Every Breath You Take: A Novel (A Kristen Conner Mystery Book 2) (5 page)

One more meeting before I’m out of here. The job offer.

• • •

“I hope you’ll really think this over carefully. I’m leaving the offer packet with you. There is a FedEx prepaid envelope in the back of it. Even if you say no, I want everything returned. If the answer is really no, just sign the first form acknowledging that you are declining our offer of employment. If you do change your mind and decide to accept what I think is a great offer based on where you are now, especially financially, you will need to fill out the forms and sign everything in the packet in the presence of a public notary. I would prefer you use the notary in our regional offices in downtown Chicago. I think you are familiar with where they office.”

“I am.”

I spent a lot of time in the State Building in the Midwest offices of the FBI on my last case.

“Any other questions?” she asks.

I’m not sure I had any to begin with.

“I’m good.” I answer. “And I really do appreciate this offer. Just not sure I can take it.”

“Understood. Each of us have to make the decision that’s best for us individually. I’d just encourage you to give it some serious thought”

She’s told me that about ten times now. She thinks I’m crazy for not jumping on the deal. If I take the offer, I double my salary.

“Okay, your driver should be here now. You better get going for Reagan. You’re going against traffic but you never know how long things will take.”

“Thank you,” I say as we shake hands.

I walk out into a gloriously sunny late summer day. A black limousine is parked there and the back door opens as I look for the van to take me to the airport.

Deputy Director Robert Willingham—he likes me to call him Bob—jumps out.

“Hop in, Kristen. Your luggage is in the trunk. I’m heading into the city. Let me give you a ride.”

He won’t get an argument from me.

• • •

“I know you aren’t going to change your mind and I respect why you’re staying with CPD. You’ve done good there. You got your detective shield early. I’m sure Deidre made it sound like this will be your one-and-only chance to come work for us. She does that—especially when we tell her to. As long as I’m with the FBI, the offer stands.”

“I’m honored, sir,” I say. “It just isn’t the right time . . . and frankly I’m not sure I deserve the offer.”

“But you do,” he says. “I was very impressed with your work on the Cutter Shark serial killer case.”

Why won’t the name Cutter Shark go away?

“We have a great team here at the FBI,” he continues. “The best in the world. But one skillset we are not hiring enough of is old fashioned street investigators. I believe in the phrase ‘follow the money,’ so heaven knows we need our forensic accountants. But I’m not sure we focus enough on recruiting tough men and women that can be dropped into dangerous situations. That’s why I keep Austin close. He can do it all. And if there’s a fight, I want him on my side.”

“I appreciate you taking the time to talk with me about this opportunity, sir.”

“Bob.”

“Yes, sir. Bob.”

He laughs. We park in the no-parking curb in front of the United Terminal at Reagan. A D.C. cop walked our way to move us along but the driver showed him a laminated ID that convinced him to return to his previous spot to watch traffic flow. My flight departs in forty-five minutes. I don’t fly a lot and I’m starting to get nervous. It is all I can do to keep myself from looking at my watch. I will my eyes not to look down.

“I know you’re ready to roll, Detective Conner. Don’t worry. You’re checked in and a friend of mine is going to expedite your passage through security.”

“Thank you, sir. Bob.”

“You’re not asking for advice and don’t need advice, but let me leave you with one small word of counsel from an old man.”

“I don’t see an old man around here, Bob, so who would that be?”

“Nicely played, Detective,” he says with a laugh. “And I’m not feeling too bad these days. I’m going to feel even better when I throw a line in the Penobscot River. Austin and I are going fishing up in Millinocket this weekend.”

“That’s what I heard.”

I studied Willingham’s career when I was a criminal justice major at Northern Illinois University. I wrote a paper on him. Now I know him on a first name basis. Bob. I don’t have a clue where he is going with this “word of counsel” stuff.

“Our strengths are usually our weaknesses,” he says. “Your strengths are your unbending will, your fierce determination, your lack of guile and political motivation.”

“Thank you, Bob.”

I think that was a compliment.

“Those are also your weaknesses. It’s not the right time for you to say yes to us. I understand that and am not pushing any more. But there are other areas of life where you need to be a little more open-minded and flexible. Do you know what I’m saying?’

“I think so.”

I’m pretty sure not.

“Good. But just in case you don’t, I would encourage you to not be too hasty in your judgment of Major Reynolds. He’s an awfully fine young man.”

Did the Deputy Director of the FBI just give me advice on my love life?

11

IT’S EIGHTEEN LONG,
excruciating hours, and no one from the police has contacted me. It isn’t going to just go away, is it? Is this over for me—could they be on to the real murderer? I thought I might be in custody by now.

The silence is almost eerie. No one knows I was there. I’ve thrown away everything I was wearing that night but that won’t be any help since I threw up in his bedroom. My DNA is literally all over the murder scene. My only hope is that I never become a suspect.

I wasn’t hiding my visit to him from anyone. I didn’t use the back entrance of his building to avoid security cameras. That was at his instruction and insistence. I wasn’t hiding—he was hiding me. I wasn’t good enough for him and his world.

Who killed Jack?

It would make things so simple if it was Bobbie. She brought Jack and I together. We got off to a rocky start but I came to believe she was someone I could trust. But she betrayed me. I’ll never forgive her for pushing Jack and me apart. She knew he cared for me and she wanted to protect her own relationship with him. Would she have killed Jack if she felt she was losing her hold on him?

