Framed and Burning (Dreamslippers Book 2)

by Lisa Brunette

  “She’s got a gun,” Grace told Strickland and Alvarez, who both registered alarm.

  Grace began to pray silently, appealing to the universal energy running through all things to show Serena a better way.

  “Let’s be reasonable,” said Carrie. “It’s been a very profitable business for us. Even you’ve benefited from it. Think about it. The money we’ve paid you over the years. It came from pictures like the ones of you.”

  “I can’t believe this. Are you offering to cut me in?”

  “Look how much I’ve taught you,” Carrie said. “There’s so much more you could learn.”

  “I don’t want any more to do with you.”

  There was the sound of heels clicking across the floor. “Stay away from me!” yelled Serena. And then the gun went off.

  Strickland had the pilot take their boat in to Star Island, where agents had secured the Langholm residence. An ambulance was already on the scene. Grace walked toward the front door, which was open, with agents filing in and out.

  “Is Serena okay?” Grace asked. Strickland was speaking with someone on a radio. He and Alvarez pressed forward.

  Inside, Grace was relieved to see Serena talking to a group of federal agents. Kristoff Langholm, in handcuffs and with two agents guarding him with guns raised, sat on the couch. Carrie was on the floor, a group of paramedics surrounding her like flies.

  They loaded Carrie onto a stretcher. Grace could see she was wounded but alive. Kristoff stood up and motioned to the guards. “Please, I want to see my wife.”

  They nodded but followed him. Kristoff took Carrie’s hand. “I’m sorry, love,” he said.

  “We shouldn’t have tried to help that stupid girl,” Carrie said. “That was our biggest mistake.”

  The agents nudged Kristoff, and he was taken outside to where an FBI van waited.

  In his wake, Grace leaned over Carrie. “Tell me one thing. How is it that you and Kristoff made your relationship work for so long, with such darkness at its center?”

  Carrie closed her eyes and then opened them again. She gave Grace a sinister smile. “We always wanted the same thing. Great wealth, to buy perfectly secure lives, so that nothing could ever hurt us. That’s better than love, you know. Love fades.”

  >>>

  Back at the Miami PD station, Cat was working with the tech team, and this much Grace knew: They were trying to monitor what they called “hidden services sites,” which were sites offering illegal services such as child abuse material, drugs, and the like. Grace had heard about the highly encrypted, anonymous Tor network, which originally had been a Navy invention and was relied upon by activists and whistleblowers who had legitimate reasons for anonymity. Unfortunately, criminals were its heaviest users.

  “Your whiz-kid granddaughter came up with the idea to use Flash code,” one of the tech guys told Grace. “We think we can get some IP addresses this way. We might be able to break the whole Langholm network.”

  Grace saw Mick researching Pennington James online. She thought of that party again, and the fact that Kristoff hosted so many of them. He must indeed have an extensive network of people across the country to make as much money as he had. Situated there in Miami, he was probably the one who handled the art fraud and smuggling aspect of the business for the rest of them.

  She realized they’d been interrupted in their investigation of the other men at the party, the Texas judge with the bolo tie and the other one Mick had jotted down, a guy with two first names. What was it? Philip Peters.

  Grace went over to Cat and Strickland, who were bent over a computer monitor where Cat had been working, and told them her insight.

  Strickland stood up slowly. “Get those names from Mick,” he directed to one of his FBI assistants. “We’ve now got probable cause for a raid on both their houses.”

  What happened next was a whirlwind for Grace. It was as if two torpedoes had been set off simultaneously. One torpedo detonated in Denton, Texas, where Judge Reinhold Busch ran a server for hidden services on the darknet with suspected ties to a network involving the Langholms. The other blasted into Kalispell, Montana, where Philip Peters did the same.

  Grace watched footage of the raids. In addition to the servers, which had not been scrubbed and still contained child-abuse material, they found caches of illegal firearms at both residences.

