NINETEEN
“Whoever made this baby knew what the hell he was doing.” Alex surveyed the damage in the bedroom as Mark, Tyrell, and a less-than-cooperative police detective picked through the rubble, sorting through it for pieces of the bomb and the shrapnel it contained.
“Any six-year-old can put one of these together off the Internet,” the detective informed him hostilely.
“Off the Internet, any six-year-old can’t set a timer to it and give it the exact amount of time needed to get away from the window,” Mark stated coldly as he used a large set of tweezers to lift another piece from the carpet.
He looked at the part of the device he was holding, turned it and considered if for long moments. “Hell of a timer, Major.”
Alex inhaled slowly, his nostrils flaring in rage. “So we have an explosives expert to find. Someone who’s obviously native to the area.”
“Lots of explosives experts around the world,” the detective muttered. “Not everyone that wants to kill comes from Somerset.”
The detective, Joey Runyon, was a Somerset native. At five-ten and forty-seven years old, he was a veteran on the force. His shoddy work wasn’t an example of his past record.
“Detective, do you have a problem with this job?” Alex leaned against the doorframe and watched him with cool curiosity. “Because I can make damned certain you’re reassigned.”
Detective Runyon rose to his full height, not that it did him any good. Five-ten wasn’t six-plus feet no matter how much a man threw his shoulders back and lifted his chin.
Mark came to his feet, laying the piece of the timer in the shallow plastic container used to collect the shrapnel and debris from the bomb.
“You’re not police chief yet,” Runyon sneered. “And after this, it’s doubtful you will be. Everyone knows Jane Mackay is nothing like her brother. She was her daddy’s little pet whenever she was around. Sleeping with her isn’t going to gain you points—”
Alex didn’t have to jump for the man. He took one long step, his arm snapping out, his fingers latching around the other man’s neck as he slammed him into the wall.
The detective’s eyes bulged, and his face paled as he struggled against Alex.
“I really want to kill you,” Alex said softly. “If we were anywhere else, I’d cut you in tiny pieces, Runyon, and feed you to the local wildlife. Is that what you want?”
“Major Jansen, what have I told you about harassing local detectives? Son, it’s bad for the Department of Homeland Security’s image. You know that. Let the little fart go so I can have his ass fried with his superiors. That’s always so much more fun.”
Alex’s teeth clenched at the sound of the familiar voice. He should have expected it. Why hadn’t he expected it? Timothy Cranston, special agent in charge of the investigation that had been responsible for cracking the theft and potential sale of weapons in the Somerset area two years before.
“Come on, Alex, let go of the little fucker’s neck. You know how much I enjoy breaking careers.” Timothy patted his shoulder as he stepped farther into the room.
“Man, you are so fucked-up.” Alex sighed as he stared back at the detective. “I would have just killed you. The Rabid Leprechaun over there will make you wish you were dead. Over and over and over again.”
He released the detective.
“Detective Runyon,” Cranston drawled. “You were in the military, weren’t you?” Cranston flipped open the little notebook he never left home without.
Runyon rubbed his skinny little neck and glared back at Cranston. “Yeah. I was.”
“Runyon worked with explosives, Major Jansen,” Cranston drawled, his brown eyes flicking to the detective with malevolent humor. His chubby face was wreathed in a devil’s smile, his hair almost standing up in spikes.
“Then he should have known any six-year-old couldn’t have built this explosive,” Mark commented.
Cranston turned to Mark with a frown. “You’re not supposed to be here.”
Mark grinned. “I’m the ghost of explosives past, just lending a little wisdom here and there.” He arched his blond brows expressively.
Cranston sighed and turned back to Alex. “Is this the best you could do on short notice for a team? Son, call me next time; I’ll send you a team.”
“Special Agent Cranston.” The detective spoke up then; evidently he knew Cranston. It seemed sometimes that everyone did.
“Don’t talk to me, asshole. You don’t exist.” Cranston frowned back at him heavily, his shaggy brows arching like little demi-horns as he turned back to Alex. “How did you get stuck with that prick?”
