Nemesis (20 page)

Deliah Abbott stared from that ankle bracelet to Griffin. She took Brakey’s hand. “Don’t show that bracelet off to anyone else, okay, Brakey? We don’t want people talking any more than they already are.”

Deliah Alcott turned fierce eyes to Griffin. “You’re Agent Hammersmith?”

“Yes, ma’am.” Griffin handed her his creds. “And you’re Brakey’s mom, Mrs. Alcott.”

“Yes.” She walked right up to him, got in his face. “Why is he wearing an ankle bracelet? Do you think he’s going to run off?”

“We need to know where he goes, Mrs. Alcott, that’s all. He’s having trouble remembering, and there’s a killer out there. It’s for his protection, too.”

“Bring him in, Morgana. I want to see the boy who’s brought Brakey home, too,” came a scratchy old voice from behind Mrs. Alcott.

Deliah gave Griffin a long look, then ushered him past the elaborate wooden front door with the pentacle hanging on it, over a wide threshold that would easily allow a wheelchair through it, and into the large entry hall that smelled faintly of sweet incense.

Griffin spotted the old lady Savich had told him about. Ms. Louisa, but not Louisa May.
What an old tartar
was his first thought. He studied her dark hooded eyes and wondered briefly if her dead son had had eyes, like hers. He introduced himself, shook her veiny arthritic hand.

“I thought the other one was a pretty boy, but you’re really a looker, aren’t you? What do you think, Morgana?”

Deliah Alcott shrugged impatiently, opened her mouth, but was interrupted by a man Griffin took to be Jonah wandering into the entry hall. He stilled. “You’re back, Brakey. That’s good they let you out. And who are you?” He stared hard at Griffin.

Griffin introduced himself again, showed his creds. Mrs. Alcott introduced her second son. While Jonah Alcott looked at them, the old lady wheeled herself into the middle of the living room, did a neat K-turn, turned off the motor of her wheelchair, and waved to them. “Well, come on in and tell us what all you smart folk think about the poor deputy’s murder. It took you long enough to figure out some crook set up my poor Brakey.”

Griffin followed Brakey and his mother into the large living room, redolent with the same sweet incense. Deliah Alcott didn’t ask him to sit down. She didn’t sit, either. She drew a deep breath. “I’ve been frantic.” She gave Brakey a quick look, as if to reassure herself he was here and he was safe. “I sent you all the positive energy that was in me today, Brakey, to get you home.” She turned back to Griffin. “So what is it you’ve got to tell me? What will happen to my son now?”

“Agent Hammersmith doesn’t agree with me, Mom,” Brakey said, “but I’m thinking how both Walter and I were drugged, and someone forced us to”—he couldn’t get it out—“do what we did.”

“But they don’t know you killed Deputy Lewis, Brakey. They just don’t have anyone else,” Deliah said. “There’s no proof, is there? So don’t give in to them. Why would you even say you did something like that?”

“Because I can’t remember and it was my truck and I don’t see how anyone else could have gotten into it.”

“Got you there, Morgana,” Ms. Louisa said, and pulled her knitting needles out of the pile of bright green and gold wool on her lap. “You’d better be careful about what you say before you get Brakey into even more trouble.”

Finesse it,
Savich had told Griffin, and so he did the best he could. “Actually, Mrs. Alcott, Agent Savich and I believe someone managed to manipulate Brakey into murdering Deputy Lewis. It is this person we’re looking for now, and we’d like your help.”

He looked from Mrs. Alcott to the old lady to Jonah, the middle brother, who was now slouched against the fireplace, holding a deck of cards in his hand. Jonah said, “I thought you said Brakey couldn’t be hypnotized. If that’s the truth, then how could someone
manage
to talk him into killing Deputy Lewis? Is there any drug that can do that? Make you kill another person like that?”

How to finesse that?
Griffin fell back on, “Sorry, Mr. Alcott, I really don’t know the details. That’s part of our investigation,” to which Jonah Alcott snorted and started shuffling the deck of cards with one hand. He was quite good.

