life, just like I did. I thought you would be able to see it from my point of view, that you would see how hard it was for me to live knowing what I’d done, that the last words she heard from me were words of anger. But I guess you’re still too angry to see how what you’ve gone through is exactly what I went through.”
“I didn’t tell Sarah to kill herself. I didn’t leave her there with the intention of allowing her to die.”
“But you brought death to her door just the same.”
Those words hung heavy in the air. Jackson was right. If Durango had done his job right, if he’d found the real Harrison Strangler instead of the man who’d died in his cell before Sarah was killed, she would still be alive and they’d be married, living the life they’d planned in Chicago. But he didn’t, and the strangler came after her.
And now he’d come after Kyle, too.
Durango knew it was his fault. But was it really the same as standing over a sobbing woman and telling her to go ahead and kill herself? That no one gave a shit what she did anymore?
Even words said in anger had to stop before they reached that level of cruelty.
“It’s not the same,” he said softly.
“Go ahead and believe that, son, if it helps you sleep at night. But you and I are more alike than you will ever comprehend.” Jackson turned to leave, pausing in the doorway. “I’m not the monster you’ve made me out to be. I’m just a broken man desperate to hold onto the only thing I have left from the woman I loved. You are my son, and I love you. Nothing you do or say is ever going to change that.”
Jackson walked away. Durango watched him go, suddenly feeling very alone when he was gone.
But he couldn’t call bullshit, could he? Everything his father said was true.
Durango had killed Sarah and Kyle just as true as if he’d been the one to wrap his hands around their necks. And that made him no better than his father.
“Fuck me.”
Durango crossed the room and snatched the bottle of tequila out of the cupboard in the kitchen. If he ever needed a drink, it was right now.
Chapter 11
Springfield, Illinois
Calder Obre’s Home
“What do you feel like wearing today, Miss Addison?”
The little girl tilted her head and rested her finger against her jaw just like she’d seen her grandmother do a million times. Then she sighed.
“There’s nothing good in my closet, Daddy.”
“Nothing at all?”
“No.” She sighed again. “Nothing perfectly bootiful.”
Calder bit back a laugh. “Nothing beautiful. But everything you wear is beautiful.”
She rolled her eyes. “You’re silly, Daddy.”
He lifted her up and rested her on his shoulder as he walked over to the closet, digging through her extensive wardrobe. He’d never realized before how many cute outfits they made for little girls until he found himself picking out a new dress or a new blouse every time he went to the store. His mother was the same, constantly buying a little something for Addie. She would probably be the most spoiled little girl in Illinois if he didn’t put his foot down on the spending from time to time. But, between a grandmother who had lost a daughter and a father who was making up for the loss of a mother, it was a miracle she wasn’t a throw herself on the floor and wail sort of spoiled child.
She was loved. That was what was most important, right?
They chose a little yellow sundress with teeny flowers all over it and a matching white cardigan. There was still snow on the ground from the snowstorm they’d gotten last week, so he also grabbed her galoshes to slide over the little black Mary Janes she loved to wear every day.
“We made macaroni pictures yesterday, Daddy.”
“I know. You told me.”
“What do you think we’ll do today?”
Calder shrugged as he fumbled with the buckle on her shoe. “I don’t know. But isn’t it nature day? Don’t you go to the greenhouse today?”
“Oh, yes! We get to see our new plants!”
“That sounds exciting.”
She nodded. “They have leaves and everything now.”
“That’s pretty awesome.”
She giggled even as she nodded, pushing his hand away so that she could stand. “We have to hurry. I don’t want to be late!”
Suddenly enthused to get to school, Addie ran out the door of her bedroom with only one shoe buckled. Calder groaned as he pulled himself up off the floor and followed, nearly catching up when his cell phone rang. Another groan as he answered.
“Calder Obre.”
“Hey, Calder. This is Steven. Your client tried to slip out of the house passed us this morning. Thought you’d want to know.”
“Where did she go?”
“An office building downtown. I can text the address.”
“You on her?”
“Yeah, just waiting for her to come out.”
“Stay there. I’ll be there in a few.”
Calder sighed as he hung up. He’d told Quinn not to go anywhere, but she clearly hadn’t listened. He supposed the unseen assailant shooting at her yesterday wasn’t enough to convince her that she needed to listen to him.
He went downstairs, unaware that his mother was sitting at his desk, staring at the websites he’d been reviewing the night before. She looked up, her eyes narrowed and filled with emotion.
