Kitabı oku: «Safety Breach», sayfa 2
Chapter Two
Hell. Kellan wanted to kick himself for not getting to Gemma sooner so this wouldn’t happen.
But he hadn’t been sure who he could trust, hadn’t known how the info about Gemma’s location had been breached. His brother Jack was a marshal and would have been his normal contact for something like this, but Jack was in Arizona escorting a prisoner. That’s why Kellan had tried to handle this himself.
Now none of that mattered because they could both be gunned down by a serial killer.
Kellan scrambled over Gemma, pushing her all the way to the ground so he could cover her with his body. It wasn’t an ideal position, nothing about this was. They were literally out in the open with only the steps for cover. That wouldn’t do squat to protect them if Eric came around the side of the house and through a back door. Of course, if he did that, then Owen would see him.
“Were either of you hit?” Owen called out.
Kellan shook his head and hoped that was true. Beneath him, Gemma was trembling. No doubt reliving a boatload of memories, too. But he couldn’t tell if she’d been injured, and Kellan didn’t want to risk moving off her to find out.
While Owen made a call, no doubt to get them backup, his brother had taken up cover behind the door of the unmarked cruiser. It was bullet resistant, which meant if Kellan could get Gemma to it, she’d be a whole lot safer than she was here. But there was a good twenty feet of space between them and Owen. That was twenty feet that Eric could use to gun them down.
Well, maybe.
When Kellan had searched Gemma’s house, Eric hadn’t been inside. And Kellan had shut and relocked the open window along with checking to make sure no other locks had been tampered with. So, how had Eric gotten in?
Or had he?
There was something else off about this. The angle of the shot seemed to have been all wrong. It was hard to tell, but instead of coming from inside the house, the bullet had been fired more to the left side of it. If that’s indeed where the shooter was, then he and Gemma wouldn’t have been able to see him. Neither would Owen—which could be the exact reason the shot had been fired from there.
And that led him to something else that didn’t fit.
Eric himself.
There was no reason for Eric to put himself in the middle of what could turn out to be a gunfight. Way too risky. No, he was more the lay-in-wait type, and if he’d truly wanted Gemma dead, he would have just waited inside and shot her when she’d opened the door. That would have given him a minute or two to flee before Kellan had even arrived.
So, who’d fired the shot? And where the hell was Eric?
“I think the voice we heard could have been a recording,” Kellan whispered to Gemma.
She went still, obviously giving that some thought, then nodding. A recorder wouldn’t have been that hard to hide if Eric had indeed managed to come in earlier through the window. Also, it would give Eric an advantage if they thought he was inside the house. That’s where they would be pinpointing their focus when the real danger could be at the side of the house. Or even across the street from them.
That sent Kellan snapping in that direction. “Get down!” he yelled to Owen. Kellan hadn’t actually seen anything, but a year of chasing Eric had told him to expect the unexpected when dealing with the snake.
Owen did drop down, putting his body behind the door. Just as another shot came. And just as Kellan had thought, this one came from a house directly across the street. This time, he got a glimpse of the shooter who’d fired out the second-story window. A bulky guy dressed all in black, and he was using a rifle with a scope. If Owen hadn’t ducked when he had, he’d be dead.
Which might have been Eric’s intent all along.
In addition to being a snake, Eric also liked to torment his victims, and killing Owen would have definitely accomplished that. Along with adding another huge layer of guilt and grief they were already feeling because of his father’s murder.
“Hold your position,” Kellan instructed Owen. “How long before the local cops get here?”
“About five minutes,” Owen answered. “I’ve texted them to let them know about the gunfire.”
That meant Austin PD wouldn’t come in with guns blazing. They’d stay back, evaluating the situation while trying to figure how to get Gemma safely out of there. Kellan and Owen would be doing the same thing. Because Kellan didn’t want anyone dying today. Eric had already claimed enough lives.
Another shot came—again from the second floor of the neighbor’s house. The bullet blasted into the stone steps just inches from where he and Gemma were. Owen pivoted and returned fire. It worked because the gunman ducked out of sight. That didn’t mean he was leaving, but the guy might think twice before appearing in the window again.
“I need to stop this,” Gemma whispered, and she mumbled something else he didn’t catch. “One of my neighbors could be hurt.”
