Laying Down the Law (13 page)

And Mack yelled out in pain.

The thug had shot him in the arm.

“The next one goes in his belly,” the man growled. “Then, his heart. After that, your precious DEA agent takes a bullet to the head and all because you’re too stubborn to follow orders.”

“I’ll go with you,” she said, earning her a sharp glare from Cord.

She wasn’t sure if he saw the knife she was holding. Or maybe he had and knew it wouldn’t be much of a weapon against two armed men. If they got her in that car, they would take her somewhere and kill her.

Maybe even take her to the Moonlight Strangler.

“Don’t do this, Karina,” Cord insisted. He was volleying glances from Mack, who was grimacing in pain, to the men and then to her.

She connected gazes with the man who was holding Mack, and she could tell from his eyes that he was about to pull the trigger again. This wasn’t a bluff, and it didn’t help when she heard the police sirens approaching. The thugs were running out of time.

And so was she.

Karina started walking. Not slowly, either. She didn’t want to give them a chance to see the knife. The moment she was near the thug, he shoved Mack forward, the deputy falling onto the floor, and he grabbed Karina.

That’s when she made her own move.

She brought up the knife, aiming for his neck. But he saw her and tried to knock her hand away. Karina came right back at him, and this time she jammed the knife in his throat. He yelled out, cursing her, and with the blood gushing from his neck, he fell to his knees.

The other man brought up his gun, but it was too late. Cord fired. Two shots. Both of them slamming into the man’s chest. He dropped to the floor next to his partner while Mack scrambled away from them.

Karina moved, too, thanks to Cord. Her legs seemed to have stopped working, but he maneuvered her to the other side of the room behind a stainless prep table. That’s when Karina looked at her hand. She still held the knife.

And now she had his blood on her.

As horrifying of a sight as that was, she wasn’t the only one with blood. Mack had the gunshot wound to his arm, and Karina dropped the knife so she could grab a dish towel and apply some pressure to it. The wound didn’t look that bad, but he would need a doctor soon.

There were some sounds in the diner. Then, hurried footsteps. Several seconds later, two uniformed officers came running to the door to peer into the kitchen. Both had their weapons drawn.

“I’m Cord Granger, DEA,” he said, taking his badge from his pocket to show them. “We need an ambulance.”

“Already on the way,” one of the officers assured him. One of the uniforms went toward the thugs. The other stayed near Cord, Mack and her.

“Who are these guys?” the officer asked.

“Hired killers,” Cord answered. Good thing because Karina wasn’t sure she could speak yet. Cord went to the men, yanking off their ski masks. “Strangers,” he added.

That didn’t make it any easier to stomach. They’d come close to dying. And now Mack was hurt. All because of her. And Karina still didn’t know why.

“Is it clear back there?” someone called out. Another officer probably, because one of the uniforms responded right away.

“It’s clear. And there’s a DEA agent on scene. Two injuries, though.”

Karina shook her head when she realized he was adding her to the injured list. Probably because of her bloody hands and the cuts and bruises she already had.

“I’m not hurt,” she said.

“How many dead bodies you got?” the cop in the diner called out. He came into the doorway of the kitchen. Not a uniform this time. He was in khakis and a white shirt. Probably a detective.

“Two,” the officer next to her answered.

The cop in the doorway mumbled something she didn’t catch, and he looked around the room until his gaze connected with Cord. “You’re the DEA agent?” he asked.

Cord nodded.

The cop hitched his thumb toward the diner. “A woman’s out front, and she says she needs to speak to you immediately, that it’s important.” The cop paused. “She says she’s your mother.”

Chapter Fourteen

Cord stood there a moment, trying to process what the cop had just told him. He couldn’t.

“My mother?” he questioned.

After his conversation with Jericho about the photos, Cord was just coming to terms with the notion that his mother might not be dead. But he sure as heck hadn’t expected her to show up at a crime scene.

And maybe she hadn’t.

