Eye for an Eye, an (Heroes of Quantico Book #2): A Novel (7 page)

Plus, we could be at her door in seconds.”

“Sounds like a plan,” Coop concurred.

“I also got an update from Steve. The guy left a clear route through the woods, thanks to broken branches and trampled underbrush, but not much else. The lab’s working on what they have, but no results yet. They promised to have more by the briefing tomorrow.”

A door opened upstairs, and Emily came down the steps a few moments later. She’d changed into shorts and a T-shirt, and her feet were bare. If anything, she looked more vulnerable than ever. Mark’s throat tightened, and he had to restrain the urge to close the distance between them and wrap her in a comforting hug.

She hesitated in the doorway of the living room, grasping the door frame with one hand. “Am I interrupting?”

Mark rose. “Not at all. We need to talk with you, anyway.”

She joined them, and with Mark’s assistance gingerly lowered herself into one of the striped chairs. She flashed him a smile as he took his seat. “Why do I think you gentlemen have been planning my life for me?”

“Nick volunteered to sleep on your couch,” Coop told her.

“We voted him down,” Mark added. “He’ll be in the parking lot.”

“You can’t blame a guy for trying.” Nick grinned, eliciting a smile from Emily.

“We’ll regroup after the briefing tomorrow, but in the meantime we’ll have an agent in the visitor lot out front. What are your plans for tomorrow?”

“I have appointments, but I’m going to reschedule them for later in the week and stay close to home. I think I’ll sleep most of the day.”

“Good plan,” Mark approved. “By end of day, we may have some additional information. We do need one more thing from you. Names of the women you’ve counseled at the shelter in the past four weeks.”

Emily sent him a puzzled look. “Why?”

“Abusers are not nice people. And when thwarted, they can be dangerous. If any of the women you spoke with told her spouse or boyfriend that your counsel convinced her to leave him permanently, he could be very upset. How many women would you estimate you’ve counseled in the past month?”

“Eight, maybe. Some weeks I only talk to one, other weeks two or three.”

“Can you get us their names? We’ll check them out, see if they’ve mentioned your name to their significant other.”

“You’ll be discreet?”

“Always.”

“My notes are at my office. I can have Maria, my secretary, check my file tomorrow. She could also call the shelter to get additional contact information. Is that okay?”

After a brief hesitation, Mark agreed. “Today would be better.

But we can wait until first thing in the morning. Have her fax the information.” Mark withdrew a small notebook from his pocket and jotted down a number, glancing at the other two men as he handed it to Emily. “Anything else we need to cover today?”

When the other two agents shook their heads, he gave Emily his full attention. “Then we’re going to let you get some rest.”

“I’ll be across the parking lot, in the black SUV,” Nick told her, rising.

“I’ll wait for you outside.” Coop followed Nick to the door.

“Thanks, guys.” Emily started to stand, but Mark restrained her.

“They can find their way out.”

Waiting until the door clicked shut, he moved to the ottoman across from her and took her hands. “We’re going to do our best to find this guy, Em.”

“I know.” She squeezed his fingers. “Some reunion, huh?”

“Yeah.” A humorless smile twisted his lips. “But we’re going to make up for this after the dust settles. And that’s a promise I won’t forget.”

For an instant, Mark was tempted to lean close and seal his pledge with a kiss. Emily had been right earlier. The years had melted away, and Wren Lake seemed like yesterday. He, too, felt as if they’d picked up where they’d left off.

But twenty years had passed, and you couldn’t step back into a relationship that easily, he reminded himself. They were different people now, with histories that had shaped and changed them in the two decades that had elapsed since they’d shared their first kiss. She’d loved again, and mourned that loss. He’d shied away from commitments, unwilling to take on the inevitable stress of trying to juggle a relationship with his demanding career. Reconnecting wasn’t that simple. Especially when he was slated to return to Quantico in four short weeks, and her life was here.

Restraining his amorous impulse, Mark gave her fingers one more squeeze and rose. “Lock the deadbolt behind me.”

