Carolina Rain (22 page)

Reaching the second floor, he took a deep breath and entered the lighted conference room, the subtle groaning of the wooden floor telling anyone in the room he was
t
her
e
. The gray-haired man sitting on the edge of the table looked up and smiled. Manny stuck out his hand and felt the strong grip of a cop who had worked a day or two in his life.

“I’m sorry we’re late. We had a run
-
in with a couple of deer on
Highway
17 and had to wait for the wrecker,” said Manny as he put his briefcase on the long mahogany table
, which was
surround
ed
by
plush, comfortable
chairs
. A
large
media screen
hung
at the front of the room
,
yet the
place
maintained its older ambiance. It felt almost homey.

“I’m Captain Jeb Tanner
,
and not a problem
. Yo
u were only a couple of minutes late,” his greeter said quietly. “We’re just glad to have you here in the Port City.
Like I explained to Agent Corner two days ago, w
e’ve never seen murders like this in our county and can use all the help we can get.”

“We’ll do our best,” said Manny. “The others will be right in. They’re just finishing
up
a fast-food
dinner.”

“I’ve been there
.
That’ll give me
a minute
to get the rest of the folks in here that might give y’all some help.”

Then the Captain strode through a side door that squeaked as it shuddered shut and was gone.

Their host was average height, looked to be in good shape for a man in his fifties, and carried a sense of urgency that Manny immediately appreciated. His accent indicated he’d probably been in this area of North Carolina his whole life. That was good. Locals
who
were true locals almost always carried a special sense of protection for their community. That meant more attention to what was required to get the job done. That never hurt. But he found they could also be resistant to suggestions and proposals for action made by the BAU. That type of reaction was probably born from the sense that outsiders couldn’t possible know
their
people,
their
community better than
they
and
their
department
. T
o top that off, it was always hard to believe someone in
their
town could be capable of the crimes being committed right under
neath
their collective
nose
s
. Manny liked that aspect about cops like Tanner
and towns like Wilmington.
A l
ittle faith in human nature
and a sense of community could
off
set the dark side of what law
enforcement
sometimes
saw as the norm. Manny was willing to concede a cop’s take may not
be
as the world really was
. . .
probably not, in fact. He guessed that would be a subject for a book or two, if he ever took the time to write one.

Sitting down in one of the cushioned chairs, he reached into his pocket and pulled out the now disabled tracking device they’d found under the bumper of the SUV. His mind swam with strange possibilities ranging from conspiracy theories that would rival JFK’s horrific demise to something as simple as this vehicle being in the wrong place at the wrong time and perhaps the device was intended for another
unit
similar to theirs. If the answer were closer to the conspiracy side of
the ledger
, and
the device
was placed for the purpose of tracking them, then who wanted to know where they were and when? How would anyone, other than the people at the Columbia, South Carolina
,
office where the vehicles came from
know which unit they would drive?
Did one of the agents who delivered the
SUVs
to the Myrtle Beach airport have a reason to track them? And why? All
that
Quantico, or any other FBI Office, had to do was tap into the GPS devices inside any of the BAU’s smartphones to locate them. Manny felt
a
small, but vivid
,
alarm go off
inside his head.

There were only two possibilities
;
someone outside the
B
ureau wanted to know where they were, or some overzealous private dick had just lost a very expensive piece of equipment. Josh had already contacted the folks back in Virginia and they were in the process of running down the
tracker’s
serial number and would have some info in a few hours or by tomorrow regarding its original owner. He frowned. He suspected there’d be more questions
.
But they couldn’t waste any more time worrying about it. They had a killer to catch before anyone else died.
Manny’s
disquiet
returned. She wasn’t going to stop, was she?

Just then, Sophie, Josh, Dean, and Alex filed through the door. He glanced up as Sophie sat to his right, Josh to his left
,
and the two CSIs
to the
left of Josh.
They were lined up across from the local’s side of the table.
It was part of the training to make sure each agent got a good look at whomever they were meeting.
Their position
enabled more concise eye contact and body language interpretation. Studies showed those two areas led to better communication. In this realm
—
the
world of cops and killers
—
proper communication was essential. They had a million meetings behind them to prove it.

Josh leaned over. “Hey
,
Manny, do we look like trained seals or what?”

“What? Speak for yourself
.
”

Sophie stopped, looked to
wards
Josh, back to the others
,
then
threw
her hands in the air. “I hate it when you’re right
. W
e just need the beach ball and that little rack of horns to beep.”

“Come on guys, procedure works, mostly,” said Dean. “I think lining up like this makes it look like we have our shit together, yes?”

