Chapter 3
When she could, she asked in a low tone, “Why didn’t you tell us?”
He gave her a flat stare and said, “Because I didn’t want your pity. Because I had a difficult journey of my own, and I didn’t want anybody mocking me or feeling like I was less than I should be.”
She shook her head in disbelief. “You know that’s not something we’d ever do.”
“Maybe not you, maybe not Chad, but there are certainly people who take great delight in demeaning others who have a difficult path to walk,” he said. “Besides, Chad knew.”
That blow almost felled her. “What?”
He nodded. “I don’t know how he found out. I had been planning on going hiking with him when I came back from my last tour. I was due back in ten days. When I didn’t arrive, he checked and kept checking to see where I was. Finally he hounded somebody into telling him that I’d been in a bad accident. When he eventually tracked me down, he forced his way in, until he could be at my bedside in the hospital, finding out for sure if I was alive or not. I was only a few shades away from dead actually,” he said in dry humor. “And I forbade him to tell you.”
She stared at him again in shock. “Why?” she asked bewildered. “Why couldn’t he tell me?”
“For the same reason as before. I didn’t want him telling anyone.”
She glared at him. “Right now I just want to walk over there and smack you hard.”
He raised an eyebrow. “And you probably would have if I hadn’t shown you my hand. But already you’ve seen me as handicapped. Somebody you have to protect and to treat better.”
“You will never be handicapped,” she snapped. “You’re too arrogant, too strong, too powerful, too determined.”
Laszlo chuckled. “I see you know him well.”
She shot him a glance. “I know him too well. He’s insufferable most of the time.”
“And the rest of the time?” Laszlo asked with a grin. “Apparently he’s not that bad.”
She shook her head, turned toward Talon. “You still should have let him tell me.”
“Why? So you wouldn’t have hated me all these years?”
She glared at him. “The only time I really hated you was when you didn’t show up for Chad’s funeral. At the time I thought you hadn’t had anything to do with him in the previous years either, since we broke up. I’d spoken to him about you, but he never said a word.” Her tone carried her frustration. “What was I supposed to think when you didn’t show up? I couldn’t even tell you myself because I didn’t have your contact information.”
He didn’t say a word.
She raised both hands in frustration. “And you never explained yourself. It’s as if you think I don’t have a right to know.”
“It’s not that you don’t have the right to know,” Laszlo interjected, “but the news will upset you yet again.”
“What are you talking about?”
Laszlo smiled. “He won’t tell you, but I will,” he said, ignoring the expression on Talon’s face. “At the time of Chad’s death, Talon had just come from a very difficult surgery where he died on the table. He was in critical care and found out somehow what had happened to Chad. Talon was in a spiral downward that almost took his life again as he tried to fight off the drugs and fight off the surgery so he could come to Chad’s side.
“At that point, the doctors knocked him out and kept him sedated for several days, as he was a danger to himself. Then, when he did wake up, he wasn’t allowed to have any contact with the outside world for at least another ten days, until he stabilized. When he was released from the hospital a month later, he managed to evade all of us and came here on his own and went to Chad’s grave site. After he had a chance to visit, he went back into the hospital because he’d already reinjured himself again.”
She sank back, tears slowly sliding down her cheeks. Hearing Laszlo’s recital and seeing Talon’s downcast face and the white-knuckled grip he had on the arm of the chair, she realized that Laszlo was telling the truth. She’d been so wrong. She’d jumped to the wrong conclusion, thinking that, when Talon had walked away, he’d walked away from her and from Chad.
But instead he’d stayed in close contact with Chad, and her brother had found out about Talon’s life-threatening injuries and fought to be at his side. Whereas she hadn’t even bothered. She’d been so hung up on her marriage and divorce that it had never occurred to her that something really bad could have happened to Talon. She shook her head, hating herself at that moment. And him because he could have made it easier on both of them. “You should have told me,” she said. “I’ve never judged you.”
Instantly she felt bad because, of course, it was a lie. That was exactly what she’d done. She’d wanted him to leave the military and to be with her all the time. She’d been young, foolish, idealistic. She hadn’t realized one had to love and one had to let go. He had a mission, and he was one of the few men capable of doing the kind of work he did. And it was a crime to everyone else if he couldn’t do it because he was so damn good at it. But she hadn’t given him that chance.
She’d given him an ultimatum instead, and he’d released her to find someone else. At the time all she’d done was get angry and hurl mental insults at him. Because she’d been hurting so bad. Chad had tried to talk to her about it, explain what she’d done and why it had been so wrong. But she didn’t want to listen. All she wanted was Talon back. What she should have done was said he was welcome to do what he felt he needed to do, and she was there for him.
Now as an adult, not an immature twenty-one-year-old girl, she got it. “I would have understood,” she said quietly. “I’m not that stupid girl anymore. I do understand that life has ups and downs and that it’s not all sunshine and roses.”
He stared at her but wouldn’t say anything in his defense.
She’d done that to him too. She used to rail at him when he’d done things wrong, and he’d never defend himself. He would just stand there and stare at her, wait for her to finish. She’d always felt better afterward, and then she would immediately feel worse because, of course, he never would stand up for himself. He would never give an explanation.
