Dylan (Bowen Boys) (12 page)

The door opened behind them, and Dylan
filled the space. He was upset, and she went to him. When he kissed her, she
could feel the coiled tension in his body. He looked at the people assembled
there.

“Someone knows Jack is here. A wolf came
onto the property today and found Monica out in the woods. He read her mind and
was clumsy about it. He left his print behind, and I’ve been able to see what
he found.” He looked at her. “Mann knows where you are.”

Chapter Nine

Kirby moved around the room without
touching anything, and when he did touch something, he was careful to wipe his
prints away. He had been hiding there for a whole day, and he was already going
stir crazy. He just hoped to fuck that the books he’d read were right, and that
without taking his blood the vampire couldn’t find him.

His wife was dead, as was his daughter. He
knew the moment that he’d gotten the call from Lucius that he would kill them. The
man did not strike him as a houseguest sort of person. And his family had been
spoiled. He knew this as he’d done it to them. When things did not go their way
or they didn’t get what they wanted, they tended to whine about it. It was one
of the reasons he gave in, and also the reason he worked late several times a
week and went in on most weekends. He loved them, but he had made it hard for
himself. And Lucius did not strike him as a patient man. Then there was the
blood that had been on Lucius’s jacket.

Kirby still couldn’t believe that he’d seen
it or that he’d done what he had. When Lucius had sent him out of the room to
speak to…or kill the wolf, Kirby had gone to the bedroom and found the coat
there. He’d not even remembered him having one on, but that was beside the
point. But the blood had been there, and he’d taken a sample. Actually, he’d
taken several samples. He’d had them tested the very next day to see who or
what he might have killed.

Three of them came back as canine. Kirby
had no idea whether it was actual dog or a werewolf like the one he’d had as a
guest. But two of them were his wife and daughter. The blood splatter of all
the samples had been enough to convince him that they’d been murdered, as all
the blood samples he’d taken had been. So Kirby had run.

He didn’t go near the window, nor did he
order in at his new place. It was not the worst he could have moved into on a
temporary basis, but it was as close to slum-like that he’d ever been in. Kirby
hadn’t worked for one of the largest agencies in the world to not know a thing
or two about keeping yourself safe. He’d even put on a disguise to hide who he
was to the taxi drivers, as well as when he’d gone into Walmart to get the
things he’d need. In each instance, after he’d had to talk to or ask for
services from someone, he’d changed his appearance. He was quite proud of
himself about it, too.

He’d gone to the store before coming
here and had purchased a small microwave and enough shelf-life foods that
required no refrigeration that he could live for nearly a month. He’d also
picked up a cheap laptop. The bottled water sat in a cooler that he’d brought,
too. His clothes, packed for such an occasion, had been updated and freshened
every few months or so. He had even made sure that his pictures on his IDs were
updated to the current year, as well as his aging face.

He had paid cash for the room and had
paid for the week. Knowing that someday he’d have to leave in a hurry and not
be found, he’d had several IDs made for himself and his family, and money
enough that they would be able to start over if need be. He had never dreamed
he’d be doing this on his own. Sitting down again, he pulled out the only thing
he’d taken from the house other than the things from the garage storage…a
picture of them all together at Christmas. He sobbed again at their loss.

Putting the picture into the large case,
he glanced at the contents. He was glad now that he’d been able to put this
away without his family knowing. Lucky, too, that he’d been able to be in on
the ground floor of the mess that had gotten Small arrested and eventually led
to Garrett’s suicide.

No one knew that he’d been watching over
the books and sending the money to each of their offshore accounts for them. He’d
been paid well, very well, but he still took a percentage of their deposits as
well. He’d amassed well over twenty million in a very short amount of time, and
was thrilled that he’d never used his own name when dealing with them. The
others had gone down because they were careless and stupid.

Kirby’s money had never seen the inside
of a bank other than to transfer it to cash, and had never left the garage once
he put it in there. It was his run money and nothing more. Setting up a dummy
account with one of his aliases and a business that did nothing more than take
up space, he would deposit the money directly into the account, then write
checks to another dummy corporation and cash them. He even filed a tax form
every year and paid his taxes on that money like a good boy.

Looking at the computer that sat on the
table, he wondered again if he was doing the right thing. Giving up just about
all he knew was going to make his life on the run a little more difficult, but
he had to try and appease some of what he’d done to his wife by saying yes all
those years ago. She deserved better than whatever Lucius had done to her and
his child.

Kirby walked over to the computer again
and sat in front of it. It was all there. Files, names, dates, anything and
everything he needed to expose not only Lucius, but everyone else in the
organization, as well. He’d even put in information about Small and the things
he’d been able to dig up about him over the past several months. He’d had no
use for it when the man had ended up in prison, but Kirby had held onto it. He
thought someday he might write a book…inder a pen name, of course. But the one person
he had nothing on was that fucking woman.

Crosby had been nothing but exemplary
from birth to now. The one thing that had been on her record had been expunged
years ago when Davenport had gone to the courts on her behalf and had it
removed. The judge had taken one look at her life after the jail time and had
it done. Kirby had never told her about it. He’d let her think that he’d been
magnanimous by letting her work for him. Fat lot of good that had been for him…she’d
still fucked him over.

Crosby had done each job he’d assigned
her, and though she killed for him, that didn’t make her guilty. It simply made
her a perfect employee. He’d had a chance to look over her record, too. Crosby
had never been caught with anything. Going in and out of the building, she’d
been checked thoroughly. But he knew as surely as he was looking at his own
stolen files that she’d gotten some out, if not everything. She was that
fucking good.

