Dead Reckoning (33 page)

She brewed hot tea and made an organizational chart of the corporate structure of the Ferguson and Rooks companies. She cruised several search engines, reading, seeking, filling her print tray with information. Ferguson and Rooks. Endroad Holdings. Quorum Partners Limited. Java, Inc. Tuscan Bread Company. Snack and Gas. It wasn’t until she reached the end of the chart that the search engine took her to a story that stopped her in her tracks.

A two-year-old archived newspaper article from the
Times Record News
of Wichita Falls, Texas, read:

 
The parallels between the Wichita murders and the murders of Evangeline Worth and Irma Trevino chilled her.

Kate flipped through the file she had compiled and pulled out the Dun and Bradstreet report. Sure enough, twenty-nine Little Italy stores were owned by the Tuscan Bread Company, out of Kansas City, Kansas. The Tuscan Bread Company was owned by Endroad Holdings, which was owned by none other than the Dallas law firm of Ferguson and Rooks.

“Gotta be a coincidence,” she muttered to herself.

Kate expanded her search, seeking similar crimes committed in the last five years. There were two additional murders at Little Italy stores. More digging revealed similar crimes at Java the Cup coffee shops. In the last five years Quick Stop, Inc., the franchisee of over two hundred Snack and Gas convenience stores, had reported six robberies. Five of those robberies had a fatal outcome. Five had had the hidden camera shot out.

Kate was shaking when she finally pushed away from her computer and stood. What the hell had she stumbled onto? Was it coincidental that there had been so many robberies with fatal outcomes? That the shootings were so eerily similar? Were these crimes somehow linked?

As an ADA, Kate knew the importance of motive when it came to prosecuting a case. Who would have something to gain by robbing and murdering clerks? Had she stumbled upon some sort of organized robbery/murder ring? But why would someone risk so much when such a small amount of money was actually stolen?

She considered calling Mike Shelley, but quickly dismissed the idea. It had been Mike, after all, who’d removed her from the Bruton Ellis case and ordered her to take some time off.

That left one other person. She groaned inwardly at the idea of calling Frank. But she knew that if the crimes were connected, he would find the link.

“Damn you, Matrone.”

She’d just reached for the phone when it chirped twice. Expecting Frank, she snatched it up on the first ring.

“You got a pen handy?”

Kate’s heart began to pound at the sound of Jack Gamble’s voice. He rarely called. When he did, it was invariably something important. “Do you have something for me?”

“I got an address on your man. Danny Lee Perkins.”

A dozen emotions descended in a rush. Shock. Relief. Dread. And a surprising amount of fear. She hadn’t expected to be afraid.

“Kate? You there?”

“I’m here.” Putting her hand over the mouthpiece, she took a deep breath, mentally shifted gears. “What’s the address?”

“It’s 1421 Pioneer, Apartment 6, in Grand Prairie.”

She turned to her laptop, pulled up a popular mapping website, and typed the address. “He live alone?”

“As far as I can tell.”

Uneasiness swirled in her gut when she realized the cop parked in front of her house was going to be a problem. “I need you to rent a car. Something nondescript. Economy. Tie a ribbon or string to the antenna so I can identify it. Park it in the 3500 block of Beverly Drive.”

“Kate . . .”

“I need you to do this, Jack. It’s important.”

He sighed. “Give me an hour.”

She closed her eyes. “Thank you. I’ll add five hundred dollars to your final payment.”

She considered hanging up on him when he didn’t respond. She hadn’t told him what she had planned, but Jack Gamble was no dummy. He’d read between the lines. He knew. The last thing she wanted tonight was for him to try to talk her out of it.

“Kate, I ain’t never asked you about your personal business.”

“Don’t.”

“It ain’t like you and I are strangers. We been working on this for a year now.”

“You’ve been working on it for a year,” she said. “I’ve been working on it for eleven years.” It was the most she’d ever told him. The most she ever would. She didn’t want to involve him any more than she already had. If things went south, she didn’t want him getting into trouble. “The smartest thing you can do right now, Jack, is stop asking questions and forget I was ever a client.”