  “Residences” wasn’t even the right word to describe what amounted to compounds, as they were on sizable acreage with security fencing surrounds and watchdogs as an added deterrent. At the judge’s compound, they found a collection of artwork that had been reported stolen from private collections and museums. At Philip Peters’s place, they uncovered a studio he used to create forgeries of valuable artwork, with several pieces in progress.

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  It was New Year’s Eve, and Cat’s last night with Jacob.

  They were having a quiet evening in a hotel room away from the revelry, and away from her grandmother and great-uncle. They’d decided to celebrate the evening on their own, a needed break after spending so much time together the past month.

  Jacob gave Cat a full-body massage lasting more than an hour, with extra attention to the trouble spots in her neck and shoulders that had come from tensing up about the case and bending over computer screens for what seemed like days at a stretch. He demanded she remain quiet while he worked, and every time she tried to say something, he’d playfully reprimand her. “No talking, only sighing and grunting.”

  While he worked, she reflected on the case. There was a lot she had learned about the world through it, and much of that wasn’t pretty. Cat grieved for Serena and hoped that she’d find some peace after what amounted to a lifetime of betrayal and multiple forms of abuse, ranging from that of her own parents to the deceit of her so-called surrogates.

  With the news that Mick had helped bring an entire child-porn network to its knees, he’d been somewhat vindicated in the press. But a few members of the blogosphere—conspiracy-minded types—still held out that Mick was some kind of pervert to have painted the girl in the first place, that he and Pennington were child-porn buddies, and that Mick had simply turned on his friend. Cat couldn’t do anything about that, and it frustrated her.

  Cat remained astounded by her grandmother’s skills as a dreamslipper and was eager to continue apprenticing with her back in Seattle in a more advanced capacity. If Cat could learn to target and direct her dreamslipping like she did, there was no limit to what she might be able to do.

  For a cool minute she’d considered leaving the Amazing Grace Detective Agency and entering the FBI. Strickland and his team were awesome, and Cat felt the pull of that world of more sophisticated tools and access to information. But in the end, she realized it wasn’t her place. She wanted to remain with Granny Grace.

  On the whole, she was feeling more acceptance of herself as a dreamslipper, and she ultimately had her grandmother, as well as her great-uncle Mick, to thank for that.

  Jacob finished with a feathery brush of his fingers across her face, and she popped open her eyes and said, “Can I talk now?”

  “Silly woman,” he said.

  Cat propped herself on her side, and Jacob lay down next to her. She reached across and tugged on his chest hairs. “You haven’t told me what you’ve decided about San Francisco.”

  Jacob grinned. He grabbed her hand and squeezed it. “That’s because I didn’t want to freak you out. This is supposed to be casual, after all.”

  Cat’s pulse sped up, but she nodded. She still wasn’t sure what she wanted with this man.

  He took a deep breath. “I’m going to give this gallery thing a try.”

  She smiled, recognizing that her heart leapt at the thought.

  “Oh, good,” he said. “You look happy. I was hoping that would be the case.”

  Cat rolled into his arms. “I don’t know where this is going, but I would like to see you again.”

  “I feel the same way.”

&n
bsp; They made love with less urgency and more tenderness than they had previously, and when the clock struck midnight, they stood in the window watching fireworks go off over the beach. She kissed Jacob, and then they held each other a long time.

  They fell asleep together, and soon Cat found herself slipping into one of his dreams, albeit with some guilt, since she hadn’t resisted much. She was growing more curious about Jacob and liked the ability to see into him through his subconscious mind. What girl wouldn’t use any trick up her sleeve? But she knew her grandmother probably wouldn’t approve.

  Jacob was standing on the Golden Gate Bridge again, but this time, Cat saw herself, way in the distance at the other end of the bridge.

  “Cat!” he called after her.

  Police cars with sirens flashing blew past Jacob on the bridge, headed in the direction of Cat at the end of the bridge, who became quickly engulfed in a flurry of activity: black FBI vans, police squad cars, FBI helicopters, police boats. And Cat disappeared.

