Maddie glanced out the window again as a man exited the store and stopped on the sidewalk to light a cigarette. She looked at his hands, his face, his body. He glanced up, and she made a small, strangled sound.
“What?” Brian looked at her.
“That’s him,” she whispered, easing low in the seat.
“With the bandage on his nose? Are you sure?”
“Positive.” She remembered the FBI cap on her head and turned away so he couldn’t see it. Her heart was pounding now as she recalled his eyes, his weight, his fingers digging into her neck. Right before she’d smacked him in the face and managed to run.
“He’s leaving.” Brian started the car.
“What are you doing?”
“Tailing him.”
“Don’t let him see us.”
“Call Sam.” He handed her the phone as he backed out of the space. “Just hit redial.”
As Maddie made the call, Brian reached over and pulled the cap off her head. He tossed it to the floor and turned out of the parking lot as Sam answered.
“Sam, it’s Maddie.”
Silence.
“I’m with Brian, and we’re in pursuit of a black SUV.” In pursuit. Now she sounded like a cop. “We think Volansky is inside. We just saw him come out of a convenience store.”
“You get a license plate?”
“It’s too far away. He’s three cars ahead of us.”
“Tell him we’re heading west on Eighth Street,” Brian ordered. “Scratch that, he’s turning south. Tell him he’s going south on—what’s that street called?”
“He’s turning south on Sycamore,” Maddie said. “That’s away from the apartment.”
Brian veered into the right-hand lane. He made the turn, and the black SUV shot forward.
“We’re burned.” He pounded the wheel. “Damn it.”
Brian stomped on the gas, and Maddie was thrust back against the seat. She transferred the phone to the other hand so she could fasten her seat belt.
“Maddie? You there?” Sam asked.
“I think he spotted us.”
Brian raced through a yellow light. The SUV’s brake lights flashed, and it whipped around a corner. Tires squealed as Brian followed.
“East on Fifth.” Brian darted a look at her. “Tell him.”
“We’re heading east on Fifth Street. Where are you guys?”
Muffled sounds on the other end as Sam talked to someone.
“Hold on.” Brian flung out his arm and pressed her against the seat as he swung around a corner.
“Where are you going?” she squeaked.
“To cut him off.”
Her head whipped forward as he slammed on the brakes and rounded another corner. Then he stomped on the gas again, and they sped down a street. Brake lights glowed in front of them. He swerved into the opposite lane to avoid a pickup. Headlights blinded them. Horns blared. He accelerated past the truck and swerved back, just in time to miss a head-on collision.
Maddie’s heart skipped a beat. She clutched the phone in her hand and held her breath as he raced through another yellow light. He slowed at the next intersection and careened around the corner in time to see the black SUV shoot through a red light.
“Shit!” Brian pounded the wheel again.
“Maddie? What’s going on?” Sam demanded.
“We’re—” She glanced around frantically. “We’re near the campus. Approaching Hudson Boulevard.”
“You’re headed east?”
“Uh—yeah. Now we’re turning on Hudson. South on Hudson.”
Brian’s arm reached out again, and she batted it away. “Drive!”
He swerved around some slow-moving cars and sped through an intersection, but the light ahead was red.
“Watch out!” she yelped, but he was already on the brake. They skidded to a halt only inches away from a crosswalk. A stream of college kids filed past, headed for the bar district, completely oblivious to the hot pursuit going on around them.
Maddie caught her breath. She looked at Brian. His knuckles on the steering wheel were white as he waited for the pedestrians. He darted a look in the rearview and muttered a curse, then thrust the car into reverse.
“Brian!”
He shot backward up the street, all the way to the previous intersection, as Maddie craned her neck around to see the people they were no doubt about to mow over. He shifted gears. Tires shrieked as he shot down a side street. Another hairpin turn, and Maddie closed her eyes.
“West on Pecan. Tell Sam.”
Maddie relayed their location.
