They’d set the scene.
The next part in this hunt was set, and as soon as the FBI arrived, they’d begin.
From not too far away, they perched in a secure location. No one would see them there, and they could study their prey.
“Are you sure it’s safe here?” she asked. “We have to go soon.”
He was well aware. They had normal lives to fill, all the while keeping their secret desires between them.
“I know, doll. Just sit there and look pretty. This is far from over. We need to watch them, so we can figure out their next step.”
She didn't say anything.
If she did, he’d get angry.
With each kill, he was getting worse.
At the beginning, it was a thrill to take lives. Now it was getting more and more miserable.
He was the reason.
“What are you thinking?” he asked.
“Just how smart you are.” She lied. That wasn’t what she was thinking at all. In her head, she was plotting her own little plan, and it didn't involve being his punching bag.
“That’s why I love you, doll. You completely understand and get me.”
“Do you really love me?” she asked, curious about his answer.
“More than anything.”
“Then stop screwing them.”
He glanced over. “What?”
“You heard me. If you loved me, then you wouldn’t touch them.”
He turned back to watch the house with the binoculars. “I’ll think about it.”
She said nothing.
“Okay.”
“Does it really bother you?” he asked.
She didn't really care either way.
“Yes.”
“We’ll see,” Clyde offered.
Her plan was in motion, and Bonnie smiled to herself. Yes, she would bide her time until she had total control.
She was patient.
And Clyde was becoming a loose end.
* * * B l a c k h a w k - W h i t e f o x * * *
Morgue
When the team arrived, Elizabeth noticed there was one person visibly late.
It pissed her off.
Time was money, or in their case—lives, and she didn't have time for this jackassery.
If he was wasting her time, or yanking her chain, he was going to get her cowboy boot up his ass. Her patience, after that morning, was running thin.
“Where is Sheriff O’Neil?” she asked.
No one had an answer.
She glanced over at Callen. “You’re Mr. Calm. Find the sheriff before the team is done, or I’m going to hurt him. I’ll probably enjoy it too.”
Callen grinned. “On it, angel.”
When he was out in the hall, she turned to begin. Both doctors were there, Merry, and her agents. At least they could follow directions.
Then again, they were afraid of her.
“Anything on Maximillian and his wife, other than what you shared last night?” she asked.
They shook their heads.
“There have been no hits on the credit cards.”
“Merry?” Elizabeth stated, focusing on their head tech. “Please tell me that you found something—anything.”
“Boss, I don’t have much. There’s nothing to compare them to anyway. We’re assuming that it’s Bonnie and Clyde’s DNA, but until we have a person to really match it too…”
She was well aware.
“Okay, give me anything you have. I’m desperate here. I’ll take speculation.”
“I may have something.”
“What?”
She pulled out an evidence bag before handing it to Elizabeth. “Here you go.”
She took it and stared down at it. “A ticket for a cruise? I sincerely hope this is a belated birthday present because I don’t know how the hell this correlates with our case.”
She laughed. “Check out the issuing agent on the top.”
Elizabeth read the name out loud for everyone’s benefit. “Okay, it says Juliet Singer. I’m not getting the connection.”
“I didn't either until I saw this.”
She handed her another ticket.
“They were both found in two separate desks of two different victims. I know you like coincidences.”
Elizabeth held the bags in her hands and grinned. “Both couples had booked a vacation through the same agent?” she asked.
The woman nodded. “It appears so.”
Elizabeth walked toward her and hugged her. “You get a gold star and a raise.”
Ethan cleared his voice. “You don’t have the power to hand out raises. You tend to like to use them to motivate our staff. HR frowns upon that.”
He had a point.
“It doesn’t matter.” She grinned. “Merry, I could kiss you.”
There was chortling from behind her. Immediately, she spun to face her doctors.
“Don’t or you’re going to get hurt. I’ll tell your wife and your fiancée that you’re being pervs.”
They closed their mouths.
At least she had some control.
Turning, she focused on the agents. “I want you to dig up all you can on Juliet Singer. She sold vacations to two couples, and now they’re dead. It may be nothing, but it’s all we have to work with for now.”
She was grateful for any little tidbit at this point.
“Ethan believes that Clyde is a watcher, and what better way to get information from them?”
Both agents gathered all their gear. They were going to hit this angle hard. If the boss lady wanted dirt, they had to find it. As they headed into the next room to begin working, she faced her ME.
“What can you tell me about Max and Lily?” she asked.
“We don’t have much.”
“Christopher…”
He raised his hand to stop her. “Lyzee, we’re trying. The issue is we have nothing to compare the DNA to on our end. If somewhere, there was a site with Bonnie and Clyde’s DNA, we could have a comparison. Right now, we’ve tagged it as theirs, but it’s in limbo. That makes our jobs hard.”
She got that.
“What else can you give me?”