Mrs. Alcott was still standing facing him, her arms over her chest. Brakey had sprawled on an oversized chintz sofa. Ms. Louisa was knitting something he couldn’t recognize, only the clicking sound her needles made filling the silence.

He said, “Do any of you know of anything Deputy Lewis and Sparky Carroll have in common that could have got them both killed?”

The Alcotts looked at him blankly. Deliah said, “Even if there was, even if you find something like that, I’m sure Brakey had nothing to do with it. You mentioned some other person. Who?”

Griffin pulled out his cell and showed her the FBI sketch of the man Savich had described to him, Stefan Dalco.

She froze.
Gotcha,
Griffin thought. He knew in his gut she’d seen him before. “You know this man, Mrs. Alcott?”

“No—I was surprised at how bizarre he looks, how foreign.”

Griffin showed the photo to Jonah and Ms. Louisa. They both shook their heads. “Would you show me the Athames you have in the house?”

“Jonah and I each have our own, but we don’t have anything like a collection, Agent Hammersmith.”

Brakey said, “We gave away Dad’s collection after he died, right, Mom?”

“Who did you give the collection to, Mrs. Alcott?”

“I gave it to Millie Stacy.” She paused. “That’s Tammy Carroll’s mother.” Mrs. Alcott looked blindly at him. “She’s Sparky Carroll’s mother-in-law.”

COLBY COMMUNITY HOSPITAL

Friday night

K
elly Giusti was so physically tired she wanted to slide down the wall and onto the ancient Berber carpet in the waiting room. But she knew she wouldn’t relax or sleep because she couldn’t stop seeing Nasim Conklin’s dead face. He’d begun as a mad terrorist in her mind and slowly morphed into a man whose life she realized had been taken over and flung away as if it meant nothing. He’d been a brave man, an innocent man they’d wanted out of the way. And he’d died not knowing why it had happened to him.

It was chilling. It didn’t surprise her, but it did sadden her unutterably. In saner moments, she wondered if she was letting herself get too hardened at the advanced age of thirty-one. She’d seen so many evil human beings in her years in counterterrorism. What she needed now was some good news, like finding Hosni Rahal, the brother of one of the men who’d taken Nasim, or identifying the shooter, who’d been in surgery all this time. He’d carried no ID on him, not a surprise to any of them. They were running his fingerprints and photograph through the system, and she would have to wait. She looked over at Cal speaking quietly to Sherlock, probably consoling her about Nasim. From across the room Kelly could see the dried tears on Sherlock’s face.

Sherlock’s cell blasted out Brewer King’s “It’s a Cold Day in Hell,” and she jerked up.

Kelly saw her look at the caller ID and draw a deep breath. She walked out of the room.

Sherlock saw the nurses’ station up ahead and turned in the opposite direction. She closed her eyes. No way was she going to scare Dillon with the news that a bullet had barely missed splatting her head all over a bathroom. She knew the trick was to lie clean, with no hesitation. It was worth a try. She drew a deep breath, said without preamble, “Dillon, Nasim’s dead. A sniper got him, at the safe house. Top secret for now, okay?”

A pause, then, “Yes, certainly. Are you all right?”

“Yes. Cal got a bullet in the arm; he was too close to Nasim when the bullets came flying through the bathroom window. He’s okay, Dillon. I bandaged him up. The doctor in the ER said he was good to go with Steri-Strips and a tetanus shot.”

There was a long moment of silence. He didn’t believe her?

Then, “Talk to me. Did Nasim tell you everything he knew? Don’t leave anything out, Sherlock.”

“Nasim gave me a couple names, including someone with a moniker, the Strategist. He confirmed contacts with the imam Ali Hädi ibn Mirza in London, but nothing definite yet that connects the imam to the attempted blowing up of Saint Pat’s.” She told him exactly what Nasim said, and exactly what happened, except that she’d almost died. Dillon was quiet when she finished. “You did well. It’s a good start. I’m sorry about Conklin. So how did they find the safe house?”

She could hear his brain working, sifting through what she’d told him, and she kept going, fast. She told him about the GPS she believed the ME would find in his body. She told him about the shooter who was in surgery. “Kelly—Agent Giusti—is waiting on a call identifying him.”

