The Fourth Victim (7 page)

But maybe my efforts hadn't made any difference at all. Maybe I'd just dreamed they had.

Using energy I didn't know I possessed, I did the one thing I'd promised myself I wouldn't do.

I lay back down on the cold hard floor and closed my eyes, my arms beneath me as they'd been when I'd first woken up.

It felt good to lie down. So good.

Just before I lowered my lashes, blocking out the world, I saw the toe of one black boot. At least, I thought it was a black boot.

If I'd had a little more time, I might've had my hands free.

T
he prosecutor in Florida, Jeff Hayden, had just read about Kelly Chapman's disappearance on the internet when Clay phoned him Saturday morning. Back in his own car, Clay listened as the man told him he'd put a call in to a local FBI acquaintance.

And he stared at the picture on his dash, at the short hair and vivid blue eyes, gaining additional understanding of the many lives Kelly Chapman had touched.

“Our defendant is incarcerated without bond.” Jeff Hayden spoke with the rush of an adrenaline surge and Clay had to fight not to join the man in his emotion-driven energy.

“But he's got loyal gang brothers all over the state—any number of whom would feel it's their duty to take care of business for him. These guys don't play around. I'd lay at least a dozen deaths at my defendant's feet. Ordering one woman killed would be nothing to him.”

“I assume you've got people watching the key players.”

“Of course. They're being brought in for questioning as we speak. We've been after these guys for two years and finally have something we can pin on them. Everything rests on that little boy's testimony. Without Chapman there, Camden Baker won't testify and Miguel Miller's going to walk again.”

“Have your people send a list of Miller's associates to my office,” Clay said. “We need to find out who he might know in Ohio, Kentucky and Tennessee. And who might have left Florida in the past few days.” Clay gave the man JoAnne's cell number and hung up.

“What have you walked into, pretty lady?” he asked the photo on his dash, surprised to hear the softness in his voice. He didn't even talk to his mother with such affection.

She looked so small. So fragile. Far too open and trusting. And just plain…vulnerable, considering the company she kept. The fights she took on. One of the nation's most violent street gangs. Underworld threats to national security. A slick lawyer with power and money to spare. And God knew how many other mentally disturbed individuals who could be deranged enough to take pleasure in her death.

Could she survive those odds? No matter how much energy she might have?

How he knew Kelly Chapman was a woman filled with energy Clay couldn't say. But he did know. And a woman who never lacked for energy would not lie calmly down and die. If she'd been left alive, she'd do all she could to survive until he found her.

Which might give them a few more hours. Depending on her condition.

Twenty-four hours had already passed. His chances of finding her were diminishing. And Clay couldn't accept that.

Think, man. What are you missing?

In that second, Clay's phone rang. The local FBI agent had something for him. Something he couldn't discuss over the phone. Putting his car in gear, Clay sped off.

Emotion wasn't going to find Kelly Chapman. Only focus would do that.

 

Maggie had just been to visit her mother on Thursday, but she had to go again. She was only supposed to see her once a week. But she'd learned a lot in the six weeks she'd been “in the system.” She was a kid, and if she needed to see her mom and it was a visiting day, which Saturday was, they'd let her go.

Detective Jones was at her office working, trying to find Kelly, so Kyle was the one who drove Maggie to the prison not quite an hour from town late Saturday morning. Maggie wasn't sure about Kyle. He didn't talk much, which was kinda weird, but he'd tackled Chuck Sewell barehanded the night he'd been about to kill Detective Jones. Kyle had also been there later that night when they'd come to tell Maggie about Mom.

And to tell her other things, too. Like that Mac was a criminal. Kyle was the one who said he'd heard the dirty cop say Mac was some kind of drug lord. And a lawyer with a wife and kids, too, who was just after Maggie because he was into young girls. He was wrong. That David Abrams guy—he might kind of look like Mac, but that was all. They were two different men. Mac wasn't married. He was hers. He'd told her so. Just like his great-great-great-grandfather had belonged to his fourteen-year-old wife, Elizabeth.