“Cranston, you don’t have jurisdiction in this case.” Runyon stepped forward aggressively.
Alex stepped back cautiously. Because Timothy smiled. A real-life honest-to-God filled-with-amusement smile as he rubbed his hands together in glee.
“So report me,” Timothy drawled, his brown eyes sparkling in childlike pleasure. “I dare you.”
Runyon finally had the good sense to swallow nervously.
“This isn’t a federal case.” Runyon was obviously restraining his own sense of self-importance.
“Hey, dickhead, there was an attempt on a military officer’s life, one assigned to the Department of Homeland Security—that makes it a federal case,” Timothy growled in disgust. “Alex, where did this little turd come from?”
Alex winced. He’d rarely seen Timothy so pissed off. This was Timothy carrying a load of pissed, and the dumbass detective was about to get the brunt of it.
“He was the first one on the scene last night.” Alex lifted his good shoulder in a shrug. “Besides, the chief and I are friends. I figure there had to be something good about him somewhere.”
“I’d question that friendship if I were you.” Timothy turned back to the detective. “Get your bony ass out of my investigation, you incompetent little prick. And pray to God I don’t decide to see if I can’t pin this explosion to your sharp little nose and throw you behind bars for a nice little vacation.”
Runyon stepped back.
Alex shot him a compassionate look and shook his head warningly. “Go, Runyon. I’ll see if I can’t settle him down and save your job.” Alex grinned. “At least until I’m your boss. Then we’ll talk.”
Runyon stalked out. Seconds later the front door slammed as Timothy cackled.
“That little prick.” The special agent shook his head. “He’s got issues. I’ll have him checked out.”
“What the hell are you doing here, Timothy?” Alex watched curiously as the special agent stared around the room slowly.
Timothy shrugged. “Forced vacation. They were making me take a break until this came across the wire. Since I handled the investigation here, they let me come back to work.”
Alex’s brows arched. Timothy didn’t take breaks. He was always manipulating, conniving, and catching criminals. It was all he lived for. He’d die in the line of duty, Alex was convinced of it. Likely from a stroke.
“I don’t need any help, Timothy,” Alex told him firmly. One had to be firm with Timothy. “I have it covered.”
“I’ll just make sure of that.” Timothy shoved his hands in his pockets and turned back to him. “Report says you’ve been living with that little Mackay girl, Natches’s sister. You like living dangerously, don’t you, boy? I’m surprised he let you live.”
Alex’s lips quirked as he rubbed the back of his neck. “It’s been touch and go, the letting me live part.”
“She’s a good girl.” Timothy nodded slowly. “I had a full investigation done on her. Damned shame how Dayle Mackay tried to use that kid against Natches all those years.”
“She’s survived.” Alex had to fight the anger that threatened to return.
“Survived only to come home and face this bullshit.” Cranston stared around the room again. “You know what, Alex?”
“What?” Alex’s eyes narrowed on the other man. His expression was heavy, his gaze dark with grief.
“She looks like my baby girl,” Cranston said softly. “My little Maria. She was in the Federal Building with her mother when that terrorist’s bomb hit, you know.”
Shit. He hadn’t seen the vague resemblance. “Yeah, she does, Timothy,” he said gently.
The agent had lost his wife, his daughter, son-in-law, and new granddaughter in a strike by homeland terrorists. Cranston had taken every terrorist-related assignment he could get since. He didn’t rest. Alex knew he would never rest.
“She looks like her,” he repeated as he turned back to the bedroom, his expression twisting for the slightest second in rage and pain. “Bastard tried to blow her to little pieces, didn’t he?”
“He almost managed it.” Alex had to grit his teeth against the rage.
“And almost took out my best fucking team commander,” Cranston snarled. “Where’s your mind? I got the papers the other day that you’re not returning? What’s with that shit?”
Alex grinned. “Bum leg.” He rubbed at his thigh.
“Lying bastard.” Timothy stared around the room again, his attention shifting from the window to the bed. He pursed his lips as he measured the distance. “Five-ten, maybe,” he murmured. “Your perp. Not a big boy. Didn’t take a lot of force, but he would have had to put everything into it. Jerked a little; aim was a little off when it came through the window, I bet.”
