Sanctuary (12 page)

“I AM WATCHING.
Always watching,” Keith muttered, reading aloud.

He stood with one hand on the counter, running the other through his short blond hair, studying the scrawled red words on yellow-pad paper. He’d read it twice, hardly giving my apartment a second glance.

I, on the other hand, had read the letter at least a dozen times as I paced, waiting for him to arrive, and then again with him. My nerves were too raw to pay any attention to common courtesy, which would have suggested I change into jeans before he got there. And that I put away my kit or close the door to my bedroom. Maybe offer him a drink.

But the contents of the letter had wiped all social grace from my mind. It was the writer’s claim that there was only one way to save the sinner’s soul that had me worked up. The demands were all there, in red, unmistakable.

Of that, there was no longer any doubt.

“The question is, how?” Keith said. “Randell’s on the inside and unless he has frequent phone access or has a cell phone stashed in there, it would be very hard for him to get timely updates from anyone on the outside.”

“So it’s more than him, obviously.”

“Someone with a grudge against the priest. One of his previous victims.”

“His name is Danny,” I said.

Keith was taking it all in stride. He did, after all, have sheriff’s blood in him.

He nodded. “They’re using your attachment to him as leverage.”

“Leverage for what?”

“Evidently a million dollars.”

“How can we be sure this
is
actually Randell? Maybe it’s just someone on the outside.”

Keith took a deep breath and blew it out slowly. The sleeves on his blue T-shirt were short and exposed the lower half of a tattoo on his left shoulder—a sheriff’s badge with something about honor and death. His eyes flitted over to my gun, which still lay on the counter. He’d hardly given the Browning a second glance when I’d first let him in, which made sense. He’d expect someone like me to be packing after receiving the threats I had.

“The money points to Randell,” he said. “When you know the whole story.”

“What story?”

“But it’s about more than just money. They want you to know they know about Danny’s past, which validates their threat. The real question is, who got away from the priest and is back to make him pay?”

“What story?” I asked again.

Keith scanned the letter once more. I knew he was holding something back and I needed to know what it was. I also needed him to work with me. Having him beside me provided far more comfort than I was used to, and I can’t say it bothered me.

“Okay, look,” I said, covering the letter with one hand so that he would look up at me. “Let’s get one thing straight. It’s not just a coincidence that you’re here. If the woman hadn’t given me Bruce Randell’s name, I wouldn’t have tracked you down and you’d be back home right now, watching football and drinking beer. But she did, and I came to you and whoever is stalking me now knows about you. They may know you’re in here right now. You’re involved, like it or not. So we’re in this together. Right?”

“So it seems.”

“You’re either going to help me or you aren’t. Which is it?”

He studied me with his hazel eyes, then nodded. “We’re in this together.”

I removed my hand from the letter and stepped back. “Good, because I need you.”

He glanced over my shoulder and I followed his stare into my bedroom. There were my criminal tools, spread out like a smorgasbord.

“Looks like you can handle yourself just fine,” he said.

“Yeah. Well, every woman living alone needs to protect herself.” Which explained pretty much all of the tools on the bed except the strangling wire.

“True. Okay, let’s start over.” Keith walked into the living room where he paced, letter dangling from his right hand.

“For starters, there’s no way I’m going down to this bar of his,” I said. “Who does he think I am?”

“A person he has in a corner.”

“Then he doesn’t know me.”

“Let’s hope not. From the top. My best guess: The priest…​Danny…is transferred to Basal, and in a matter of hours you get a call from someone on the outside who knows Randell. One of them had to know Danny was going to be transferred.”

“How? That’s protected information.”

He waved my assertion off with a simple flip of his wrist. “Forget that. Obviously we’re dealing with people who have access. Money buys you anything, honey. As anticipated, the phone call had you scrambling.”

“They wanted to scare me.”

“Just enough so that you would dig, knowing that you would quickly learn just how impossible it is to reach Danny. Isolation is critical to them. Danny belongs to them now, not to you. They hold that card. And we have to assume they wanted me involved.”

“Why would they want you involved?” I answered my own question. “Because he knew you would confirm the threat. Everything that’s happened so far—the call, the woman, the shoe box, the letter—it’s all to make sure I take them seriously.” I let it set for a breath. “Tell me about the money.”

“I’m getting to it. The letter mentions Danny’s failure to kill all of his victims. Any ideas?”

“He was convicted on two counts of murder. Jonathan Bourque and Darby Gordon. Both scumbags in their own rights. But he was a priest who didn’t mind using a gun. I’m sure that he scared the heck out of more than a few in his time. Injustice drives him around the bend.”

“You don’t know any of them?”

“No. He was very private.” Mostly true. I knew about the pedophile he’d killed and a few others, but they were all dead.

“Well, now one of them is back and with a vengeance.”

“And what about the money?”

“Are you always so persistent?”

“Only when my life’s on the chopping block.”

“Okay, the money. We were able to close down on Randell because of information leaked to us by an anonymous source who claimed to be Randell’s partner. I always knew the informant was high up, but I didn’t understand his motivation to betray Randell until later. This guy—who’s still unknown, by the way—kept a large sum of money that should have gone to Randell. I would guess that Randell thinks he can now get to the money using you.”

“Why me? Why not just have one of his contacts on the outside go get it?”

“I’m getting to that. He can’t trust them. His operation turned on him and fed him to the wolves. But this man who hates Danny—Randell can trust a man like that. You give him a means to the money in exchange for Danny. In the end they both get what they want.”

“Randell gets his money back—”

“And his pride.”

“And his pride. And this brute on the outside makes Danny and me pay.”