He helped her up, and she followed him to the door.

“Be careful, Mark.”

“I will. And keep the shades and curtains closed.”

“Okay.”

He lifted his hand and touched her cheek. Hesitated. And then he stepped through the door and pulled it closed, waiting until he heard the soft click of the lock before joining Coop.

Emily took a long, slow breath and rested her forehead against the door as quiet descended in her condo.

If the last thirty-six hours had left her reeling, the last thirty-six seconds had sucked the air from her lungs.

Unless the pain medication was totally addling her brain, she’d swear that Mark had wanted to kiss her just now.

Unsettling as that was, she was more unnerved by her reaction. She’d wanted him to.

Pushing away from the door, she forced her lethargic legs to carry her back up the stairs to her bedroom. Sinking onto the mattress, she stretched out with a sigh. She’d tried to disguise her discomfort as much as possible around the three agents, but she was hurting. Badly. Every muscle in her body ached, and her arm was throbbing. The pain medication she’d downed as soon as she’d arrived home hadn’t yet kicked in.

Yesterday, she’d used the word surreal to describe her present situation. And it fit. Despite the bulky bandage, she found it difficult to believe she’d been shot. Things like this didn’t happen to people like her, who lived quiet lives, pursued safe careers, abided by the law. Crime and violence weren’t supposed to be part of her world anymore, now that Grant was gone.

She turned her head on the pillow, toward the photo on her nightstand. It had been taken at Grant’s birthday party a week before the fire that had claimed his life and destroyed their future.

She’d known when she’d married him that his job carried some risk. But he’d assured her accidents were rare, that the safety net of his training would protect him 99 percent of the time.

Neither of them had counted on Grant running into the 1 percent sort of situation where it wouldn’t.

Lifting the photo from the nightstand, she gazed at Grant’s face, recalling their first meeting. She’d shared an elevator with him when he’d come to do a safety inspection at her office building. His energy and intensity had reminded her of Mark—a surprise, considering she hadn’t thought much about her summer beau in the years before meeting Grant.

It wasn’t that she and Mark had had a falling out. They’d stayed in touch for a few months after that idyllic summer, and she’d seen him again at her grandmother’s funeral, but they’d both had plans, and the letters had gradually dwindled, then ceased.

Nevertheless, she’d tucked the memory of her first, sweet taste of romance in her heart, expecting someday to find the man who would take it to the next level.

But for years, she hadn’t. Always goal oriented, she’d devoted herself to her schooling with a singular focus that allowed no room for other pursuits. She’d received her PhD at twenty-six and gone on to work with a seasoned pro, opening her own practice after he retired two years later. There’d never been any time for romance.

Until Grant had convinced her to
take
time.

And in truth, it had been an easy sell, she reflected. With his teasing smile, he’d always been able to coax her away for a day of fun, convince her to leave the office before seven and share a pizza, or cajole her into taking a walk through the autumn leaves. He’d helped teach her the value of balance in her life, the importance of carving out time for relationships.

It was a lesson that had been long overdue for an army brat who’d never been in one place long enough to form lasting friendships. As much as she counseled her clients to take time for themselves and the people who were important in their lives, she hadn’t followed her own advice until Grant came along.

Since his death, she’d fallen back into old habits, using work to fill the empty place in her life—and to keep risk at arm’s length.

If you didn’t let anyone trespass on your heart, you couldn’t get hurt. She’d been down the road of loving and losing once; she didn’t want to travel it again. Instead, she’d counted on work to sustain her.

What she hadn’t counted on was Mark reappearing in her life.

He would have liked Grant, she speculated, tracing the image of her husband with a loving touch. They shared common traits.

A ready smile. Integrity. Honesty. A teasing manner that hid a serious side revealed only to people in whom they had absolute trust.

Under different circumstances, Emily might have considered exploring the possibility of picking up her relationship with Mark. He’d been up-front in his interest, said he didn’t want to let her slip away again. And their shared history gave them a solid base on which to build.

