In Harm's Way (Heroes of Quantico Series, Book 3)

by Irene Hannon

  "Oh, Nick." Distress contorted Rachel's features, and her voice choked.

  He tightened his grip on her hand. "I'll spare you all the other similar episodes. And the details of the physical abuse, except to say he put his belt to good use on the parts of my anatomy that were always covered in public. Until one night, in a fit of drunken rage over some minor infraction, he began yelling and pushing me around. The next thing I knew he was chasing me around the house with a carving knife. I dove under his bed, knowing he couldn't follow. It was too low to the ground. But he had a long arm. He reached under and started to swing the knife back and forth. It clipped me before I could get out of the way. If the neighbors hadn't heard a ruckus and called the police, I doubt I would have survived the night:'

  "Is that when you went into foster care?"

  "Yes. The authorities took me away from him that night. My head healed, but the scar remained-along with all of the invisible scars. For months I struggled with fear and insecurity and a feeling of unworthiness. I stopped talking and withdrew into myself. The experts began to think I might have autistic tendencies.

  "But gradually the fear gave way to anger. I became rebellious and belligerent and obnoxious. One foster family after another gave up and sent me back into the system. I became a kid without a country. No home base, no one who cared. That's why I was such an easy mark for the group of misfits that recruited me. I would have ended up on the wrong side of the law forever if Dan Foley hadn't saved me:"

  "How did he manage to get through to you?"

  "Persistence. Sincerity. Consideration. He was the first person other than my mother who took a genuine interest in me and my future. He's also the one who tapped into my talent for carpentry. He used to invite me to his house on Saturdays to help with chores, on the pretense of letting me earn a few bucks but in reality to keep an eye on me. The fall we connected, he was expanding his one-car garage. I discovered I had a natural ability for that kind of work, and after we finished the project, he got me involved in building sets for a play at his church. Before I knew it, I was in the youth group.

  "Dan is also the reason I ended up finding God. He was a devout Christian, and he lived the values of his faith every day. He went after the kids who needed the most help, and even when they rejected him, he kept trying. I asked him once why he didn't just give up on the really tough cases, and I never forgot his answer. He said that if God never gives up on us, if he's always willing to offer another chance, how could he do any less?"

  There was silence for a moment before Rachel spoke.

  "What happened to your father, Nick?"

  "He went to jail for a while. I didn't keep up with him as a kid. I was just glad he was out of my life. But I checked as an adult and found out he died years ago. He fell down a set of stairs in a drunken stupor. Ironic, isn't it?" His mouth twisted into a brief, mirthless smile. "I'm ashamed to say I felt a sense of vindication at the news. Despite my faith, I'm still working on forgiveness. One of these days I'll get there, with God's help"

  "I'm beginning to understand how important your faith is to you"

  He locked gazes with her. "It's the center of my life, Rachel. My relationship with the Lord is the most incredible gift I've ever received. The absolute certainty that I'm never truly alone has gotten me through some very tough spots:" He gave her hand one final squeeze and released it. "Thank you for listening."

  "Thank you for sharing"

  He didn't miss her slight wince as she flexed the fingers he'd been gripping. "What's wrong?"

  "Nothing." She started to pull her hand toward her lap.

  "Let me see." He snagged her hand, appalled by the white ridges crisscrossing the angry red skin. Swallowing past the lump in his throat, he began to carefully massage away the evidence of his tight grip as he'd clung to her hand while he spoke of his ugly past. "I'm sorry, Rachel. You should have told me I was hurting you"

  "I didn't even notice"

  "My story was that compelling, huh?" He tried to smile. Failed.

  "In a word ... yes. And I'm intrigued by the power of faith in your life. Plus, the notion of never being alone is very appealing. I'll tell you what ... if the invitation to attend services is still open, I'd like to go with you tomorrow"

  This time his attempt to smile succeeded. "I'll pick you up at nine-thirty. And I promise you won't regret it."

