Fractured Memory (16 page)

There was a rustling on the phone. “Sorry, Ben’s here. He thinks you’re putting Julia at risk. I’m not sure I disagree with him.”

Eli huffed. He was tired of fighting these battles from people on his own team.

“Ben needs to meet me at my place in the morning by eight o’clock. If he’s not there, I don’t think he needs to be part of Julia’s case anymore.”

“I’m beginning to wonder the same thing about you, Eli. If you’re the best one to keep Julia safe,” Quentin said.

And then he hung up without another word.

SIXTEEN

I
n the rearview mirror, Ben scowled at Eli. Evidently, thinking about things overnight hadn’t changed Ben’s opinion about talking with Harper Dymond again. Julia seemingly tried to ignore the situation by counting trees outside the passenger’s window—at least he guessed that was why she tapped her leg when no music was present.

Seriously, what is Ben’s deal? Does he want to solve this case or not?

Eli fumed the more Ben frowned. Whatever the reasons were for Murphy’s insolence, Eli had had it, and his very next job was to speak with Quentin about sending Ben back to the FBI. Ben wasn’t proactive enough and even though he’d helped to rescue Julia on two occasions, Eli couldn’t help thinking he’d done it with ulterior motives.

Not the selfless attitude Eli expected him to have.

Eli parked the car in front of Harper’s house.

“I’ll stay here,” Ben said.

Eli waited for Julia to climb out of the car before he turned to Ben sitting in the backseat. “Do you have a problem?”

“No, do you?” Contention marked Ben’s words.

“It just seems you want to be anywhere else but here.”

“You’re right,” Ben said.

“Want to voice your concern?”

“Let’s see—you and Julia were already here and it didn’t help in any way. You’re leaving the most obvious interviews up in the air—that of Heller’s ex-wife and anyone from Medical Interventions International. Being here is a waste of our time. Julia’s had some emotionally trying days, and you won’t give her a break. She was on the road for over four hours yesterday, yet you seem to have no concern for her welfare. You took her to a maximum-security prison to visit the man who almost killed her! One of us needs to stay out here and monitor the situation in case someone sneaks up on this house. Is that enough of a list for you?”

Eli got out of the car, leaving the keys in the ignition, and slammed the door. On some level Eli had to admit that Ben was right. He shouldn’t give Ben grief for stating the obvious. He was putting Julia through a lot, but he also needed her. Somewhere in that memory of hers was the key to identifying the hit man and the Hangman’s partner. The recording was there—he just needed to unlock it.

Eli fingered the piece of paper taped to the side of the front door—a notice for eviction. He rapped on the screen door with Julia one step behind him, and young Miles was the one to pull it open.

He jumped up and down, clapping his hands together. “Mommy, Mommy. It’s Miss Julia!”

Harper came to the door. “Agent Cayne. I sure wish you would have called.”

“Sorry to interrupt your morning, but I have a few follow-up questions I need to ask you.”

Harper eyed the car in the driveway and pushed Miles back behind her. “Will this take long? I just finished making breakfast. Miles doesn’t like it when it’s cold.”

“It won’t take longer than is necessary.”

Harper dropped her shoulder and released the lock on the screen door. She shielded her eyes against the sun. “Who’s waitin’ in the car?”

“Just my partner, Ben Murphy. He’s keeping an eye out on things.”

She turned to Miles. “Son, go up to your room and play some video games.”

“Uncle—”

“Right now,” Harper all but screamed, cutting his statement off at the knees.

Uncle?

Eli ruminated over the word. Did it have any meaning? Julia raised a puzzled eyebrow, as well.

“But why can’t I stay here or play outside?” he whined.

“Just do as I say!”

Eli bristled and Julia clenched her hands at her sides. Neither of them liked children being chastised with such force undeservedly.

“He’s fine,” Julia said. “We really don’t mind if he’s here.”

“Nonsense,” Harper said. “The ol’ saying that children are to be seen and not heard has some value. Now, Miles, do as I say.”

The boy scurried up the stairs, the look in his eyes as droopy as a basset hound’s. Julia wandered near the decrepit mantel, taking in the photos that sat there. Photos that hadn’t been there on their first visit.

“Harper, I’m sure you’re aware your husband is in custody,” Eli said.

“And he’ll be stayin’ there. No way I can bond him out.”

Couldn’t or wouldn’t bail him out?