“We’re five minutes from there,” Sam said. “I’m sending the other team to Hudson. Maybe we can intercept him.”
“There!” she shouted as they sailed past an alley.
Brian screeched to a halt. He shifted into reverse again and zoomed backward until they were even with the alley. The black SUV was parked in the middle, driver’s-side door hanging open. A shadowy figure raced away and disappeared around a corner.
Brian yanked the Glock from his holster and shoved open the door. “Tell Sam where I am!”
“But—”
“And stay here!”
Brian heard the man’s shoes slapping against the pavement as he rounded the corner.
“FBI! Freeze!”
He bolted ahead. Brian raced after him. The guy was small and wiry but surprisingly fast, and he had a decent lead. Brian turned on the gas and started gaining ground.
The man glanced over his shoulder, then darted right, down another alley.
Brian surged after him. Any doubt that this was Volansky was long gone.
The next alley was really just a driveway behind a building, looked like maybe a movie theater. Volansky ducked behind a Dumpster, and Brian gripped his gun, ready to take him down. But then a door popped open, and a teenager in a red shirt and black pants—probably some theater employee—stepped out. Volansky shoved him aside and darted through the door.
“Son of a bitch.” Brian ran to the door and yanked it open.
“Hey, you can’t—”
He raced inside and found himself at the end of a long hallway. Moviegoers milled around with buckets of popcorn. Brian’s stress level skyrocketed as he thought of the potential for disaster.
A flash of movement. A yelp. The man barreled through a crowd of people. Brian lunged after him, squeezing his way past shocked onlookers. An alarm wailed as Volansky plowed through an emergency exit. Brian dodged around a knot of teenagers, plucking a phone from the hand of some girl as he went. He ran through the doorway and looked left, right. No sign of anyone. He glanced at the pink rhinestone phone in his hand, disconnected the call, and dialed Sam.
A noise to his right. Something hitting pavement. Brian bolted for it. A blur of black as Volansky darted around the building. Brian turned on the speed. He rounded the corner and—
Ping.
He leaped behind a Dumpster.
Ping.
Another bullet hit metal. Shit, two rounds. Close range. His heart jackhammered in his chest. Where the hell was he? Brian leaned his head back, peering through the narrow gap between the Dumpster and the concrete wall, but saw no sign of him. His pulse raced. He hadn’t been shot at in years, and he felt the familiar clutch in his chest, the panic pumping through his veins. He took a deep breath and tried to shake it off. He had to focus.
The phone in his hand made a noise, and Brian pressed it to his ear. Voice mail. Shit.
“It’s Beckman. I’m at the movie theater south of campus. This guy’s armed, and I need immediate backup.”
A clatter of footsteps, a grunt. He was running away.
Brian shoved the phone into his pocket and crouched low as he rounded the Dumpster. He scanned the area. No one. With his back to the wall, gun up, he hustled to the corner of the building and peered around.
Parking lot. Fuck. Hundreds and hundreds of cars and innocent people flowing between them. Brian ran for the lot, mind racing with a
long list of bad outcomes to this. Volansky was going to grab a car, that was certain. Would he just take it, or would he put a bullet in someone when he did? Brian took the phone out again and dialed 911, then barked directions at the operator while sprinting for the sea of cars. He reached the first row and dropped to his knees so he could peer under the vehicles. No one hiding or duck-walking around that he could see.
A distant scream, shrill and terrified.
Brian jumped to his feet, searching for the source.
Another scream. He took off toward the commotion. He ran for all he was worth, heart thundering. Don’t shoot, don’t shoot, don’t shoot.
Across the lot, a red hatchback rocketed backward out of a space. He heard the squeal of brakes and then the growl of the engine as the car sped away.
CHAPTER 5
Maddie knelt on the sidewalk beside the shoe print. She took a deep breath, held it, then let it out partially and snapped the picture.
Blurry again.
