The nightmare was starting over again…
Or, she told herself in annoyance, she was just being paranoid.
“Ain’t paranoia if they’re really after you.” Her father’s words boomed in her brain with the force of a chainsaw revving to life. Sweat popped out of her skin. She swiveled on her heel and started walking fast. She jogged across the wide avenue and turned in the direction Cole had taken, determined to end the uncertainty.
She spotted him half-a-block ahead and ducked behind a giant potted shrub.
He wasn’t looking her way. Cole was focused one hundred percent on the woman in his arms and sucking her in like she was his personal oxygen. Tess couldn’t see the woman’s face, but she was slender and dressed in a smart pant suit and a black woolen coat. And her brother’s hands were getting mighty familiar for lunchtime on a busy city street.
Tess leaned back against unyielding terra-cotta, her heart thundering inside her ribcage, her breath sawing in and out of her chest.
“Thank you, thank you, thank you.”
Icy cold seeped through her jacket and into the flesh across her shoulders, down the ridge of her spine, but she didn’t move. Her brother was not meeting some wild-eyed bozo, plotting the next phase of the revolution. He was having a hot and heavy fling and wanted to keep it private.
She sighed in relief, rolled her shoulders and then peeked to see if they were still on the street.
It was empty.
Of course it was empty. They were having a nooner, not sightseeing.
Maybe the woman was married. That bothered her, but not close to how worried she’d been at the thought of Cole meeting with some antigovernment activists with a domestic terrorist agenda.
Been there. Done that.
She stood and raised her face to the sky, surprised by the icy track of tears on her cheeks. She swiped at them and pushed away from her hiding place, ignoring the odd stares of people walking by. Worst-case scenarios didn’t seem so far-fetched when you’d lived through hell the way she had.
She had plenty of work to get on with, and decided to do it in one of her favorite places. She crossed the street and went up the steps and through security into the Natural History Museum. She still had questions about that photograph, but for now she could breathe again. Cole would have a rational explanation for that file being in his drawer, and she would feel like an idiot. She was the one who was going to have to lie and pretend she didn’t know what he’d had for lunch.
Chapter Seven
Mac entered SIOC and immediately knew from the high level of activity that something was up.
He slipped into the media room where agents simultaneously watched fifty different TV channels and monitored trends on social media. In today’s world, stories were not broken by reporters from news organizations. They were broken by eyewitnesses with cell phones and service in a twenty-four-hour news cycle.
“What’s going on?” he asked Libby Hernandez, the analyst ASC Gerald had introduced him to yesterday.
She looked up from her seat. “Local DJ was found murdered after she left her radio station around eleven-thirty this morning.”
Mac checked out the monitors. Droves of reporters were camped out on a street about a five-minute drive away.
“What do we know?” Gerald appeared at his shoulder. The chatter from one of the sound feeds coming through the speakers had drowned out the noise of the other man coming into the room.
Hernandez typed furiously on her keyboard and the volume decreased. “Sonja Shiraz hosted ‘Sunrise with Sonja’ every weekday morning on Radio WDC. Nine-one-one call came in from a member of the public saying they found a body in an alley. A paramedic recognized the vic.”
Mac’s gaze scanned the monitors and the newsfeed, taking in the buzz. The murder of a public figure was shocking but it wasn’t this shocking. “What am I missing?”
“Sonja Shiraz’s former name was Sanjay Patel,” Hernandez told him.
“Transgender?” A sinking feeling entered his gut.
Hernandez nodded. “She detailed the whole transition experience on her show and on her blog. Generated a huge following.”
“And a lot of hate mail, I bet.” Mac’s gaze flicked over the screens. First a black federal judge, now a transgender DJ, all within two days? He didn’t like it. “I’d like to go take a look—”
Gerald was shaking his head. “I know what you’re thinking, but three murders in two days isn’t that unusual.”
“All high-profile potential hate targets?”
