Mint Cookie Murder (21 page)

"Are you sure about this?" Rex asked as he climbed into the car wearing his body armor and packing his service pistol.

I nodded. "You called in reinforcements?"

"I did. They'll be there. It was tough to explain why I needed a yarn shop surrounded, but they'll do it. What made you so certain something was up?"

Throwing the car in reverse, I gave him a look. "Riley called me Finn. He doesn't call me Finn. Not since before I moved here."

It had been inspired, really. Either Riley texted that to warn me, or someone had his phone and didn't know I went by Merry now, but it didn't matter. Something was wrong, and I had to deal with it.

As I drove, I filled Rex in on what had happened to Philby.

"Bastard," Rex growled. "I hate people who prey on helpless animals."

"And there's something else you should know." I bit my lip and gave him a weak smile. "It's about Angela."

"What about Angela?" He asked.

"Well, she's in a CIA holding area after Riley shot her for shooting at us." Okay, that could've come out better, but a little old lady dodged into the road, and I had to swerve to miss her.

"What?" Rex shouted. I told him everything. There was no point in holding back now. He listened in silence, and when I was done, shook his head.

"Wow. Just…wow. What is it with all of my exes being crazy?"

"Wait…all of your exes? As in more than one?" I asked. And did he say they'd all been crazy?

"Watch where you're going!" Rex grabbed the wheel to steer me out of the way of an oncoming truck.

A minute later, I slammed on the brakes. We were a block away at a shop across the street from All About Ewe. I didn't want to just walk into an ambush. Rex led me into the furniture store, and we went to the back room to check the windows.

"I don't see anything unusual." Rex frowned.

"I do," I said as I checked my gun. "The sign says
Closed
in the middle of the day."

My boyfriend, the cop, sighed. "So, what's the plan?"

I shrugged. "Time to go in. Just me. Alone."

Rex shook his head. "Oh no. I'm going with you."

"You can't. You're the cavalry. If I don't come out in five minutes, you and your guys come in."

"No. I don't like it," he said.

"I'll be fine." I kissed him. "But make sure you come in and rescue me."

"You have two minutes. Not five." Rex kissed me back. "Starting now."

I walked out of the furniture store, around the corner and right up to All About Ewe. The lights were out inside. My fingers gripped the door handle for a moment, and I felt the confidence of my pistol in my waistband. With a deep breath, I pulled open the door and went in.

"Hello? Suzanne? Riley?" I called out trying to sound like I didn't suspect anything. No one answered. I found the lights and switched them on and still didn't see anyone. Whoever it was who'd wanted me there must be in the safe house in back.

As I walked through the store, I picked up a pair of wooden knitting needles that had wickedly sharp points and shoved them into my back pocket. There was no sound as I approached the bookcase that hid the door. I shoved it aside and slowly opened the door. It was dark.

A bullet hit the doorframe less than a centimeter from my head. I drew my gun as I dropped and fired in the direction the shot came from. A man cried out in pain, and I silently prayed it wasn't Riley as I rolled across the floor to where I'd remembered the bed being.

"
Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaarrrrrrrrrrrrrgh!
" A woman's scream thundered toward me, and I put my arms up in time to catch her before she dropped on top of me. Hands that felt like a steel vice circled my throat and squeezed. I brought my arms up between hers and down over them to break the grip, then brought my knees up hard, knocking her headfirst into the wall behind me. Her body shuddered before going limp.

Another shot rang out, a little to my left. I started crawling to my right, trying to focus in the dim light. It was hopeless. I didn't want to shoot without knowing if Riley was in here. I kept going until my head smacked on the table.

Stars filled my vision, and I dropped to the floor just as someone lunged on top of me and used his knee to crush my throat. It was working. I felt all over the leg until I felt blood. My first shot must've gone through his thigh. I jammed my finger into the wound.

My assailant screamed but kept pushing his knee into my neck. Even though I struggled, I felt consciousness slipping away. I couldn't breathe at all, and in a second my trachea would be crushed.

I fought through the encroaching darkness and pain, feeling my attacker's breath on my face. Fighting was no use, and I remembered I had another weapon. Reaching back to my pocket, I pulled the knitting needles out and jabbed upward as far as I could reach.