  “Wait!” he yelled. Then his uncle, his face once again shaped like a giant fish head, appeared next to him.“ That’s a dirty business your girlfriend’s into, sonny. Why don’t you stare at these pretty pictures instead?” At that, he opened his coat, which became the wall of his art gallery. And the scene morphed so that Jacob was standing in what must be his uncle’s gallery in San Francisco. And in walked a woman Jacob seemed to recognize, an attractive blonde wearing high heels and a skintight cocktail dress showing off her hourglass curves.

  Cat felt jealousy, and it was hers, not Jacob’s. The feeling she had from Jacob could best be described as tortured. He seemed very much stirred up by this woman.

  “You’re a New Yorker,” he said to the woman.

  “And so are you, Jewish boy. But go ahead and shack up with some Catholic girl. She seems like she can read your mind. You guys love that.”

  His uncle reappeared, took off his fish head, and set it on the woman’s body. “Is that any better?” she asked him.

  “You’re a fish stick,” said Jacob.

  “You’re mad because I’m not kosher,” she said before disappearing.

  Jacob heard the sound of heels clicking on hardwood, and he turned to see Cat walking into the gallery. But Cat’s dream self seemed not to see Jacob. She walked over to a painting on the wall, grabbed it, and threw it to the ground.

  “Rubbish!” she pronounced. “Pornographic!”

  “No, it’s not,” Jacob protested, but Cat in the dream didn’t seem to hear him. “Burn it all!”

  At her words, the gallery burst into flames, and Jacob woke with a start, ending the dream and popping Cat out of it.

  He sat up in bed, his breathing rough.

  “You okay?” she asked.

  He began to laugh. “Yeah,” he said. “I had the weirdest dream.” He snuggled back into her and chuckled softly till he finally fell back to sleep.

  Cat lay in bed and wondered at her strange gift. She didn’t feel bad about the blonde woman at all. Whatever was going on in him with regard to that woman didn’t have much to do with Cat. As far as the rest of what the dream revealed, she could lie there and analyze it if she wanted, but she was tired, and she wanted one last night’s sleep with Jacob before returning to her bed in the Grand Green Griffin. She fell back to sleep thinking fondly of her room in Granny Grace’s old Victorian.

  Chapter Thirty

  After most of the activity surrounding the Langholm case had subsided, Mick found himself back at the fourplex with a beautiful day beckoning outside. Pris invited him to go for a walk on the beach. Mick had been watching his sister in the aftermath of the case and knew she’d been to see Ernesto a couple of times. Released on an astronomical amount of bail, he had engaged the same lawyer who worked with Serena Jones. It was a contrast to how Candace’s case was going down. She would definitely be doing some jail time for second-degree arson.

  Unsure how to broach the subject, Mick stumbled into it. “So, uh, you okay with this whole Ernesto thing, Pris?”

  His sister gazed out toward the water as they stepped from the wooden boardwalk and onto the sand.

  “I won’t ever be seeing him again,” she said. “And I’m sorry about that, but I can’t.”

  “You feel betrayed.”

  “Yes.”

  “You’re angry.”

  “Yes, I am.”

  Mick was quiet for a while. Anger was not an emotion his sister showed often.

  “It’s something I’ll have to work on,” she added.

  “I’m sorry,” Mick offered. “I dragged you and Cat into this.”

  “Don’t be,” Pris said. “I lost a lover and old friend, and that is sad. But you and I, we’re closer than ever. And Cat? She’s reawakened. Look at us! We’re a family of dreamslippers!”

  Mick smiled, but what she said made him think of Strickland and the strange conversation over sandwiches. “Pris, I think Agent Strickland suspects our, uh, superhero power.”

  Surprisingly, Pris laughed. “He does?”

  “Mine, anyway.” He told her about their exchange.

  “Well, he’s an intriguing one, isn’t he? I wonder if he ever makes his way to Seattle. I rather liked working with him, and so did Cat.”

  As they traced a path at the edge of the surf, Pris said, “Speaking of Seattle, you know we have a very exciting art scene. I’ve been so impressed with the quality of the shows I’ve seen lately downtown,” she said. “I’d say they rival Miami. Maybe even out-shine it.”