“No evidence to suggest either were hate crimes, let alone that the murders are connected.”
“Was she shot?” Mac asked.
“Unfortunately, getting shot isn’t that unusual either.” Gerald pressed his lips together. “WFO weren’t happy with you turning up at their crime scene yesterday. I got a call from their SAC telling us to butt out.”
“I offered help. I didn’t tread on any toes.” Mac rolled his eyes. He hated politics.
“How would you have felt if some headquarters’ suit insinuated himself into one of your inquiries?”
“Pissed, but I don’t need a friendship badge from the Brownies. I can help solve these crimes. I know how these guys think.”
“WFO?” Gerald queried.
Mac laughed. “Right wing extremists.” At Gerald’s doubtful expression Mac continued, “I spent a year undercover during the investigation into David Hines’s Pioneers organization.” At Gerald’s surprised expression, he added, “It was before I joined the FBI.”
Several people nearby were listening hard to their conversation but this wasn’t a secret. It just wasn’t common knowledge.
“That was back in the mid-nineties. What, were you in diapers?”
“It was my first undercover job.” Mac scratched the back of his neck. “I was a little wet behind the ears, I’ll admit. That’s why they chose me. The Pioneers never imagined a goofy cowboy was also an undercover cop.”
“You must have had a hell of a resume by the time you joined the FBI.” There was grudging respect in Gerald’s tone now.
“I was lucky I wasn’t strung up by my balls,” Mac told him honestly. “After the shootout, my identity was kept out of the reports because of fears of reprisals from the surviving members. The assholes all turned on one another anyway so they didn’t need my testimony.” Mac curbed his impatience as the media room danced around them. “The thing is, during my time with them David Hines often discussed his ‘manifesto.’ First thing on it was kill a federal judge. The next was kill a prominent black man.” He tucked in his chin. “Obviously they used a more derogatory term than ‘black.’”
ASC Gerald’s mouth firmed. “Obviously.”
“I forget the exact phrasing but I can find it in my notes. Next on the list were prominent figures who sympathized with homosexuals, Jews, Mexicans, Arabs, abortionists, followed by any cop, federal official or politician they could get their hands on. Last but not least, POTUS himself.”
He let that sink in.
These assholes had been eager to kill their president regardless of his politics or ideology—just for being the man in the White House. There had already been one attempt on President Hague’s life—Mac had been on scene for that and it had ripped out his insides. The idea of a second attempt pissed him off.
“The Pioneers were not alone in their antigovernment rhetoric in the nineties, and white nationalists and extremist groups have been on the rise for the last decade,” Gerald said slowly.
“It would be wise to warn other agencies to increase their levels of alertness.”
Gerald scanned the screens, then crossed his arms over his chest. “Agreed, but I can’t sign off on your deeper involvement in this. If there’s a connection between Judge Thomas and the DJ the ME will notify the field office and they’ll deal with it. Until we have some viable indication it’s a hate crime, we stay out of it.”
Mac nodded and followed him out of the media room into the
quieter hallway. He’d be lying if he said he wasn’t disappointed but knew better than to show it.
“Hostage fusion cell wanted to talk to you about ways of increasing networking between negotiators across the county.” Gerald seemed busy and distracted. Running SIOC must be complicated enough without some newbie stirring the pot.
“I’ll get right on that.” Which would take him a couple of hours tops. Mac reined in his frustration and tried to quash the eagerness to get involved in every case. He needed to focus on his career.
He headed off to where the small group of guys from HRT and the Crisis Negotiation Unit hung out in one of the breakout rooms at the back of the National Assets Command Room. This room was the place where all the experts would gather if there was ever a nuclear bomb on the ground in the US. Thankfully it was quiet. Hopefully it would stay that way.
The room itself was a reminder that SIOC brought together the best of the best in a small space. It was the waiting part that killed him and he missed the hands-on rush of running an investigation. Special Agent in Charge by forty, he reminded himself as he searched out Eban Winters, one of the best negotiators in the world and head of the hostage fusion cell at SIOC.