He sighed. “Kate, don’t do anything you’re going to be sorry for.”

“I never do,” she said and hit the End button without saying good-bye.

TWENTY-THREE

WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 8, 8:06 P.M.

Before becoming a private detective, Jack Gamble had been a police officer for twenty years. He’d spent four of those years working undercover in narcotics. Two as a tactical officer on the S.W.A.T. team. He’d been in plenty of dicey situations during those years. A couple of times he wasn’t sure he was going to live to tell about it.

But none of those situations seemed as precarious as the one he found himself in tonight.

His wheelchair creaked when he leaned back, laced his hands behind his head, and stared at the phone on his desk. He hadn’t bothered turning on the desk lamp, but he didn’t need light to know he was in one hell of a pickle.

He’d had the name and address for days now, but hadn’t been able to bring himself to call Kate. She hadn’t told him what she was going to do, but Jack had been around the block enough times to know it wasn’t good.

Growing up in a tough South Dallas neighborhood, Jack knew all about street justice. There had been times when he condoned it. A few times when he’d doled it out himself. He knew that sometimes it was the only justice served. Other times street justice wasn’t justice at all, just another meaningless act of violence cloaked in self-righteousness and cruelty.

Street justice was a tricky thing. It didn’t come without risks. It sure as hell didn’t come without a price. Street justice forced a person to cross lines. One wrong move, one mistake, and that person could find herself on the wrong side of the law. Jack
wanted
Kate to have her justice. He just didn’t want her to have to go to jail to get it.

He’d done his homework on Kate Megason. It hadn’t been easy, but he’d finally learned what happened to her and her sister eleven years ago. He knew Kirsten Megason would never recover. He knew the two men who’d raped and brutalized the two girls had never been caught. He knew the statute of limitations had long since run out.

He’d never let on to Kate that he knew. He never would because he knew it would change the dynamics of their relationship. A relationship he’d grown fond of in the last year. He liked her grit. He admired her courage. He knew she was a decent person. But he knew that even decent people had their limits. Kate had endured the kind of physical and psychological anguish that would mark her forever. She might have survived, but she had not survived unscathed.

Jack had had the name and address for two days. Trying to decide whether or not to give it to her had kept him up nights. Now that he’d done the deed, the only question that remained was if he was going to let her ruin her life.

Cursing beneath his breath, he reached for the phone. He punched in four numbers before hanging up without placing the call. It was the third time he’d reached for the phone. The third time he’d hung up without completing the call.

Damn, he wished he knew what to do.

He wished he hadn’t given her the name. He wished he’d tried to talk her out of whatever she was about to do. But Jack knew Kate well enough to know she couldn’t be talked down. Not after she’d made up her mind.

The way he saw it he had two choices. He could sit here in the dark and kick himself for not stopping her. Or he could call the one man he could trust to do the right thing.

Jack had noticed the way Frank Matrone looked at her. The way a man looks at a woman when he cares. And he knew if he called Frank Matrone, the other man would keep her from getting hurt, either by someone else’s hand—or her own.

Muttering a curse, Jack reached for the phone.

 
WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 8, 8:12 P.M.

Kate felt nothing but a low-grade anxiety as she changed into black jeans, a black turtleneck, and low-heeled boots. Tucking the latex gloves into her pocket, she entered the study, knelt at the credenza behind her desk, and unlocked the bottom drawer. Shoving the neatly labeled hanging folders aside, she withdrew the lockbox and set it on her desk.