“Why are you researching Roan Naylor? I thought you’d let all of that go.”
“It’s for a case, Mom.”
She shook her head. “It’s insulting when you lie to me, Calder.” She got up and headed toward the kitchen from which the warm aroma of fried bacon was emanating. “You’re too much like your father. Always refusing to let a grudge go. It’s what led to his death, you know.”
“I’m aware of that.”
“He should have just let it go.”
“You would have been okay with that man living free? Possibly killing another little girl?”
His mother stopped, the tension in her shoulders obvious even buried under a heavy cardigan. “That’s not fair,” she said quietly.
Calder knew she was right. But he hated when she spoke that way about his father.
“He did the only thing he thought he could do.”
“He was needed here. You needed him. I needed him.” She turned and studied his face. “Look at all he’s missed out on. Look at Addie. She’ll never know her aunt and she’ll never know her grandfather. The one . . . we couldn’t stop. But the other . . .”
It was the first time his mother had expressed anything like acceptance for what had happened to Andi. For years, she blamed herself, insisted she should have known something was wrong, insisted that she shouldn’t have allowed her to walk home from school alone even though Andi was twelve and had been walking home by herself since second grade. And every time she mentioned those things, Calder burned with his own guilt. He and Andi always walked home together. He was only ten months older than her—Irish twins is what people called them—but he’d had to stay after that day to retake a spelling test he’d failed. If he’d studied for that test, Andi wouldn’t have been alone and maybe that freak would have picked someone else. And then the guilt over that thought . . . who could want someone else’s child to die?
He still ached with that guilt. That’s why he was careful to do his homework and do it well the rest of his school career; why he was always better prepared for a mission, when he was in the Army, then anyone else in his unit; why he was so careful about preparation for his operations with Mastiff. He wasn’t going to let anyone else down because he wasn’t prepared.
In reality, he knew that man had been watching Andi for months; that he was a sick predator who would have found a way to get to her once he became fixated with her. Ten years working on the Decatur Police Force had taught him that. But it didn’t soothe the guilt. Surely his sister would have been the exception if only he hadn’t failed that spelling test!
Twelve years old and the things she endured while that man held her. Three days he held her. Calder had seen the police report, the coroner’s notes. He knew what she went through before he finally had mercy on her and cut her throat. And he knew his father had seen it, too.
A mild-mannered history teacher, Angus Obre was a changed man after his daughter died. Obsessed. The detective on the case finally showed him the files because he thought it might end that obsession, allow Angus to move on with his life. But it didn’t. It only made his obsession worse.
And when that asshole went to prison and then cried to the governor that he was being abused by the guards and the other inmates . . . he only served two years before the governor decided the abuse constituted cruel and unusual punishment, releasing him from prison to protect him from an environment that was a hell o
f a lot safer than the one he’d offered Andi.
Calder was seventeen the night his parents got the news. Things had almost returned to normal in the past few years since the trial, his parents had started talking to each other once again, and spoke to him. There was little laughter in the house, and every time someone mentioned Andi’s name, both his parents would disappear into their grief. But it happened less often in those months before they got the word.
He was at the kitchen table working on his calculus homework when the phone rang. He couldn’t remember his father saying anything at all, not even a simple greeting. But he remembered the way the muscles in his face went slack, the way the light disappeared from his eyes.
“He did what he thought he had to do.”
Calder’s mother shook her head. “It was selfish, and it was wrong. It stole him from us, stole him from Addie and all the babies you’ll have down the road. It stole everything.”
Her chin began to shake as she stared at him, her eyes blurring with tears. Calder went to her, pulled her close to him.
“I’m sorry, Momma.”
“I’d already lost my daughter. I was beginning to come out the other side, thought he was too. We were going to be okay. But then he disappeared, and it all happened again.”
Calder could see it from her point of view. It’d even felt that way to him, at first. His father took that phone call and left the house immediately, never looking back, never bothering to say goodbye. Calder and his mother didn’t even know what had happened until they heard it on the evening news the following day.
“Child killer released with full pardon by the governor based on abuse claims . . .”
Then the knock on the door two days later. Angus had tracked his daughter’s killer, observed his movements, and set up an ambush outside the halfway house where he was living. The cops weren’t exactly clear what had gone down between the two men, but it was clear there’d been a brief scuffle. And then they both ended up with bullets in their chests.
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