A scream brought me back to life as the knee lifted off my throat. I gasped for air and scrambled to my feet as light flooded the room and Rex, followed by four uniformed policemen, ran in.

Suzanne was crumpled against the wall where I'd left her. Bobb was gurgling as he clawed at two knitting needles plunged into his throat, his thigh bleeding heavily from the gunshot wound. But Dr. Rye and Riley were nowhere to be found.

"I remember this guy," Rex said 10 minutes later as paramedics were loading Bobb onto a gurney. "But who is that?" He pointed to Suzanne's dead body that lay where it fell. Apparently, slamming into the wall had snapped her neck. Too bad.

"Suzanne Smith," I said as I rubbed my throat.

"Like Lenny Smith?" Rex asked.

I nodded. "His daughter. When Daddy was arrested, she changed her name and joined the CIA. Turns out, she was the mastermind spy. Not her father. He just took the heat for her."

Rex stared at me. "You didn't tell me about her."

I shrugged. "Because she didn't register. She was invisible. Unnoticeable and had been vetted by the agency as Suzanne Aubrey."

"I still don't know how you figured that out," Rex said.

"Remember how I told you I'd found that ledger sheet? Riley and I didn't get it at first. But then I googled a little bit of it on my cell while waiting at fake Dr. Rye's. What popped up was a newspaper article about a young girl who'd won the Westinghouse Award for writing computer code. The girl was Suzanne. And in the background was the photo of her parents, Ann and Lenny Smith." I'd seen their initials on the sheet,
SS
and
LS.

Rex shook his head. "I don't get why the internet address for an old news article would be on a ledger sheet?"

"I'm not entirely sure. But I'd guess that Lenny was seeking me out because he wanted to tell me that his daughter was responsible for the espionage he'd been imprisoned for."

"Why would he turn on his daughter if he took the rap for her in the beginning?" Rex asked.

"I don't know. Maybe they'd become estranged? Maybe she didn't send him a card on Father's Day? Who knows?" I shrugged.

"But that doesn't explain Angela, Bobb, the chip in Philby's neck, Dr. Rye, or why Riley disappeared. There's too much we don't know," Rex said.

"Fortunately, it's not your problem." I nodded and pointed at the door. Two older CIA agents had entered the room and were taking control of the situation. They flashed their ID at us.

Rex sighed. "Okay. But will you come by later and fill me in?" He kissed me before gathering up his men and joining the two agents.

I sat down on the bed and checked my cell.

Philby's going to be fine.
Kelly texted.
Bringing her and the kittens back to my house after they finish stitching her up.

Closing my eyes, I leaned back against the wall. At least they were safe. Now I just needed to find Riley. Hopefully, he had Dr. Rye's head in a bag for me to punch.

"Good job, Ms. Wrath." One of the CIA suits was standing in front of me when I opened my eyes. "I can see we lost a good agent with you."

I stood. "Thanks. And you are?"

He held out his hand. "Chuck Winslow." He motioned to his partner. "And this is Dennis Gray."

I shook their hands and didn't ask any more questions. I recognized the faces and names. They'd worked with Cy Stern on the Lenny Smith case.

"I have to ask," I ventured. "Why did Lenny come see me when he got out? I never worked with him."

Dennis Gray answered. "The woman who impersonated you at the prison visit gave him your name and told him where to find you. Her partner, the man you called Bobb, broke him out and got him here. They worked for the daughter." He pointed at the dead woman.

"They thought he might give you the information on the missing SD card, since you weren't an active agent anymore," Winslow finished. "They didn't think he'd betray Suzanne in the process. Once they realized that, they killed him."

Of course these two knew everything. And of course they never thought that was important enough to tell Riley. The CIA worked in mysterious ways. Agents never trusted anyone but their partner. Asking these two why they'd let things get so out of hand was worthless. They wouldn't tell me anyway.

"So Lenny had microchipped his cat, but with the SD card instead," I said.

The men nodded. "That's what we think too. But it wasn't his cat. It was just a stray he'd found and took in to some vet on his way here. Bobb followed him after busting him out of Florence. He knew the cat was important but didn't know how."