That could have already happened. The shooter could have harmed or killed anyone else who happened to be in that house just so he could use the window to launch the attack. However, it was also possible that her neighbor was working for Eric. Or maybe Eric had simply hired some thug to break into the house and fire the shots. Either way, Kellan wasn’t seeing how Gemma would be able to do anything to put an end to this.
However, Gemma must have thought she could do something because she moved, levering herself up on her arms and lifting her head. “I’ll try to bargain with Eric. It’s me he wants.”
Kellan put her right back down on the ground. “You don’t know that. Don’t get Owen and me killed because we’re trying to protect you.”
Yeah, it was harsh, but it worked because Gemma stayed put. Besides, it was partly true. He didn’t wear a badge for decoration, and that meant he’d do whatever it took to keep her safe.
Even though Kellan seriously doubted that it was possible to negotiate with Eric, he took out his phone. He was about to shout out for Eric to call him, but before he could do that, his cell rang, and he saw Unknown Caller pop up on the screen. He hit the answer button and put it on Speaker so he could keep his hands free in case he had to return fire.
“Want to talk, do you, Sheriff?” Eric asked.
Just hearing the sound of the killer’s voice caused the anger to roar through Kellan. He hated this man for what he’d done, and Kellan wished he could reach through the phone line and end this piece of slime once and for all.
“Call off your hired thug,” Kellan warned him.
“I will...in about four minutes, give or take some seconds. That’s about when the city cops will get there.”
Kellan wasn’t sure if Eric had heard Owen say that, but it was just as possible the shooter across the street had relayed that info to him. Not just that info, either, but every move they were making. It was highly likely that Eric wasn’t anywhere near Gemma’s house.
“Why are you doing this? Why now?” Kellan demanded while he continued to keep watch around them.
That included keeping watch of Gemma.
Her breathing was way too fast now, and it was possible she was about to have a panic attack. God knew what kind of psychological damage had been done to her because of what had happened a year ago. Of course, she was hearing the voice of the man who’d nearly killed her, so Kellan doubted she was going to have much luck reining in her fear.
“Why now?” Eric repeated. “Well, duh. Because it’s nearly the anniversary of your daddy’s death. Which I’m sure you remember in nth detail. I’ll bet Gemma remembers it, too.”
They did. It was impossible to forget that in only three days, it would be a year since their lives had been turned upside down. And apparently Eric was going to make sure they recalled it by giving them a new set of grisly memories to go along with it.
Kellan tried to fight off the images from that night, but they came anyway. The storm with lightning slicing through the sky. Ironic that it was the lightning that had given him glimpses of what was going on. Just flashes of the horror that had started before Kellan had even gotten on the scene.
When Gemma had figured out too late that Eric was a serial killer the FBI had been after for years, she’d called the sheriff, Kellan’s father, Buck, and he’d told Gemma to wait, not to confront Eric until he got there. Instead, she’d attempted to stop Eric when he tried to leave. Eric had then taken Gemma and her best friend/research assistant, Caroline Moser, hostage. Kellan’s father, Buck, and another deputy, Dusty Walters, had gone in pursuit, only minutes ahead of Kellan who’d gotten the call after them.
His dad and Dusty had come upon Eric’s vehicle that had skidded off the road because of the storm. The accident had happened in front of an abandoned hotel with the mocking name of Serenity Inn. A crumbling Victorian mansion with acres of overgrown gardens and dark windows that had looked like darkened eye sockets. Eric had forced the women at gunpoint onto the grounds, and Dusty and his father had followed.
That’s when Kellan had arrived.
Just in time to hear the crack of the gunfire, and then seconds later, he’d seen his father lying, bleeding—dying—on the weed-choked, muddy ground.
Kellan had ordered Dusty to call for an ambulance and stay with Buck while he went in pursuit of Eric who had slipped into the house with the women. Because of more of those flashes of lightning, Kellan had seen Eric shoot Gemma in the shell of what had once been the grand foyer. He’d seen her collapse, and while he was saving her life by stopping the blood flow, Eric had escaped with Caroline in the dark maze of rooms, halls and stairs. Kellan hadn’t even managed to get off a shot for fear of hitting Caroline.
For all the good that’d done.
