by Cynthia Eden
“Let’s get started on the search,” Tucker announced to the team he’d gathered. “Remember, this is a door-to-door trip. We don’t have search warrants. We’re doing a visual hunt. I want to know who is in these cabins. You see something suspicious, you report back immediately.”
The group went to work. Tucker marched toward Bowen. “I can tell by the look on your face that that call was bad.”
Bowen shook his head. “The ME just got his throat sliced.”
“Fuck.”
“He’s alive, but the perp got away.”
Tucker’s eyes glittered. “The guy is ballsy. Going into a lab—”
“Macey thinks he’s going to call me again. If he does, we have to get the bastard.” Each time he’d called, the perp had been dicking around—playing his games and leading them astray when they tried to search him out. “The guy is screwing around with us. He knows tech. He can have his phone signal bouncing from tower to tower. He has us chase our own asses while he lines up his targets.” Frustration boiled in his words.
That same frustration was mirrored in Tucker’s bright blue gaze. “Who will he come after next? I thought he was focusing on you, but—”
“We have to make him come after me,” Bowen said grimly.
Tucker’s face tightened. “I don’t think—”
“I have to push him. I have to get his focus totally on me. The bastard is already calling me. He wants to play some fucking game with me? Then we let him. We get him to come after me, not after anyone else, and when he does—” Bowen exhaled “—that’s when we get him.”
“Playing the hero—that gig can get you dead.”
“I know how to fight back when a killer comes at me.” He’d had plenty of practice. “Dr. McKinley? He didn’t. The next target might not, either. The guy isn’t stopping. He’s getting bolder with his attacks. Macey was right the hell there. He could have gone after her!”
Tucker’s gaze swept over him, lingering on the hands that Bowen had clenched in his rage. “Why do you think he didn’t?”
“Because Macey isn’t guilty of anything in his mind,” Bowen immediately snapped back. “She’s a victim, not a killer.”
Tucker nodded. “By that logic, then Dr. McKinley was a killer.”
Bowen had already thought the same thing. “He survived the attack. We’ll find out what skeletons shake loose in his closet. If there are any. The killer murdered Captain Harwell because the poor bastard didn’t stop Curtis Zale.”
“Maybe there is something that McKinley didn’t do, either.”
Bowen forced his back teeth to unclench. “I’ll get this killer to come after me.”
Tucker threw up his hands. “Why? Because you have a death wish?”
No, because he didn’t want anyone else dying on his watch.
* * *
“MACEY, ARE YOU all right?”
Jonah. He was back. Macey lowered her phone and glanced back at him. He stood at the end of the hallway, right near the spot that the crime scene techs were marking. The spot where she’d found Dr. McKinley.
Macey lifted her chin. “I’ve been better.” On the days when she didn’t let a killer get away.
He hurried toward her. His worried stare swept over her face, and the overhead light glinted off the lens in his glasses. “I checked the power grid. The guy made it go down—had a timer in place. He gave himself ten minutes without power. Seems there is a generator that feeds directly to the body storage unit, but everything else went down. The guy had his attack timed perfectly.” Jonah almost seemed admiring. A dangerous thing.
“We need to check Dr. McKinley’s office.” Macey turned back toward the lab—and the office in question. “Tucker and Bowen found surveillance devices at our cabin. They think the perp we’re after could be watching his victims.” She made her way back into the lab. A cop in uniform was there, and Macey cast a suspicious glance his way.
Dr. Lang said she saw a cop near Bowen’s vehicle. Was she supposed to start suspecting every cop she saw now? Maybe.
Macey reached for a pair of gloves. “The whole place is a crime scene, so be very careful, okay?”
Jonah had already reached for his own gloves. “Always.” His gaze slid to the corners of the room. “Tech can be so tiny these days, freaking microscopic. We need to get a sweeper in here so that we can detect any devices.”
Macey sat down at McKinley’s desk. She drew in a bracing breath, then opened the top desk drawer. A bottle of whiskey sat inside.
Jonah gave a low whistle. “Don’t see that every day in an ME’s office.”
Her fingers bumped the mouse, and the computer woke up as the screen flashed.
“No.” She gazed down at the bottle. A fourth of it had been consumed. “He said he had a sponsor. That he’d been sober for ten years.”
Jonah paced closer to her. “You believe that? Or you think the ME has been hitting the bottle for a while now?”
He hadn’t seemed drunk when she’d met him before. His eyes had been clear. His words hadn’t shown any typical alcohol-use slurring. He’d spoken in a normal pattern, articulating well.
“Macey...” His fingers stroked over her shoulder. Jonah’s voice had dropped to a whisper. “The camera is on.”
What camera?
His head bent, and he whispered in her ear, “The computer, Macey. The camera is on right now.”
Her gaze lifted, and sure enough, she saw the faint red light next to the camera—a camera that was perched on the top of the computer monitor.
“Don’t stare at it. Just...act naturally, okay?” Again, Jonah had whispered in her ear. “Come with me.”
She rose, moving with him, and a few moments later, they were in the hallway.
“Genius,” Jonah announced. “Fucking genius.”