But there was no way she could ever again get involved with someone in a high-risk profession.

And from everything she’d read, high-risk defined the HRT.

As the medication began to take effect and her eyes drifted closed, she hugged the photo of Grant to her chest. In their brief months together, he’d given her enough memories of love to last a lifetime. She didn’t need to create any more. Yes, it had been good to run into Mark. She’d enjoyed their reunion, would look forward to seeing more of him in the next few days. But they had no future together.

Even if Mark thought otherwise.

7

“Okay, if everyone’s ready, let’s get started.”

As Carl Owens called the Monday morning briefing to order, Mark surveyed the table in the conference room. Reps from the ERT were present, as were the detectives and agents working the case. Although it was a joint investigation, Carl and Steve had agreed that today’s briefing would take place at Oakdale police headquarters.

“Les, are you with us?” Steve verified.

“We’re hooked in.” Les Coplin’s voice had the typical disembodied sound of a conference-call connection.

“We met a couple of times over the weekend. No breakthroughs. But the evidence team has a preliminary report.” Steve turned to Clair. “You’re on.”

The ERT lead investigator rose and moved to the front of the room, flipping on the overhead projector.

“The shooter didn’t leave much. No casings, but we did find the projectiles. They’re 30-06, suggesting they were fired from a common deer rifle. Both are distorted.” She put the photos of the bullets on the screen. “Ballistics ran their rifling parameters through the general rifling characteristics database and thinks the rifle may be a Winchester.”

She replaced the bullet shots with one of a footprint. “It was fairly easy for the detectives on the scene to identify the shooter’s route through the woods and his firing position, based on broken branches and compressed ground cover. There were no fibers at the scene, but we did get a partial footprint in an area of damp ground. Size eleven, common work boot. Not enough there to verify wear pattern. We did take a soil sample from the footprint, and there appears to be some material in the dirt that is inconsistent with the soil in that area. Quantico is working to identify it as we speak.”

The footprint transparency was replaced by one of a tire track. “We found this impression in some mud at the edge of the woods, where the shooter exited. We can’t verify it’s from his car, but it was at the far end of the church parking lot, in an area that wouldn’t be used by members of the congregation unless there was an overflow crowd. Also, since it rained the day before the shooting, we know it was a recent track. There’s not much here, but enough to tell us the shooter drove a midsized car.”

Clair tucked her short blonde hair behind her ear and adjusted her glasses. “This diagram is interesting.” She centered it on the projector. Picking up a laser pointer, she aimed it at an X at the edge of the woods. “This marks the shooter’s location.

Note where the two victims were standing at the time of the shooting.” She indicated Mark’s and Emily’s positions southwest of the shooter. “They came together from opposite directions; Agent Sanders from the north, Dr. Lawson from the south.” She traced their routes with the pointer.

The room went silent, and Mark’s stomach clenched as he exchanged a look with Coop. He’d passed directly in front of the shooter as he walked toward Emily, and the man hadn’t taken a shot.

“This would suggest Dr. Lawson was the target.” Steve voiced the obvious conclusion. “But if she was, why wait until she and Mark were together to fire?”

“If he was focused on Dr. Lawson, it’s conceivable he didn’t see Mark until it was too late to get a clear shot,” Carl weighed in.

“What were you doing immediately before the first shot was fired?” Coop directed his question to Mark.

It took Mark a second to re-create the moment in his mind.

“We’d just talked about getting together for a cold drink, and I was checking the time. I had to angle away from the sun to cut the glare on the face of my watch.”

“In other words, you shifted enough to the right to potentially open up a line of sight for the shooter to Dr. Lawson.”

“Yes.”

“Let’s not be too hasty here,” Steve interjected. “What about that row of bushes along the path, Clair? Wouldn’t they have prevented the shooter from getting a clear shot at Mark?”

