Dangerous Games (43 page)

“And create another killer.”

“I saved Madeleine’s life,” Abby snapped.

“Not tonight.”

Abby turned away. There was a long silence between them, broken only by the sibilant fall of rain.

Finally Abby said, “Still, you’ve got to admit, I did save
your
butt.”

Tess shut her eyes. Suddenly her anger was gone, replaced by a great weariness. “You did. And I guess I haven’t thanked you for it.”

“Don’t get all mushy on me. That tender moment we shared back at the field office was sappy enough.”

“Speaking of which…” She pointed to the ID tag, which somehow hadn’t been washed away and was still clipped to Abby’s shirt.

Abby removed the tag with a smile and handed it back. “Thanks for the loan. Came in handy. By the way, Kolb kept a storage locker near Vermont and Olympic. Lots of neat stuff inside. I left the door open for you.”

“Did anyone see you there?”

“Yeah, the storage manager. I also visited this bar called Below Ground in the same neighborhood. The bartender and I had a conversation.”

Tess sighed. “That’ll come out, you know. Michaelson was already going half-crazy trying to find you. When he learns you were running around town investigating the case, he’ll go into overdrive.”

“Just wait until my car turns up in the drainage system.”

“Your
car
? Oh, my God.”

“Don’t worry about it.”

“When they find your car, Michaelson will
know
you were down there.”

“He’ll know Abby Hollister was down there. That’s the name the car is registered under, just like my fake apartment. He’ll figure Hollister was some kind of unlicensed PI hired by Madeleine Grant. He’ll question Madeleine’s household staff. That’s okay. They only know me by my alias.”

“He won’t stop looking for you,” Tess said.

“Of course he will. Don’t you get it? Abby Hollister
died
in the tunnels. The car is proof. She drowned, and her body got swept into the ocean through one of the beach outfalls. Nobody spends any time looking for a dead person. So don’t sweat it, Tess. Abby Hollister is dead.” She got up, stretching. “And Abby Sinclair is dead tired. I’m getting out of here. You can call your playmates at the Bureau and have them pick you up.”

Tess stood also. “Where are you going?”

“To catch a cab or a bus, thumb a ride, something. I don’t live far from here. Maybe I’ll walk home.” She nodded at the streaming downpour. “Nice night for a walk, don’t you think?”

“Abby…I’m sorry for what I said.”

“No, you aren’t. You meant every word. Maybe you were even right.”

“But that’s not going to change how you do business, is it?”

“Nope.”

Tess needed to say more. “Whatever happened last year, without you we wouldn’t have gotten Kolb. Not this soon. Maybe not ever.”

“Well, that’ll be our little secret. As far as everyone else is concerned, you identified Kolb and nabbed him. You snuffed the bad guys and ended the Rain Man’s reign of terror.” Abby smiled, a slow, sad smile, rare for her. “And you did it alone.”

Tess watched her walk away until she disappeared behind silvery sheets of rain.

50

“You wanted to see me?” Tess asked, entering the ADIC’s office. She deliberately avoided calling him
sir
.

“Shut the door,” Michaelson said from behind his desk. He looked oddly small sitting there, although at the news conference earlier today he’d been puffed up to his full height as he explained how the case had been cleared.

Tess, in the hospital getting stitches in her cheek and a full workover from a battery of doctors, hadn’t been able to attend. She’d watched the event on TV, amused to see Michaelson spend most of the question period fielding inquiries about her role in the investigation. Maybe that was why he seemed to have shrunk in his chair.

“Sit down, please.” Michaelson was being very formal. Tess didn’t know what to make of it. She took the chair opposite the desk and waited.

“So.” He rapped the desk blotter with his knuckles. “How are you feeling?”

“The ER gave me a clean bill of health.”

“That cut on your face—”

“They say it won’t leave a scar. I’ll be as photogenic as ever in a couple of weeks.”

“Well, good. You’ve been through quite an ordeal. You’re entitled to some R-and-R.”

“All I want to do is get back to Denver. Crandall picked me up at the hospital. He’s waiting in the parking lot to drive me to LAX for a two-thirty flight.”

“That was quick.”