“One thing that has always confused me is who dropped off the hit package to Ryder’s parole officer.”

Harper chewed her nails, taking a seat on the threadbare, Kool-Aid–stained love seat.

“I should thank you,” Eli said. “For doing my job for me.”

“How do you figure that?” Harper asked—her voice a pitch higher.

Julia stopped her browsing and turned to face the two of them.

“You’re the one who delivered the hit file to Ryder’s parole officer. Once you found out what Ryder was involved in, you wanted to save Julia. You probably assumed Ryder wouldn’t be so stupid as to leave his prints all over it. But since they are present, it diminishes his ability for plausible deniability.”

“Look, mister, Ryder has made his bed and now he has to lie in it. I just want Miles and me to be free of him. I don’t want what’s left of our family to be caught in his shenanigans no matter how much money we’re...”

Eli let her wallow in the mud of her confession for a few moments. “Can’t say that I blame you.” He could see Miles tiptoeing down the stairs.

Julia snagged a photo from the mantel and pulled it close to her face. With the other hand, she gripped the edge of the fireplace.

What did she see in that picture?

Eli kept Julia in his peripheral vision as he directed his comment to Harper. “On our last visit you mentioned you’d seen too much death. Do you know a boy by the name of Jason Montgomery?”

Harper grabbed the edge of the couch with both of her hands and leaned forward as if she was going to topple over—a soft mewing escaped her lips. Julia turned the picture Eli’s way—pointing to a photograph of two young boys. It was a large eight-by-ten. The youngsters each held a fishing pole and a string of fish between them. Julia tapped her finger against one of the boy’s heads and mouthed
Jason.

All of a sudden, missing puzzle pieces snapped into place for Eli. Jason Montgomery had to be related to Miles and therefore related to Ryder. That bolstered credibility for a personal vendetta as a motive for the Hangman—taking out those who had cared for this boy and didn’t prevent his death.

It meant Heller could be telling the truth.

Eli didn’t believe Ryder had enough intelligence to be the head of the snake. A competent partner—even that seemed to be a stretch.

A knot formed at the base of Eli’s throat. It meant...the Hangman was free. What he needed most at that time was to have Julia near him—to wrap protective arms around her to keep her from the coming danger.

But from which direction was the threat coming?

“Both of you need to leave,” Harper demanded.

Miles parked himself in front of the screen door. His head swiveled from side to side like that of a watchdog guarding the perimeter.

“Right now,” Harper seethed. “Get out of my house. I don’t want you here anymore!”

Julia set the photo back on the mantel and walked to the door. Were puzzle pieces falling into place for her, as well? Or did she just want out? The tension too much for her? Then again, ER nurses functioned under a mountain of stress every day. Miles blocked Julia’s exit from the house.

“Harper, please,” Eli said. If he didn’t clear this up now, he wouldn’t be convinced he could ward off the coming onslaught against Julia. “How is Jason related to you? I know that Julia took care of him in the hospital. That he died as a result of an equipment failure. Do you and Ryder know Jason? Is that why he’s participating in this murder-for-hire plot against Julia?”

Miles shot out the door, and the screen door slammed like a bullet from a gun. Now Julia hovered there with her pediatric nurse’s eyes watching over his safety, since Harper seemed unconcerned about his egress from the house.

Harper stood from the couch. “Do I have to call the police? Get out of my house!”

Julia exited, calling Miles’s name.

* * *

“Miles—come back here!” It was clear that Harper wasn’t in any position to keep an eye on her charge, and Julia knew a child’s unmonitored exuberance was usually a ticket for admission to the ER.

The boy pumped his legs to their car where Ben sat and pounded on the window. When Ben didn’t immediately respond, the boy grabbed the handle and pulled the door open, and something tumbled to the driveway.

Julia narrowed the distance and found Miles yanking items out of what appeared to be Ben’s wallet. Credit cards. A driver’s license. Several photos.

“Miles, give it back to me,” Ben ordered.

Ben knew Miles? Julia’s heart fell into her hands as she gathered the faded photographs Miles carelessly let fall onto the driveway. Ben and Jason together. Julia plucked them from the cement more quickly. Ben hugging Jason. Ben with Jason at a five-year birthday party.

“Uncle Ben! Uncle Ben! When is Cousin Jason visiting from heaven? You said I would see him again someday. Please, please—can today be the day?”

