Whisper of Evil

by Kay Hooper

  “It took time,” Miranda continued. “So I came down here first and settled in, a couple of months before we knew Adam Gallagher’s estate would be through probate and Nell could be expected to arrive.”

  “By the time I got here,” Nell continued, “Miranda had eliminated most of the cops from suspicion, but there were several we couldn’t be sure about. And then there was you, Justin.” She smiled faintly. “We were sure Max had brought you in because Ethan was making noises about arresting him for the murders and he knew he needed someone solidly on his side involved in the investigation. But even if we’d been wrong about that, you were eliminated from suspicion because you hadn’t been in Silence long enough.”

  “You knew I could be trusted. Which is why you aimed Shelby at me.”

  Shelby started laughing.

  Nell grinned. “Well, yeah. I knew the answer to why George Caldwell had been killed lay in those birth records, and I couldn’t really check into them myself.”

  “What was in those records?” Shelby demanded. “Nobody ever told me.”

  “Kyle had done what he called some ‘discreet’ checking to find out if he could inherit my father’s— our father’s estate,” Nell said. “He wasn’t about to go to Wade Keever, given his reputation for indiscretion and the fact that he was the lawyer for the Gallagher family, so Kyle went to another lawyer in Silence, one who wouldn’t ask too many questions.”

  Nell sighed. “That lawyer’s golfing partner happened to be George Caldwell, to whom he casually mentioned Kyle’s questions. Curious, Caldwell started digging. The irony from our point of view is that there was nothing there to find. Nothing at all in Kyle’s birth record that was in the least bit suspicious.”

  “All those hours reading birth records,” Shelby moaned.

  “I know. Sorry about that. What actually happened, as far as we can tell, is that when he couldn’t find anything in the records, Caldwell just casually asked Kyle if he was related to the Gallaghers. By then, word was spreading—thanks to Wade Keever—that I was coming home. Kyle was afraid Caldwell would ask me the same question, and since he wanted the timing of introducing himself to me as my brother to be his rather than someone else’s, he decided to get Caldwell out of the way. Another murder didn’t mean anything to him, after all. It was just like swatting a troublesome fly. Putting together the blackmail scheme was just a fun bonus.”

  “What about the other lawyer?” Justin asked. “Didn’t he pose a bigger threat to Kyle?”

  “No, because Caldwell never got the chance to tell Kyle what it was that had made him curious. But we were afraid Wade Keever might pose a threat, not because we were sure he knew anything to threaten the killer, but because we were certain if he did know anything he certainly wouldn’t be able to keep his mouth shut about it.” Nell frowned suddenly and looked at Miranda. “I guess we can let him come home now.”

  “I’ve already called the safe house and ordered his release.” Miranda chuckled. “He’d stopped threatening a lawsuit and was playing poker with the agent watching him. So now he really does have some information worth sharing.”

  “You mean you kidnapped Wade Keever?” Shelby exclaimed, grinning.

  “Not at all,” Miranda said. “I just suggested he might want to relocate until we identified the killer.”

  “Suggested at gunpoint,” Bishop murmured. “At night, underneath a streetlight.”

  “Like you wouldn’t have done the same thing.”

  Bishop started to deny it, then paused, considered, and suddenly smiled. “You’re right. I would have.”

  “Not finished yet?” Nell asked, coming into the small office where Max was typing his statement.

  “Almost. I think Ethan gave me that list of questions just to keep me here all day.”

  “Now, would he do that?” Nell asked, perching on a corner of the desk Max was using.

  “I won’t even dignify that with an answer.”

  “Good to see you two playing nice again.”

  “Is that what you’d call it?”

  Nell grinned. “Well, yeah. For you two.”

  Max sighed. “We’ll see. Listen, I meant to ask sooner if you’d decided to keep looking for where Adam buried your mother.”

  “Ethan says his people will. Now that we know Hailey’s was the murder I saw in my vision and that Kyle was the one who killed her, finding my mother’s remains is really the only thing left to do. For closure, I mean.”

  “Do you think Kyle deliberately buried her locket with Hailey to throw you off in case you ever came back?”

  “Maybe. Or maybe he was just getting rid of all he had of his other sister—me. We’ll never know now, I guess.”

  “Unless Hailey comes back again?”

  Nell smiled. “I don’t think she will. She took care of her unfinished business in one night.”

  “And now she’s at peace?”

  “I hope so. Bishop says that sort of visitation only happens when a spirit is ready to move on.”

  Max pushed his chair back from the desk a bit and eyed her somewhat hesitantly. “Didn’t Bishop also say the plan was for the team to leave first thing tomorrow?”

  “Yeah, but he and Miranda have already gone.” Nell smiled. “Considering how long she had to be down here and the fact that they were barely able to see each other the whole time, I think they intend a little R and R on their way back to Quantico.”

  “I don’t know where he’s spent the past weeks, but I’d say she’s certainly earned some time off.”

  Nell nodded. “They work together as much as possible, but sometimes they have to be on different cases. It’s tough on them, I think.”