Mac had told her they'd lie to her about him. She'd promised she wouldn't believe them. Any of them. He'd said she was his angel. Sent to him from God. He's said he'd protect her. Which was why he hadn't told her what he did for a living or anything else about himself that they might try to get out of her. He wanted her to be completely innocent, no matter what happened. If they came after him with their lies, he didn't want anything to connect Maggie to him. Anything that could get her into trouble. Because he loved her that much.

And he was right about the lies. People believed Kyle. Including Kelly. Which meant Kelly didn't think Mac loved Maggie. She thought Maggie's Mac was that Abrams creep. She believed Kyle, so she didn't understand.

And because of that, Maggie couldn't see Mac right now. Because he was older and could go to jail for loving Maggie. If they so much as smiled at each other he could be in big trouble. Which meant she had to be without the one person who loved her more than anyone else at the absolute hardest time of her life.

And it was all Kyle's fault.

“You want me to go back there with you?” Kyle spoke for only the third time during the whole trip as they pulled into the prison drive. The first time had been to ask her if she wanted to talk. She'd politely declined. And the second time had been to ask if she wanted to stop for something to eat or drink or to use the restroom. Like she was a little kid. Like she couldn't make it less than an hour without eating, drinking or peeing.

“No, I know the way,” Maggie said. And then, remembering last Thursday, added, “but you have to sign me in, and if you want to wait in the hall, that would be okay.”

She didn't want to be in that place alone. Even if it was just Kyle waiting for her.

She didn't want to be pregnant at fourteen, either. She wasn't ruining her life like Mom had. She was going to college. To be someone, like Kelly was. But still, she'd cried so much when she'd had her period and knew she wasn't having Mac's child.

If she was pregnant with his baby, she'd have someone of her own to love—and to love her. And she'd have part of Mac with her always. Their love would be alive and the baby would keep them together forever.

Kyle signed Maggie in and then stepped back. “I'll be right here,” he said, looking her straight in the eye.

The way Kelly did.

She liked that, when someone looked at her as if she was a real person, not just a kid.

Nodding, Maggie followed the guard through the series of doors that led to the dungeon where Mom lived now.

 

He'd driven fifteen minutes to the local downtown FBI office for a phone. Glancing at the cheap-looking cell, Clay drove to a nearby park and, moving at all times as he'd been instructed, he headed toward a large deserted grassy area and dialed the number he'd been given. It wasn't like he had to worry about other park-goers this morning. It was December and barely fifty degrees outside.

“Agent Thatcher? Rick Thomas here.” The voice that picked up on the first ring didn't completely surprise Clay. It did relieve him, though. “Sorry about all the paranoia here, the scrambled phone, but I can't afford to take chances. We were hoping my past was over, that I was free, but with Kelly Chapman missing we can't be sure. Consequently, my fiancée and brother and I are leaving this morning for a new life under government protection. After this conversation, we won't be speaking again.”

Goddamn. What kind of vicious case was he into?

“Who's after you?”

“I've made a lot of potential enemies within the world's crime population—drugs and illegal arms, mostly—but my fifteen years of staying alive in that world tells me that if Dr. Chapman's disappearance has anything to do with me, you're either looking for a man named Hernandez Segura or for a mole in the United States Department of Defense.”

Holding the phone between his ear and shoulder, Clay walked and wrote in his pocket notebook at the same time.

“In either case, if they have her, chances are they aren't
going to kill her right away. If someone from my world is behind this, that means they think I've told her something that can put them at risk.”

“What could you have told her?”

“Nothing. I've already given up everything I have, which is why I thought the past was behind me. But if they've determined that she could have information that puts them at risk, then they're going to do whatever it takes to get it out of her.”

“And if she tells them she knows nothing?”

“They aren't even going to ask her at first. You don't get your best answers when someone is fully cognitive and functioning at their best. Even when they're initially scared. They'll weaken her, physically and mentally, and then they'll start to question her.”

Clay got the picture, but asked, anyway. “And if—when—she has nothing to give them?”

“They'll keep her alive a little longer. But they'll step up their attempts to get her to talk. When they're convinced she knows nothing, she'll be killed.”

“We've had a ransom call.” Didn't sound like the people Rick Thomas had dealt with would need extra cash.

