Chapter Thirty-Six
“He manipulated the investigation from the beginning.”
Stephen tore his gaze from Kat, who was pacing the floor of the hospital. Her agony was palpable, so thick Stephen felt it as if it was his own. He’d tried to hold her, tried to reassure her that they were in the best hospital they could be in. She’d clung to him…for a while. He glanced up at the clock.
Six hours and counting.
“Stephen.”
“Yeah,” Stephen responded. But he wasn’t paying attention, too worried about Kat. And Ethan, who had risked his life to save Stephen’s.
That fact blew his mind.
He glanced at Kat again, wishing there was some way he could comfort her. She stopped pacing for a moment, glanced over at him and he wished he knew what was going on in that head of hers right now.
Needing to stretch his legs, Stephen stood, going on full alert when the door whooshed open. From the wrong side. The opposite side of the surgical unit. Kat reacted the same moment Stephen did, disbelief filling her expression as a ghost appeared in front of them.
“Mark Prescott, Federal Bureau of Investigations.”
Silence fell around them as Mark held up his badge, Kat stiff in his arms when he reached her. Two men flanked Mark, the three of them holding up their badges for everybody to see. As Alex and Xavier moved beside him, more introductions were made, but Stephen remained frozen, waiting for an explanation. Glancing at Kat, Mark said, “I was wearing a vest, Ms. Collins. If you’ll follow me, I’ll explain everything.”
Kat refused to move. Mark spoke with one of the agents standing next to him, too low for them to overhear. “Bryant will stay and collect you immediately when the doctors come out.”
Stephen still had to force Kat to move until Mary Robinson walked in, standing beside one of the agents. She nodded, first at Kat, then at Stephen. The four of them followed Mark and through the doors and into an unoccupied office down the corridor. None of them sat, wouldn’t have even if there were enough chairs. Kat had dried her tears, her body on full alert.
“Fine.” Stephen nodded, but still wasn’t sure he trusted the man. Kat didn’t acknowledge him either way, just waited for him to continue. Beside him, Xavier and Alex stood at alert, flanking them both.
“Officially, our investigation began two years ago when we noticed an increase in undercover agents being killed.” He looked at Alex. “I’ll save you the details, but after a ton of man hours, we were able to trace the timeline of the killings back to the meth lab explosion. About the same time, we received intel that suggested Matthew Harrington was still alive, which we later confirmed. Of course then we were questioning whether Senator Harrington knew his son was alive.
“When his former campaign manager fell ill last year, I went in undercover, but had found nothing useful. At least not until Harrington’s wife died three months ago. We finally caught an image of a man, who we later identified as Matthew Harrington, on camera. He was meeting with Jessica Adams.
“We had been watching Jessica for a while, only because of her relationship with the senator and his family.” He looked at Alex again. “Which is how we noticed when other agents began watching her. It took us a week to figure out what agency you were with, to discover a drug dealer named Mancini had been arrested and was spilling the beans on Harrington.”
“Three weeks ago. That’s when you pulled the DEA from the investigation,” Alex said.
“We couldn’t take the chance that our investigation would be blown. Alessandro was telling you the truth, Agent Chandler.”
Stephen couldn’t help but think if all the damned government agencies worked together, maybe they’d be a little more efficient.
“During this time, like you, we also spotted Emma Anderson with Jessica again. It wasn’t the first time. The first time was back in February. Before Harrington’s wife died. By then Emma had hired Genevieve Harrington as an intern. I befriended her right away, not as a federal agent, but personally. In part to keep her safe, and in part to try and figure out what she knew. That was back in February. I believed, we all believed, Emma knew Matthew was alive, but as for the rest of it, we had no knowledge.
“As Harrington said earlier, he hadn’t planned on killing Emma Anderson that night. From what we’ve been able to piece together, when you walked in,” he said to Stephen, “Harrington alerted Allen, although we didn’t know it was him, and the plan was quickly set in motion. Unfortunately, it was done before I knew what was going to happen and by then it was too late to save her—”
“You sent the text,” Stephen interrupted. Only Kat’s hand on his arm stopped Stephen from going after him, the threat of assaulting a federal officer not even a blip on his radar. No jury would convict him, he thought as his fury rose. Hating this man who had known while his reputation has been shattered. Hating this man who had purposely framed him for a murder he didn’t commit.
Mark shot him a look, but nodded. “I did. I couldn’t break cover without jeopardizing the rest of the investigation. Remember, we still were under the belief that Harrington was hiding his son’s whereabouts. Killing Emma was the first proof we had that the senator was hiding something. My horror over what had gone down when I confronted the senator wasn’t an act, but I had to play it carefully, had to convince him I was on his side, that I would protect him.”
“Yet you lost Matthew anyway. Or is he really missing again?” Kat said sarcastically.
“He’s missing,” Mark said stiffly before glancing at Alex. “You, of all people, should understand my predicament.” Alex remained silent before Mark finally continued. “Over the next few days, I stayed loyal to the senator, even though he wouldn’t fully explain what was going on or who was involved. We didn’t even know who had stabbed Emma, only that the order had come from the senator. The night you were shot,” he said to Alex, “Ethan O’Rourke showed up at the senator’s house. The senator’s bodyguards viewed him as a threat.”
“And they beat him.”
Mark nodded. “They subdued him, as is their job. However, instead of turning him over to authorities, the senator was holding him, knew he couldn’t let him go. We still weren’t sure who the senator was working with, and unfortunately, I wasn’t able to get to Ethan, not without the senator knowing and blowing my cover. We were still working blind until earlier, when Jessica Adams finally woke up. That’s when we first learned Emma’s investigation had nothing to do with Matthew Harrington and the full truth began unraveling.”