She indicated the bushes with her pointer. “These are about six feet high and spaced four feet apart. They run along the path for thirty yards. They wouldn’t have blocked the shooter’s view, but they could have been an impediment to shooting if Agent Sanders was moving at a fast pace. And when he emerged from behind them, he would have been directly across from the shooter, presenting a less-than-optimal side view as a target.”

“The guy might have been waiting until Mark got past the bushes and moved away from him, planning to aim for his back.”

Carl studied the diagram and shook his head. “I don’t think this gives us a clear answer about the target.”

“Or if there was one,” Steve pointed out. “We can’t discount the possibility that we’re dealing with a random act of violence.

What we’ve learned suggests otherwise, but it’s too early to rule anything out.”

“Agreed. Anything else, Clair?” When she shook her head, Carl picked up a notepad. “Let’s move on to the interviews. We finished canvassing the neighbors in the vicinity of the church, and with the exception of several families who were on vacation, we talked to someone in every household. No one saw anything out of the ordinary that morning, or noticed any activity at the church. The investigators also asked residents and the pastor of the church about surveillance cameras but came up blank there too.” He set the notepad down. “What about suspects . . .enemies, people who are holding grudges, recently released criminals?” He turned to Mark.

“I’ve checked my recent releases. There haven’t been any in the past few months. I’ve also spoken with Dr. Lawson.” He filled them in on the contacts from the shelter she would provide that morning. “Did anyone track down Jack Hanley yet?”

“No.” One of the detectives on the other side of the table spoke. “No one’s been home since you passed his name on to us. I’m heading there again after the briefing.”

“That brings us back to Mark.” Steve looked toward the speakerphone. “Les, do you want to chime in here?”

“I’ve got Christy Reynolds with me. She’s the profiler in our Behavioral Science Unit who evaluated the hate mail we got after the convenience store incident. I asked her to take another look at that material in light of the shooting. Christy.”

Folding his arms across his chest, Mark leaned back in his chair as she began to speak.

“All the overtly threatening feedback we received was anonymous. Assuming the shooter was one of those people, logic tells us there was nothing to prevent him from taking action sooner if he lived in the East. The fact that the shooting occurred in St.

Louis suggests that if Mark is the target as a result of some of that feedback, and if the shooter was following his movements, proximity might now give him an incentive to act. As a result, I focused on letters and emails from the Midwest. I’ll fax you the names of St. Louis area people who signed their letters, but we’re not able to identify the authors of the more hostile feedback.”

“What’s your risk assessment, based on the content of the communication?” Steve asked.

“Marginal. Most people who spout off like this are the same people who write nasty letters to the newspaper or get into shouting matches at board of aldermen meetings. They blow off steam that way versus taking any direct action. That doesn’t mean there aren’t exceptions to that rule, but I saw nothing in any of the material I reviewed to suggest we’re dealing with the kind of deep-seated hate or mental imbalance that would pose an imminent danger to Mark. Nor was there more than one communication from any single individual, which might have suggested a fixation or vendetta.”

Steve rested his elbows on the table and knitted his fingers together. “What about the family of the boy who was killed at the convenience store?”

“We’ve already done a cursory check on them,” Les responded.

“The parents are model citizens, churchgoers, gainfully employed, civic volunteers. The remaining two children are ten and fourteen, good students, no apparent problems. Last weekend they were all on vacation, visiting family in Michigan.”

“Did any leads surface based on the media coverage?” Coop threw in that question.

“No.” Carl ran his fingers through his bristly salt-and-pepper hair, shook his head, and let out an audible breath. “I’m not seeing anything substantive. Steve?”

“I agree.”

“I suggest we finish the remaining interviews as soon as possible,” Carl continued. “Steve, it sounds like Christy’s list will cover multiple jurisdictions. Do you want to have your people tackle those?”

“Okay. And Mark and Coop are going to handle the interviews of Dr. Lawson’s domestic abuse shelter clients.”

“We canvassed the park this morning, talking to everyone who came through,” Carl noted. “We’ll be there again tomorrow, and next Saturday. There’s a chance one of the regulars saw something out of the ordinary on Saturday.”

