Lawman

by Palmer, Diana

  She walked back into the dining room, carrying her small purse. “I’m ready when you are,” she said.

  He got up and looked at her openly, smiling at the pretty picture she made in the outfit. “Not bad, Mrs. Grier,” he murmured.

  Her heart skipped. It was the first time he’d called her that. He didn’t usually comment on her looks, either.

  “Thanks,” she said shyly, avoiding his eyes. Maybe he thought flattery would lift her mood and make her eat properly. He really wanted the child.

  “Come on, then.”

  He opened the car door for her and helped her inside. It was a hot day, without a cloud in the sky. She wondered how his colleagues would react to her presence in his office. She felt uncomfortable at the thought of meeting them. Most men still made her uneasy.

  THEY WALKED into the office together, but Garon was immediately hailed by one of the other agents, and pulled away into an office for an urgent meeting.

  A good-looking woman paused and stared at Grace. “May I help you?” she asked.

  “Uh, no, no, thanks,” Grace faltered, embarrassed. “I’m just waiting for my husband.”

  “Is he the witness Agent Carlson is trying to interview in there?” she asked, indicating a cubicle nearby.

  Before she could answer, a spate of impatient Arabic wafted from the cubicle, having a strange, foreign, almost musical tone in the quiet office.

  “Oh, hell, why couldn’t you get someone to come in with you and translate?” the agent asked irritably. “Joceline!” he yelled.

  “Yes?” the woman replied.

  A tall, blond man stuck his head out beyond the freestanding wall. “This guy doesn’t speak English. Is Jon Blackhawk out there?”

  “Sorry. He had to be in court this morning to testify on that murder last year.”

  “Well, what am I supposed to do now?” the agent grumbled. “This guy witnessed a murder. If he leaves, I may not be able to get him back!”

  The man in the cubicle, clearly middle eastern, appeared in the doorway, lifted both hands and expressed his dismay that nobody in the FBI could understand him.

  Grace moved toward him with a soft smile. “It’s only because the agent who usually translates is in court,” she said in perfect Arabic.

  The foreign man smiled from ear to ear and greeted her warmly. She replied politely, and with a smile.

  Joceline and the agent both gaped at her.

  “You can speak Arabic?” the agent exclaimed.

  “Yes. What do you want to know?” she asked.

  “Come right in,” the agent invited, smiling.

  TWENTY MINUTES LATER, Garon came back out and started looking around for Grace. He scowled. He hadn’t told her to stay in the office, but he hadn’t expected her to go walking around town in this heat in her condition. He had been worried that she’d feel totally out of place in his upscale office.

  He stopped by Joceline’s desk. “Have you seen my wife?”

  Joceline’s eyes widened. “You’re married? You never said you were married.”

  “Nobody needed to know,” he returned in an icy tone. “It’s a complicated story, and I’m not volunteering it.”

  “The maternity outfit volunteered it already,” Joceline mused. “If that pregnant lady is your wife, she’s right over there.”

  Grace had a group of agents clustered around her; all were talking and laughing.

  “Is she yours?” one of the agents, Blackhawk, asked Garon.

  “Mine?” he shifted. “Yes. This is my wife, Grace,” he said belatedly.

  “Jon Blackhawk,” the newcomer introduced himself, taking Grace’s small hand in his. “A pleasure.”

  “Same here,” Agent Carlson agreed.

  She smiled. “I’m glad to meet you both.”

  Garon caught her hand in his. “We have to go or we’ll miss lunch.”

  “Bring her back again sometime,” Carlson called to Garon.

  Garon didn’t answer. He tugged Grace gently out the door and put her in the car.

  He turned to her before he started the car engine. “Well, it looks like you had a good time.”

  Her eyebrows lifted. “Yes, you can sometimes take me out in public. I can talk and walk,” she replied. “Mostly you talk about your job, eat supper, watch the news, shut yourself up in your office and then go to bed. I don’t suppose we’ve had more than an hour’s conversation all told since we married.”