Mac’s phone dinged and he looked down and saw Heather was now angry-texting him.
Nice.
He’d rather deal with a hundred white supremacists than deal with his ex, which said more about him than it did about her. She’d done him a favor by having an affair with her boss. He plainly wasn’t cut out to be the romantic lead in someone else’s happily ever after. He’d rather arrest the bad guys.
* * *
Tess placed her laptop on the kitchen table and eased out of her coat. Cole was putting the trash out on the curb for garbage day. She started through to the den, determined to accidentally come across this file folder and get her questions answered so she could quit worrying.
She collided with a hard, male body that nearly knocked her off her feet. Joseph, her brother’s best friend, grabbed her by the upper arms and held her against him.
“Well, hello, beautiful.” He smiled down at her. “I finally get my hands on the lovely Tess.” Joseph leaned closer. “Cole’s not here, but you’re welcome to keep me company while you wait for him.” His hands were large and warm and started to drift down her waist toward her ass.
She jerked out of his grip and took a step away. “I’m good. Thank you.”
“Oh, you are better than good, Tess. You are perfect. You wanna come to my birthday party next weekend? I’ll feed you chocolate cake. I know you like chocolate cake.”
He flustered her and unsettled her but she realized a tiny part of her was flattered by the attention. That’s what happened when you dated losers. She did not intend to encourage him. She crossed her arms. “Your nineteenth birthday party.” She raised a knowing brow at him. She was thirty for heaven’s sake.
He dropped his voice to a murmur. “But it’s only cake, Tess.” Except he said the word ‘cake’ like he was licking it off her naked skin.
The door opened behind her.
“There he is now.” Joseph walked over to the refrigerator. “Want a beer, Cole? Tess?”
“Sure.” Her brother threw his jacket on the back of a kitchen chair.
Tess checked the clock. It wasn’t even four o’clock. “You guys remember you’re underage, correct?”
“Seriously?” Joseph handed Cole a bottle, ignoring her protests. “We’re old enough to go to war, and have sex,” his eyes lingered on her chest, “but not drink a beer? Live a little, Tess.”
He held out a bottle to her in challenge, but she hadn’t been peer-pressured since high school when she’d been caught taking her one and only puff of a cigarette by her favorite gym teacher.
“No. Thank you.” She smiled tightly. “Those of us who work for a living have things to do.”
“Ouch.” Joseph gave a wince. “Your sister’s killing me, dude.”
Cole laughed. “She has your number. Did you go to class today?”
“Three classes and I finished an assignment. Where were you?”
“Had something important to do,” Cole muttered evasively, flushing.
He’d skipped class? He never skipped class. She watched him anxiously as he avoided her gaze.
Joseph took a long pull of beer. “I’m supposed to have a date tonight but I might ditch it.”
“You going to let the lady in question know you’re bailing or should we expect angry texts?” Cole asked sardonically.
Joseph sent Tess an assessing look. “I haven’t decided yet. What do you think, Tess?”
Tess tried to keep her face expressionless. “Treat her with respect. If you’re not going to show up, at least tell her. No one wants to look stupid being stood up—especially if she actually likes you enough to go on a date with you.”
“She asked me.” His smile said this happened a lot.
Women would find him attractive. “How would you feel if she stood you up?”
He shrugged like it was no big deal. “I’d find someone else to take home.”
She blew out a gusty breath. The more she discovered about men the less she liked the species.
Footsteps thundered down the stairs as Zane and Dave joined the party.
“Hey, Tess.” Zane gave her a sly grin and Dave blushed. Zane was all silky, black hair and long, lean muscle. He was the captain of the soccer team and had one of those faces that could easily transition into a modeling contract. Dave was a stocky redhead from Oklahoma who morphed into a demon defender on the pitch.