This could be another part of some sick hoax. Or else the woman could be working for the person who’d hired these now-dead thugs. Because her timing was certainly suspicious, and she could be here to make sure she finished the job that her hired guns had started.

“Did the woman give you her name?” Karina asked.

Good question. One that Cord should have already asked. He needed to collect himself. Hard to do, though, with the adrenaline still pumping through him, and his body primed for the fight.

The cop shook his head. “I figured if she was your mother, that you’d know her name. I also figured she had come here with you.” He did another thumb hitch. “You want me to get her ID and question her?”

“No. I’ll do it.” In fact, Cord didn’t want anyone else talking to her yet. After they were done, it was possible these uniforms would be arresting her.

“I’ll clean up,” Karina said, looking at the blood on her hands. “I’ll be out there in a minute.”

“Stay back here until I know what we’re dealing with.”

That clearly didn’t do anything to put Karina at ease. But then nothing would at this point.

Cord didn’t holster his gun when he went into the diner, and he spotted the woman right away. Not inside but rather standing at the glass door. He couldn’t see much of her face because the diner’s name, Tasty Eats, was etched on it, so he went closer.

She stood there wearing a dark blue dress, her nearly white hair pulled back. Not in a fashionable style, either. She looked old.

No, he corrected. She looked weary.

An emotion he completely understood, but Cord pushed it aside. He didn’t want to feel any connection with this woman until he found out exactly who she was and why she was there.

With his gun still ready, he opened the door. She was looking down at the ground and was holding a purse in front of her like a shield. Cord snatched it from her, causing her to gasp in surprise, and he rummaged through it.

No gun.

Wallet, keys, tissues and some papers, all neatly arranged.

“Who are you?” he demanded, handing her back the purse.

The woman lifted her head then, their eyes connecting. He didn’t see the resemblance as he’d done with Willie Lee, but he did
feel
something.

Hell.

He couldn’t trust a gut feeling on something like this.

“You don’t remember me,” she said, sounding a little hurt by that. “Of course you wouldn’t. You were hardly more than a baby. Your name was Courtland then, but we called you Court.”

Court. No doubt what he’d been trying to say when the person found him in that gas station. His name had gone down on record as Cord. No last name because Cord hadn’t remembered one.

“And your sister was Gabrielle,” Sarah added in a whisper. “I didn’t think you would remember me, but I’d hoped...”

Each word put him through an emotional wringer. Because they could be true. He cursed that feeling again. The tug deep within him that told him that this could indeed be his mother.

“I’m Sarah Prior,” she said, extending her hand for him to shake.

He put out his left hand, without even thinking about it. Mainly because he couldn’t take his attention off her. Then, he fired off a text to Jericho, asking for the sheriff to run a quick background check on the woman’s name.

“May we sit down and talk?” she asked. “I have some things to tell you.”

“And I have some things to tell you.” Of course, he didn’t sound anywhere near as friendly, and frail, as she did.

Cord got another look at that frailness when he stepped back, and she came inside. She was limping, and judging from the way she maneuvered herself, the limp had been with her for a long time. Maybe an old injury.

She sat down at one of the tables, glancing over at the detective who was watching them. “Will he arrest me?” she asked. “Will
you
arrest me?”

Cord had to relax his jaw muscles before he could speak. “What have you done to warrant an arrest? Did you hire those two armed men in the kitchen?” He didn’t tell her they were dead. Because if she was behind this, she might think they were in there spilling their guts to the cops.

Her eyes widened, and her hand went to her mouth, muffling yet another gasp of surprise. “No. Of course not. I wouldn’t do anything to hurt you. I love you.”

A burst of air came from his mouth. Definitely not humor. “If you’re really my mother, then you abandoned me at a gas station. That doesn’t sound like love to me.”

That put some tears in her eyes, and even though what he’d said was the truth, Cord suddenly felt bad about it.

There was some movement to the side. Karina. She stepped around the officer in the doorway, but she didn’t come closer. Not until Cord motioned for her.

