Chapter Sixty-One
“Stop it! Both of you.”
Sam and the huge man froze at the same time.
Angel rolled her eyes and stepped off the elevator. “Sam, this is Deputy Marshal Marks, the other man assigned to your detail. Justin, this is Sam.”
“Gun?” he said, glancing at the Glock Sam was still holding on him.
“Oh. Right. Sorry.” She lowered it sheepishly and tucked it away.
Justin gave her a hard look as they walked down the hall. “I heard about what happened to Dane.”
“How’s he doing?”
“Don’t know,” Angel said. “Let’s get you inside.”
Justin put his hand on the panel by the door and it unlocked. He urged her in, and he and Angel followed behind her. She watched in amazement as Justin not only locked the door, but moved some kind of reinforcement panel over it.
“Bombproof,” Angel said at Sam’s raised brow.
Okay, then. Sam looked around the fancy apartment.
“So are the windows,” Angel went on. “This place is called the Bird Cage, because it’s up in the air and completely self-sustained. The president has even used this suite.”
“Lucky me,” Sam said as she took in the white leather sectional in a sunken living room with white carpet and white walls. Good grief.
She missed Garrett’s cabin in the mountains.
“Garrett said you like to read. There’s a library down the hall.” Angel pointed. “Kitchen.” She gestured to a room off the living room, all chrome and black. “Your bedroom is down that way. Second on the left. Go ahead and get comfortable while I let everyone know we made it in one piece.” Angel seemed satisfied by that fact.
So was Sam.
She checked out the library, which had more books in it than she would be able to read in a lifetime. She went to her room, which had a wall of glass that made her feel very exposed. The blinds worked via a remote on the nightstand. There was also a remote for a giant TV hanging on the wall.
She put her small bag on the king-size, pillow-top bed, and went to the kitchen to see what snack options awaited.
Angel was arguing with someone on the phone when Sam walked in. “…you’re off this case. You wanted off the case, so don’t think you’re going to order me around. She’s here. She’s safe. Beyond that, why would you care?”
Garrett.
Sam’s stomach did a little flip. She indicated the refrigerator behind Angel, who moved out of the way, still grumbling into the phone.
“I have to go. We’ve got things under control here. Enjoy your time off.”
Sam could hear Garrett yell, “I’m not taking time off. How am I supposed to go on vacation when she’s in the middle of a shitstorm?”
“Don’t know. Don’t care. I just thought you’d want to know we got her secured without incident. Next time, I won’t call.” Angel hung up and huffed. “What the fuck is his problem?”
“Me,” Sam muttered under her breath, and took a sip of flavored water from a bottle she’d found in the massive refrigerator. It was big enough to store a dead body. She decided not to think about that as she rummaged around in cupboards, finding some chips.
For dinner, Justin ordered pizza from Santiago’s.
She laughed as they all sat down and each of them put their gun on the table at the same time as though they had rehearsed it.
She and Angel had a bet going that Justin wouldn’t be able to eat his whole pizza. Sam lost when he finished off the last piece of his and the last piece of theirs.
Despite their shaky start, Justin had warmed up to her. He was a natural flirt with an easy grin and funny retort at the ready. But he still wasn’t Garrett.
Angel also had a softer side, despite her assassin-like moves and the scars on her arms. Sam wouldn’t mind spending three months with these people. But it wasn’t the same.
There would be no one in bed to keep her warm at night. No one to snuggle on the sofa with to watch movies.
The next morning after she was up and dressed, someone knocked at the door. She watched as Justin and Angel disarmed the alarm to let in the visitor, then searched him as soon as he stepped inside the room.
“All clear!” Justin said.
The handsome black man adjusted his suit jacket and looked over at Sam with a pleasant smile. “Ms. Hutchinson, I’m District Attorney Hugh Harris. Call me Hugh. We spoke on the phone a few months ago.”
“Yes. I remember.” How could she forget the inquisition?