Alex looked between the shattered window and the hole in the bed where the bomb exploded. “How do you figure?”
“Placement.” Timothy shrugged. “It came in high, dipped, and missed the exact center. He wasn’t as strong as he thought he was.”
Timothy was fucking scary.
“I think he’s right.” Tyrell moved into the room as Alex turned to him. “I was checking outside. Found some prints in the yard that were a little off. Ground is still damp where she uses the sprinklers in the evening. Someone dug in deep at one spot, braced, and threw, I suspect. Footprint is small, likely size eight to nine. Zeke is casting it.”
“Where’s the Mackay girl?” There was the barest edge to Timothy’s voice. Sorrow mixed with concern and the cool disinterest he wanted to portray.
“In the restaurant.” Alex grimaced. “Chaya showed up, and last I heard Natches was cursing a blue streak. Janey just smiles at him and does what the hell she wants to.”
Timothy chuckled at that. “She’s a good girl, but she’s got no business here. It’s like a fucking war zone.” He stared around. “I’m pulling your team back. They’re on training missions at present so it’s not going to affect anything important. I want enough men to cover this. We place them right, pull in a few of our female agents from Louisville, and we should be able to catch him fast.”
“This is personal, Timothy,” Alex warned him. “The department’s going to slap you over it.”
“Hell, won’t be the first time.” Timothy grinned. “And it’s not personal. Attempting to kill one of my boys is serious shit. Department takes it serious.” Timothy turned, looking around the room again. “Did you find all the cameras?”
“There was one in every room except the kitchen. There’s no overhead vent there,” Alex told him.
Timothy moved beneath the vent, turned, looked at the side of the bed, and tilted his head before moving through the apartment. Alex followed after him.
“Your report said her apartment was broken into with no signs of a breach in her security system?”
“None I could find,” Alex agreed.
“Hmm. Thought you were good at that stuff.”
“So did I.” Alex grunted as he followed Timothy through the apartment.
There were two bedrooms, two baths, closets in each room and the bathrooms, and a hall closet for linen and towels that Janey never used because she never had guests stay overnight. Living room, kitchen, pantry closet. Timothy checked it all, then turned and paced back to the hallway, scratching his grizzled cheek.
“What do you see, Timothy?” Alex knew him. He’d worked with Timothy for ten years now; in the past years his team had been under exclusive DHS authority, and Timothy was the primary agent he worked with.
“Doesn’t work out,” Timothy muttered.
“What doesn’t work out?” Alex shifted his shoulder, trying to relieve the ache in it. The nails had gone deep, and Alex had felt the wounds breaking open and bleeding throughout the afternoon.
He moved back to the closet at the end of the hall, slapped the back, and frowned. The wall was solid. He stepped into Janey’s bedroom, looked around, then went to the guest bedroom, looked around it. Alex looked but couldn’t see whatever it was Timothy was looking for.
“You think there’s an entrance to the restaurant below?” Alex asked.
Timothy counted steps across the bedroom, along the width of it. He moved back to Janey’s bedroom and into the bathroom. The bathroom was on the other side of the closet.
He was frowning as he moved back to the hall, stared at the closet again. “Four feet difference.”
“How the hell do you know this shit?” Alex growled. “I don’t see it.”
Timothy shrugged. “You’re not trained to see it the way I am. You haven’t had to rip out walls and dismantle homes to find them. Question is, where is our door?”
The bedrooms weren’t even. The guest room door was close to the closet, while Janey’s bedroom door was closer to the living room. The bathroom to the guest room had another door from the hall into the bathroom as well as one into the guest bedroom.
Timothy ran his hands over the wall, tapped and knocked, listened. It all sounded solid to Alex. He and Natches both had checked the walls the same way just after the break-in.
“Bathroom,” Timothy spoke more to himself. “It has to be in the bathroom.”