Macey shook her head, wanting to make sure she understood. “He was watching McKinley...through the guy’s own computer?”
He nodded quickly. “You can do it remotely. Hell, try a search on the internet—you’ll get instant results, a freaking how-to guide. Anyone can do it. You hack into your victim’s webcam and boom, you can always see what they’re doing.”
“The camera was on when I woke the computer up. Was he watching me? How?” He’d said, “hacking,” but she wanted specifics.
Jonah waved his hand. “It’s really easy to do. You get the vic to download a bad link on a website, you give a malicious document to the target—so many options.”
Her stomach was dropping. “Can you figure out who did this? Can you figure out where the guy is?”
But his gaze had turned distant. “The perp could have taken still shots from the camera. Or even done a live viewing.”
And if he caught McKinley drinking... Her eyes squeezed closed. “He saw Dr. McKinley.” With the whiskey?
“Trojan malware,” Jonah said, nodding hard. “The malware found a way to activate the camera and from that moment on, Dr. McKinley was his.”
She stepped closer to him. “You can find out when the malware was installed.” He was their tech genius. He’d better be able to find that out.
“I can find out when it was installed.” His eyes were bright. “Dr. McKinley wouldn’t have noticed it. I saw it because I knew to look for the LED light flashing with the camera... When that happens, always a fucking sign.”
She made herself take a deep breath. “You can find the guy, right? You can trace this for me.” He’d gotten her out of that office fast, and he’d whispered the whole time. Trying not to alert anyone who is watching?
He smiled at her. “I can find the guy.”
Yes. “Then let’s get to work.”
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
“WE’VE GOT HIM,” Macey said, her voice catching with excitement as it filled Bowen’s ear. He stood outside a cabin—another damn cabin that he�
��d been searching with Tucker. “Jonah just did a reverse DNS query and tracerouting and some pretty much computer voodoo magic—and he found the guy.”
“What? Slow down, Macey.”
“The perp was watching Dr. McKinley through his computer. Jonah found the email that was sent with the Trojan file attached. Jonah traced him—we’ve got the bastard! The guy is at the museum, Bowen. The file was emailed directly from the oddities museum!”
Fuck. “He was screwing with us.”
“Jonah and I are going there now—I left a cop to stay with Dr. Lopez. She just arrived. Are you meeting us at the museum? I—I know you’re supposed to stay back, but—”
“Tucker and I are on the way.” He’d let the other agent take lead, but Bowen would be there for his team.
She disconnected the call, and he turned to Tucker. “They got him!”
Tucker bounded toward him.
“The ME’s computer was being hacked. Jonah traced it back—he said the guy was at the oddities museum. The fucking place with the hate nails.” And the museum director had been so calm and controlled during their meeting. Peter Carter.
But Tucker shook his head. “The signal from your cabin wouldn’t transmit that far.”
“Then keep the men here searching. Maybe he has a second base here.” Tricky son of a bitch. “But Macey and Jonah are closing in and we’re their backup.”
Tucker barked orders to the local agents, and then they were rushing for Tucker’s rented SUV. They jumped inside and sped down the mountain.
“Do I need to remind you that you don’t have a fucking gun?” Tucker snapped at him. “You can’t go running into that place—”
“Then I’ll make sure he doesn’t run out,” he replied grimly. “You go in with Macey and Jonah. You watch her back.”
They rounded another curve. As they went down the mountain, Tucker could feel his ears popping. The road was steep and small, and dotted with cabins to the left and to the right.
“We checked that list of employees,” Tucker said as he held tight to the wheel. “No one came up as raising a red flag.”
“Then our perp just doesn’t have a record. He’s been good at hiding in plain sight.” But not good enough. “He didn’t count on Jonah.”
Tucker’s hands tightened around the wheel. “Right, Jonah.” But there was a note in his voice. A hesitation when he said the other agent’s name.
Bowen’s eyes narrowed. “Something you need to say?”
Tucker was silent.
“The guy is with Macey right now. She’s about to confront a killer. I need to know that the man with her can be counted on.” Wait, what was he even saying? Of course, Jonah could be counted on. The guy was FBI.
“I was the one who didn’t want Jonah on the team.” Tucker paused at the stop sign. Darkness was falling fast and his headlights flashed onto the road up ahead. “He doesn’t have enough field experience.”
Shit. Bowen had expressed that same worry—
“He’s done the training, yes, but then the guy sat behind a computer for years. When he’s confronted by a guy with a gun... I just wasn’t sure what he’d do.” He exhaled on a rough sigh. “Macey pulled for him,” Tucker continued as the vehicle accelerated. They’d left the subdivision of rental cabins and were snaking down the twisting mountain roads that would take them to Gatlinburg. “She worked with him on a few cases.”
And she got him to try to find Haddox.
“She knows more about his past than I do, and she convinced Samantha that the man would be an asset.” They crossed a bumpy, wooden bridge. “I have no doubt that Jonah Loxley is smart as hell, but I wanted to know that his instincts in the field were good.” Tucker slid him a quick glance. “You shot a man less than twenty-four hours ago. And it’s like you have freaking ice in your veins.”
No, that wasn’t what was in his veins.