“That’s right. I would guess that whoever Randell’s working with doesn’t just want you dead. He wants you to suffer. Thus the game.”

“Which isn’t going to happen. We’re going to stop them first.”

“Maybe. But it’ll be risky. We can’t go to the authorities without running the risk Randell will know we’ve done it. There’s also the fact that the wheels of justice turn very slowly, as they say. There’s a gulf between the law we know and the prison system. Two different worlds. If Randell wants Danny dead, the warden will have a tough time stopping someone from putting a shank between his ribs.”

I glared at him.

He shrugged. “I’m sorry, but we have to be realistic.”

“Danny’s tougher than that. Last night you said wardens are good at suppressing violence.”

“They are. But if someone like Randell has nothing to lose—he doesn’t care if time is added to his sentence—there’s not much the warden can do for long. And that’s assuming the warden isn’t in on it. Point is, going to the law or the warden will probably make things only worse for Danny. And certainly for you.”

None of this was particularly new, just a little clearer. I had always feared for Danny’s life on the inside. His strategy for staying alive in the prison system was to stay out of trouble, period. Show strength but never use it. He’d managed three years at Ironwood without making enemies. That had all changed the moment he stepped into Basal.

“Okay, so where does that leave me?” I asked, picking up the gun. I needed a reminder that I wasn’t powerless in the face of these thugs. “Don’t tell me you expect me to play this game of his.”

“I don’t know. We have to think about that.”

“Then think about this. I say we cut this game off at the head.” I said it waving the gun at the ceiling in frustration. “We don’t know who’s messing with us on the outside, but we know about Randell. So we take out one side of the partnership. Without Randell, the guy on the outside can’t threaten Danny or manipulate me by doing it.”

Keith’s brow arched over his right eye. “Break in?” He seemed to consider it for a moment. “No way.”

“Why not?”

“We don’t have access, for one. Even if we did, it’s a crime.”

I stepped up, snatched the letter from his hands and held it up. “What do you think
he’s
demanding from me? Community service?”

“No. But he’s not demanding we walk into a prison and take the life of a prisoner.”

“Right. Instead he’ll demand I kill some innocent bystander on Long Beach Boulevard.”

“We don’t know that yet. But breaking into Basal to kill Randell is out of the question.”

“Then use one of your contacts to do it.”

He shook his head. “I don’t have those kinds of contacts.”

We stared at each other, silent for few seconds.

“You’re actually suggesting I do what he wants?” I finally said. “Go to this bar tonight?”

“Not necessarily. I’m just talking this out.” He gently plucked the letter out of my hand and lowered it to his side. “I’m only suggesting we consider all of your options.”

“
Our
options,” I said.

“Okay, our options.”

“And if the warden’s crooked?”

“Then it’s game over. The warden is judge and jury on the inside.” He paced, one hand in his hair. “Look, I don’t trust legal channels any more than you do, but given our alternatives, maybe it is your best option. I might be able to reach out to some people and find a way to the warden. Maybe—”

“And risk Danny’s life? Or mine? You already made that case!” I had the distinct impression he was having second thoughts. “I can’t do that. You have your reasons for quitting the law, I have mine. They know too much about Danny’s past. And mine.”

“And what’s in your past?”

There it was.

“Let’s just say I stood by Danny.”

He nodded slowly. “Fine. Short of any legal route, the only play we have is to gain both you and Danny some time. And the only way to do that is to go through some of the motions.”

Short of trying to kill that snake Randell, which I think I preferred, Keith was right. I took a step to the couch, sat down, and dropped the gun on the cushion beside me. “Do you mind sitting? You’re making me anxious.”

“Sure.” He sat down in the chair opposite me, letter in hand. “We have to figure out who this guy on the outside is. He’s probably the one pulling the strings. We need time.”

“So we play his game.” I said it plainly but my stomach was turning.

He looked at me with tender eyes for a few moments. It was in that look that I first saw his compassion for me. I hardly knew Keith, but he’d come from a hard world—his résumé made that clear enough. Up until this point he’d been all business.

“Read it again,” I said.

He lowered his eyes and read, “You will put one million dollars on my plate. You will confess to the murder of the person you kill. You will spend the rest of your life in that sanctuary of penance, paying for your sins. Do this and the priest will be set free. Maybe he can save you.”

“He wants me to trade places with Danny,” I said. “But there’s no way anyone could set Danny free.”

“Unless…” I could see the wheels spinning behind his eyes as he stared at the drawn curtains. “I know you say you don’t know, but is it possible Danny could have gone after someone in power back then? A judge, for example?”

It hit me. Danny’s first victim, the pedophile, was the adult son of a judge. Which judge, I had no idea. But a judge.

“It’s possible. But I wouldn’t have a clue who.”

Keith watched me. “The right judge could suspend Danny’s sentence. If a judge is involved and we can turn that judge…But it’s more likely whoever wrote this note’s leading you on.”

It was my first real thread of hope, and I grabbed it like a falling monkey snatching a vine. From that moment I knew, without the slightest reservation, that I would play this sicko’s game.

I snatched the gun, pushed myself up, and paced. “Okay. So I play along. I go to this Rough Riders bar at ten tonight. What then?”

“Then we don’t know what. But I don’t want you to get the wrong idea. Even if we take the claim at face value and assume the writer of this letter can free Danny, which is highly unlikely, it would require that you do everything he demands. That’s not going to happen.”

“We don’t know what’s going to happen. Like you said, the only way to buy us time and flush this sicko out is to play his game.”

“Flushing him out won’t be easy…”

“So what are you suggesting? That we play or that we don’t?”

“I’m suggesting we play. But don’t get your hopes up. This could all go very wrong.”