Alex was in complete bafflement as he followed Timothy back to Janey’s bathroom. The other man tapped, listened, pressed, and moved until he was squeezing himself into the narrow space between the wall and the claw-foot bathtub. And there he found it. He tapped the wall, pressed down on one of the tub’s clawed feet, and Alex watched as the end of the bathtub slid to the side and the entrance in the floor slid seamlessly open.
“Damned ingenious.” Timothy stood staring at the narrow staircase that led downstairs. “It goes straight down. Think and tell me where this will end.”
Alex moved to gaze into the darkened interior. “The other side of the restaurant, away from the office. The banquet room. Janey’s been wanting to open it for seating.”
“Anyone fighting her over it?” Timothy asked him quietly.
“Tabitha, one of the young waitresses. She works as hostess when Janey’s dealing with other things.”
“Not her.” Timothy shook his head. “Tabitha Cooke is a kid. A little flighty, low grades but social. She doesn’t have the intelligence. Anyone else?”
Alex shook his head. He bet Timothy had files on every damned citizen in the county memorized from the investigations he had run in the past two years.
“Everyone else seems excited by the prospect,” Alex told him. “Why didn’t I find this? Natches and I both went over this room and the other bedroom.”
“Some of the ways they do it would amaze you.” Timothy shook his balding head as he backed away and slid the tub back in place. “There’s a locking lever on the foot of the tub.” He pressed it with his foot. “Not easy to accidentally activate. I saw something similar at another place. The whole shower stall slid out like this. This one just slides around, leaving all the pipes intact. Very good.”
“Someone had access to her all along.” Alex could feel the adrenaline racing through him now, fury igniting in his head. “Son of a bitch, it’s a wonder they didn’t kill her in her sleep.”
Timothy shrugged, the wrinkled sleeves of his gray suit jacket shifting around him.
“Stalkers are odd creatures,” Timothy said. “From the report the sheriff sent me, it’s only started escalating since you showed up. The pictures, this attack. Natches told the sheriff the stalker was upset, crying, because you were, ummm, getting a little nasty. She was corrupting you. Making you unnatural.” Timothy’s brows wagged. “Really, Alex. Anal sex?”
Alex refused to blush. Dammit to hell. It was bad enough Zeke saw those pictures and knew just how fucking hot Janey was; having Timothy know was damned uncomfortable.
“Timothy, don’t make me murder you,” Alex sneered.
The special agent in charge of making Alex crazy snickered.
“Come on, let’s go see Natches and Chaya, then.” Timothy hitched the band of his pants and moved through the bathroom. “And let’s keep that little passageway our secret for the time being, at least until we’re away from the restaurant.”
Alex followed, more anxious to check on Janey than he was letting on. After letting Mark and Tyrell know they were heading to the restaurant, he and Timothy had left the apartment and were headed down the stairs when they heard Janey, obviously arguing.
“I don’t care if you do burn it to the ground. As long as it’s standing and open, I’ll do what the hell I want to do.”
“Are you trying to die?” Natches was leaning over her desk, his hands flat on the surface, tension filling the air as Janey held the identical stance, her hands on the desk, almost nose to nose with him.
“I’m not shutting down. If I shut down, I’ll never regain momentum. It doesn’t work that way.”
“You stay open and someone’s going to kill you.” Natches’s voice rose in anger as Chaya sat on the leather couch with her legs propped on the table, staring up at the ceiling as Alex followed Timothy into the office.
Chaya took one look at Timothy, lowered her jean-clad legs, and stared back at her former boss dismally. “Oh hell,” she muttered. “What are you doing here?”
Janey’s gaze jerked from her brother’s furious one to see Alex walk in behind a short, squat little man. He looked like someone’s favorite uncle or grandpa. His face was lined, there were traces of sorrow in his eyes, and his thinning hair looked as though he ran worried fingers through it much too often.
The bright smile on his face was forced, and the mockery in his eyes was brittle, hiding things, she was certain, he didn’t want others to see.
“What the fuck do you want?” Natches snarled at the little man as Janey came from around her desk.
“Natches!” She stared at him, shocked. “That’s rude.”
The little man snickered. “Yeah, Natches, don’t be rude.”