"So do you guys know how Lenny escaped from a supermax prison?" I asked.

"That's classified, Ms. Wrath," they said in perfect unison.

I excused myself and drove the SUV home. Kelly called to say she'd take care of Philby and the kittens overnight. I was so tired, I agreed. I cleared the house before going to the kitchen and pouring a glass of wine. Where was Riley? And where was fake Dr. Rye?

My cell phone rang, jolting me awake. I'd fallen asleep on the couch with my gun on my stomach. Not good form.

"Riley?" I asked as I checked the caller ID. "Where are you?"

"Sorry, Merry. I can't say," Riley answered apologetically.

"Ah," I said, slumping back onto the couch. "It's classified, right?"

"Yes. I'm chasing Rye, if that helps," he said.

"He's not part of the Smith situation then, is he?"

"Not really, except for the secrets Smith stole. But it does have to do with an earlier problem. Have some sushi, and I'll check in later." He hung up.

Kelly rang my doorbell first thing in the morning. I was so happy to get Philby and the kittens back that I didn't mind that it was 6:00 a.m.

"Dr. Glen says they'll all be just fine." Kelly smiled as she stroked Philby's cheek.

My cat looked like a deflated basketball with a Frankenstein scar and stitches across her shaved neck. Cool. This would take the embarrassment away from looking like Hitler.

"Sure you don't want one of the kittens?" I asked as I set the box on the couch between us.

Kelly shook her head. "No, I'd better not."

"Because of Robert's allergies?" I asked. "Hey, by the way, I'm sorry I didn't ask how your doctor's appointment went. What did they say is wrong with you?"

"Well," Kelly said slowly. "I've got a parasite condition."

"What? That's horrible! Like a tapeworm?" That made sense. Stuff like that often made you tired because the parasite devoured all your nutrients.

"It's worse than that, actually." Kelly frowned.

Oh, crap. "Must be some big parasite." I looked around her to see if she had a lamprey on her back or something—although I was pretty sure I wouldn't have missed something like that.

Kelly sighed heavily. "It is a big parasite. I'm pregnant."

The next day, I was at Rex's house, snuggled on the couch with my cat family. In spite of my previous ambitions of going out to someplace nice, it seemed better to stay home with my boyfriend, my badass mama cat, and two little kittens.

"There's just one thing I don't understand," Rex asked as the kittens slept soundly on his chest. "What did the fake vet want the SD card for if he wasn't involved with the Lenny Smith case?"

I shook my head. Rex didn't know about Midori, and I wasn't ready to tell him about it until I knew more. "I guess there was some sort of intelligence Smith had hidden on there that had to do with something else."

"It's very confusing," he said, petting the purring kittens. "Even for a detective."

I kissed him very slowly. "It's very confusing for an ex-CIA agent too. Half the time though, cases are intertwined like this. My guess is that another interested party was looking for some info Lenny had promised to the Chinese but never delivered. Suzanne just wanted to recover any intel that was still out there. We may never know what was on that SD card, even when Riley recovers it, because the brass at the agency will take it."

I suspected that it had to do with technology secrets that the Yakuza had wanted as well. But there was no point speculating until I knew more.

"How did Riley's phone text you if he wasn't there?"

I sighed. "Suzanne hacked it somehow. Riley has his phone, but she hijacked the technology."

"I'm still surprised about Angela. I didn't see that coming," Rex said.

"Suzanne recruited her because she had a connection here. Suzanne wasn't really from WT. She wanted someone who knew the layout of town. Angela took the gig with no experience because she thought she'd get to take me out and regain you." I didn't tell Rex that I knew this from Angela's interrogation once she came out of the coma. And he didn't ask.

"What surprised me was that Bobb wasn't
the
Bobb," I said in an attempt to change the subject.

Philby raised her head and stared at me for a moment. She didn't hiss. She just stretched her paws and laid back down closing her eyes. Bobb hadn't made it to the emergency room. He'd died on the way. I'd managed to kill two people in one night—a new and unseemly record for me. I think Philby knew that.