He hoped to Christ that wherever her
body was—and he was pretty sure she was dead now—that no one found anything on
it that he’d not taken out of his files he was sending to Bowen the Bitch. Smiling,
he looked at the file he’d created to give to the Feds. There was enough stuff
in it to put him away forever if he were to get caught, but there was enough
information in the deleted file that would get him shot. Kirby had not been a
very good man. Not now, and certainly not in his youth. He’d murdered to get
where he’d been, and he knew that he’d do it again if he had to.

He glanced up at the television and saw
his nemesis, Caitlynne Bowen…Bowen the Bitch in the flesh. There was another
woman he could have gone his entire life without knowing. She was bossy and a
know it all. Of course, she was his boss, but that didn’t mean that he had to
like the way she lorded herself over him. Or the way she made him come to her
office to go over the slightest entries in his bookkeeping. He’d been able to
do whatever he liked with Garrett. Where did that fucking cunt get off telling
him he needed to curb his spending? He turned the TV up to see what she was
doing now.

“…no longer considered a threat to
National Security. Her name has been cleared of all charges concerning the
death of Vern and Cindy Clements and Ruby, their daughter. If anyone knows of
Agent Jack Crosby’s whereabouts, please tell her that she is not wanted, but we
still need to speak to her. If you are listening to this, agent, we would like
to offer you a safe haven until all this is cleared up and we find the person
or persons responsible for the murders. Again, Agent Jack Crosby is no longer
wanted in questioning for the murders of the Clements family. We are currently
looking into other information that has come to light in recent days. It not
only shows that Agent Crosby is not guilty of the crimes charged against her,
but also indicates that she had information about who the actual murderers
were. We’ll have more details as we verify them. Thank you.” She walked off the
podium rather than answer any questions. The fucking cunt.

Kirby turned it off. He sat there for
several minutes with nothing going through his head but one thought. She knew. Bowen
knew something. He got up to pull a bottle of water from the cooler and put it
back. He reached in and pulled out the bottle of tequila that he’d stashed in
there, as well.

Pouring himself a healthy drink in one
of the plastic water glasses, he thought of his boss. Bowen the Bitch, as he’d
taken to calling her early in her career as his boss, wouldn’t put anything out
there unless she was positive about it. She was a ball buster for sure, but she
also knew her job. But she didn’t have Crosby. Or so she said.

He wondered if she was there, put into
the big house of Bowen’s so that no one could find her, and she was singing all
sorts of shit. It would be like the two of them to get together and try to
bring him down. He glanced at the email addressed to Bowen the Bitch and
realized that now, if she did have Crosby or not, it was useless to him as a
way to save some face. Crosby had already given it all to her.

He poured himself another glassful after
drinking the first one down. After deleting the email, he started a new one. This
one he was sending as soon as he was finished with it. No more dicking around. He
was going to walk away from this shit with a clear mind and a cleaner slate. Kirby
wrote until he couldn’t see the keys, then finished off the other half a bottle
of the tequila and crawled into the lumpy bed. He would rest a few hours, then
get up and do it again until he was finished.

~~~

“What do you mean he isn’t at his home? Did
you go to the correct address?” The wolf nodded. “Let me see it.”

Timmy Huston handed him the paper that Lucius
had given him three days ago. It was the right address. He looked at the wolf, which
was still in a supine position on the floor when he gave Lucius the paper but
quickly looked back now, knowing which of them was the inferior.

“Did you go inside the house?” Lucius
asked.

Timmy nodded, keeping his head down.

“What did you find? Maybe he simply went
out for a cup of sugar from the neighbor’s house.”

“I watched it for two days before coming
here. I even tried to track him. His scent went to the garage, where he pulled
something from the floor. Then he walked back to the house. I caught his scent
out to the front sidewalk, then nothing. He might have taken a cab or gotten a
ride. I couldn’t follow it because of the many cars on his street.”

Lucius kicked him. When the wolf shifted
and landed on his feet after hitting the wall, Lucius hoped that he’d try and
attack him, but he only stayed where he was. But now he was upright and not in
a subservient position. Lucius thought about killing him but was leery of the
wolf. He’d survived the kick, so Lucius knew killing him might not be easy.

“You’ll find him or I’ll kill you.” The
wolf snarled in response. “If you think that frightens me, you’re stupider than
your predecessor. And he was an idiot.”

Lucius watched him pace. He wished now,
like he did with the human, that he’d taken his blood. He’d had the wife’s and
thought that that had been enough, but now he knew it hadn’t been. He also had
a feeling that the human knew that he’d killed his wife and child. He’d not
meant to, but their excessive whining and crying had driven him over the edge.

The trial was in five days. Just five
days for everything to go away so that he could get Small into the White House.
He knew that the man had confessed. He’d even read it…but the man was going to
get him what he wanted, and that was war.

War was so wonderfully filling for his
kind. People could disappear from a field of combat and never be missed. He and
others like him had been so plentiful because of the ability to turn so many
without fear of being caught.

He smiled after the wolf left, thinking
about the many children he’d created and left. He and others of his kind hadn’t
even bothered to train them, knowing that they would be dead within a month or
so. Some would have survived, and those were the ones that he called to him when
he needed something done. They were the killers, the ones that would do
anything to anyone to get what they wanted. The strong.

He knew Small was an idiot and a fool. But
he knew that he could control him, because he was greedy and only looked out
for himself. He’d promise him anything and everything for his help. He would
tell him that he would live forever. Lucius knew that he’d be dead once the
last of the information he wanted was in his hands.