01 A Cold Dark Place (4 page)

Slim shoulders rose and fell with false confidence, as if she wasn’t terrified to be in the same room with him. Because
he
was the scariest thing she knew. Pissed, he smiled. Maybe she was right. He was more dangerous than most of the monsters they hunted.

He studied the photograph.
This particular killer generally dumped bodies out in the open in drainage ditches in remote areas. Why was this victim different? Or was it simply the first time law enforcement had found a body that he—or she—had hidden this way? Impossible to say for certain.

“Can we get access to the police and Medical Examiner’s reports?” He wasn’t a psychologist but he understood killers better than most. He didn’t get the compulsion or the buzz, but he definitely had a handle on the mechanics, and the mechanics were usually what tripped these guys up. Like
the FBI profile combined with Meacher’s cell phone data had finally earned him his just rewards.

“Not immediately
unless someone hacks them, but now the local PD has started searching ViCAP. It won’t be long until they find a connection to the other bodies. The feds will be all over this very soon.”

His eyes flicked over his wall map of the United States. Forensics took time. Finding a killer took time. “I have some other appointments that require more immediate attention—”

“The boss is most insistent—”

“
It’s a long shot at best.”

“After all these years,
everything
is a long shot.”

Alex
hid his reaction by staring out of the window. It wasn’t ghosts of the people he’d killed that kept him awake at night. It was the wreckage of families he’d left behind. He’d always followed orders. Right up to that last fateful mission when he’d been poised to break the neck of an international arms dealer. Then the man’s twelve-year-old daughter had walked into the room and Alex had frozen. A better assassin would have killed them both, but he couldn’t do it. He’d left them alive and walked away.

He’d had plenty of time to regret that decision.

What bothered him most was he still wouldn’t be able to kill that arms dealer in front of his daughter. Even after the bastard had exacted some personal retribution in prison. Maybe Alex had deserved it.

Jane gather
ed her things, obviously in a hurry to get away from him. “There’s something else,” she lowered her voice to barely above a whisper. “Someone involved in the Meacher investigation started snooping.”

It
had only been a matter of time.

“We need to adjust some of our practices.” A little more assisted suicide and a little less lethal force. “You need to inform the others.”

Her slight gasp made him frown. Did she really think he didn’t know about the two other assassins The Gateway Project had recruited for this operation? He hoped they weren’t as fucked up as he was. “Who’s the person doing the snooping?” He’d tap their email and cell phones.

“I’m surprised you don’t already know.” There was a bite to Jane’s tone that almost made him
smile. “The boss wants you to keep a close personal eye on the situation.” She paused again, but it would take more than a well-timed silence to crack him. “The person doing the digging is one Special Agent Mallory Rooney, FBI Charlotte Division.” She walked out without another word as though she hadn’t just smacked him in the face.

CHAPTER FOUR

M
allory’s hair was wet from her rushed five minute shower and her ears burned from cold as she raced through the frosty morning into the building. She’d worked at home yesterday. Normal routine for a federal holiday, curled up in front of her fireplace. She took the stairs up to her floor, a bounce in her step that had been missing recently. Not only had she managed to get some decent sleep and run three miles this morning, she was also pretty damn certain there was a vigilante at large, targeting violent criminals. Maybe that was a good thing, but for the most part Mallory believed in the legal system—she had to.

She pushed through the door and saw a group of people
hovering outside the boss’s office. Wary glances shot to her and then darted quickly away. She frowned. She’d thought they’d be over the whole
Post
deal by now, although a new version had been rehashed and made the print edition. She rolled her eyes and walked to her desk, dumped her bags, and started to wander to Lucas’s desk but he wasn’t in yet. He was going to be the case officer in charge of this investigation, and if her theory was correct this could be special.

“
Special Agent Rooney.” SSA Danbridge’s voice cracked like thunder from her doorway. “My office.”

Mallory had thought they
’d parted on good terms Monday night. What had happened to destroy the truce? She closed the door behind her. “Ma’am?”

“
You know I applied for that position at the BAU in Quantico?”

“
You got the job?” Mallory smiled, cartwheels and fireworks going off in her head as her inner voice sang Hallelujah. “Congratulations!”

Danbridge
’s blue eyes glowed in narrow slits of rage. Mallory shifted back a step.

“
No, I didn’t get the job.” The SSA thrust a piece of paper at her. “
You
did.”

Mallory
’s mouth gaped. “What?” She took the paper and scanned it. She was being transferred to Quantico? She tried to hand the letter back but Danbridge wouldn’t take it. “That can’t be right. There must be some mistake.”

Her boss gripped the edge of her desk as if to physically restrain herself. Her voice carried and Mallory could feel her colleagues
’ interest through the walls like darts in her flesh.