  She was right. He’d deliberately avoided being alone with her. It was all he could manage not to sweep her up, toss her into the nearest bed, and ravish her. But that was taboo right now.

  “I’ve been busy,” he acknowledged.

  “Anyway,” she added, fastening her seat belt, “I guess getting to know me better doesn’t really concern you. Once the baby’s born, I’m going home.”

  There was a profound silence in the car.

  She glanced at him, curious about his strained expression. “That’s what we agreed, when we got married. You said we’d go our separate ways once the baby came.”

  He had said that. He wished he hadn’t.

  “You’re working part-time at menial labor jobs. I thought you wouldn’t be able to handle a more sophisticated level,” he pointed out curtly.

  “I’m doing what I like,” she corrected. She stared at him quietly. “I can’t handle a high-pressure, high-paying, overstressful career. That doesn’t mean I have to stick my mind in a box. Although apparently that’s what you thought I was doing, so much so that you thought I couldn’t even get along in an office environment for half an hour without you.”

  “I never said you were stupid.”

  “You wouldn’t dare,” she pointed out with a smirk. “You’d never get another apple cake.”

  One corner of his mouth pulled up and he chuckled.

  “Careful, laughter can be habit-forming,” she cautioned.

  He sighed deeply, watching her. “You really do look pretty, pregnant, Grace,” he said abruptly.

  That was below the belt. He was flattering her. He didn’t love her, but he did appear fond of her. He just couldn’t bear her company when they were home together.

  But she didn’t mind so much. She would have the baby, when he left. Her fingers touched the swell lightly. Or he would have the baby, if Coltrain’s worried predictions came true. At least she could live with Garon, be near him, for as long as it lasted. She knew that she’d never love anyone else. She just had to hide her feelings. It wouldn’t do to give him a guilt complex. It wasn’t his fault that he still loved his late wife. Some people just couldn’t love twice.

  TIME PASSED, and Garon realized with a start that Grace was now almost eight months pregnant. He’d spent a large part of those months working on the task force, but the killer had left no trail that could be followed. They’d questioned witnesses over and over again, hoping for a single clue to break the case. But they never came close. They checked out every white pickup truck in Texas eventually. None of them belonged to a man named Sheldon. It was a dead end. More and more, the investigators gained sympathy for those poor law enforcement people in Washington state who’d spent twenty years trying to catch their serial killer. Garon and the task force had Grace’s memories to work with, but they hadn’t given them the edge they’d hoped for. Sheldon had to be the key to solving the murders, but lead after lead vanished. They’d spent months tossing out ideas and following them through, with no visible result. There was talk of disbanding the task force. Certainly, it wasn’t making progress.

  Meanwhile, Garon was irritated that Marquez seemed to be taking an increasing interest in Grace. He managed to be visiting Barbara at least two days a week when Grace was cooking at the cafe. It was the only time she acted naturally, he thought irritably. Grace did nothing to give Garon hope. She was fond of him, but she seemed disinterested in any romantic leanings.

  When they met, Marquez was courteous to Grace, but he never said anything that might disturb Garon. The one plac
e he never trespassed was on the ranch.

  Garon came home unexpectedly on a blustery cold autumn day. He couldn’t find Miss Turner or Grace inside, so he changed to his ranch clothes and went out looking for them.

  The Expedition was gone. At first he thought the two women had gone to town for something. But he became aware of voices in the big barn out back. He started to ward it, curious about what was being said.

  As he approached closer, he noticed two things. There were no cowboys around, and the man talking to Grace was the missing link in the child murders. It was Sheldon!

  15

  GARON COULD HAVE TRIED to bluff it out, by moving closer with a display of careless welcome. But Sheldon was too sharp for subterfuge to work on him. Instead Garon did the only thing possible in the circumstances. He drew his service weapon, snapped its sights on the visitor and called, “FBI. Keep your hands where I can see them!”

  Grace caught her breath as she realized that Garon had recognized this man and considered him a threat. He’d come to the house to ask about adopting one of the kittens in the barn and Grace had gone out there with him. She remembered him from her childhood. He’d been a substitute teacher at her school. All the children had liked him.