“No reason to delay it. I’m ready to go.” Tess sighed. “More than ready.”

“Homesick?”

She was, but she didn’t admit it. “There’s a lot of work piling up on my desk. How’s the investigation into Ed Mason coming along?”

“We found the bank account numbers at his residence. We ought to be able to recover the two million dollars paid for Paula Weissman.”

“Let the taxpayers rejoice. Anything else turn up?”

“An impressive collection of vintage LPs. Two fully packed suitcases in his car—he was planning a quick escape.”

“There was nothing holding him to LA, I take it.”

“He was unmarried, no close relatives, and apparently no friends. His life consisted of his job, his record collection, and fantasizing about the perfect crime.”

“How do you know that?”

“He had another collection besides record albums. True-crime books, hundreds of them. Evidently he liked to imagine himself as another D. B. Cooper, someone who could fleece the system, make a clean getaway, and end up as a legend in his own time. Anyway, that’s what the shrinks say. At the very least, he saw himself as something more than a humdrum civil servant.”

“Don’t we all.”

“His fantasy life was probably harmless enough until Kolb started working on him. Mason let himself be talked into their partnership. It was his dream scenario. He would pull off the crime of the century and pocket a few million dollars.”

“At a cost of a few lives.”

“Until last night, he never had to deal with the victims personally. I suppose that made it easier for him. They were just part of the game he had going in his mind. They were never real.”

They’d been real to somebody, Tess thought. She said nothing. Michaelson, too, was silent.

“Was there something more you wanted to discuss?” she asked finally.

“We haven’t found her body yet.”

“Madeleine Grant?”

“Well, yes. Her, too. But I was referring to Abby Hollister—if that was her real name.” Michaelson gave Tess a hard stare. “You, of course, have no idea what she was doing in the storm sewers?”

“No.”

“You never saw her down there?”

“Of course not.”

“She was some kind of operator, obviously. All her paper was forged. Good-quality stuff. She knew what she was doing.”

“Apparently so.”

“At least, until she drove into the tunnels during a rainstorm. She must have drowned.”

“Must have. If that’s all you need to discuss…”

She made a motion to rise. Michaelson waved her back to her seat. “We’re not through yet, Agent McCallum.”

Another silence stretched between them. Tess began to wonder if he’d learned the truth about Abby and was simply prolonging the tension before he made a formal accusation of misconduct.

“Do they really call me that?” he asked at last.

She blinked. “Call you what?”

“The Nose.”

“Oh.”

“Do they?”

“No,” she said. “I made it up. I apologize. It was childish of me.”

Michaelson studied her, uncertain whether he could believe her. After a few seconds he looked away, perhaps preferring not to know. “Apology accepted. You’ve seen Larkin, I’m sure.”

“Yes, at the hospital. His prognosis is good.”

“Crandall did a fine job getting him out of there. Both agents will receive commendations. Agent Larkin will, however, be sidelined for several months of rehabilitation. I’ll be needing a replacement. A new deputy to the assistant director. It’s quite a prestigious post, as you know.”

She began to see where this was leading, but she couldn’t believe it. Michaelson would never—
never
—make her this offer.

“Yes.” She watched him with almost impersonal fascination.

“Well, you see…” He swallowed hard, as if fighting to suppress a bad taste in his mouth. “FBI HQ thinks it would be a good idea, from a public-relations standpoint…that is, considering the success you’ve enjoyed in Los Angeles on two separate occasions…considering the reputation you’ve made for yourself in this town…”

Now it made sense. It hadn’t been his idea at all. Washington was forcing him to offer her the post. And he was hating every minute of it.

Tess leaned back in her chair. The meeting had turned out to be fun.

“What I’m saying is, the position is open, and it”—he pronounced the words with visible effort—“it can be yours. If you want it.”

She let him dangle for an unconscionably long moment.

“I don’t,” she said. “Thanks, anyway.”

He cocked his head as if he hadn’t heard. “You don’t?”

“No, Richard. I don’t. I like Denver. I like running things. Working in LA as your deputy is not my idea of a good time.”

“I assure you, the discomfort entailed by that arrangement would be mutual.”

“If you keep on sweet-talking me like that, I might change my mind.”