“I would trust you under any high-pressure situation, any day of the week. Because I know you’d get the job done. You’d do anything necessary to protect your teammates and to protect any victims out there.”
Bowen cleared his throat. “You’d do the same.”
“Yeah, because you and I...we’re alike inside. We’ve seen the monsters, and we’ve both had to make the hardest fucking choice of all.”
The choice to kill. Because Tucker had taken out his brother.
“What choice do you think Jonah would make?” Bowen asked quietly.
“I’m afraid that’s what we will all have to find out.”
Bowen stared into the darkness before them. Macey was out there. “Hurry the hell up, would you, man?”
* * *
“IS IT ALWAYS this busy here?” Jonah demanded as he pushed through the crowd in downtown Gatlinburg. The small town was at the bottom of the mountains. The streets were lined with stores—the buildings connected one after the other. Families strolled the streets. Bands played. Cars honked. Chaos reigned.
“I think so,” Macey replied as she skirted a group of teenagers. Her holster was a reassuring weight at her side, hidden just beneath her coat. A chill was in the air, and the chill seemed to sink straight to her bones. She could see the oddities museum up ahead, but it was dark. She checked her watch. The sun had set just a few moments ago. Darkness came fast in the mountains, something she’d learned. Very, very fast.
“The sign says they shouldn’t be closed yet,” Jonah muttered.
No, they shouldn’t be. But the place was pitch-black.
“Guess someone decided to go home early,” he added darkly.
The police force in the area was stretched too thin. With their captain gone, with their mayor’s office in chaos, the cops had been divided—half were still at the Curtis Zale crime scene, searching for bodies. Some were with Tucker and Bowen, checking the cabins there, while other officers were tending to the basic safety needs of the people in the area.
So Macey and Bowen didn’t have a big backup force with them. They’d called the PD, but it was going to take time to marshal the officers, and time was a luxury they didn’t have. So she and Jonah had come alone.
But Bowen and Tucker are en route.
A big Closed sign hung on the main entrance. Macey put her hand to the front door. She expected to feel resistance from the lock, but instead, the door swung right open. Her head turned toward Jonah.
“Like that’s not suspicious.” He’d pulled out his gun.
She had hers at the ready. If the door was open, they’d be going in—especially with their intel pointing to this building.
“The guy could have just cleared the hell out,” Jonah said. “Maybe he realized we were onto him at the ME’s office.”
“Maybe.” She squared her shoulders. “I’m going in first. Cover me?”
“Right.” He nodded briskly. “Let’s do this.”
Macey pushed the door open and she rushed inside.
* * *
“YOU STAY OUT HERE,” Tucker directed. They’d finally arrived at the museum, but the place was dark and quiet. Tons of people lined the streets but the museum... It’s like a grave. “I’m going to check the back of the place.”
“Macey and Jonah are inside.” He knew it. They’d had a head start on him and Tucker. They had to be in there.
Tucker glanced at the building, and then he slid toward the front door. He put his fingers around the handle and he pushed it open.
Not locked.
“You cover the front,” Tucker said again, “and I’ll get the back.”
The guy rushed around the building. And Bowen pulled out his backup weapon, more than ready to face any threat that came.
His gaze strayed to that unlocked door.
Was Macey okay in there?
He took a step toward the door.
* * *
THEY CREPT UP the sta
irs. The place was as quiet as a tomb. Macey remembered her way around, thanks to her previous trip, so she knew the business office was located on the second floor.
The displays were turned off. The mannequins and animatronics were all still. In the dark, they created big, hulking shadows. Creepy as hell.
At the top of the stairs, she turned to the right.
Then she heard the stairs creak behind her, beneath Jonah’s feet.
He immediately stilled.
So did she.
“His office is to the left,” she said, barely whispering the words. She had a flashlight in her hand, one that she used to sweep out around her. A few more feet and she was at his office. The door wasn’t shut. Macey walked right in, with Jonah behind her. He pushed the door closed and then flipped on the lights.
Only they didn’t turn on. She took a step forward and heard something crunch beneath her shoe.
Macey’s flashlight swept the scene and she saw the destruction. Every computer there had been smashed. Glass and broken hard drives were scattered on the floor.
Her flashlight danced over the material once more. “Guess someone didn’t want us to see what was on those drives.” She hoped that Jonah could still recover the information. “We need to search this whole building,” Macey said. “We have to make sure he’s not still here.” She pulled out her phone and called Bowen. His line rang once, twice.
“Macey, where the hell are you?”
“Inside,” she told him, keeping her voice barely above a whisper. “Second floor—in the office. But the place is wrecked. Every computer here is smashed.”
Bowen swore. “I’m right outside the building, in the front. Tucker is around back.”
So they had the place surrounded. Good. “Jonah and I are going to search all the rooms.”
“Macey...”
She could hear something nearby. A faint moan.
“Someone’s here,” she whispered to Bowen. “I have to go.” She shoved the phone into her pocket and picked up her flashlight again. Jonah was already on the move. He’d left the office, following that low moan.
And, up ahead, she could see that a light was flashing. On, off, on, off. The strobe light. Everything else in the building was pitch-black, but the strobe light had power in that display room.