“I’m going to brief you on what’s been happening with the case, then we’ll go over your testimony. I understand you’ve had a rough time in the program over the past few months. I’m hoping things will calm down while we prepare for trial. When Howe is behind bars permanently, you’ll be able to start over somewhere safe.”
“Yes,” she said. Safe.
“As you know, Congressman Howe killed Heather Riddell.”
Yes. She’d seen it with her own eyes.
“Kenneth Holden was the person who supposedly planned to meet her from an online dating site, and was later found in the Potomac River from an apparent suicide.”
“He didn’t kill her, and I doubt he killed himself,” Sam said.
Hugh nodded in agreement.
“Howe’s four defense attorneys maintain Kenneth Holden lured Heather away from a date and shot her. When he realized he was going to be caught, he killed himself rather than face the consequences.”
She understood the theory, though she certainly didn’t believe it. Kenneth Holden wouldn’t still be hunting Sam after he killed himself.
“Problem is, the gun they found in Holden’s car—the one used to kill Heather Riddell—was the same gun used to kill a man named Adam Dresden, a few months before Heather’s murder.”
Sam scooted closer. This was new information. “And?”
“Kenneth Holden was in Germany when Dresden was shot.”
“So, Holden had a solid alibi for the first murder,” Sam said.
“Exactly. And then when you throw in the fingerprint and the computer file we found, their story is crumbling like a sandcastle during a hurricane.”
More new stuff. “Fingerprint?” she asked.
“The gun found in Holden’s car was wiped clean of fingerprints. Except for Holden’s. At least on the outside. But on the inside, we found a partial print that came up in the system as a former federal agent, Martin Roberts. Roberts had been hired by Congressman Howe twice as a bodyguard. He was shot with a large caliber rifle when he and a number of other of Howe’s men broke into the safe house where you were staying.”
Ah. That would have been her doing.
All of that sounded very good for the case…which meant it was going to be very bad for her. The more desperate Howe was to save his skin, the more determined he would be to kill her.
“Once our senior inspector testifies Roberts attacked the safe house, we’ll be able to add attempted murder, conspiracy, and intimidation of a witness to Howe’s list of charges.” Hugh smiled. “He’s so going down.”
“Senior inspector? You mean Garrett?” she asked. Her heartbeat sped. She almost looked forward to testifying now, in hopes she would get to see him.
Obviously, she still wasn’t over the man.
But…
“He’s in danger, then.” she said.
“No more than usual,” Hugh said, glancing over at Angel in confusion. “You need to worry about yourself and the case for right now. Garrett will be fine.”
“Okay.” They were right. He was a seasoned federal marshal.
“Let’s go over what you remember about the shooting in the safe house.” Hugh threw questions at her and scribbled on a notepad for hours.
“Do you know why Howe killed her?” Sam finally asked. It seemed like the proof was solid, but didn’t there need to be a motive?
“Heather Riddell was a paralegal in the law office that Howe was using to set up divorce proceedings from his wife. We think she might have overheard something or seen something she wasn’t supposed to. Maybe he was planning to hide assets from his wife’s lawyers, something like that. We’re only guessing.”
Which meant Heather might also have been trying to do the right thing. Just like Sam.
“We do know she did not have a date planned with Kenneth Holden. She never mentioned it to her mother or any of her friends. She was still wearing clothes from work. All the correspondence from the dating site was uploaded after her death. It was a cover-up. Kenneth Holden’s only crime was looking a lot like Congressman Howe. We have our tech people trying to track down where the file originated. That would help the case substantially.”
“Maybe if you have enough evidence, I wouldn’t even need to testify,” she said hopefully. It was long shot.
He shook his head. “You are our key witness. You’re not having cold feet, are you?”
She almost choked. “Cold? My feet are frozen stiff, but I’m still going to do this. Howe needs to pay for what he did.”
“Then let’s make that happen.”