The strength in Julia’s hands left her, and the pictures fluttered to the ground. Without standing, she looked up. Ben towered over her. “Miles, you won’t see Jason today, but I think Miss Julia will be able to say hi for you.”

Julia’s heart thundered in her chest, her body frozen as she riffled through the options her mind presented to her.

“Will you do that for me, Julia?” Ben asked.

Julia reached up and placed a protective hand on Miles’s shoulder.

Ben is Jason’s father—or stepfather, since their last names are different, but he’s the one seeking vengeance on behalf of this child. Ben Murphy is the Hangman!

* * *

Eli walked through the front door and headed for the car. It was clear Harper had closed down answering any more questions. His phone buzzed in his pocket. He grabbed it and stopped in the middle of the lawn. Julia was picking something up from the driveway—Ben hovered over her.

“Miles! Come here right now!”

Julia lifted her face to Harper but kept a firm hand on Miles’s shoulder as if to keep him from leaving her side.

“Cayne,” Eli snapped into his phone.

“Eli, it’s Shawn Jaeger from FBI Forensics. I’m calling in regards to your request to have me test the blood found in the Hangman’s case for the special preservative used in donated blood to keep it from clotting.”

“And?”

“The blood that has Heller’s DNA is definitely from a donated pint of blood—likely whole blood, which is why the DNA yield was so high.”

Eli’s heart jumped into his throat.

Shawn continued. “Your request raised several issues for our lab, as this information puts into serious question whether or not Dr. Mark Heller could have been present for any of these crimes, and so I initiated an internal investigation.”

“Have there been any conclusions?” Somehow the words still came through Eli’s constricted throat.

“It appears one of our own agents, Ben Murphy, paid a lab technician a good sum of money to alter the report and stand by it in a court of law.”

Eli swallowed hard. “Shawn, do you know if Ben ever lost a child?”

“I do...his stepson, Jason Montgomery. He was completely devastated.”

Ben and Eli locked eyes and at that moment—an understanding of their roles clarified in a nanosecond. No longer partners in the fight against evil, but lawman against criminal with the hunter’s prey within his grasp.

Was there any other easier person to suspect as a hit man than someone who had a criminal background and was also having a financial crisis? When Miles said the word
uncle
, he was signifying Ben’s relationship to himself. The picture of the two boys together—they were cousins. That made Ryder Jason’s uncle. Add that to a financial crisis, like losing a house, someone who had a personal vendetta against a health-care team for a child’s death and it was the perfect mixture of morality lost and evil filling the vacuum.

Ryder wasn’t the only one trying to take Julia’s life. A witness only identified him near Julia’s neighbor’s house.

Ben had tried to kill Julia, as well—his saving her life a ruse to keep Eli and his team from discovering his true intentions.

The first morning Eli met Julia, Ben had not been on the doorstep clearly to stay out of the line of fire. Ben’s foot pursuit a cover for his involvement. The carbon monoxide poisoning—would evidence place him as the one who’d tampered with the furnace? The remote control of Eli’s car—and Ben’s computer expertise.

How could I miss this? Everything was right there before me. And he’s not a partner... Ben is the Hangman.

Ben shoved Miles to the ground and advanced on Julia—unholstering his gun. Julia’s hands drifted up in the air as she looked back at Eli.

Ben grappled Julia around the upper body, lifted her up and backpedaled her to the front passenger’s side of their car—rounding it more quickly than Eli thought possible.

Eli drew his weapon, but with the way Ben’s head bobbed back and forth behind Julia’s, he couldn’t get a clear shot. The front end of the car providing additional cover.

“Ben! Stop right now. Killing Julia isn’t going to accomplish anything. Let her go!”

“This is for my son. This is for Jason!”

Ben aimed his weapon at Eli and fired off a round. Eli ran toward Miles, who had crawled away from the car but was positioned between the house and the driveway, and tackled him into the grass, covering the boy’s body with his own.

Ben continued to fire shots, a startled scream tingling Eli’s ears as he anticipated the iron-hot spindle of pain hitting his own body at any moment. His heart hammered in his ears—almost as loud as the gunfire. He covered Miles’s head with his hands and turned to see Harper lying on the front porch, her hands holding her belly.

The car door slammed. Eli looked back to see Ben rounding the front end of the car and scurrying inside. The engine turned over, and Ben threw the car in Reverse.

Eli couldn’t believe leaving the keys in the car for Ben’s comfort had just aided the escape of a madman.