On first hearing, the comment could have seemed snide, but Janey heard the underlying affection in his voice. She knew it, because she had heard the same tone in her own voice. It kept others off balance, at a distance.
“Chaya, Natches really needs to go home for his afternoon nap.” Janey smiled tightly at her brother. “He’s getting cranky.”
Chaya’s laugh earned her a brooding look from her husband as she shook her head. “Don’t worry, Janey. Natches and Timothy don’t actually come to blows; they just threaten to.”
Alex moved over to Janey, and surprised her when, with a grin, he lowered his head and caught her lips in a quick kiss.
“Timothy, this is Natches’s sister, Janey. Janey, meet Special Investigative Agent Timothy Cranston from the Department of Homeland Security.”
“Hello, Mr. Cranston.” She gave him her hand to shake, and was not in the least surprised by the firm warmth of his handshake or the flicker of amusement in his gaze.
“Miss Mackay, it’s a pleasure to meet you.” He nodded, then pulled back, rubbed his hands together with an air of glee, and looked at Alex and Natches. “We’re going to have fun, boys.”
Janey noticed that neither Alex nor Natches looked comfortable with that proclamation.
Natches ran his fingers through his hair in frustration before turning to Alex. “She won’t close the restaurant down,” he stated furiously as he shot her another glare. “I’m half-owner.”
“And you promised you’d be the silent half,” she muttered, moving behind her desk again. “Let it go.”
“Shutting the restaurant down is the wrong move.” Timothy shook his head, then turned to Alex. “Have you checked this room for the cameras as well?”
Alex nodded. “We found two cameras in the overhead vents. They were accompanied by voice-activated recorders. It was simple, not as professional as the bomb, but effective.”
“Can I look around the restaurant?” Timothy turned to Janey.
“No.” Natches turned to Janey then. “Tell him to go home.”
Janey felt like rolling her eyes as she stood to her feet, thankful she was wearing comfortable clothes rather than the hostessing attire she usually had on by now.
“A quick tour.” She smiled at the other man. “Then I have to get dressed. The restaurant opens in less than three hours and I have a feeling we’re going to be packed.”
“We’ll just keep my investigative status between us if we meet anyone,” Timothy told her as he held out his elbow for her to take. “I must say, Ms. Mackay, I believe you may have gotten all the politeness and hospitality in your family. Natches can be a little cranky.”
“Yeah, like a five-year-old.” She shot Natches another glare as they moved to the door. “If we have time, we’ll stop in the kitchen. Desmond loves giving out samples of what he’s working on for the evening. Perhaps he’ll have time to fix you a quick lunch.”
Timothy’s smile was pleased, his gaze warming as he patted her hand while moving into the hallway with her. “I’d very much appreciate that, Ms. Mackay.”
“Janey.” She liked this little man. He had a charm and a flare that immediately put her at ease, and an underlying sadness and warmth that touched something inside her. “Please, call me Janey.”
Alex followed behind them silently, almost grinning as Natches and Chaya followed. Natches was pissed. Alex glanced back at the other man, to see the dark, suspicious frown he leveled on Cranston’s back.
The Mackays butted heads with Timothy too often to see the almost pure genius behind the man’s maniacal façade. Alex had worked with him enough to understand it, respect it, and be very wary of it.
“So, this room isn’t used?” Timothy was walking around the banquet room after Janey had opened it, so innocently unaware that she had been maneuvered. “Why aren’t you using it?” He turned back to Janey with a curious look.
“Because my coowner refuses to authorize an ad for a general manager.” Janey crossed her arms over her embroidered shirt and glared at Natches. He grunted in reply.
Timothy tilted his head, rather like an inquisitive, eager hound, and regarded them both somberly. Alex held back his wince.
“He’ll change his mind,” Timothy promised her with an almost besotted smile. “I’ll discuss it with him, my dear.”
“Thank you.” Janey bestowed one of her sweet, perfect smiles. Alex’s dick hardened. Cranston blinked, and for a second, Alex saw the emotion in the other man’s eyes.
Janey resembled the child he had lost. And Alex had the uncomfortable feeling that she might have just gained a father figure.