He studied her. “I don’t understand you, McCallum. Anyone else would jump at the chance to be assigned to this office—especially at such a high level. I won’t be here forever. When I move on, you’d be poised to take over as assistant director.”

“Sounds good on paper. But I’m not sure I’m cut out to be an assistant director.”

“You’ll get no argument from me about that.”

She winced, knowing she’d set herself up for that one. “The higher you go in the bureaucracy, the more your job is about politics and not about the work. I want it to be about the work.”

“Well, good for you. You keep doing the work, and I’ll keep moving up the ladder. Then when I get to be director, I’ll have the pleasure of firing you. It will be my first official act. After that, you won’t have the work anymore. You won’t have anything.”

“You’re a charmer, Richard. Don’t ever change.” Tess rose. “Are we done?”

“Thankfully, yes.”

She was opening the door when he said, “You didn’t seem surprised.”

“By the job offer? I have a poker face.”

“I meant you weren’t surprised to hear that Abby Hollister’s body hasn’t been found.”

“Should I have been?”

Michaelson looked at her across the office. “I know you’re holding out on me. And I intend to get to the bottom of things sooner or later. Unless you’d care to unburden yourself right now.”

She hesitated. “All right, Richard. I have to admit, I’ve been lying to you.”

He leaned forward, his face drawn taut with anticipation. “Have you?”

“I’m afraid so. Actually, they
do
call you the Nose. Well, I shouldn’t say
they
. I should say
we
. As in all of us, everybody, all the time. It’s a semiofficial nickname, I guess.”

“Get out, Tess.”

“Don’t take it personally. That particular feature of yours just happens to be the only thing about you that makes a lasting impression.”

“Get
out
.”

She left the office. As she rode the elevator, she activated her cell phone, which had somehow survived her underwater adventure, and called Josh Green, the Denver ASAC.

“I’m coming home,” she said. “I need an airport pickup at four.” She told him the airline and flight number.

“It’ll be arranged. Congratulations, Tess. You’re all over the news. A media superstar—again.”

“I don’t want to be a superstar.” She got off at the ground floor. “By the way…is that dinner invitation still open?”

“You taking me up on it?”

“I am.”

“What happened to the unwritten rule against fraternizing with a subordinate?”

“I’ve decided there are some occasions when it may—just
may
—be permissible to break the rules. I’ll see you, Josh.”

“We’ll leave a light on for you.”

She found Crandall in the parking lot by the Bureau sedan she’d commandeered on Monday night. It was his car again. He slid behind the wheel, and she slipped into the passenger seat.

“LAX, here we come,” Crandall said, shifting into drive. “How about some music for the trip?”

“I’m not in a Sinatra kind of mood.”

“Me neither. After last night, I may never be a Rat Packer again. What do you say we go classic country?”

He switched on the radio. A clear tenor voice filled the speakers. John Denver singing “Rocky Mountain High.”

“Appropriate, given your destination,” Crandall said.

“The song title? Or his last name?”

“Both, actually. Maybe it’s a…what’s the word…synchronicity.”

“A sign from above. Could be.” Tess smiled. “A little pat on the back, a way of saying, ‘Job well done.’”

“You deserve it.”

“I think it’s meant for both of us.”

Crandall pulled onto the San Diego Freeway, heading south. Traffic was light under a cloudless sky. “Hey, you know what? I got a call from my father.”

“I’ll bet he’s proud of you.”

“Claims he is. I didn’t have the heart tell him all I really did was fall on my ass.”

“You survived a firefight in close quarters. You kept your head. You got Larkin to safety. Don’t sell yourself short.”

He was embarrassed but, she thought, secretly pleased. “At least I’ve proven I’m not a complete screw-up at everything I try.”

“There you go. That’s the attitude.”

“Can’t believe it was Mason, though. I mean, he was so friendly to me. Sucked me right in.”

“Me, too.”

“And all the time he was just trolling for info. And I gave it to him.”

“Everybody did. He was the civilian liaison. He sat in on the meetings. He knew everything—which entryways would be watched, which neighborhoods we would concentrate on. He knew it all, courtesy of his friends at the FBI.”

“But
you
weren’t fooled.”