“You said Cal was shot because he was standing too close to Nasim. So where were you?”

Distraction time. “Close by, but really, I’m fine. Tell me, Dillon, what happened with Brakey Alcott and Dr. Hicks?”

The distraction worked. “It was as I thought, Dalco front and center. As you can imagine, Brakey Alcott is a mess. We’ve put a monitor on his ankle and Griffin took him home. He’s going to speak to the family, see what he can learn. It’s about all we can do, short of protective custody. I’m going to have to lay the facts out to our lawyers soon, see what they say. After they stop rolling their eyes.

“It sounds like they don’t need you anymore. When are you coming home?”

Sherlock realized she was crying. She didn’t make a sound, wiped the tears off her cheeks. “Oh, Dillon, the whole deal at JFK—Nasim was supposed to sacrifice himself for his family and he was fully prepared to. He was brave, Dillon, he let himself be killed. I promised him I’d find his family. I have to do my best to keep that promise. We’ve got a lead, the name of a man who may be able to lead us to the family. And Kelly wants me here, wants both Cal and me involved.”

Savich tried to keep his voice emotionless, but he didn’t manage it. “Agent Giusti shouldn’t be using you. She knows very well the terrorists would be happy to see you as dead as Nasim. It wouldn’t be simple revenge for wrecking their plan at JFK, but a lot more than that. Killing you now would be a powerful message that they can eliminate anybody they choose, even you.”

She felt a slick of fear in her belly, tried to quash it, to keep it from making its way into her voice. What would he say if she told him everything? “They may want that, but Cal and I won’t let it happen. I don’t have a GPS embedded under my skin. They won’t get close. All I want now is to find Nasim’s family alive. Give Sean a big kiss for me, okay?”

She knew he didn’t like it, knew he wanted to argue. She wouldn’t like it either if he were the one sitting in the hospital in Colby, Long Island. After a long silence, he said, “Yes, you know I will.”

Her good-bye came flying out of her mouth. “You be careful, too, Dillon. Promise me you’ll be careful. I love you.”

“I love you more.” A pause, then, “Don’t ever forget, you’re my mate. Keep Cal upright, okay? Otherwise he won’t be any use to you.”

He’d called her his mate.
His mate.
She liked the sound of that. She wondered if he’d fly up here, but she knew he couldn’t, not yet. She had to remember to threaten Cal with mayhem if he dared mention that bullet.

As Sherlock walked back into the waiting room, Kelly’s cell buzzed. It was the point agent in Boston. Kelly’s heart speeded up.
Please, please.
She listened, felt her hope die, and punched off.

“What?” Cal asked her.

“The Boston Field Office followed up on a Hosni Rahal who lives in Plover, Massachusetts, and has a Syrian brother on the no-fly list. Agents scoured the house for evidence Nasim’s family might have been kept there, or any connection at all, but nada, zilch. The family appears to know nothing about any of this. In fact, Rahal claims he hadn’t spoken to his brother for two years.” She sighed. “At least that’s what he said. They looked at his passport. He hasn’t been out of the country in over five years. But that doesn’t mean much of anything. They’re going to keep him under surveillance.”

“Sit down before you fall over,” Cal said.

Kelly shook her head, leaned back against the pale green wall, not wanting to show any weakness, Cal thought. She stretched, trying, he knew, to keep herself upright and together.

“Really, Giusti. Sit down.”

She looked back at him. “If I do, I’ll go comatose.” She fell silent, started worrying an opal ring on her thumb. It looked old. A family heirloom?

“Have you heard from the medical examiner yet?”

Kelly shook her head again. “It should be soon. I told him to call me the minute he found anything like an embedded GPS chip. I guess Nasim never planned on going through the X-ray machine at JFK. They would have wanded him, maybe found the GPS. But maybe not, if it was mostly plastic.” She looked down at her cell, as if willing the medical examiner to call her. Finally, she slipped it into her jacket pocket. She sighed. “I should have wanded him myself.”

“Why?” Cal said, an eyebrow going up. “That isn’t something you’d normally do. So why Nasim?”

“Shut up, McLain. I don’t need logic right now.”