“Could be to throw you off track. Or it could be that your kidnappers have nothing to do with me. I'll pray for the latter.”

Clay would, too. Meanwhile… “Tell me about this Segura guy.”

“He's into illegal arms. He runs things from an island off Costa Rica. He's got at least eight men that I know of who could get Kelly Chapman out of the country without a trace.”

Thomas named the men. Clay wrote.

“Segura's business was brought down by my team, but he walked away because he had a government contact. Since then, he's built the business back up bigger than
ever. The guy we know he was working with is dead, but we could never be sure if there was only one government man involved. We
are
certain there was a mole in the DOD. Whether it's the man who died or not is anybody's guess. All intelligence has gone dark on this one.”

Scribbling the name of the dead man—a U.S. career military official—Clay rapidly wrote down other details from Rick Thomas's covert life as the man dictated them and then, thanking Thomas, Clay destroyed the phone as he'd been instructed and tossed the remains in a trash bin on the way back to his car.

He had more leads than he had time to follow.

And only one question at the moment.

How the hell was he going to bring one woman out of this clusterfuck alive?

 

“You look good, Mags. Nice. No makeup. Your hair in a ponytail. I like the sweater. It matches your jeans. Are they new?”

“The sweater is,” Maggie said, ashamed. Mom would feel bad that someone else was buying Maggie nice things when she couldn't ever have. Maggie'd thought about not wearing the soft pink pullover. But Kelly said the new sweater brought out the light streaks in Maggie's hair and complemented the deep brown of her eyes. Besides, it was Kelly's favorite and right now, with Kelly missing, Maggie just had to wear the sweater.

The jeans were new, too. Just not as new. And Maggie had paid for them with money she'd saved from the paper route she'd had over the summer. Money she'd saved in the account Mom had helped her open.

“They said you asked to see me,” Mom told her now, her eyes all warm and soft-looking, like she got when Maggie had a bad dream or had cramps or was puking or some
thing. It was the Mom she loved more than anything. And missed so much she hurt thinking about it.

Which was why she tried not to think about Mom too much. Or about what Mom had done.

Some days it all still seemed like a huge mistake. Someone was wrong. Except that Mom had written it all down. She'd pled guilty so there wasn't even a trial.

And she was in here, sitting at the stupid, old, scarred, dirty table wearing an orange suit thing that didn't look good on her at all.

“Mags? What's wrong, sweetie?” Mom's hand covered Maggie's on the table and Maggie turned her hand over, grabbing the softness of her mother's, and held on. She tried to talk, but she was going to start crying and she couldn't do that.

She had to be strong.

To grow up.

That was the one thing she knew. Mac was counting on her to be a grown-up. “Kelly's missing.”

“I know. And I guess that's scary to you right now, but in the end, it'll be fine.”

No.
Maggie could hardly breathe. She couldn't look at Mom. And then she did. Because she had to.

Maggie leaned forward. “Tell me you didn't do this,” she whispered.

Mom leaned in farther and she didn't smell good at all. Like sweat and cigarette smoke. And her hair was greasy, too. “Do what, Maggie?”

Mom talked just as low so they wouldn't be heard.

“You know, get rid of Kelly.” Maggie didn't want to think about that. It was bad enough knowing that Kelly was missing. She couldn't think about her being hurt.

Or worse.

Her best friend, Glenna, had been murdered. Kelly couldn't be, too. Maggie would just die.

“Oh, Mags, you're so young.”

Maggie gritted her teeth. She hated when Mom said that.

“Just tell me you didn't do it.”

“How could I, sweetie? Look at me.” Mom held up her hands that were handcuffed for the visit, even though a guard stood right behind Maggie. “I'm locked in here. You know that.”

“Tell me, Mom.” Although why it was so important to make her mom admit something, Maggie wasn't sure. It wasn't like she hadn't lied to her before.

She had. A lot.

“I'm telling you, Maggie. I didn't do it. I didn't do anything.”

“Do you know who did?”

Mom didn't say anything. She just looked at Maggie and shook her head, like this was one of those things Maggie was too young to understand.