“T
wo
months and you’re warped,” answered Josh, turning back to Manny. “Oh hey, I made another call. I don’t remember the unit having this many distractions during an investigation, including the murder of Garity and Max’s escape, so I’m passing off the tracking device to someone else. It’s probably nothing anyway.”

“You might be right. Did you assign it to the Columbia office?” asked Manny.

The side door swung open
,
and Captain Tanner entered the room followed by three others. Two women
;
one older, the other maybe in her mid-forties. They were
trail
ed by a tall, good looking man
,
younger than anyone in the room.

“We
’
ll talk later,” whispered Josh
to Manny
.

The four locals sat down and Captain Tanner began to introduce his staff.

“I want you to meet
—
”

There was quick, loud rumbling of heavy feet as someone
rushed
up the first flight of stairs. Manny thought it a large someone by the sound of their approach. He looked at Tanner,
who
shrugged
,
and nine cops reached for their weapons
. . . only
they were too late.

The huge, muscular man broke through the doorway l
ike a runaway freight train, wa
ving his hands and yelling, and then reached for Manny, pulling him clean out of his chair
.

CHAPTER-30

“I
’ve
got to tell you, Chloe, this is the best Shepard’s Pie I’ve ever had,” said Jen Williams, stuffing another bite into her mouth before Chloe could answer.

She couldn’t hold back the smile. If her mum, Haley Rose, had taught her anything, it was how to cook the traditional Irish dishes that travelers staying at their bed and breakfast in Galway wanted to experience. Shepard’s Pie
had
bec
o
me her specialty. Over the years
,
the recipe had evolved some, a little more of this and a little less of that, but it wasn’t far from the one that had been in
Chloe’s
family for hundreds of years.

“She’s right. I’m
no connoisseur or anything, but this is damn good. And it tastes as good as it smells,” agreed Gavin Crosby, sitting to the left of Jen, scooping another helping on his plate, then another.

“I’m glad ya like it. It’ll stick to your ribs and beats the heck out of all of that fast food and pizza crud you could be eating.”

“Oh I still like my double
-
pepperoni
-
and
-
cheese pizza but I’d eat a lot less if I had this to choose from,” said Jen.

“We’ll see what we can do about that.”

She glanced back at her guest and then again at her step-daughter and felt a twinge of what mothers feel when the family was home and it was just them
, t
he intimacy of conversation and subtle communications that was unique to only that family. Manny, Jen, and she had
shared
a few meals before they had been married and
,
in those rare
instances
,
a
whole
new world
had opened to
her. She was looking forward to doing it as man and wife
. . .
and daughter.

Her heart ached a little more. In their line of work, doing what they do, there was no guarantee that all of the BAU would return home safely, if at all.
Alex and Manny were examples of that.

Shaking off that line of thought, she buried it
along
with the uneasiness she’d experienced when Manny and the others had headed for North Carolina. Manny would tel
l her that it served no purpose. H
e was right, of course
. T
hen again, he wasn’t home sitting on pins and needles.

Having Gavin decide to stay with them for a night or two, and the two patrol cars sitting on the street, help
ed
alleviate some of the worry about Manny and the others. They could talk because Gavin understood
. E
ven though Chloe was an FBI
s
pecial
a
gent and could take care of herself and
her family
, it didn’t hurt to make sure Max Tucker’s profile wasn’t
n
o
r
th of where everyone thought it should be.
Talking with Gavin had helped.
For the most part, s
he agreed with Manny’s assessment that
Max
wasn’t really after anyone other than Josh and Manny, at least at this point, but there was no reason to tempt fate. Max was a bright man and
,
in the end, who really knew what motivated the
thinking
of people infected
with
psychopathology like the one
that had torn her old friend away from the world he’d
once
embraced.

“You going to eat, missy?” asked Gavin, in that gravelly voice that was his own.

Looking at her own plate, she realized she
’
d not really touched her food. She’d never really been able to eat when she was anxious
,
and being away from Manny
—
especially now
—
was all she needed to let her anxiety rule.

“Yeah, I’ll get to it,” she said sighing. “It’s been an up and down
couple of days
. I just need to settle down.”

“We
ll, you’re missing a damn fine meal,” said Gavin as he heap
ed
on an
o
ther helping.

Jen laughed.

“You two are funny. One of
you
can’t eat when you’re stressed and the other can’t stop.” Then she laughed again, causing
Chloe
and Gavin to join her.
She
loved
how magical Jen’s laughter was. She seemed at peace with her situation and maybe, just maybe, she could teach Chloe a thing or two about that peace.