She unlocked the box and found herself staring down at the blue steel of the Jennings .25 caliber pistol. It was a semiautomatic six-shooter with a two-and-a-half-inch barrel, black Teflon finish, and a wood grip. She wasn’t proud of the way she’d obtained the weapon. It was the one and only time Kate had ever used her position with the DA’s office to further her goal. But one snowy Saturday a year ago she’d been in the police evidence room preparing for a case. She’d overheard the officer on duty talking to another cop about four hundred and fifty confiscated guns. Guns that had been designated for destruction. These particular guns had been confiscated during busts. The striations had never been entered into the computer system. The opportunity had been too good to pass up.

It was as if someone else had been inside her body as she’d crossed to the wooden pallet. Someone else’s hand that had reached inside and pulled out the deadly piece of steel that was now lying on her desk. By the time she’d walked out, her entire body had been shaking. But Kate had gotten what she’d wanted.

A gun that could never be traced back to her.

A few months later she’d asked Jack Gamble to help her buy a silencer. She’d told him it was her father’s gun. That she would be taking lessons and didn’t like the noise. She was pretty sure he hadn’t believed her. But, as always, he’d come through.

Shoving the box back into the credenza, Kate rose and slid the Jennings into the waistband of her jeans. She turned off her cell phone and clipped it to her belt. She stuffed an old thrift store coat into her shoulder bag, and then slipped into her regular coat. Leaving on the front porch light, she locked the door and took the sidewalk to the street where the police cruiser was parked. The window rolled down as she approached.

“Hi,” she said, offering a smile and her hand.

“Evening, Ms. Megason.” He shook her hand gently. “Brian Kozloskow. Everything okay this evening?”

“Of course.” She smiled. “Mike put you up to this?”

He nodded sheepishly. “Just getting in a little O.T.”

She rolled her eyes. “I just wanted to let you know I’m going to drive over to the Turtle Creek Convalescent Home to visit a relative.”

“Sure thing. I know where it’s at. I’ll just follow you.”

“Thanks, I appreciate it.”

Ten minutes later Kate pulled into the Turtle Creek Convalescent Home lot and parked near the door. She turned and saw Officer Kozloskow park a few spaces away and walked over to the car.

“I should only be an hour or so,” she said.

“Take your time. I’ll be with you until seven A.M. tomorrow morning, so you just follow your normal routine.”

If her heart hadn’t been pounding so hard, Kate would have laughed outright at the idea of any of this being routine.

The halls of the convalescent home had already been dimmed for the evening when Kate walked in. She’d been hoping to avoid being noticed by the head nurse, but the woman looked up as Kate turned down the hall where her sister’s room was. Smiling, Kate raised her hand and waved, but she didn’t stop to chat.

Once in Kirsten’s room, Kate walked over to her sister’s bed and looked into the face she knew so well. For an instant she saw her as the young girl she’d been, lovely and full of life and looking forward to a future that had wonderful things in store.

“It ends tonight, Kirs.” Blinking back tears, Kate reached down and cupped her sister’s face. “I’m going to get him. I’m going to make him pay for what he did to us. I’m going to make sure he never does it again.”

She removed her coat and slipped into the thrift store coat. Crossing to the door, she turned left instead of right and went out the rear exit. The cars parked along the side street were cloaked in shadows from the live oaks that grew along the median. Kate spotted the string on the rental car’s antenna immediately and jogged to it. Finding the keys in the visor, she started the engine and pulled onto the street.

 
WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 8, 8:29 P.M.

Frank’s cell phone was beeping when he stepped out of the shower. Toweling his hair, he left the bathroom and limped to the bedroom where he’d left it charging. His heart did a weird little dip when he saw that the voice message icon was blinking, and for an instant he found he was hoping it was from Kate.

But Frank knew she wouldn’t call. He was going to have to do some creative groveling if he wanted to get back to the place they’d been before he’d made his recommendation to Mike Shelley. Even then, he wasn’t sure she would forgive him. The thought cut a lot deeper than he wanted it to.

He’d been thinking about her since the ugly scene in his office. Every time he closed his eyes he saw the way she’d looked at him when she told him she’d been removed from the Bruton Ellis case. As if he’d thrust a knife into her heart and then gleefully twisted it.