“We know that she was hit with a Taser. We found some burn marks on the back of her neck. She must have had her hair up when they stuck.”
“So we have nothing new?”
Chris wished he could give her something else to go on, but there just wasn’t anything there to work with. He wasn’t a miracle worker.
“It’s the same MO. I’m sorry, Lyzee, but we have nothing substantial for you.”
She wanted to kick a table around the room. It would get the anger out of her system. Elizabeth knew it was only a matter of time before the killer dropped the next set of bodies.
Time wasn’t on their side.
As she was about drop some serious profanity, the door to the morgue burst open and the sheriff rushed in, and he wasn’t calm and collected. The man looked like he’d swallowed a hive full of hornets.
“Sheriff, you’re late. We had an interview set for today. Why the hell isn't your deputy’s ass in here and ready for us?”
“Yeah, about that—she didn't show up. She’s MIA, but that’s only the beginning of the problem.”
“Okay, what’s the issue?”
“A citizen called in.”
It was like playing jump rope blind. She was getting nowhere.
“Who was the call from, and why is it a problem?” she asked. He must have thought she was a mind reader.
“A call just came into my office that there are two suspicious packages on a front porch. Apparently, the resident saw the morning news, and your husband was on it tearing some reporter a new one.”
Blackhawk grinned. “I’m glad I made the morning news.”
“Who is it?”
“It’s the mayor’s wife.”
Immediately, the team went into crime scene mode. As the doctors and techs got ready to head out, the investigators ne
eded more information.
“If she has heads on her porch, that’s a bad sign.”
The sheriff was aware. “She also hasn’t seen her husband in a while.”
Yeah, that was bad too.
It was going to get ugly, especially since Bonnie and Clyde were taking out ‘guilty’ people. That meant the mayor might have been dipping his stick in someone he shouldn’t.
“Was he seeing anyone on the side? Since Bonnie and Clyde like making people pay for their indiscretions, this might be one of those moments.”
He had to think about it.
“Not to my knowledge.”
“And she just noticed the packages?”
“She was away until last night. She woke up this morning and there they were. She’s scared shitless to open them.”
“Yeah, she should be.”
“We have to get over there on the double.”
“I have deputies on their way there now to secure the scene. I told them we’d be close behind.”
Elizabeth was working something out in her head. A part of the conversation had her perplexed. “And you say you can’t find your deputy? Is there any way that she was getting more than her paycheck signed by him?”
“No.”
“Are you sure? When’s the last time you saw her?”
He had to think about it. “She didn't show up yesterday, so I’m guessing the night before when she went off shift.”
“And you weren’t alarmed?” Elizabeth asked.
“No.”
“Why?”
“This is a quiet town. I figured she forgot to call in. So I left her a voicemail.”
She wanted to roll her eyes in the worst way.
Yeah, it made perfect sense. A woman goes missing while they have a serial killer, and no one think it’s more than a mere coincidence.
Really?
Elizabeth needed to let it go. Sometimes, crazy was out of your hands, and you couldn’t redirect it.
This was one of those times.
“Did the mayor’s wife touch the boxes?”
“No.”
She looked around her room. “Get your parkas on, team. We’re heading out to retrieve some heads. Make room in the cooler, Chris. Bonnie and Clyde have likely left us a present.”
He motioned to his team.
Immediately, they began getting ready to go.
“Sheriff, we want you to ride with us,” she said, motioning to her partners. She wasn’t done questioning him, and hopefully, in a not so public setting, he’d spill everything.
Outside, they piled in.
When they were pulling out, Ethan behind the wheel, Elizabeth began her interrogation. “Okay, tell me everything you know about the mayor and your deputy.”
“That they aren’t a couple. She’d never do that. Lina was a good girl. She’d never mess around with a married man. That wasn’t how she behaved.”
“Uh huh. So has she been on the force for long?”
He shook his head. “No, not at all. She started last year. The mayor recommended…”
Then he stopped, realizing he’d made his own connection.
“Oh shit on a shingle! The mayor was the one who pushed her application through.”
“I bet that would be enough to make some crazy go over the edge. Now, why would he do that?”
He didn't have an answer.
Well, she had one, but he wouldn’t like the implications. If Lina was sleeping with the mayor, or his spy, she’d been lying and being sneaky.
Well, shit!
“It’s right down this street,” he said, pointing to the left.
Ethan followed his instructions. When they pulled into the parking lot, Elizabeth pointed toward the entourage following them.
“You need to get your men to hold back the media. They’re like vultures.”
He got it.
As he went his way, they went theirs. The second they stepped on to the porch, the door opened, revealing a tiny woman. “Mrs. Boone, I’m Director Elizabeth Blackhawk. We got your call. We want you to head back inside with these two US Marshals. They’re going to start asking you some questions.”
She nodded. “Okay. I can do that. I’m really freaked out. I tried calling my husband, but I can’t reach him.”