“You’ll get us the lab report on the material you found in the shoe print ASAP?” Steve turned to Clair.

“Yes. I hope to have it later today or tomorrow.”

“What’s your security protocol?” Carl directed the question to Steve.

“We’re covering Mark. Most of you met Evan Cooper before the meeting.” He nodded to the dark-haired agent, who lifted a hand in response. “He works with Mark on the HRT. I’ve also assigned one of our people to him as Coop’s backup.”

“What about Dr. Lawson?”

“We’ve got someone on her now, but if things remain quiet, we’ll reduce our coverage in a day or two.”

That news didn’t surprise Mark. He didn’t like it, but he knew Steve was already doing more than was required. The FBI didn’t provide protection for targets. Federal marshals often worked security details, but they focused their efforts on high-profile witnesses and judges. And the local cops didn’t have the personnel to provide round-the-clock protection. Once the case began to cool—and in light of the sparse evidence and lack of leads, that was happening with alarming speed—Emily would be on her own.

Unless he could convince Steve to let him and Coop step in.

“Assuming nothing breaks sooner, let’s regroup this afternoon about four,” Carl said. “Thank you all for coming.”

As the meeting concluded, Steve signaled to Mark and headed out the door. Mark followed him to an empty interview room, and Steve waved him to a seat as he shut the door. “What are your thoughts?”

“I don’t like pulling security off of Emily.”

“I didn’t think you would.” Steve took a chair at right angles to Mark.

“There’s too much we don’t know yet. I know we can’t cover her 24/7, but for the immediate future I’d like to give her some company when she ventures out.”

“I can cut you loose from some of your day-to-day work to focus on this case—and to provide some security for Dr. Lawson.

Coop can back you up. I can also give you Nick now and then to fill in. That’s the best I can do.”

Some of the tension in Mark’s shoulders dissipated. It was more than he’d hoped for. “I understand. And I appreciate your willingness to let me work this.”

“You’ll be gone in four weeks anyway. No sense getting you involved in anything new here.” Leaning back in his chair, Steve gave him a steady look. “Unless we could convince you to stay.”

The out-of-the-blue remark surprised Mark, and he wondered if Steve might be kidding. But the man’s tone and demeanor suggested he was very serious.

“I was a case agent before I joined the HRT.” He chose his words with care, watching the other man. “I don’t think I’d want to step back into that role.”

“I hoped you might consider it if the role was . . . enhanced.”

Steve paused to give his vibrating BlackBerry a cursory look, then slipped it back on his belt. “This is confidential, but Dave Sheldon is retiring to take a job as police chief in California at the end of September. I need to fill his slot. I like what I’ve seen of your work on the reactive squad here, and I know you have the tactical and special weapons experience to do the job.”

Stunned, Mark stared at Steve. The man was offering him the chance to head the St. Louis FBI SWAT team.

“I wasn’t planning to leave the HRT.”

“Understood. But things have a way of changing. Think about it.” He rose, signaling the end of the discussion.

“Okay. And . . . thank you.”

His hand on the doorknob, Steve turned. “I like to surround myself with good people. If it works for you, great. If not, I understand.”

Mark gave himself sixty seconds to regroup. When he stepped into the hall, he found Coop waiting, arms crossed over his chest, one shoulder propped against the wall.

“Everything okay?” Coop raised an eyebrow.

“Yeah. Fine.” He’d share Steve’s offer with Coop eventually, confident his partner would respect the need for confidentiality.

But first he had to process it himself.

“I talked to Les. He called me after the meeting to let me know he doesn’t want to ease up on your security.”

“Meaning we’re stuck with each other.”

“Like glue. Until we get this thing figured out.”

“I have a feeling that may not happen anytime soon.” Mark headed down the hall.

Coop fell into step beside him. “The guy didn’t leave much to work with, that’s for sure. But it only takes a lucky break or two to turn the tide. Let’s check and see if the list of Emily’s clients from the shelter has come in yet.”