He was no angel. That’s for sure. It’s ironic that after he finally told me he loved me, he still made me use the door by the delivery dock. He would have kept me a secret from the world forever if he could have pulled it off. That was going to have to change. And it could have. But then she stepped between us.

No, Jack was definitely no angel, but I could have helped him. I think we could have helped each other change for the better. Doesn’t everyone deserve a second chance at happiness?

I still can’t believe he is dead. Everywhere I turn and look I see his face. I don’t have to watch news coverage to see him. I think I see him out of the corner of my eye. At a restaurant. At a shop. I turn quickly and he’s gone.

He was cruel to me the last time we were together. And now he can never make those wrongs right.

Even if she didn’t kill him, she deserves some payback. If this investigation drags out, there might be a few ways I can point police her direction.

But who killed Jack?

• • •

“Detectives will be here in the next hour,” Stanley McGill said.

Robert Durham, Jr. and Robert Durham, Sr. were seated with McGill, their corporate and private attorney, in Durham, Sr.’s home office.

“We really have to talk to the police today?” Robert Sr. asked.

“I’m afraid so, sir.”

“We landed from Moscow less than twenty-four hours ago,” Robert Sr. grumbled.

“Let’s get this over with, Dad. We need to help the police any way we can.”

“You do know that family members, including us, are always suspects?” Robert Sr. asked his son. “I’d rather neither of us give a formal interview under any circumstances while suffering from jet lag.”

“I’m fine, Dad. You’re fine. All that matters is helping the police find Jack’s murderer.”

“Had you two been talking?” Robert Sr. asked.

“Yeah, we had,” Robert Jr. said. “It’s hard to believe but we were actually getting along. I thought we might be starting a new chapter as brothers. Then this happens.”

Robert Jr. put his face in his hands and began to weep.

Robert Sr. stood up from behind his desk, walked over, and put a comforting hand on his son’s shoulder.

“Let your mom know you and Jackie were getting along, would you son? She’s not doing well and it would mean a lot to her.”

He nodded his head yes as his shoulders continued to shake.

The doorbell chimed.

“Before you get that, Stanley, let me say something. I loved my son very much. This has been the worst day of my life. I want the murderer caught and put away for life. I’ll do anything in my power to assist. But I won’t have our family turned into a media circus.”

The door chimed again. McGill nodded and went to answer it.

12

I COULD GET used to this. I’m 35,000 feet over Dayton, Ohio—that’s what the flight map says anyway—sitting in United Airlines first class. The FBI bought me a regular economy class ticket but has a deal with certain airlines, including United, that if any first class seats are open, their people get a bump up front.

The flight attendant brought me a bowl of warm mixed nuts while we were still at the gate. Not just peanuts, but the expensive stuff, like walnuts, cashews, Brazilians, and they threw in a few macadamias for good measure. The guy in a business suit next to me was gulping Maker’s Mark on the rocks before we were airborne and is fast asleep. His snoring is fairly quiet now but every ten minutes or so he gives a jerk and a loud snort. He better get checked for sleep apnea.

I need to invest in a briefcase. My old fashioned doctor’s-style carryall under the seat in front of me is worn out. I don’t load up my purse for a trip around the world like my sister does. But I have enough personal stuff to go along with my vintage laptop—a couple generations away from the sleek thin models they are selling now—that when you add papers and reports from my time with the FBI, my purse is stuffed, overflowing, and straining at the seams. I think the security guy at Reagan International was ready to throw the whole thing away and put it out of its misery. Good for me Willingham called ahead and had an escort smooth the way for me through a crowded security line to make my flight in plenty of time.

My laptop—three years old with a battery that didn’t get me out of Pennsylvania—is poking out the top with my FBI training notebook, a couple magazines, and a cardboard envelope that contains the employment offer from the FBI. It’s marked “confidential” and the flight attendant has looked at it with curiosity a couple times.

I told Deidre Cook this morning that I had already made my decision. The answer was no. Cook basically refused to accept that. She told me to think about it a couple more days before giving my final answer. The problem is I don’t want to think about it anymore. We have an early phone appointment scheduled for Monday. Today is Wednesday. That gives me almost five days to stew. I’m not good at the kind of process that prolongs decisions. I want to decide and move on. This lack of closure will probably ruin my whole weekend.

I will be coaching the Snowflakes on Saturday. Tiffany’s dad has been running practices for the three weeks before our first game. I talked to him on the phone twice while I was at Quantico to give him some training drills and ask how the girls were looking. Both times he hinted that it may be good for us to be co-coaches. I didn’t take the bait. The Snowflakes have a head coach.
Me
. What is Tiffany’s dad’s first name?

“Anything else to drink?” the flight attendant asks.

I’ve already had three cups of coffee today and don’t need to get any more wired up. I drank three glasses of apple juice this flight and visited the bathroom twice already. Even if first class is much roomier on leg room, I don’t want to wake the guy who is contentedly snoring in the aisle seat. It may be good to check if he’s alive, however. I haven’t heard the guttural rumble of a grizzly in hibernation for at least five minutes.

“I guess one more apple juice,” I answer.

Why is it so hard to turn down free stuff?

I start to think about being back in the office. After the year we’ve had, I’m looking forward to normal, boring, routine murder—even if such a thing doesn’t exist.

I’ll be in the bullpen at the Second in two days. I miss the place. I kind of wish I could end my leave of absence and go in tomorrow. I haven’t heard a thing from any of my colleagues. I wonder if anyone missed me while I was gone.

• • •

“You look worried, Robert. What is on your mind?”

“Marjorie is the main thing.”

“She’s a mother. This is going to be tough on her.”