While Kellan had been saving Gemma, Eric had shot through one of the windows at Dusty, killing the deputy instantly. Kellan hadn’t known it then, but his father was already dead.
Later, they’d found Caroline’s blood in one of the rooms. No body though. No Eric, either. Just a dead sheriff and deputy who’d been doing their jobs and an injured profiler who hadn’t done her job nearly well enough.
“You screwed up the investigation,” Eric went on. “You didn’t get things right when it came to solving your father’s murder.”
“What the hell are you talking about? You killed him. I got that right.” Kellan snapped. Then, he reminded himself, again, that Eric liked playing the tormenter, and what better way to do that than by implying that Kellan had botched something as important as the investigation that followed the murder and Gemma’s attack?
“You need to take a second look at the details of your father’s case. The devil is in those details,” Eric went on. “That’s what this warning is all about.”
“Warning?” Kellan questioned. “You had someone shoot at us. That’s more than a warning.”
“My man didn’t hit you, did he?” Eric said, his voice dripping with sarcasm.
In the distance, Kellan heard a welcome sound. Sirens from the responding police officers. Now, he had to hope that the cops’ arrival didn’t cause the gunman to open fire again.
“Time’s running out,” Eric added, which meant he’d likely heard the sirens, too. “Gotta go.”
Of course, he wasn’t staying around for this. And his hired gun must have felt the same way because Kellan saw him run from the window.
Getting away.
That was better than trying to gun them down again, but Kellan hated that the shooter would escape. Kellan wanted to chase down the idiot and make him pay for what he’d done. But that would mean leaving Gemma—and she’d then be an easy target for Eric.
“One more thing,” Eric said. “My advice would be for you to run because things are about to get very...loud.”
Eric ended the call, and it didn’t take Kellan long, just a couple of seconds, for him to realize what was about to happen.
“Cover us,” Kellan shouted to his brother.
He hooked his arm around Gemma’s waist, dragging her to her feet, and with her in tow, Kellan started running toward the unmarked cruiser. Good thing, too.
Because behind them, Gemma’s house exploded into a fireball.
Chapter Three
Gemma clutched her hands into fists to try and stop herself from shaking. It didn’t help, but maybe it made it less noticeable to Kellan who kept glancing at her while he carried on his phone conversations.
She hated feeling like this—with the nerves and fear all tangled in her stomach. But what she hated even more was that Eric and his hired gun had gotten away. She had no doubts, none, that they’d be back.
And this time, they might actually kill them.
“You need to put some distance between us,” she told Kellan.
It wasn’t the first time she’d said it, either. She’d repeated variations their entire time at the Austin Police Department. However, Kellan was doing the opposite of distancing himself, because he and Owen were taking her to Longview Ridge. Something she’d been opposed to the moment Kellan had told the Austin cops what he had planned for her.
Gemma agreed with him about her needing protective custody while the Justice Department figured out how her WITSEC identity had been breached, but going “home” had enormous risks. Still, here they were on the interstate, heading to the very place Eric would expect them to go.
Owen was behind the wheel of the unmarked cruiser, and Kellan was next to her on the back seat. Both were keeping watch while they got updates on the investigation. There was also an Austin patrol car with two cops behind them just in case things turned ugly. Eric likely wouldn’t be able to set explosives along this route, but he could perhaps cause a car accident.
“Eric will keep coming after me,” Gemma repeated when Kellan finished his latest call.
Just saying that caused the sound of the blast to echo through her head. And she could feel the effects of it, too, since the debris flying off the explosion had given Kellan and her plenty of nicks and cuts. None serious, but they stung, giving her a fresh memory of how close they’d come to dying.
Everything she owned was gone, of course. Not that she’d had anything of value. The place had felt, well, sterile. A lot like her life had for the past year. The only real loss of her personal things was her purse and phone. Now she had no cash or credit cards—which meant she had to rely on Kellan to help her. At least for a little while. But once the marshals were cleared of having any part in the WITSEC leak, Gemma needed to call Amanda to see about arranging a safe place she could go.
If there was such a place, that is.
Since Kellan didn’t even react to her reminder about Eric not stopping, she gave him another one. “You could get caught in crossfire, or worse, the way you did at my house.”
That got a reaction. He gave her a look that could have frozen El Paso in August, and he tapped the badge he had clipped to his belt.
