Dead Reckoning (11 page)

 
Kate read the story twice. She’d known he’d gone overseas, but her knowledge of what had happened ended with that. When Mike had told her he’d been injured, she hadn’t cared. All she’d cared about was getting a good investigator for her case. Someone who could get the job done. For the first time it dawned on her that Frank might be more vulnerable than he let on. That he might be more human than she’d anticipated. That rough-around-the-edges ex-detective might have some issues to work through.

“Do it on your own time, Matrone,” she muttered as she shut down the computer.

But as she turned out the study light and headed toward her bedroom, she found herself wondering why he looked so damn sad sometimes. So . . . disconnected. She wondered if any of those things had to do with the time he’d spent in the Middle East.

 
THURSDAY, JANUARY 26, 12:13 A.M.

Next to her, Kirsten was sipping a Corona and slapping her palm against the door in time with the drum. The night was sweltering
—
typical for Houston in July
—
but neither girl cared about the heat. After days of planning, they’d finally done it. They’d sneaked out of the house while their parents slept. They had Mom’s car, a six-pack of beer, and a party to go to. Life just didn’t get any better when you were seventeen and as wild as the summer days were long.

They were sitting at a stoplight in a quiet industrial area. It was just after eleven P.M. and the streets were deserted. Kate glanced at her watch. If she pushed it, they could be there in twenty minutes. She and Kirsten had agreed to stay for an hour. Then they would leave, sneak back into the house
—
and no one would ever be the wiser.

The car jolted violently, yanking her from her thoughts. “What the
—
”

Kate walked to the rear of her mom’s car, careful to keep her distance, and looked at the bumper. He’d left his headlights on, and she could see that there was a dent in the shiny chrome.
Shit,
she thought, and felt a small flare of anger. That anger was smothered by something else when a second man got out of the car. This guy was big, and he didn’t look nearly as nice as the first man.

“We’re going to a
—
” Kirsten began, but Kate cut her off.

Vaguely she was aware of the fat man pulling Kirsten from the car. Kirsten screaming.
They can’t do this,
she thought and screamed. “Run!”

This isn’t happening,
she thought
. No. No. No!

“No!”

Kate woke to her own scream. For an instant she was seventeen years old and so filled with horror and revulsion that she wanted to die. Sweat slicked her body and dampened her pajamas, but she was shivering with cold. A cold that came from a place inside her that knew of unspeakable horrors.

It had been a long time since she’d had the nightmare. She didn’t know why it had come rushing back tonight. Maybe the pressures of her caseload were taking more of a toll than she’d thought. Kate tried hard to keep her past out of the cases she tried, but she wasn’t always successful. She knew that for better or worse, she would always be a product of her past.

Throwing back the down comforter, she got out of bed, pulled off her damp pajamas, and wrapped herself in her robe. A glance at the clock told her it was almost one A.M. Even though she was exhausted, she knew sleep wouldn’t come again. In the bathroom she opened the medicine cabinet and picked up the bottle of prescription sleeping pills. It had been over a year since she’d taken one. She didn’t want to take one now, and slid the bottle back onto the shelf.

But she could still feel the dark press of the nightmare, hanging on like a leech, sucking the lifeblood from her. Eleven years had passed since that terrible night. But some wounds never healed. The key, she’d realized, was learning to live with them.

The truth of the matter was she was lucky to be alive, but some days Kate didn’t feel lucky. She felt damaged and tainted. She thought of Kirsten lying in her bed in her overdecorated room at the Turtle Creek Convalescent Home and felt the old pain slash her with spindly claws. Her sister hadn’t deserved to have her life taken away.

Goddamn those sons of bitches who did this to us,
she thought with a vicious anger she was all too familiar with.

Giving up on the hope of going back to sleep, Kate crossed to her closet, pulled out a pair of jeans and a navy turtleneck sweater. Quickly she dressed and stepped into her boots. She ran her fingers through her hair, shrugged into her leather jacket, and grabbed her keys. She may not be able to sleep, but that didn’t mean she had to stay home and bounce off the walls.

There was plenty she could do tonight.

For what she had in mind, the wee hours of morning were the perfect time to do it.

 
THURSDAY, JANUARY 26, 1:56 A.M.

The wipers slapped rain mixed with sleet from the windshield as Kate parked on a narrow side street in a nasty part of South Dallas. Not bothering with her umbrella, she opened the door and stepped into the cold night. She took the cracked sidewalk to a three-story brick building bedecked with gang graffiti. A single bullet hole marred the storefront window of the long vacant furniture shop next door. She was keenly aware of a car idling slowly down the street and knew the driver was eyeballing her, wondering what a nice white lady was doing in that part of town at two in the morning.

If only he knew.

The wooden door creaked like old bones when she opened it and stepped into the dark foyer. Her boots thudded in perfect time with her heart as she crossed to the narrow wooden staircase. She took the steps two at a time. The second level smelled of garbage, marijuana, and vomit. Down the hall and to her right, a wino sat slumped against a wall, a bottle of rotgut in his hand, his bloodshot eyes glaring. A mangy cat looked at her from behind a garbage can, a dead rat hanging from its mouth.

Frowning, Kate continued on to the third level and took the darkened hall to a wooden door with an etched glass window. Like a Philip Marlow movie from the 1940s, a printed sign on the glass read: “Jack Gamble, Private Detective.” She almost smiled every time she saw it. Almost.

The light was on inside, but Kate didn’t need the light to know he was working. Jack Gamble was a night bird. By the time he opened his office for business, most folks were at home and tucked into bed. But then, she supposed Jack’s kind of work required the cover of night. That was precisely the reason she’d hired him.