Deadly Sins (48 page)

“And the manhunt continues for Adam Raiker, ex–FBI agent and head of Raiker Forensics, better known as the Mindhunters,” a vapid-looking blonde was telling the camera. “A spokesman for the bureau has verified that Raiker is a person of interest in the DC killings, a case, ironically enough, he was assigned to as an independent consultant.” A phone number scrolled across the bottom of the screen. “Residents are warned not to approach Raiker if they see him, as he is considered armed and dangerous. Instead call the number on the bottom of this screen, or 911. And be sure to check in for regular updates on this chilling ongoing investigation.” With a brilliant smile she turned to her cohost. “Back to you, Chet.”

As the male anchor began the national news, Jaid set her mug carefully on the table, her hand shaking slightly. Setting up the meet with Hedgelin wasn’t their only problem, she realized, fear threading through her. They also had to move undetected through the city, when every officer in the area was looking for Adam.

“Hey, boss, just caught you on the news.” A sleepylooking Kell pushed open the door, held it for Macy, who looked as fresh and crisp as her fiancé looked rumpled. “Terrible picture of you. Where’d they get it?”

“That’s sort of the least of his worries, don’t you think?” A lanky woman with green-gold eyes and sun-streaked short hair followed them in, blowing on a cup of coffee. Ramsey Stryker. She and her husband Dev had driven Royce and Jaid’s mother to Orlando.

Jaid gave her a faint smile. “I hope my family didn’t give you too much trouble on the trip.”

“Your kid is pretty funny. Him I like. Your mother should be locked in my mom’s trailer for twenty-four hours while we take bets on which of them comes out alive.”

“Don’t mind her.” Dev trailed behind his wife, giving her a reproving nudge on the shoulder. “Your mother is charming.”

Ramsey rolled her eyes, but her expression was amused. “Women seem to get that way around him. I’m still getting used to it.”

“I can see why.” Jaid smiled warmly at the man. He’d been a balm to her fractured nerves at the hospital in Philly, she recalled. She hadn’t forgotten his kindness.

“Macy and I kicked around a couple ideas for arranging the meet with Hedgelin,” Kell started. The others filed in and took chairs around the conference table. Jaid caught Macy’s eye surreptitiously. The other woman made a show of fiddling with a folded paper in her hand. Then shook her head. The communication sample she’d promised to get from Paulie, Jaid realized. Apparently, she’d run it, and it hadn’t been a match. Jaid couldn’t help but feel relieved. She hadn’t wanted to discover Paulie was implicated in this. Adam didn’t deserve to live in a world where his closest friend betrayed him.

“All right.” Adam was seated at the head of the table, Paulie at his side. “Since you’re so anxious to be first, you can—” His voice abruptly broke off as he grabbed the remote. Turned up the volume on the TV.

“Breaking news. This just in.” The blond news anchor looked appropriately somber. “One of our affiliates has informed us that the DC killer may have struck again.” A photo of a church appeared in the right corner of the screen before the camera panned to its parking lot and then to the street. “An eyewitness gave a description of a man hurrying out of the church, leaving another male fatally shot in the pew ahead of him. The victim’s name is being withheld at this time, and officers on the scene will not confirm or deny the association of this latest homicide with the DC killings. The witness is described as having dark hair, wearing a long black coat and an eye patch, and using a cane.”

The outbursts of the people in the room effectively drowned out what the woman said next. Jaid felt frozen in place. Her gaze was still on the screen, full of horror. She recognized a car in the parking lot shown. It was almost as familiar as the description of the assailant.

Risa’s voice was heard over all the others. “Adam, what the hell’s going on?”

He looked at the group, his expression a grim mask. “You heard the news. It appears that this morning before breakfast I shot and killed FBI assistant director Hedgelin.”

“Shit, with Hedgelin out of this, we’re right back to where we started. No suspects.” Nate’s face was equal parts shock and frustration. “First you’re framed with a thumbprint on the card, now someone pretends to be you while claiming another victim.”

“We’re not back at the beginning,” Jaid said. “We can’t be.” She refused to believe it. It would be too heartbreaking to have come this far and to be left with nothing. “There has to be someone with motive as solid as Hedgelin’s. Who else would know about the connection to LeCroix? And conceivably be tied in with the Mulder kidnapping case last winter? We know some of that ransom money found its way into accounts for at least two would-be assassins sent for Adam.” Her smile was tight. “Maybe we need to focus on that avenue. Who’d have access to multiple hit men for hire? They’re not exactly in the Yellow Pages.”

“It leaves one very good suspect.”

Adam felt Paulie’s eyes on him as the man spoke the words. In one part of his mind he marveled at the uncanny way the man’s thinking so closely paralleled his own. “Paulie’s right. I should have thought of it before, but Hedgelin fit so neatly.”

He held his hand up to quell the clamor of voices. Meeting Jaid’s eye for a moment, he saw by the stunned realization there that she knew exactly who they should have looking at all along. “Abbie and Ryne Robel called last night from the road. They’ve been checking with people in the towns where Lambert claims he and his mother stayed when they escaped from LeCroix. I told them to specifically ask if others had been asking about the two. One woman told them yesterday that last summer someone from the FBI was asking her similar questions about them. I assumed she was referring to Hedgelin. Everything else fit. But we’ve been looking in the wrong direction all along.”

Ramsey looked around the table. “Will someone please fill me in?”

“Shepherd?” Shocked realization was on Jaid’s face. “I can barely believe that. He told me more than once how much he—”

“Owed me?” Adam smiled grimly. “Apparently, he wasn’t talking about my getting him transferred from the Bismarck office. He must fault me for his landing there to begin with. His failure to rescue the Mulder girl the first time she was kidnapped was bad enough. Having me solve the case and return her safely to her parents was a personal affront.”