“Is she your mother?” Karina asked.

“The jury’s still out on that. This is Karina Southerland,” he said. Great. He was making introductions now. If this kept up, he’d be hugging the woman.

Much to his disgust, it was something he wanted to do.

“I’m Sarah.” The woman shook Karina’s hand, too. “Willie Lee works...worked for you.”

“He did. And I don’t think he’s the Moonlight Strangler. I don’t believe he could hurt anyone, and I’ve known him for years.”

Well, since Sarah and Karina had brought it up, it was time to get this conversation moving. The cops likely wanted to start processing the scene and get them out of there for statements.

“Start from the beginning,” Cord ordered her. And it was an order. “Tell me what happened. If you lie, or even if I think you’re lying, you will be arrested.” He had no idea what the charges would be, but he’d come up with something.

Sarah nodded, nodded again and then took a deep breath. “Willie Lee and I got married thirty-four years ago when I was pregnant with you and your sister. Samuels wasn’t his last name then. It was Joyner. Willie Joyner. He didn’t start using Willie Lee Samuels until, well, later.”

That explained why no one had been able to find birth certificates for Addie and him, but there was no official name change on record for Willie Lee. However, he could have just started using the name without making it legal.

Cord would want to know all about that
later
part she’d mentioned, but he wanted to hear more of the beginning. He motioned for her to keep going.

“We were happy, for a while anyway,” she finally continued. “Money was tight so Willie Lee took a lot of jobs. Sometimes, he had two or three at once. I complained about never seeing him, and I think that’s what made him desperate. Because he got mixed up in something with some bad men.”

“Money laundering?” Cord asked.

“Yes. I don’t think he knew what was going on. Not at first. And then it was too late.” She pulled one of those tissues from her purse and dabbed her eyes. “Things got bad. One of the men involved in that mess took Addie. He kidnapped her, and he did that to keep Willie Lee quiet.”

That meshed with some of the things Addie had learned and remembered about some man taking her to a woman’s house. Obviously, Addie hadn’t been hurt, but she darn well could have been. It sickened him to think of that even now.

“How did you get Addie back?” Cord asked.

She tucked a strand of her hair behind her ear, twisted the tissue in her hand. “I’m not sure. Willie Lee worked that out. And we moved, he changed our last name and started a new life. Things were better for a while. And then
he
came.”

“He?” Cord persisted.

Another breath. “I don’t know who he was. A stalker. It started with hang-up calls and...escalated. He started leaving pictures of your sister, you and me. Pictures I didn’t know he was taking. Some of them were taken from my bedroom window when I was dressing.”

Karina winced a little. Probably because she had her own version of a stalker with Rocky and his club friends.

“And you never saw this man?” Karina asked.

“No. Not once. But I always got the feeling he was there, nearby. Once I even stood out in the yard and yelled for him to tell me why he was doing this. He didn’t answer, and the following day he sent me some photos of mutilated animals.”

Even though Cord didn’t want to believe her, he did. About that part anyway. Cord could practically see her reliving what must have been a frightening time for her.

“Someone claiming to be the Moonlight Strangler sent me photos,” Cord said. “One was of Addie and me on the porch with a woman.”

“Yes, she was a neighbor lady, Ida Kincaid, who babysat the two of you sometimes. She was watching you while I had a doctor’s appointment.” Sarah shuddered, touched her mouth again. “When I came home, I found Ida’s body in my bedroom. It was obvious someone had murdered her.”

Cord didn’t bother holding back the profanity, and he was about to jump down Sarah’s throat about why she hadn’t reported it to the cops. And he knew she hadn’t because Cord had all the names of the Moonlight Strangler’s known victims and even those who had similar MO’s.

Karina shook her head, silently begging him to pull back on the anger, and she moved closer to Sarah and slipped her arm around her shoulders. That’s when Cord realized Sarah was crying again.

“What did you do after you found the body?” Karina continued, and her voice was a lot calmer than Cord’s would have been.