“
There’s been a mistake all right. There is no way you’re the most qualified person who applied. You are nothing but a Harvard dropout—”

“
No.” Mallory corrected her. “I didn’t drop out, ma’am.” She hadn’t done anything wrong and she could fix this. “I graduated with my law degree before I joined the Bureau.”

“
Well,” Danbridge practically hissed, “we both know it isn’t your law degree that got you a position at the BAU.”

“
There has to be some mistake. I didn’t even—”

“
There’s no mistake! I called them to confirm. You got it.
You
got the best fucking job in the FBI.” Danbridge leaned closer, her jaw muscles working frenetically. “You got it because your mother is a senator on Capitol Hill—”

“
My mother has no pull within the Bureau.” Mallory gritted her teeth. This had to be a clerical error.

“
She shouldn’t have that’s for damn sure.” Danbridge’s lips curled, accentuated by blood-red lipstick. “Don’t expect your mother to save your ass when you need back-up.” Deep creases arrowed at the outer edge of her eyes. Her voice was low and mean. “I have a lot of friends in Quantico.”

Was that a threat?
Mallory turned on her heel and strode back to her desk. She called Quantico and got nothing but a terse change of orders spiel and a tight-lipped refusal to let her talk to anyone higher up the food chain. The transfer was with immediate effect. She texted Lucas that she needed to talk to him ASAP, but he didn’t reply. A sense of failure wrapped around her like a cold, wet, shroud.

Filing
the last of her reports and clearing her desk took most of the day. Two boxes and three plastic bags of belongings were all she had to show from her time in Charlotte. Plus, a few gangbangers safely behind bars and one dead serial killer, she reminded herself. She thought about Janelle Ebert as she hauled her possessions out the main door and past the frost battered trees. Maybe one day she’d look back at her time here and know she’d made a difference. She dumped her boxes in the trunk and slammed it shut. Right now she felt like a puppet on a string. The FBI played the tune, she just danced.

***

Alex swore as he drove past Mallory Rooney’s small two-story home on the outskirts of Clanton Park. She didn’t usually get back from work until late at night, but there she was struggling through the front door with a bunch of boxes. Her change in routine screwed with his plans. Now he had to rethink.

He parked a couple of blocks over and approached from woods that edged the back of her property. He hoisted himself up a gnarled American oak grateful for the leather gloves he wore. Muscles burned from the strain until he was able to swing a leg over a branch about fifteen feet up, and straddle
a bow that allowed him to look over her fence into the shadowed yard. There was a small shed and a rectangle of neatly mown grass. The neighbor’s house on the south side was dark; those to the north appeared to be watching TV, images flickering through the drapes like flash photography. A light in Mallory’s kitchen filtered outside. She came into sight as she rolled down the kitchen blind. Her features were pinched and tired. It made him wonder what sort of day she’d had, and what sort of woman chose to fight crime when she could afford to live in idle luxury.

The wind rustled the branches around him, the tree creaking and groaning in gentle protest at his weight.
He needed to leave. The idea of breaking in while she slept didn’t appeal. He didn’t want to terrify her should she awaken, and if for any reason she saw his face, she could identify him. Then he’d be well and truly screwed.

Mallory Rooney represented a complication he didn’t need. Since his conversation with Jane Sanders, he’d made it his business to learn everything there was to know about the special agent and the initial attraction had ramped up a notch. He liked smart women.

A light went on upstairs. He was about to swing down to the ground to head out when a shadow separated itself from the garden shed. Alex froze as the shadow took a crowbar and inserted it into the lock of the back door and jimmied the wood. The quiet crunch was barely audible from where Alex perched.

He hesitated as the figure slipped inside.
Fuck
. He stayed where he was. Going inside was a massive risk. He lived in a house of cards that could collapse with one wrong move.

His eyes tracked to the upstairs window. Had Mallory heard the guy break in? Did she have her weapon on her? Was she ready to take on the
prick? Probably.

But w
hat if she wasn’t?

What if she’d removed her weapon and was listening to music or the TV?
What if the guy caught her unaware in a blitz attack? Then what?

He dropped to the ground and pulled his ski mask low over his face. He vaulted the fence, sprinted across the grass before slipping silently into the house.

The first thing he noticed was the sound of water rushing through pipes. Mallory was either running a bath or in the shower. Vulnerable. Unaware.

He used all his senses to locate the intruder. Whoever it was knew there was woman in the house and had broken in anyway. The hair on his nape prickled beneath the wool of his cap. A stair creaked. Alex gave it a few seconds before following. He drew a knife from his boot and eased into the sitting room. He left the M1911
pistol he habitually carried in its holster. It was too loud and too deadly to solve this particular problem. He didn’t want to be found here, especially armed. He didn’t want to kill anyone unsanctioned by The Gateway Project. But he couldn’t just abandon a woman to known danger.