Her hands were shaking all over the place, and she desperately wished for her tripod. She glanced around for something to use as a substitute and spotted the police cruiser zooming toward her. It came to a screeching stop nearby, and Brian jumped out of the passenger side.
“I told you to stay in the car.”
Relief washed over her at the sight of him. But she didn’t respond, because she didn’t want him to see how rattled she was. She put her knee up and rested the camera on it, with the lens angled slightly down.
“Maddie?”
“I need to get a few photos.”
“We’ve got techs for that.”
Click.
She checked the screen. At last, a decent shot. She pocketed her metal scale and stood up to look at him. In the street light, she saw that his face was slick with sweat, but he wasn’t even breathing heavily, and here she was shaking so badly she could hardly hold a camera. He’d called her after the carjacking, but the few minutes between hearing those distant gunshots and getting that phone call had been terrifying as she envisioned Special Agent Brian Beckman bleeding out on some street corner.
She looped the strap around her neck. “I needed to document fleeting evidence. Stuff that fades or blows away—strands of hair, dust . . .” She nodded at the sidewalk in front of her. “Wet shoe prints on concrete.”
Brian’s phone buzzed, and Maddie pulled it from the pocket of the borrowed jacket. She handed it to him and strode back to the SUV, where she could busy herself with more photos of the running board.
Someone had shot at him just minutes ago, and he looked completely unfazed. His voice sounded perfectly normal as he stood behind her, talking on his phone. Any doubt that he’d once been in the military was erased.
Maddie crouched beside the black Explorer and clicked a few more pictures of the blood smear on the running board. These particular shots could wait for the FBI crime-scene techs, but extra pictures wouldn’t hurt. She studied the blood, knowing it could very well belong to Jolene Murphy. This might have been the primary vehicle used in her abduction. It made sense. The Explorer had tinted windows, unlike the sedan.
The SUV shifted as the police officer ducked inside and reached for the keys.
“Hey!” Maddie shot to her feet. “Hands off. This is a crime scene.”
He frowned. “Who are you?”
Who the hell are you? she wanted to ask. This was another rookie she didn’t know, but at the moment, that was good.
“I’m the forensic photographer.” She nodded at Brian. “We’re waiting for the rest of our evidence response team. Until they arrive, no one touches anything. Are we clear?”
She didn’t wait for a reply but resumed taking her photographs as the officer stalked off. Footsteps scraped behind her, and she stood up. Brian was watching her, a look of concern on his face.
“You seem upset,” he said quietly.
Upset didn’t cover it. Maddie took a deep breath and gazed up at him. “What happened at the apartment?”
“They didn’t find her. Looks like some people might have been in there recently, but it’s empty now.”
She bit her lip and looked away. They’d been so close.
“SWAT took off, and our evidence team just showed up to have a look around,” he said. “Sam’s over there supervising things.”
“Where are the shell casings?”
He looked blank.
“From the movie theater,” she said.
“Our evidence guys are processing the scene. Why?”
“I’d like them.”
“The casings?” He sounded surprised.
“We can run them through our ballistics lab.”
“So can we.”
“Probably tomorrow.”
He rested his hands on his hips and gazed down at her.
“Don’t even pretend you can turn anything around that fast,” she said. “You have to send them to Quantico, and then it will probably take weeks.”
“We need them for the case record.”
“You can have them back as soon as we’re finished. You can even run them again yourself, but in the meantime, you might have a lead.”
She watched him consider what she was offering, and she knew he felt tempted. Her time frame blew his out of the water. Problem was, investigators were notoriously controlling when it came to evidence, and she already had the tripod he’d wanted.
“Give me one of them, at least,” she said. “For twenty-four hours.”
She could see him starting to cave as his phone buzzed. He exchanged a few cryptic words with someone—probably Sam—and hung up.
He gazed down at her and sighed. “One casing, but I’m going to need it back.”
“Fine.”