  Nor would he. A surge of hope lightened his heart as they both rose to finish clearing the table. Best case, she'd come to some understanding of the appeal of Christianity. Worst case, he'd simply bought himself another couple of hours in her company.

  As far as he was concerned, it was a win/win situation all around.

  Do something productive.

  Nick had been repeating that mantra since he'd arrived at his office Monday morning, but it wasn't having much effect. His thoughts kept wandering to his weekend with Rachel. They'd ended up spending all of Saturday together. Breakfast had led to a trip to the Missouri Botanical Garden, where they'd wandered through the tropical Climatron in defiance of the frigid cold on the other side of the glass sphere. From there they'd gone to a movie. A cozy pasta dinner on The Hill, St. Louis's traditional Italian settlement, had concluded their day.

  Leaning back in his chair, he smiled. Sunday had been as good, if not better. The morning service had been uplifting, and afterward Rachel had peppered him with questions that suggested she had a sincere interest in learning more. He'd driven her to the hotel for her piano gig and hung around for scones and finger sandwiches. Rachel could no longer say she'd never seen a man come alone to afternoon tea.

  He'd gotten nothing done on his house. By his usual measure, that would mean the weekend was a dismal failure. But his yardstick had changed.

  "I see you spent time this weekend with Rachel:"

  At Mark's comment, Nick swung toward the door of his cube. "Have you been doing surveillance on me?"

  "No need. That sappy smile on your face says it all:"

  Stretching his legs in front of him, Nick clasped his hands behind his head. No sense denying the obvious. "It was a good weekend:"

  "Get much done on the house?"

  "Nope. I had better things to do:"

  Mark grinned. "It's about time. One word of advice, though:" He shot a glance over his shoulder and lowered his voice. "Look busy. Steve's on the prowl for someone to follow up on some leads for a Houston case:"

  "Thanks for the heads-up:" Nick sat up straighter and rotated back toward his desk. The last thing he wanted to do was get stuck conducting dead-end interviews or checking bogus leads for another office.

  Determined to focus, he zipped through his email, printing out those that were case-related and required follow-up phone calls to gather additional information. He quickly skimmed through the Sentinel system and the bureau-wide teletypes, emails, and intelligence bulletins on high-profile cases; the information from all those databases seldom had much relevance to his day-to-day work.

  The bulletin on the O'Neil kidnapping, however, caught his eye, and he scanned the update. Still no breaks. After being snatched seven weeks ago, the five-month-old infant had vanished without a trace. There had been no contact from the kidnapper and few leads. The Chicago office continued to ask agents around the country to keep the case top-of-mind, but after all these weeks Nick knew there was little hope of a happy outcome. In general, if a kidnapped baby wasn't found in the first few days, it wasn't found at all.

  To delay starting his real work, Nick clicked on the attached head shot of the infant. Cute baby. Curly reddish hair, big blue eyes, a happy smile. He couldn't begin to imagine what the parents were going through.

  His finger was poised on the mouse to close the file when the orange tufts peeking into the bottom of the picture snagged his attention. They looked like yarn.

  The kind used for hair on a Raggedy Ann doll.

  Nick leaned closer for a better look, then swiveled in his chair to check out the doll smiling back at him from t
he corner of his cube. Before it had been dragged through dirty slush, this doll's hair could have been the same color as the yarn in the photo.

  A sudden jolt of adrenaline nudged up his pulse, but he tamped it down. Millions of kids had Raggedy Ann dolls. Even if the material he saw in the photo was yarn, and even if it was attached to a Raggedy Ann doll, there was nothing to connect the doll in his office with the one in this photo.

  Except, perhaps, Rachel's bad vibes.

  Another surge of adrenaline shot through him. This one more difficult to contain.

  Yet Emily had offered a perfectly rational explanation for Rachel's response to the doll. One everyone had accepted, including Rachel. To think her reaction had been triggered by anything more than a buried memory was nuts.

  So how come he wasn't moving on to his real cases?