“That badge didn’t save your father,” she snapped, but she instantly regretted the mini outburst. There were enough bad memories floating around them without her adding that one. “I’m sorry.”
He was back in no-reaction mode and turned his lawman’s gaze to keep watch out the window. Gemma watched, too. Not out the window but at Kellan.
Mercy, that face. It still got to her. Still tugged and pulled at her in all the wrong places. Sculptured with so many angles and tinted with just a hint of amber from his long-ago Comanche bloodline. Those bloodlines had blessed him with that thick black hair that he’d probably never had to comb. It just fell into a rumpled mane that he hid beneath his cowboy hat.
There was nothing rumpled about his body. It was toned from the endless work he put in on his family’s ranch and the rodeo competitions he still did. Once, she’d seen him take down an angry bull that he’d roped. All those muscles—both the bull’s and Kellan’s—locked in a fierce battle. Dust flying. Hooves and feet digging and chopping into the ground. The snorts from the bull, the grunts of exertion from Kellan.
Kellan had won.
He had literally taken the bull by the horns, brought it down and then calmly walked away. Gemma thought that was the way he handled lots of things in his life. Not women, of course. He did take what he wanted from them. But never forced or even coerced. He took simply because it was offered to him.
Gemma knew plenty about that because once she’d offered herself to him. And he’d taken.
He glanced at her again, maybe sensing that she was playing with memory lane, and she got a flash of those incredible eyes. That had been the first thing she’d ever noticed about him. Sizzling blue or stormy gray, depending on his mood. Right now, his mood was dark and so were his eyes, but she’d seen them heat up not from anger but from the need that came with arousal.
Arousal that she had caused.
It hadn’t been one-sided back when they’d been eighteen, and she’d willingly surrendered her virginity to him on the seat of his pickup truck. She had no idea who’d been on the receiving end of his virginity, but she’d been thankful for whomever had given him enough practice to make that night incredible for her. One that had become her benchmark. She was still looking for someone who could live up to him.
His eyebrow came up, and for one humming moment, they stared at each other until his mouth tightened. It was as if he’d gotten ESP issued with that badge, and he was giving her a silent warning to knock off the sex thoughts. He was right, too, as he usually was. But it had been much easier to slip into those memories than the things she needed to face.
Things she needed to piece together.
Like why Eric had waited a year to come after her? But that could be as Kellan had suggested—because it had taken him that long to find her. However, there were the other things that Eric had said.
You need to take a second look at the details of your father’s case. The devil is in those details. That’s what this warning is all about.
“Do you believe you could have missed something in your father’s murder investigation?” she asked, knowing it could earn her another of those frosty glares.
It didn’t though. Instead, Kellan took a deep breath. “Maybe.”
There was doubt, but that could have nothing to do with the way Kellan had handled the case. It could be the guilt over not being able to save his father.
“Eric’s never said anything like that before,” she went on.
Kellan shifted his position, their gazes colliding. “You’ve had other contact with him over the past year?”
“No.” And she was thankful she hadn’t, either. Not just because she hadn’t wanted to deal with Eric, but also because she was betting Kellan would have been riled to the core if her answer had been yes. He would have wanted to know why he hadn’t been told everything that pertained to Eric since he was looking for the killer.
“Eric left messages for me when I was still in the hospital, remember?” she continued. Gemma hadn’t actually spoken to him since she’d been first in surgery and then recovering from her injuries. But the hospital staff had recorded the calls and turned them over to Kellan.
“Yeah, I remember.” The muscles in his jaw went tight again. “He threatened you.”
She nodded, hoping that he didn’t repeat the actual words. Gemma didn’t need to hear them again to recall that Eric had been enraged that she’d lived and could therefore testify that he’d been the one to shoot her.
Except she couldn’t.
Gemma had some memories of that horrible night, but because of the storm and the darkness, she hadn’t seen much. About the only thing she could say for sure was that Eric had taken Caroline and her from Gemma’s house in Longview Ridge, and that later there’d been a gunfight.
“I’ll take another look at the investigation,” Kellan assured her, though it wasn’t necessary for him to say that. From the moment she’d heard Eric toss that out there, she’d known that Kellan would dig back into the files despite the fact that he likely knew every single detail in them.