  Sheldon was moving back to Jacobsville, he’d told her, and he needed a cat to get rid of mice. Someone had mentioned that they had a new litter. Which they did. Grace always had kittens from the barn cat.

  The man was intelligent and pleasant, just as she remembered him being. But there was something about him that made her uneasy. Something…She was trying to put her finger on it when Garon appeared at the door of the barn.

  It happened so fast that she didn’t realize what was going on until her visitor suddenly grabbed her around the neck and held the sharp edge of a knife to her throat. She knew then why she’d been apprehensive. There was a smell to this man that was individual and chilling. She could see his wrists above the thin gloves he wore. His skin was white. She knew who he was now, and that he’d come back to make sure she couldn’t identify him. Her mind went back to the past, to the things this animal had done to her. Now she was pregnant, and he seemed eager to rob her of her child, and her life.

  “I didn’t expect you to identify me, Grier,” Sheldon called to him, laughing. “I’ve always kept on the move, one step ahead of the law. But everywhere I go, people are looking for me. Know why?” he asked. “Because of my damned hands. I thought wearing gloves would throw people off the track, but that description you put out on me was too good. I’ve been on the run since spring.”

  Garon’s eyes didn’t waver from the subject. This wasn’t a new situation for him, not after six years in the Hostage Rescue Team. “What do you want? Transportation? Money?”

  “I’m through running,” the man replied. His arm tightened around Grace’s slim neck and the knife pressed harder, cutting the skin. “But before you get me, I’m going to clear the deck. This—” he indicated Grace “—is the only one who got away. They said she had amnesia. But when you started identifying me by my hands, I knew she’d lied about forgetting. She hadn’t forgotten a thing.”

  “She’s pregnant,” Garon said through his teeth.

  “That’s nothing to me,” the man said in a monotone. “I hate children. Especially little girls. My stepmother hated me, especially when she found out she couldn’t have a child. I wet the bed and she punished me by making me wear frilly dresses. She kept my hair long and tied it up with ribbons. She sent me to school like that.” His face grew red with temper. “My father was afraid of her, so he never said a word. Everybody made fun of me. But I grew up. I got bigger than both of them. And I got even.” he smiled coldly. “I told the cops that a strange man did it, that I ran for help when I saw what he was doing. I cried and cried. Stupid cops. They believed me.”

  “Is that why you wear gloves?” Garon asked, the pistol still aimed at the suspect. “Because you feel guilty?”

  Sheldon moved restlessly. “When I was twelve, I started wetting the bed again. It was dark and cold and all we had was an outhouse, and I was still afraid of the dark. I held it until it was almost light, and then I couldn’t hold it anymore. I covered it up and went to eat my breakfast. I hoped she wouldn’t see it until I went to school. But she went to make up the bed before the bus came and saw where I’d wet it. She was starting a stew for lunch. The water was boiling on the stove. She screamed at me, that I was stupid and retarded, and that she’d make me sorry. She grabbed my arms and rammed my hands into the boiling water…”

  Garon grimaced.

  The suspect saw it. He hardened. “I told my dad what she’d done. He said I was a liar, because she was a good woman. He said she’d never hurt me. He took me to the doctor and told him that I stuck my hands in boiling water so I could blame my stepmother for it.” His voice trailed away. “The pain was awful. They gave me an aspirin and put some purple cream on my burned skin. When they healed, the scars covered them. I had to learn to do everything with gloves on, so nobody would make fun of me.”

  “You killed little girls who’d done nothing to you,” Grace choked.

  “You looked like her,” he spat. “All of you looked like her! Like my stepmother. I was twelve when she ruined me for life. So I killed twelve girls who looked like her. One for each year. Except you lived,” he muttered into Grace’s hair. “I can’t let you live. You’ll break the chain.”

  “Let her go,” Garon told him.

  “It’s your kid she’s carrying, isn’t it, Grier?” he asked, tightening his arm around her neck so that she gasped. “Too bad she won’t live to give birth to it.” He shifted his weight.