  “You don’t say…” Mick allowed, but he was instantly suspicious, not to mention secretly flattered.

  “Listen, Mickey,” she said, pausing to dig a seashell out of the sand. “I’ve been thinking.”

  “Uh-oh.”

  She ignored him. “Please don’t take this the wrong way, but you don’t have anyone here, Mick. I mean, besides Rose. And I know to you she’s, ah…just a friend.”

  “Did she tell you what I did to her? Or rather, what I couldn’t do?”

  “Not in so many words.”

  Mick kicked a piece of driftwood. “I’m a flawed human being.”

  Grace sighed. “But I’m talking about family. You don’t have any here.”

  “Are you trying to depress me? Because it’s working. I think I need a drink now.”

  “Sorry, Mick. What I’m trying to say is that you have me. And Cat. And you’d keep us if you moved to Seattle.”

  “All it does is rain there.”

  “Well, yes, but it’s a spitting kind of rain most of the time. Never mind what you’ve seen on TV. Those downpours are just for the cinematic value.”

  “Great. I love being spit upon.”

  “You’d get used to it.” She spied him sideways. “I rather think it would suit your dour attitude better than this place does. You’re not exactly the Margaritaville type.”

  What she said struck a chord in him. But there was the matter of the trouble she could conjure, being able to walk in his dreams.

  As if reading his thoughts, she said, “Mickey, I’m so sorry about what I did to you back then. It was a long time ago. But I know it’s affected our relationship ever since.”

  “Marla Gibbs was the only one who understood me as an artist.”

  Grace winced. She flashed on the one dream of Mick’s she would never be able to forget. It had likely been an innocent pubescent fantasy. Marla Gibbs, a widower, had been kind enough to take an interest in Mick’s artistic talent. He spent time at her house, and she was still youngish and pretty. He’d dreamed of kissing her, and more. Home to visit her parents, Grace had tattled on her brother, to them and several others. It was enough back then to cause a stir, and gossip spread. Gibbs moved to another town.

  “I was unbearably righteous as a dreamslipper back then. I’ll never forgive myself for it. What I cost you.”

  “Never mind me,” Mick said. “I was young. I got over it. But Marla Gibbs didn’t deserve that,” he said. “You kind of ruined her li
fe.”

  “Oh, now you’re being overly dramatic, Mick.” Grace sighed. “I’m sorry she had to move. But I checked into how she was doing in the Eighties, and she seemed happier there. She’d reconnected with a sister, sort of like us.”

  He felt swayed, emotionally, but he didn’t want to let her know this, yet. He thought about how he’d miss his short jaunts to the Keys, the inspiration he’d taken there, and the place he and Donnie shared in the Everglades. He told her this.

  “It’s gorgeous in Seattle—the mountains, the trees, the artsy city life! There’s no greater city on Earth.”

  “When did you become a walking commercial for your own city?”

  “Since I rediscovered my own brother,” Pris said, linking her arm in his.

  Despite himself, he felt a lump in his throat. He held his arm in hers, and the two of them walked along for a while in silence.

  Truth be told, he’d already been considering a move, and Seattle had crossed his mind. He was also turning something else over in his mind, and it involved Rose de la Crem.

  “What have I got to lose?” he said to his sister. “Sure.”

  “Oh, Mickey! You’ll love it! You must live in the Victorian with us. We’ve got loads of room to spare. You can paint upstairs, in the Adorable Amber Attic. And we could use your help…”

  The two of them walked onward, discussing plans.

  Later that afternoon, Mick dropped in on Rose de la Crem, who was in her studio, painting.

  “Did you notice the railing outside?” she asked right away as she continued to stare at her easel, the tip of the paintbrush between her teeth. “It’s loose again! I think it’s time to get it replaced.”

  “Well, as my new building manager, that should be your first priority.”

  Mick waited a few beats for that to sink in.

  Rose took the brush and set it down on her easel. “Your what?”

  “My new building manager.”