Yeah, she suspected why. They’d know in a few seconds if they were right.
When the woman was back inside the house, Elizabeth whistled, and her team approached. “Here you go, Doc. Make it count.”
He began unwrapping the presents. “It’s the same paper and ribbon. The killers definitely did this.”
Well, at least they didn't have a copycat.
That would suck big time.
As Chris took the lid off one box, they saw the man’s head inside. Callen had the mayor’s driver’s license picture up and ready.
“It’s him,” Chris stated, doing the visual.
Tony agreed. “You can tell by the prominent mandibular arch. I concur with Chris on this one.”
Well, that was good enough for her.
They had the mayor in pieces, somewhere. This was going to put the entire town in a tizzy. This made it harder for them to do their jobs.
“Second box,” Chris said, pulling off the paper and ribbon. Immediately, Merry bagged it.
“When they lifted the lid, they didn't need to do a facial match. The sheriff, who was watching over their shoulders, began puking not far off in the snow. Apparently, he was doing the ID for them. This was going to be his deputy.
“I think that says it all.”
They didn't disagree.
Elizabeth pulled on a pair of latex gloves before glancing over at the heaving man.
“Well, I guess it’s safe to assume that our deputy here did, in fact, know the mayor. You don’t generally end up dead in a box unless you’re messin’ with something ugly.”
There was so much truth in that.
“Well?” Chris offered, standing and pulling off his gloves.
“Let’s do our damn jobs. The body count is adding up, and that pisses me off.”
The team got to work.
Time was ticking away too fast.
* * * B l a c k h a w k - W h i t e f o x * * *
Morgue
While sitting in the office outside the morgue, Brody and Johanna were ignoring the calls coming in from Levi Seaton, and his new wife. Neither wanted to be dealing with the couple, or anything they had to say.
To them, the line had been crossed.
Both parents had put themselves ahead of their kids’ well-being one too many times, and this was the most egregious act of all.
What they really wanted to do was be out in the field. It sucked to be chained to a desk as someone’s paperwork monkey, but they knew better than to bitch and moan.
They were both earning their stripes in the FBI, and this was the sure fire way to be asked out on more cases.
They needed to impress the bosses.
It wouldn’t be easy, but they had an advantage that other agents didn't.
They had the boss in their corner.
“Did you find anything on Salvatore Boone?” Brody asked.
“Just the basics,” Johanna replied. “He was re-elected last term, he’s got no dirt in his past, and he appears to be happily married.”
She showed him all the pictures of the man with his wife while campaigning.
They indeed looked like a happy couple.
Then again, politicians could be great actors. They’d run into a few mayors who played the role well.
“What about his financials?” Johanna asked.
Brody turned his tablet so they could both stare at the screen.
“I found this one debit that’s curious. It’s made the first of every month, and goes to the same account. The amount never changes.”
“Who’s it to?”
“A property company.”
“Is it his mortgage or rent for his home?”
Brody shook his head. “
I don’t think so.”
“Does he and the little woman have separate accounts?” Johanna asked.
“Yep.”
“There’s sign number one,” she offered. “When your hubby wants a separate account, be afraid.”
He grinned. “So we’ll be going joint?”
“You better believe it.”
He leaned over to give her a kiss. “I don’t mind sticking my paycheck in your account.”
Johanna paused.
Brody was grinning wickedly.
“You’re such a pervert. You didn't even try to clean that one up.”
He snorted. “I can’t help it. You bring it out in me. You’re a tease. How about you kiss me and make me pay for my boldness?”
Instead, she punched him. “Back to work.”
He rubbed his ribs. “Yes, ma’am.”
“How about we call and ask the management company a few questions?” Johanna suggested. “We might get something.”
Then again, they might get squat.
“You should do the call,” she offered. “There’s not a woman in the area who can turn you down.”
He grinned.
Yeah, that smile melted her defenses.
Dialing the number, she handed the phone to Brody. The second he began talking, she was mesmerized. If he could bottle that charm, they could both retire.
It was incredibly sexy.
And worrisome.
She watched and waited. As he worked his magic, dropping ‘sweetheart’, ‘honey’, and even a ‘sugar’ or three, Johanna gave him the look.
He winked at her.
As soon as he was off the phone, she reconfirmed her previous statement. “Joint account it is. You’re a menace.”
He laughed. “I’d never cheat on you. I know how lucky I am. Besides, any time away from you hurts. It would kill me. I’ve found my other half.”
He leaned over and kissed her. As his warm lips moved over hers, she let the heat pull her under.
Then, as quickly as it started, it was gone.
Brody was laughing. “God, I love you.”
Johanna blinked, trying to clear the male induced fog.
“What did you find out?”
“It’s a rental. That money is an automatic payment on it. She gave me the address.”
Slay Bells Ring (An FBI Romance Thriller Book 12) Page 31