  Garon had never felt such anguish. The man wasn’t bluffing. His fantasy was linked to killing the girls who looked like his stepmother, and this was the end of it. There was no time to call in negotiators, to ask for backup. There was no time to do anything except react. In split seconds, he’d slit Grace’s carotid artery, and no power on earth would stop her life from bleeding out into the soil at her feet. He pictured those beautiful gray eyes closed forever, and his very soul ached.

  He had to act. Now. “Grace,” he called quietly, his face like stone. “Do you remember the day I found you in your front yard, the day we went to see Copper?”

  “Yes,” she whispered.

  “Do you trust me, baby?” he asked in a voice like soft velvet.

  She managed a taut smile through the terror. “With my very life.”

  “Okay, then.”

  She knew what he was asking and she saw in his eyes that he knew it could go either way. She had a chance to live, a slim one. Everything depended on timing. She looked at her husband, shivered, and let the man behind her take her whole weight as her eyes closed and she slumped with a soft groan.

  The tiny diversion was enough. Garon never missed. He snapped off just one shot and watched it penetrate as Sheldon turned his head a fraction to look down at Grace.

  Grace felt the body behind her jump even as she felt the warm wetness of blood down her cheek. At the same time, the knife at her throat dropped to the ground and the kidnapper and murderer of children fell dead at her feet.

  She slumped to the ground, shaking, gasping for breath. The wetness she felt was her own blood, where Sheldon had cut her just as the bullet got him. It was running out quickly. For a few seconds she was terrified that her artery had been nicked. But as she felt for the cut, and realized it wasn’t the artery, her heart jerked in a shaky, unnatural rhythm and she gasped like a fish out of water. She knew what was happening. She was terrified. Not now, she prayed silently. Not now. It’s too soon! The baby’s not ready…

  She fell onto her side, still trying to hold the skin together to halt the flow of blood. She was aware of voices around her, followed by sirens. But she didn’t understand much. She felt her life draining away. She was weightless, buoyant, merging with the air, the clouds, the sky.

  Garon ran to her, kneeling, curling her head into his chest. “Oh
God, that was close! Are you all right, Grace? Baby, are you all right?” he repeated, kissing her hair, her cheek feverishly. He was vibrating with the aftereffects of the terror. If he’d missed…!

  “I’m…okay,” she whispered. She wasn’t. But he looked shaken enough. She kissed his cheek. “You saved me,” she managed to say weakly. “Thank you.”

  His fingers in her hair were insistent as he pressed a quick, hard kiss against her lips. “My sweet girl,” he said with breathless tenderness.

  Two police cars roared down to the barn and stopped, along with an ambulance from Jacobsville General. Copper Coltrain jumped out of the ambulance and ran to Grace’s side, motioning furiously for the paramedics.

  “It’s just a nick,” Garon said in a forcibly controlled tone. He pushed back her sweaty hair. “Coltrain will look after you, sweetheart,” he said softly. “You’ll be fine. I have to give a statement about what happened. I won’t be long.” He squeezed her hand warmly. “Good girl,” he added gently. “You were very brave.”

  She couldn’t answer him. It didn’t matter. He was walking away, assured that she wasn’t badly injured. But Copper Coltrain knew otherwise.

  He threw out orders to the paramedics as they loaded Grace on a gurney and put her into the back of the ambulance.

  Cash Grier had just pulled up. He glanced toward the fallen man and the people standing over him, and he started toward them. Coltrain stepped in front of him.

  “Get your brother and bring him to the hospital as fast as you can,” he told Cash. “I’m going to call the life-flight helicopter and have her transferred immediately to Houston. I have a friend in the cardiology unit, the best surgeon they’ve got. I’ll have him meet her in the emergency room there.”

  Cash was reeling. “But it’s just a cut,” he protested, looking at Grace.

  “No.” Coltrain took a deep breath, and told him the truth.

  Cash’s face tautened. “Good God!” he whispered. “I’ll get him to the hospital,” he promised and went toward the crime scene.