“And I have to drive you home now. Sam needs me at the crime scene.”
Her stomach clenched. “The apartment’s a crime scene?”
“By the looks of things, yeah.”
Goran Mladovic eyed the FBI vehicle parked outside his house with annoyance. Not that he minded being under investigation. He’d been dealing with that for years, and Matt Cabrera’s task force didn’t know its ass from its elbow. It was the agents themselves he found insulting. Cabrera had sent two rookies—including a woman—to conduct surveillance on him only hours after he’d made a major play.
Goran’s phone vibrated in his pocket, and he read an incoming message from an untraceable e-mail account.
Delivery complete.
He went to his bar and poured two fingers of vodka. Tonight he should celebrate. Only February, and it was already shaping up to be his best year yet, and the problem that had cropped up last spring was about to get solved, permanently. Soon he would be back in business and well on his way to making seven figures this quarter alone.
Goran tipped back his Stoli. Not bad for an inner-city kid who’d grown up on powdered milk and Beanee Weenees.
For the first time in a very long while, he thought of his parents, who still lived in a tiny Chicago apartment that smelled like boiled cabbage. It was an unpleasant place, where Goran had spent an unpleasant childhood. Having a mother and a father with Russian-sounding accents during the Cold War had not been easy. His parents knew English, but his father would lapse into Serbian during his drinking binges, and Goran would end up on the back steps of their four-story building, nursing his bruises and listening to his parents scream at each other through windows opened to relieve the sweltering summer heat. During those miserable afternoons, Goran dreamed of one thing: an air-conditioning unit so that his family could keep the windows shut and prevent the entire building from knowing the extent of their dysfunction.
Goran walked through the hallway now and adjusted the thermostat to sixty-two. Never mind that it was forty-six degrees outside, and he could have opened a window. No one opened windows in his house. Ever. The temperature didn’t fluctuate unless he wanted it to. No one besides himself, not even his wife, was authorized to touch the thermostat.
He took his dri
nk and settled into his favorite chair to watch the basketball game. The Devils looked strong, possibly even strong enough to win the whole thing. Another reason to celebrate.
Goran had landed a scholarship to Duke, where his natural intelligence and his striking blue eyes had made both the grades and the women come easy. He’d been denied admittance to Harvard Medical School, but his acceptance at UTMB had turned out to be a stroke of luck that would result in more wealth than he ever could have imagined. What the Texas med school lacked in Ivy League prestige, it made up for in location. Geography is destiny. He’d read that somewhere once, and it turned out to be true, as the pinko kid from Chicago started practicing medicine in the Lone Star State.
By the time Goran had finished his residency, he was married, in debt, and supremely motivated to get to the earning phase of his career. Rather than waste his time on a narrow specialty, he’d gone straight into general practice, which was sufficiently flexible to suit his ambitions. By twenty-eight, he was already implementing his master plan to achieve his two principal objectives: money and power. It wouldn’t take him long to realize that they were one and the same.
Goran had set up a clinic in an upper-middle-class suburb of San Antonio and immediately started seeing the sort of traffic he was looking for: housewives with tennis elbow, husbands with erectile dysfunction, everyone with tension headaches and lower back pain. He’d kept his calendar booked, even when it wasn’t, and made sure anyone who called, no matter how desperate, waited at least a week for an appointment. Slowly but surely, he had developed a reputation for being expensive but free with his prescription pad. It wasn’t long before the myth became reality and then exceeded it, and he was making money hand over fist by providing in-house scripts for a long list of patients who waited days and often weeks for a fifteen-minute office visit.
But then the feds had started nosing around, and the game was up. Temporarily.
Growing up poor had taught him to be resourceful, though, and it didn’t take him long to circumvent not only the state medical board but also the federal investigators who had begun sniffing around his practice. With the help of a marginally intelligent attorney, Goran had restructured his business and managed not to lose a single patient. In fact, he’d gained hundreds.
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