  The answer came to him as he examined the cherubic face of the infant on his screen. His own childhood had been shattered. If there was even one chance in a million the doll in his office had some connection to this baby, a remote possibility it could provide the heartbroken parents with answers and a resolution, he had to check it out.

  Punching in the numbers for the direct line to the case agent in Chicago, Nick drummed his fingers on his desk and stared at the doll.

  "Matt Carson"

  "Matt, Nick Bradley from the St. Louis office. I was looking through the intelligence bulletins and saw the photo of the O'Neil baby. Is there more to that image?"

  "Yeah. We cropped for the face. Why? You have a lead?"

  "I wouldn't go that far. I just want to check out a hunch"

  "I'll email you the full shot. We could use a break on that case. It's as cold as a Chicago winter. Give me a few minutes"

  "Thanks. I'll be back in touch if this pans out, but it's a long shot."

  "I'll take whatever I can get at this point"

  Five minutes later, when the ping of his email sounded, Nick clicked on the message from Matt Carson and opened the photo.

  Megan O'Neil smiled back at him. Clutched in her hands was a tattered Raggedy Ann doll-with a patch above the right eye.

  He stopped breathing.

  "The coast is clear. Steve gave the Houston leads to ..." Mark's voice trailed off. "Hey ... what's up?"

  It took a moment for Mark's question to register. Motioning him in, Nick pointed to his computer screen. "Get a load of this"

  Mark leaned over his shoulder. "That's the O'Neil baby, isn't it? Why are you..."

  In the stunned silence that followed, Nick felt Mark turn toward the corner.

  "Good God" Mark's soft, shocked comment was half exclamation, half prayer.

  "That's my reaction too" Nick swiveled around. They both stared at the doll.

  "This doesn't make sense" Mark frowned and shook his head. "Unless your Rachel knows more than she's telling"

  The hint of suspicion in Mark's tone raised Nick's hackles. But it was also a wake-up call. If Mark suspected Rachel might be involved in the crime, others would too. No one would buy her "vibes" story. Yet Nick's gut told him she had nothing to do with the O'Neil kidnapping.

  "If she knew anything more, she would have told me on her first visit. Besides, if she was involved in the crime, she wouldn't have come to the office in the first place"

  "Then how do you explain the connection between her and the doll?"

  "Emily already did that"

  "This casts a whole new light on the situation"

  "It might be coincidence. Emily's theory could still be accurate."

  "I don't know, Nick." Mark rubbed the back of his neck, his expression troubled. "This seems too weird to be coincidence"

  Nick rose and folded his arms across his chest. "Rachel doesn't know anything about the kidnapping, Mark"

  "Are you sure?"

  "Yes"

  Mark pursed his lips. "It's gone that far already, hmm?"

  "It hasn't gone anywhere. But it might. And I've learned enough about her to be confident she has no connection to that crime" He jerked his head toward the image on his screen.

  "You might be right. But we need to talk to her about it"

  "We?"

  "It would be safer if both of us go, don't you think? In case anyone finds out about the two of you and wonders if your objectivity has been compromised"

  He couldn't argue with Mark's reasoning. The fact that he hadn't considered that issue himself suggested his thinking was already muddled. "Yeah. You're right. But I need to talk to Steve and Marty first:" Both the reactive squad supervisor and the Special Agent in Charge of the St. Louis office would expect to be notified immediately of a lead in such a highprofile case, and Nick intended to follow protocol on this one to the letter.

  "Good plan. I'll clear my calendar for the morning and get the doll to the lab:"

  As Mark started to exit, Nick restrained him with a hand on his arm. "Listen ... you take the lead on the questions, okay?"

  "Sure. I recall you doing a similar favor for me last summer."

  "Yeah:" The arrest of the man who had tried to kill Emily wasn't an event either would forget.

  As Mark disappeared into the bull pen maze, Nick thought back to that incident-and how close Mark had come to losing the woman who was now his wife. It didn't leave him feeling warm and fuzzy. Neither did this latest twist in the doll story.