Their gazes went to where Cole stood in the kitchen. “Wanna play Medal of Honor?” Zane asked Cole. “We’re gonna have a tournament.”
Her brother looked like he was about to say yes.
“Nope,” she interrupted. “Cole and I need to finish his taxes.”
Joseph spluttered into his beer. “Kill me now.”
“Tempting,” Tess smiled sharply, “but I want to get this done first.”
Her brother laughed. Zane and Joseph chuckled. The three young men vied for the best position on the couch while she and Cole went through into the den. Cole woke up his laptop and colored a little at the screensaver featuring a topless woman.
“Crap. Sorry.” He quickly inputted his password. Tess tried to see what it was but he was way too fast.
Apparently, her nerdy little brother had discovered the opposite sex in a big way. His roommates weren’t what you’d call shy. She dreaded to think the sort of trouble they could get Cole into.
As long as it wasn’t enough to get them arrested, she’d deal.
“I just want the household bill totals for the year,” she told him. “Utilities, internet, phone, insurance, mortgage, bank charges and interest. And any other expenses or income you might have forgotten to mention.”
Cole opened the filing drawer and began a methodic search through the files. Her OCD brain itched as he haphazardly shoved things back into the wrong place. She leaned over the desk and peered into the drawer, silently urging him to pull out the black file with the judge’s photo in it so she could ask what the hell it was.
Cole glanced up and eyed her quizzically. “You all right, sis?”
“Sure,” she said, brightly. Too brightly.
He directed a glare toward the doorway and Tess turned her head to find Joseph standing there enjoying the view. Dammit. She straightened up from the desk.
“Spoilsport,” Joseph joked.
“Go leer at someone else,” Cole told him in disgust.
“Excellent idea. Maybe I’ll call your girlfriend,” Joseph said. “Give me her number.”
Cole gave Joseph the finger.
“So you do have a girlfriend?” asked Tess.
Joseph chuckled and turned away.
“Nope.” Cole didn’t look up but she could tell he wasn’t telling the truth from the way his ears started to glow.
“Do I know her?” she pressed, genuinely curious as to why he would
n’t tell her.
“No.”
“Who is it?”
“Drop it, Tess,” he snapped.
She flinched.
He carried on searching, his movements jerky, but missing the files she needed.
She drummed her fingers impatiently on his desk.
“Do you want to search for this stuff?” Cole stared pointedly, clearly irritated.
She ignored the fact he was being facetious and took the opportunity to come around to his side of the desk and start looking through the drawer herself.
He rolled his chair back as she quickly pulled out files. The tightness of his jaw told her he was mad with her, but when she caught his gaze his expression softened.
“Sorry. I shouldn’t have snapped at you.”
“But you don’t want to talk about her,” Tess said quietly.
“Exactly.”
“I shouldn’t have pried.”
He raised his eyes to the ceiling, then scrubbed his face. He glanced at his roommates and friends drinking beer in front of the PlayStation and sighed.
“There’s an age difference. She doesn’t want anyone to know we’re seeing each other.”
“She’s older?” Tess wondered if the woman was married but feared she’d be pushing it too far by asking.
He tucked in his chin and squinted at her. “You think I’d date a high school student?”
He was right. He’d be twenty next month. Younger would be an absolute nightmare and remind her too much of darker times. He wasn’t the only one keeping secrets.
“How much older?” she tried to sound nonchalant.
He crossed his arms over his chest. “I’m not saying anything else. I already told you more than I should.”
Tess studied him. “Just be careful, okay?”
“Are you giving me the ‘safe sex’ talk?” He cocked a brow.
She groaned. “Do I have to?”
He shook his head.
“Good. I meant be careful with your heart. And hers.”
His eyes narrowed. “Jason was a complete jackass. You know that, right?”
A lump formed in her throat and she went back to the files to hide the fact he’d hit a nerve. “And I really do not want to waste another thought on him.”
Cold Malice Page 5