“The twins were outside playing, and I was afraid he was still in the house. So, I gathered up the children and drove off as fast as I could.”

Cord didn’t hold back this time. “Why didn’t you go straight to the police station or call them before you left the house?”

“He’d cut my phone line, and I didn’t have a cell phone in those days. And he’d left me a message. A note that said he’d kill me next...after he killed my kids.”

Cord would have needed a heart of ice not to react to that. It felt like a sucker punch. Because Addie and he were those kids.

“I went to look for Willie Lee,” Sarah explained after wiping away more tears. “But he wasn’t at work, where he was supposed to be.”

Maybe because he’d been back at the house taking that selfie and the photo of the dead woman.

But why would Willie Lee have pretended to be a stalker? If he wanted to torment his wife, it would have been much more effective if Sarah knew she was living under the same roof with a deranged man.

“I kept driving,” Sarah went on. “Kept looking for him, and you had to go to the bathroom. It was dark by then, and I stopped at a gas station. You were too young to go into the men’s room by yourself, so I took you in the women’s bathroom. That’s when he attacked me.”

Sarah didn’t jump right into the rest of that in part because the detective motioned for them to hurry things along. Probably because the crime-scene photographer had arrived and wanted to get started. Cord would have to take the woman to the local police station, but he had to hear the rest of this first.

“How did he attack you?” he asked.

“He turned off the lights and just came crashing through the door. He punched me hard. Both you and your sister started crying. But he kept punching me until he had me on the floor, and then he got me outside. I don’t remember how. I was fading in and out of consciousness and terrified he was going to hurt my kids.”

Yeah, that fear was real, too, and Cord got just a shimmer of a memory. Of the violence. But the images were gone before he could latch on to them.

“What happened then?” Karina prompted.

“I woke up in the trunk of his car. I could still hear my kids crying. Well, one of the kids anyway. My daughter. I couldn’t hear Court...Cord,” she amended, “and I thought the worst. God, I thought the worst.”

So, maybe that’s when Cord had been abandoned. That felt like the truth, too, and he caught another image of him crying in the corner of the dirty bathroom. A roach had crawled across his shoes, and he’d been too scared and numb to react to it.

“I kept banging on the trunk,” Sarah explained. “Kept trying to get out so I could help my kids. The man finally stopped out in the middle of nowhere. It was dark, no moon that night, and he was wearing some kind of mask. Like a stocking maybe. He dragged me from the trunk, and that’s when I saw the blood on my baby girl’s cheek. The bastard had cut her face.”

Cord wished he’d been there. Yes, he was just a kid, three years old, but maybe he could have stopped it.

“I told my daughter to run. And she did. Thank God, she did. Because the man stabbed me, and he ran after her. I crawled into a ditch, trying to get up enough strength to help my baby. But the man didn’t find her because she wasn’t with him when he came back. I stayed hidden, and he finally drove off.”

“And you survived,” he concluded for her.

She nodded. “I got to a hospital eventually and gave them a fake name so he wouldn’t find me. When I was back on my feet, I went looking for you.”

No way could he keep the anger out of his voice. “You should have told the cops I was in that bathroom and that Addie was in the woods.”

“I was stupid. The man had warned me he’d kill us all if I went to the cops. And by then, I’d read in the newspapers about you and your sister being found. Not together, of course. But you were safe. So, I pretended to be dead so that he wouldn’t try to use you to get to me.”

Cord sat there, trying to process it, but he couldn’t. However, he could see that this was ripping Sarah to pieces.

“I haven’t seen you, your sister or Willie Lee since,” Sarah added. Her gaze came to Cord’s. “Has Willie Lee said anything about me?”

“He thinks you’re dead, that you were murdered.”

She didn’t seem surprised by that. Probably because she’d just said she faked her death.

Karina leaned in, and she gave the woman one of the napkins from the table so Sarah could dry her eyes again. “Why didn’t Willie Lee go to the cops with all of this?”