“The Austin cops weren’t able to trace the call Eric made to you, and there’s been no sign of the shooter,” Owen relayed to them when he got off the phone.
Neither piece of information was a surprise. Eric had no doubt used a burner or disposable phone. And as for the shooter, the guy hadn’t been in the house when Austin PD had searched it. The home owners hadn’t been there when the shooter had broken in, so they hadn’t seen him, either.
Now the hope was that there was some kind of trace evidence or prints that the CSIs could use to ID him. Gemma doubted though that he’d been that careless, and if the shooter had slipped up, then Eric would just kill him rather than allow him to be captured and interrogated. Heck, the man could already be dead. Eric didn’t like leaving loose ends. It was the whole reason he was so angry with her. So, why had he issued just a warning and not finished her off? Maybe he wanted to torment her first. An easy kill might not be as much fun for him.
“What about my neighbors?” Gemma asked. “Were any of them hurt?”
Owen shook his head and made eye contact with his brother in the rearview mirror. “Were you able to get any details on the bomb?”
“They haven’t been able to find the detonator and until they do, they won’t be able to start figuring out who built it. Eric doesn’t have bomb-making experience. Or at least he didn’t a year ago, so he likely hired someone or spent some research time on the internet.”
Gemma had heard Kellan talking with the bomb squad, but she’d only heard his end of the conversation. Which hadn’t been much. Obviously, Kellan hadn’t liked that there hadn’t been much progress in the investigation. Then again, it’d only happened six hours ago, and the CSIs were still processing the scene.
Kellan’s phone rang again, something it’d been doing throughout the drive, and he mumbled some profanity when he saw the name on the screen. For a heart-stopping moment, Gemma thought it might be Eric, but then she saw her handler’s name on the screen. Amanda had already called once when they’d still been at the police station, and Kellan had let it go to voice mail, but he answered it now, and he put it on Speaker.
“Have you figured out who leaked Gemma’s location?” he greeted.
“No, but it wasn’t me,” Amanda answered without hesitation. However, she did sound as frustrated and annoyed as Kellan. “Where’s Gemma?” she snapped.
“She’s safe.” Kellan looked at her and put his index finger to his mouth in a stay-quiet gesture. “I need you to find the source of the leak and prove to me that you fixed it. Then I’ll give you Gemma’s location.”
“That’s not the way this works, cowboy,” Amanda argued. “I’m the one in charge here, not you.”
Gemma winced because she could feel Kellan bristling from the marshal’s cowboy label and sharp tone. Amanda had never been a warm and fuzzy kind of person, and she was even less so right now.
“Gemma’s in WITSEC,” Amanda went on, “and that puts this under the jurisdiction of the marshals.”
“Only if the marshals can protect her, and you’ve just proven that you can’t.” Kellan huffed. “Eric killed another woman last night and left a note for Gemma with her address. He’s coming after her, and I’d rather make sure that no one wearing a badge is feeding Eric info to help him do that.”
That silenced Amanda for a couple of seconds. “Is this about Rory?” Amanda came out and asked.
It was a question Gemma had expected. Rory was Marshal Rory Clawson, and Kellan’s then fellow deputy, Dusty Walters, had been investigating the marshal for the murder of a prostitute whose body had been found in Longview Ridge. Dusty hadn’t been able to find any evidence other than hearsay before Eric had gunned him down.
“Why would it be about Rory?” Kellan challenged.
“Because I figure you’re holding a grudge against Rory because you weren’t able to pin bogus charges on him. You still haven’t been able to pin those charges on him,” Amanda emphasized. “Or maybe you’ve got a wild notion that he aided Eric in some way.”
Kellan didn’t waste any time firing back. “Did he?”
Amanda made a dismissive sound. “This isn’t over. You will turn Gemma over to me,” the marshal added before she ended the call.
It sounded like a threat, and Gemma was certain they’d be hearing from her again soon. Maybe though, Amanda wouldn’t try to put her in a new WITSEC location until they had some answers about this latest attack.
“Do you trust her?” Kellan asked when he put his phone away.
Gemma opened her mouth to answer yes, but she stopped. The truth was, she didn’t know Amanda that well at all. They’d only met twice in the months that Amanda had been her handler.