  Max braced himself. “I imagine it’s easier because they love each other. Or harder.”

  “It’s something they’ve had to deal with.”

  “Which they’ve clearly done. Dealt with the problems and figured out a way to make it work.”

  Nell drew a breath and let it out slowly. “Speaking of which.”

  “Yeah.” Max wondered if he looked as tense as he felt. “I’ve tried not to push, Nell. Tried to give you time to think things over.”

  “I know you have. Thank you.”

  She was so grave that Max felt a chill of real fear. “You aren’t—You won’t leave in the morning. Will you?”

  “Max, are you sure? Really sure?”

  It was his turn to draw in a breath and let it out. “If you have any doubts, open that goddamned door. I love you, Nell. I want to spend the rest of my life with you.”

  Still grave, she said, “Even if it would mean my traveling sometimes for my job? Bishop says there’s no reason why the SCU can’t base agents in other areas of the country, especially since we travel so much anyway. I could work out of the Baton Rouge field office. Could you deal with that?”

  “Yes. Happily.”

  “My work is dangerous sometimes, you know that. And I can’t afford to be distracted at the wrong moment. So if the door stays open, we’ll both have to learn how to handle it.”

  “We will.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Open the door, Nell.”

  She looked at him for a long, steady moment, then opened the door. His thoughts flowed into hers, his emotions. His utter certainty. She caught her breath, stared into his dark eyes.

  “I love you,” he said. “We’ve always been forever, Nell. Didn’t you know?”

  “I know now,” she said.

  Careful not to jar her wounded shoulder, Max reached up and pulled her into his arms, and again Nell had that sense of coming home. But this time, there was no fear, no reluctance, nothing inside her insisting she hide any part of herself from him.

  This time, it didn’t take a physical act to drive Nell to open her mind and heart to him. And this time, not even she had the ability to close that door. Not any longer.

  “I love you, Max.”

  “It’s about damned time,” he said, and kissed her.

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  PROLOGUE

  The voices wouldn’t leave him alone.

  Neither would the nightmares.

  He threw back the covers and stumbled from the bed. A full moon beamed enough light into the house for him to find his way to the sink in the bathroom.

  He carefully avoided looking into the mirror, but was highly conscious of his shadowy reflection as he fumbled for a drinking cup and turned on the tap. He drank three cups of water, vaguely surprised that he was so thirsty and yet . . . not.

  He was usually thirsty these days.

  It was part of the change.

  He splashed his face with the cold water again and again, not caring about the mess he was making. By the third splash, he realized he was crying.

  Wimp. Spineless coward.

  “I’m not,” he muttered, sending the next handful of water to wet his aching head.

  You’re afraid. Pissing-in-your-pants afraid.

  Half-consciously, he pressed his thighs together. “I’m not. I can do it. I told you I could do it.”

  Then do it now.

  He froze, bent over the sink, water dribbling from his cupped hands. “Now?”

  Now.

  “But . . . it’s not ready yet. If I do it now—”

  Coward. I should have known you couldn’t go through with it. I should have known you’d fail me.

  He straightened slowly, this time looking deliberately into the dim mirror. Even with the moonlight, all he could make out was the shadowy shape of his head, dark blurs of features, faint gleam of eyes. The murky outline of a stranger.

  What choice did he have?

  Just look at yourself. Wimp. Spineless coward. You’ll never be a real man, will you?

  He could feel water dripping off his chin. Or maybe it was the last of the tears. He sucked in air, so deep his chest hurt, then let it out slowly.

  Maybe you can buy a backbone—

  “I’m ready,” he said. “I’m ready to do it.”

  I don’t believe you.

  He turned off the taps and walked out of the bathroom. Went back to his bedroom, where the moonlight spilled through the big window to spotlight the old steamer trunk set against the wall beneath it. He knelt down and carefully opened it.

  The raised lid blocked off some of the moonlight, but he didn’t need light for this. He reached inside, let his fingers search gingerly until they felt the cold steel. He lifted the knife and held it in the light, turning it this way and that, fascinated by the gleam of the razor-sharp serrated edge.

  “I’m ready,” he murmured. “I’m ready to kill her.”

  The voices wouldn’t leave her alone.

  Neither would the nightmares.

  She had drawn the drapes before going to bed in an effort to close out the moonlight, but even though the room was dark, she was very conscious of that huge moon painting everything on the other side of her window with the stark, eerie light that made her feel so uneasy.

  She hated full moons.

  The clock on her nightstand told her it was nearly three in the morning. The hot, sandpapery feel of her eyelids told her she really needed to try to go back to sleep. But the whisper of the voices in her head told her that even trying would be useless, at least for a while.

  She pushed back the covers and slid from her bed. She didn’t need light to show her the way to the kitchen, but once there turned on the light over the stove so she wouldn’t burn herself. Hot chocolate, that was the ticket.

  And if that didn’t work, there was an emergency bottle of whiskey in the back of the pantry for just such a night as this. It was probably two-thirds empty by now.