“And rather than taking responsibility for the failure, he blamed you. And her father,” Kell guessed.

Adam nodded. The pieces were falling into place with a dizzying rapidity. “His career might have been deep-sixed, but he could strike back at one of the men responsible for his landing in North Dakota and get rich at the same time. He arranged for Ellie Mulder to be snatched again last winter, but this time he had no intention of the child being found safely. She was to die as soon as the ransom got paid.”

“Except we showed up on the scene and rescued her.” Kell’s pale green eyes glinted at the memory. “And thanks to Paulie, Shepherd didn’t rake in nearly as much as he’d hoped.”

“Imagine how it must have fried him to be bested by you again,” Paulie murmured to Adam in an aside. His tie today was sprinkled with mini slot machines. “And then the attempts on your life started shortly after that kidnapping case was solved.”

“When he failed to get you killed, he regrouped.” Nate’s midnight-dark eyes were narrowed in concentration. “You weren’t the only target.”

“No.” There was a fire burning in his belly. Shepherd, if he was behind this, had much to answer for. “If he can’t kill me, what’s the next best thing? Laying all these murders at my doorstep.” He scanned the group. “I want to confront him tonight. We find out everything we can about Shepherd in the next few hours.” His gaze landed on Kell. “Burke, your misspent youth is about to come in handy. You join Jaid, Paulie, and me. The rest of you, I need every tiny bit of information you can get on the man.

“This ends today.”

Tom Shepherd let himself into the double-unit condo and reset the security alarm. It was nearly eight. Agents had been expected to want to work through the night, to avenge their beloved boss.

The entire day had been a rush. First killing that bastard who had railroaded his career. And then spending hours immersed with the so-called best the country had to offer and inwardly laughing his ass off. Raiker wouldn’t be able to so much as breathe without God’s own wrath coming down on him. He couldn’t stay hidden away forever. Shepherd just hoped some rookie law enforcement officer with an itchy trigger finger didn’t shoot Raiker and ruin all his plans for the bastard. The realization might have come too late, but there were far worse things than death. Raiker was going to find that out when he was sentenced for the five DC killings.

Shepherd hung up his coat in the hall closet and toed off his shoes. Took off his suit jacket and hung it on the doorknob. Loosening his tie, he padded to the kitchen for a beer. Maybe two. He’d take them into the study and get caught up on the twenty-four-hour news channels. After all the planning over the course of the last year and a half, it was difficult to get used to the fact that his work was done. All he had to do now was sit back and watch the final act play out.

Taking a couple bottles from the twelve-pack in the refrigerator, he ambled to his recliner and settled himself comfortably, setting one bottle on the end table next to him and opening the other. He took off his shoulder harness and laid it with his weapon next to the spare beer before picking up the remote. As he channel surfed, he took a long swallow from the bottle in his hand and considered his next move.

There was a trick in knowing when to leave well enough alone. But the information he’d gotten from the reporter regarding Jaid Marlowe’s son intrigued him. He was tempted to do a little investigating there himself. Once Adam was sent away for these crimes, wouldn’t that be one more stake in his heart knowing Marlowe was suffering, too? There had to be something between the two of them. The woman had traveled to Philly to visit the son of a bitch when he’d managed to survive three bullets to the chest. It was a consideration for the future. Shepherd took another pull of the beer, while settling in to see what CNN had to offer.

A cell rang, the sound muffled. Instinctively, his hand went to his shirt pocket, but his phone there was silent. It rang again, insistently, and he straightened in his chair. There was no one left alive who knew the other cell number. It had been the one he used to communicate with Tweed, and Raiker had taken care of the man for him.

So it was a wrong number. Had to be. But he still had to make sure.

He used his laptop in the study when he worked from home, but his real workspace required a bit more seclusion. The large walk-in closet in the spare bedroom had been doubled in size, and that’s where his most sensitive work was done. By the time he keyed in the touchpad code, the phone had fallen silent. But curiosity, and a zing of something else, compelled him to check it out.

The number displayed in the missed call log was unfamiliar. Just as he’d expected. He set it down again on the counter holding the electronics equipment and turned to leave.

The phone rang again before he could resecure the door. He picked it up, saying nothing until he plugged in the voice distorter attached to it.

“I believe I’m talking to the DC killer. Do you know who I am?”

A flood of anticipation rushed through him. “Adam Raiker.” Ballsy. But then, he hadn’t expected the man to be hiding under a rock cowering somewhere. “How did you get this number?”

“You’re not as careful as you think. Left a few loose ends. Not many, mind you. But they’re there if a person knows where to look.”

“Is that what you’ve been doing since you ran away?” Shepherd tipped the bottle that he’d carried with him from the study to his lips, enjoying himself hugely.

“I have had some time to think,” came the mild response. “I’ve decided that you aren’t going to be fully satisfied with letting the FBI be the ones to bring me in. That’d be sort of a letdown, wouldn’t it? I’m sure you have a sin already in mind for me.”

“Pride.” Shepherd’s hand clenched on the bottle. “That’s supposed to be the worst, although my religious education never got that far. It came to an abrupt halt when Cote started taking me aside for some private tutelage. My old man might have been an abusive old drunk, but he tried to do right by me. Problem was, no one wanted to hear that sort of thing back then.”

“Revenge was a long time coming.”

He chuckled. “I have to admit, it would have given me a great deal of pleasure to do that one myself.”

“Like you did Hedgelin this morning?”

Shepherd took another drink. “That was you, remember? It was on all the news.”

“Let me guess. He was guilty of envy.”

“See. It
was
you.”