“I don’t have any reason not to trust her,” Gemma settled for saying.
“Other than someone compromised your location, a location that only a handful of people knew, and Amanda was one of them.” Kellan paused, and then he huffed even louder than he had when he’d been talking to Amanda. “I just don’t want to make another mistake.”
Gemma could have said those same words to him. If she’d just lived up to her reputation of being a top-notch profiler, she could have stopped him.
“I owe you,” Kellan added a moment later.
That got her attention, and Gemma turned in the seat to face him. “You owe me?” she repeated.
Again, that was something she could have said to him. She’d been the one to mess up, not Kellan. But before she could press him on that, his phone rang again, and this time it wasn’t Amanda. It was Unknown Caller on the screen.
“Eric,” she whispered on a rise of breath.
Owen must have thought it was him, too. “I’ll try to trace it while he’s on the line.” Owen quickly handed his brother a small recorder, and Kellan clicked it on before he hit the answer button.
“So, I guess you’re both still alive and kicking?” Eric asked the moment he was on the line. “If Gemma had died, my little bird would have told me.”
“And who exactly is that little bird?” Kellan snapped.
“Someone in a very good seat for birds.” Eric chuckled.
Maybe a marshal or a cop. But Gemma tried not to react to that because this could be just another of Eric’s taunts. The word was probably already out that she’d survived, and he could have heard about it through any means from gossip to even a news report. Then again, maybe he knew she wasn’t dead because he’d had no intentions of killing—yet. Not until he’d made her suffer.
“Sorry, but I need to keep my bird’s name to myself for now,” Eric added a moment later. “Might need him...or her again.”
Kellan’s eyes narrowed. Obviously, he also hated these games that Eric loved to play. “I’m guessing you blew up Gemma’s house just in case there was any evidence left behind. That tells me you were actually in it.”
“I was,” Eric admitted, causing her skin to crawl. “It was fun to see how she’s living her life these days. So much security! You could practically feel the worry when you stepped into the house.”
Three bullets could do that, and it twisted away at her that just by hearing his voice, he could pull that old fear from her.
“I left that little microphone so I could talk to you,” Eric admitted.
“You mean so you could try to make us believe you were still inside,” Kellan snapped. “But you weren’t. No way would you have risked getting blown up, because you’re a coward.”
“Sticks and stones,” Eric joked, but there was just enough edge to his voice that made Gemma wonder if Kellan had hit a nerve.
At one time Eric had wanted to be an FBI agent. Or so he’d led her to believe. And maybe that was true. If so, that coward insult would have stung.
“Too bad you didn’t blow up her neighbor’s house where you had your hired thug shoot at us,” Kellan went on. “It wasn’t very smart of him to leave a spent shell casing behind. Sometimes there are fingerprints on those.”
It was a bluff. If the CSIs had indeed found something like that, they would have mentioned it in the calls Kellan had made to them. Still, it got a reaction from Eric.
Silence.
She doubted this would send Eric into a rage or panic, but maybe it would rattle his cage enough for him to make a mistake.
“If there really is a casing,” Eric said, his words clipped, “then I suppose we’ll just have to wait and see.”
“Oh, there’s a casing all right,” Kellan assured him, “and if we use it to ID the shooter, then there’ll be a trail to you.”
“No, there won’t be. But good luck wasting your time with that.”
“It might not be a waste of time,” Gemma reminded him. And it earned her a glare from Kellan. But she finished what she intended to say, and she made sure her voice was as steeled up as she could manage. “You believe you covered your tracks, but maybe you didn’t. You’re not perfect. You were in a panic the night Caroline and I found out what you were, and you took us hostage, remember? That wasn’t the well thought out actions of a cocky killer.”
Eric paused for a long time. “I remember,” he snapped. “And I’m sure you do, too. All that research we did together on Geo-Trace, and you didn’t have a clue.”
She hadn’t. She, Eric and Caroline had worked for two years on Geo-Trace, the name of their project for profiling and predicting specific areas of cities where violent crimes were most likely to occur. It could have helped law enforcement if Eric hadn’t been manipulating the data. He’d done that by murdering his victims in those predicted areas.
“Why did you do it? Why did you kill all those people?” Gemma asked Eric, earning her another glare from Kellan.
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