  There had been a few nights like this, especially in the last year or so.

  She got what she needed and heated the pan of milk slowly, stirring the liquid so it wouldn’t stick. Adding in chocolate syrup while the milk heated, because that was the way she liked to make her hot chocolate. In the silence of the house, with no other sounds to distract her, it was difficult to keep her own mind quiet. She didn’t want to listen to the whispering there, but it was like catching a word or two of an overheard conversation and knowing you needed to listen more closely because they were talking about you.

  But she was tired. It got harder and harder, as time went on, to bounce back. Harder for her body to recover. Harder for her mind to heal.

  Given her druthers, she would put off tuning in to the voices until tomorrow. Or the next day, maybe.

  The hot chocolate was ready. She turned off the burner and poured the steaming milk into a mug. She put the pan in the sink, then picked up her mug and carried it toward the little round table in the breakfast nook.

  Almost there, she was stopped in her tracks by a wave of red-hot pain that washed over her body with the suddenness of a blow. Her mug crashed to the floor, landing unbroken but spattering her bare legs with hot chocolate.

  She barely felt that pain.

  Eyes closed, sucked into the red and screaming maelstrom of someone else’s agony, she tried to keep breathing despite the repeated blows that splintered bones and shredded lungs. She could taste blood, feel it bubbling up in her mouth. She could feel the wet heat of it soaking her blouse and running down her arms as she lifted her hands in a pitiful attempt to ward off the attack.

  I know what you did. I know. I know. You bitch, I know what you did—

  She jerked and cried out as a more powerful thrust than all the rest drove the serrated knife into her chest, penetrating her heart with such force, she knew the only thing that stopped it going deeper still was the hilt. Her hands fumbled, touching what felt like blood-wet gloved hands, large and strong, that retreated immediately to leave her weakly holding the handle of the knife impaling her heart. She felt a single agonized throb of her heart that forced more blood to bubble, hot and thick, into her mouth, and then it was over.

  Almost over.

  She opened her eyes and found herself bending over the table, her hands flat on the pale, polished surface. Both hands were covered with blood, and between them, scrawled in her own handwriting across the table, was a single bloody word.

  HASTINGS

  She straightened slowly, her entire body aching, and held her hands out in front of her, watching as the blood slowly faded, until it was gone. Her hands were clean and unmarked. When she looked at the table again, there was no sign of a word written there in blood.

  “Hastings,” she murmured. “Well, shit.”

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  Museum exhibit director Morgan West is days away from unveiling the much-anticipated Mysteries Past show—a priceless jewel collection on loan from millionaire Max Bannister. But when Morgan discovers that a criminal mastermind is waiting and watching for just the right time to strike, the stage is set for a complex game of cat-and-mouse . . .

  Barely feeling the cold, hard marble beneath her feet, Morgan darted through one of the two big arch-ways without immediately knowing why she’d made the choice. Then she realized. There had to be more than one of them and they’d be after the most portable valuables, wouldn’t they? Jewelry, then—and a large display of precious gems lay in the direction she hadn’t chosen.

  Along her route were several larger and less valuable— to the thieves—displays of statuary, weapons, and assorted artifacts, many large enough to offer a hiding place.

  She made another desperate turn through an archway that appeared to house a room dimmer than some of the others, and found herself neatly caught. A long arm that
seemed made of iron rather than flesh lifted her literally off her feet, clamped her arms to her sides, and hauled her back against a body that had all the softness of granite, and a big, dark hand covered her mouth before she could do more than gasp.

  For one terrified instant, Morgan had the eerie thought that one of the darkly looming statues of fierce warriors from the past had reached out and grabbed her. Then a low voice hissed in her ear, and the impression of supernatural doings faded.

  “Shhhh!”

  He wasn’t a security guard. The hand over her mouth was encased in a thin, supple black glove, and as much of his arm as she could see was also wearing black. Several hard objects in the vicinity of his waist dug into her back painfully. Then he pulled her impossibly closer as running footsteps approached, and she distinctly felt the roughness of wool—a ski mask?—as his hard jaw brushed against her temple.

  Better the devil you know than the one you don’t . . . The thought ran through her mind, but for some reason she didn’t struggle in the man’s powerful embrace— probably because she didn’t know the devil out in the hallway any better than she knew this one. Instead, she concentrated on controlling her ragged breathing so that it wouldn’t be audible, her eyes fixed on the archway of the room. She realized only then that she’d bolted into a room with only one door. Her captor had literally carried her back into a corner and in the shadows behind one of the fierce warrior statues, and she doubted they were visible from the doorway.

  The footsteps in the hall slowed abruptly, and she caught a glimpse of a rather menacing face further distorted by an angry scowl as her pursuer looked into the room. She stiffened, but he went on without pausing more than briefly. As the footsteps faded, she began to struggle; the steely arm around her tightened with an additional strength that nearly cracked her ribs.

  Three breathless seconds later, she realized why.

  “Ed.” The voice, low and harsh, was no more than a few feet down the hallway.

  Morgan went very still.