“You expect us to believe, this entire week, you had no idea what was really going down?” Kat sounded incredulous.
“As I said, Miss Collins, for the last two years we’ve been focused on Matthew Harrington. Nothing, and I mean nothing this past week, pointed to anything else. Not until our meeting with Jessica. The senator was tight lipped, wouldn’t tell me much, but we knew something would be going down. Earlier today, he ‘let it slip’ that after tonight, it would be over. We had all our bases covered. Both his homes, his offices. But we couldn’t predict he’d run you off the road. We didn’t even know anything about you.” He paused for a moment. “But apparently, Allen and the senator did.”
“We fed Allen everything,” Kat said, her face pale in the harsh florescent lighting. “We laid out our entire investigation and he gave it the senator.”
Mark looked at Mary Robinson, who confirmed with a quick nod. This wasn’t the first time they’d spoken, Stephen thought. That had probably happened at the scene, after Ethan had been medivacked to the hospital and he and Kat had gone up in the ambulance.
“I only began to suspect Allen when he came down without backup,” Mark continued. “Suddenly everything began to make sense, but I couldn’t be sure, especially when Allen was holding the senator at gunpoint.
“Ethan wasn’t as badly injured as he made out to be. I knew he was awake, only feigning unconsciousness. I identified myself as a federal agent and cut his ropes, gave him a gun to protect himself. My plan was to go around the other side of the senator—”
“Then Allen swung the gun toward me.”
“Yes. Ethan shot the senator, jumped in front of Allen’s bullet before I shot Allen.”
Kat looked up at Stephen and slipped her hand into his before turning back to Mark. There was a long moment of silence before Kat asked, “What about Blake? We thought he was the third man. He killed himself…”
It was Mary who answered. “Blake wasn’t completely innocent. Although he wasn’t taking part in their sexual exploits that night, we believe he provided the drugs. Seemed he tried them out on his own dates. He was expelled that final semester, one too many complaints.” She was silent for a moment before saying, “Donna Henderson’s death was their biggest mistake—”
“Because it was the children who talked, when Donna never would,” Kat finished warily. “It’s how we were able to break the case.”
Mark stared at her and Stephen could see his growing respect. “Exactly. We don’t know for sure and probably never will, but we assume Karen told Donna who the men were that night. She was probably too scared to come forward. We’re also unsure about how the senator was alerted to what Emma knew in the first place.”
“Ethan said he went to his mother when Emma started making accusations that his father was responsible for Karen Young’s death. It’s possible his mother said something to Allen. She wouldn’t have known not to,” Kat said.
“She did,” Mary verified. “She mentioned it when Allen and I interviewed her earlier today.” She glanced up at the clock. “Yesterday, now. I confronted Allen about it after we left her house, but he brushed me off. Said Ethan wouldn’t have killed Emma over a few accusations that couldn’t be verified. And although I didn’t want to believe Ethan would murder somebody, I still felt it was a lead we couldn’t overlook. We all knew Allen was close to Ethan’s family. At the time I thought he was just trying to protect Ethan, but now…obviously his reasons weren’t so altruistic. I’m sure Allen was friends with Thomas to keep watch, alert the other two if Thomas ever got close—”
“Oh, God. They didn’t kill Thomas, did they?”
Mary shook her head. “We don’t think so. We’ll have to wait until he wakes up. If he wakes up.”
“Did Allen beat Jessica?”
“No,” Mark said. “Her soon to be ex-husband did. According to him, she’d filed for divorce out of the blue, taken all their money, moved it to an off-shore account he couldn’t find. We have him in custody. We arrested him that night, but other than taking the money, he knew nothing of Matthew Harrington being alive. He was also questioned by other agents after Jessica came clean, but apparently, until she took the money, he never knew she was…evil was the term he used.”
Mark finally broke the silence, his question directed to Kat. “Would you consider joining the FBI?”
“No.”
Stephen looked over at Kat and squeezed her hand. They’d both answered in unison. While Kat’s answer was adamant, Stephen’s was more of a plea. He wasn’t trying to answer for her, but the fear that ran up his spine as soon as Mark had asked was instantaneous.
Mark turned to Stephen. “I hope you accept our apologies for everything. Please believe me when I say we wouldn’t have let you go to prison, or even arrested for a crime you didn’t commit. We were hoping you’d take our vacation offer.”
Instantly, Stephen remembered the attorney general, suggesting he take a vacation, his lame attempt at a joke, he’d said. Christ, that seemed like a lifetime ago. “He knew?”
“Just that you weren’t involved. Media Relations is currently preparing a speech for both of us. We’ll give a statement telling the press you were working with the FBI during the investigation and had it not been for your sacrifice, we wouldn’t have been able to close the case.”
So he’d be hailed a hero after being torn to shreds. Somehow, if he’d had a choice, he wasn’t sure it wouldn’t have been worth it.
“We also have them preparing a speech for you, which you can deliver right after mine.”
But it wasn’t him that had broken the case, it was Kat. Just as Stephen was about to voice his thoughts, Kat spoke. “He’ll give the speech.”
“Then we’ll be in touch.” Mark held out his hand. Neither of them moved to shake it. Kat glanced down at his outstretched hand, shaking it briefly before glancing up at the clock, probably calculating how long they’d been gone. Out of manners too deeply ingrained, Stephen shook Mark’s hand as well.
“We owe you one.”
“And I’ll be collecting,” Stephen replied. “Ten-fold.”