  There was no doubt in his mind that Rachel was innocent of any criminal connection to the O'Neil kidnapping. But she did have some kind of connection. Emily's assessment of Rachel's reaction had been logical, but in his gut Nick was beginning to believe there was more to it than that.

  He could only hope that the person, or persons, responsible for the crime hadn't seen the article in St. Louis Scene and come to the same conclusion.

  Because if they had, things could get very, very dangerous.

  Thirty minutes later, when Rachel was pulled out of her fourth-grade music appreciation class to speak with the FBI, she half expected Nick to greet her with a smile and suggest she cut out early for lunch.

  But when she stepped into the empty office, the somber faces on the two men waiting for her dashed that hope. Bewildered, she looked from Nick to the tall, dark-haired man with him, then focused on Nick again. "Is something wrong?"

  "Ms. Sutton, I'm Special Agent Mark Sanders" The darkhaired man smiled and extended his hand as he spoke. "I know you and Nick are already acquainted. We just have a few questions."

  "About what?"

  Mark gestured to a chair. "Please, have a seat and we'll fill you in"

  With another searching look at Nick, she took the chair Mark had indicated and waited while the two men sat opposite her.

  "This is about the Raggedy Ann doll, Rachel;' Nick said.

  "I thought that was over"

  "Not quite. Ms. Sutton, do you recognize this child?" The dark-haired man handed her a photo.

  Rachel looked at the smiling infant and shook her head. "No"

  "Her name is Megan O'Neil. She was kidnapped seven weeks ago in Chicago"

  "I remember reading about it in the paper." Rachel's expression softened. "They never found her, did they?"

  "No" Mark handed her another shot. "This is an uncropped version of the same photo"

  In the blink of an eye, Rachel understood why the FBI had sought her out. The doll she'd found belonged to the kidnapped infant. Her breath hitched, and she looked at Nick. "Does this mean the feeling I had wasn't related to some incident in my past after all?"

  "I have no idea what it means." Nick leaned forward and clasped his hands between his knees, his gaze never leaving hers. "Do you have any connection to the O'Neil family, Rachel? Or a Pearson family? That's the mother's maiden name."

  "No. I don't have any relatives at all. And I have no friends in Chicago" She looked again at the photo. "Do you think my uneasiness these past few weeks is somehow related to this too?"

  "What uneasiness?" Mark cast a questioning glance at Nick.

  "Rachel says she's
felt a little off balance and anxious since the first of the year" His eyes narrowed and he regarded her. "Do you remember when these feelings began?"

  "Yes. I can tell you the exact moment because it happened so abruptly. One minute I was fine, working on a mural for a customer, and the next I was overcome by a feeling of panic. It was Saturday, January 4. About ten o'clock in the morning."

  Mark riffled through the folder in his lap, scanned a sheet, and handed it to Nick, his mouth grim.

  "What it is?" Rachel asked.

  After reviewing the sheet, Nick expelled a long breath. "That's the day and time the O'Neil baby disappeared"

  For an instant, Rachel's world tilted. This couldn't be happening. She was no psychic. She didn't believe in such things. And she doubted the men across from her did, either. Which would lead them to an obvious conclusion: she had some kind of connection to the crime.

  She searched their faces. Mark's was impassive. Nick's was troubled. Neither expression was comforting. Panic clutched at her throat-and this time she could pinpoint the exact cause.

  "I didn't have anything to do with this kidnapping:' Her words came out taut and choked. "You can't believe that I did." She looked at Nick, but the reserved stranger bore no resemblance to the warm, engaging man with whom she'd spent a good part of her weekend.

  "We're not making any accusations, Ms. Sutton, Mark told her. "We're just trying to understand why you're having these ... feelings"

  "I don't understand it, either." She heard the touch of hysteria in her voice, and she sensed a subtle shift in Nick's posture, as if he wanted to reach out and take her hand. She wished he would. Instead, he asked a question.

  "Rachel, is there anything else you can tell us about this crime based on the feelings you've been having?"