Moving swiftly through the house and up the stairs, he edged carefully around the doorway and peered into
the master bedroom. Sure enough, the guy—tall, lean, dressed head to foot in black just like Alex—stood outside the bathroom door. No obvious sign of a weapon, although the pockets of the black jacket bulged with something and it was doubtful they were Girl Scout cookies. No sign of Mallory so she was presumably behind that bathroom door.
That
was a good thing. The only plus about the whole goddamned fiasco.

Now Alex had to get this asshole out of here without Mallory knowing she’d had uninvited guests. The intruder put his hand on the knob. That’s when Alex noticed the surgical gloves. Hatred uncurled in his gut that this man meant to harm a woman, and had probably done it before. This guy was the sort of offender
The Gateway Project was trying to eliminate, but it wasn’t up to Alex to pick targets. He just carried out orders.

Moving swiftly, Alex got his knife to the would-be assailant’s throat before the other man could open the door. The eyes behind the mask widened,
then glittered. Alex used his left hand to indicate the guy head down the stairs.

It would have all worked fine if the guy hadn’t decided to make a break for it. He slung his elbow high toward Alex’s face. Alex dodged.
He didn’t intend to leave any DNA either. The guy had a slight size advantage and used it to try and swing around and capture Alex in a bear hug. Alex twisted out of his grip and danced on the balls of his feet out of the way of the other man, swiping the razor edge of his blade in an arc in front of him. They faced each other in a standoff.

The door clicked.
There stood Mallory, wrapped in a blue towel, in a firing stance with a Glock 21 clutched in a two-handed grip. If she saw his face, his life was over. Alex palmed the knife. Before she could react, he twisted the pistol out of her hands. A shot went into the wall, the recoil punching both of their joined hands before he secured the weapon and pushed her away from him. Out of the corner of his eye, Alex watched the other asshole flee. Five seconds later, the front door crashed open and he was gone.

Dammit
. The evening had not gone to plan. If he was caught here he’d be labeled a burglar, a Peeping Tom, maybe even a rapist. His company’s reputation would be damaged, his friends would feel betrayed. This underlined all the reasons he insisted on seeing proof of a target’s crimes before he took them out. Circumstantial evidence was not enough.

Her eyes were huge amber pools. There was fear there, but there was also anger, and frankly he didn’t blame her. He backed toward the window and opened it wide, popping the screen with one hand and flinging it onto the bed.

“What do you think you’re doing?” Her voice was raspy.

He
didn’t dare speak. Voices dug deep into peoples’ subconscious and he wouldn’t risk being identified. And no way in hell would he risk getting in a firefight with Special Agent Mallory Rooney. He pointed the gun at the floor and climbed over the window ledge.

She crossed her hands over her chest. Lips pinched. Eyes narrowed. “That’s a second floor window.”
Asshole
seemed implied.

He tossed her Glock
behind him onto the lawn and lowered himself as far as he could before dropping the remaining ten feet to the grass. Her hands reached for him but she was too late. When he hit the ground, he rolled the same way he did for parachute jumps and sprang to his feet, no harm done. She yelled at him to stop, but he was already gone. Twenty seconds later he was deep in the heart of the woods, running like a greyhound as branches whipped his face. He ripped off the knit cap and black fleece to reveal a shirt and tie beneath. He stopped running when he hit the sidewalk and worked his way calmly back to his rental car. He got in, stuffed his clothes under the passenger seat, looking like just another ordinary Joe on his way home from work.

He
did a quick drive along nearby streets and back alleys, searching for the intruder but saw no one. Calling it quits, he drove back to the airport where he knew a pilot who’d fly him wherever he needed to go with no questions and even less paperwork. He kept trying to shake the image of Mallory Rooney standing wrapped in a towel with her gun drawn, alone and valiant against the world, but he couldn’t.

I
f she ever found out who he was, she’d be holding that gun on him for real. And he’d have to make a decision what to do about it.

***

The Behavioral Analysis Unit was no longer secreted in the dark depths of the basement, but instead set up in a smart spread of office space, complete with ubiquitous gray cubicles. Mallory headed toward the reception desk, feeling like a fraud. She’d packed the previous day while her backdoor was replaced by a sturdier model and an alarm system installed. Then she’d driven to DC. No word on the assailants, and local CSIs hadn’t found any finger or palm prints to run through the system. B&E’s were hardly rare occurrences in one of the fastest growing cities in the US, but what was more unusual—though not unheard of—was two perps wearing ski masks. Because she was a federal agent the detectives and evidence techs had been thorough, but nothing had been stolen and,
Thank Christ
, the guy who’d jumped out of the window had left her gun behind. Her face still burned with humiliation at how easily he’d disarmed her.