“Why couldn’t you have told me?” she asked, bewildered.
“Because,” Laszlo said, “he didn’t want you to see him as anything other than what he was before—strong, capable, determined, physically fit, whole.”
She sagged in her chair, realizing just how hard it must have been for these men to have dealt with the accident. And, if Talon had lost an arm and a foot, she glanced over at Laszlo and asked, “And the others? Were they as badly hurt? Or was just Talon so badly injured?”
“All of us were badly hurt,” Laszlo said quietly. “Some of us lost organs. Some of us lost limbs and organs. All of us lost muscle, tissue, bones, and all of us gained metal plates, metal screws, something added somewhere. All of us went through tremendous heartache, frustration, depression. Most of us hit the suicidal wall at one point. Only revenge kept our team leader, Badger, coming back from the brink.”
Talon picked up the story. “And now that most of us have healed enough to live a more or less normal life, and we have now realized that our incident was quite likely not an accident, we all have a purpose again. But with that purpose comes an understanding that all of us were directly affected and, in another way now, have been further injured with the loss of friends and loved ones. And we’re undertaking the difficult job of letting people know.”
“Maybe you would rather have been left in the dark,” Laszlo broke in. “I wasn’t sure what you’d rather know. I pushed Talon to come and to tell you because we ourselves would prefer to know.”
“Of course I want to know,” she said warmly. “And, yes, thank you for coming and telling me. It doesn’t make it any easier. In fact, it probably makes it worse, but at least I know Chad wasn’t being stupid in the parking lot or unaware. He really had no chance.”
“No, he didn’t,” Talon said. “He was targeted.”
“And I have to admit,” she said, feeling a huge weight come off her shoulders, “maybe it releases some of my guilt.”
“Why guilt?” Laszlo asked.
“Because I was having trouble with somebody at the time, and I told Chad about it. He said he’d check into it. And he was dead three months later. At the time I was terrified it was related to him checking into my problem. And, since my problem stopped when he died, I figured that was just more proof that I had a hand in his death.”
Talon leaned forward, his arms resting on his knees. “What are you talking about?”
She gave him a quick glance. “I thought I had a stalker. I kept looking around, and somebody always seemed to be there. A Lexus that kept following me. I didn’t know what he wanted. I finally told Chad about him, and he said he’d see if he could find out who it was.”
“A black Lexus was following you?” Talon asked.
She frowned. “I didn’t tell you the Lexus was black.”
“No, but we suspect the driver of a black Lexus was connected to your brother’s death.”
“At least it’s the same type of vehicle, but that doesn’t mean the same driver. We don’t know anything at this point,” Laszlo corrected. “Our killer was driving a Lexus in Santa Fe. We can’t be sure it’s the same one. We can’t even be sure it’s the same model. But he had a penchant for Lexus vehicles. Although that doesn’t mean he used them to commit crimes.”
She sat back. “Do you have a picture of the killer?”
Talon reached in his pocket, then stopped and glanced at Laszlo. “I left mine in my pack. Do you have a copy?”
Laszlo pulled several photos from his pocket. He handed the printed images to Clary.
“This is him,” Clary said.
“This is a man we only know as John Smith.”
“Right, great name.” She tapped the paper with her finger. “This is one of the guys. But it’s not the second one.” She shuffled through the photos. “Don’t you have a picture of the other one?”
Both men stared at her. In a low voice Talon asked, “Who’s the other one?”
She frowned. “He’s the man who started stalking me. And then this guy stepped in. I crossed paths with them at a coffee shop. They were having a conversation. When they realized I’d seen them, I didn’t see the other guy anymore, and this one took over. Honestly it was the most bizarre thing.” She watched as Talon and Laszlo exchanged a hard glance.
Talon turned to her. “Can you describe the other one?”
She frowned. “Why?”
“Because we think he might be the one who hired the man who killed your brother.”
Talon waited with bated breath while he watched her contemplate this news.
She got up for a moment, then turned back to him and said, “Excuse me.” She went into the kitchen.
They could hear her rummaging around in one of the drawers. “What is she looking for?” Laszlo asked.
“No idea,” Talon answered. “But if she can identify the other man …”
“Doesn’t mean he’s the boss. It could be another hired gun or could be somebody who was an intermediary,” Laszlo said.
“It’s a line to tug. And we need any and all lines there are.”
Laszlo nodded. “That’s true.”
“Again we don’t know anything for sure at this point.”
Laszlo nodded.
“That’s something we can ask Mason to look into,” Talon said. “We’re talking a long time ago. That’s the problem.”
“Not all that long ago,” Clary announced as she walked into the living room. She held several sketchbooks in her hands. “I thought I saw him here again about a month ago. Actually he looked straight past me, so I don’t know. Maybe I imagined it.”
At that news Talon bolted upright. “You saw him one month ago?”
“Maybe. I don’t really know.”
Talon looked at Laszlo. “Maybe the boss lives here. Maybe the Lexus is his.”
“In which case, we have to talk to all the Lexus owners in town.”
“Good luck with that. This is San Diego. There’s got to be thousands of them here.”
“I don’t suppose you happen to know what model?”
She shrugged. “Black. That’s all I can tell you.”
The two men nodded. Laszlo brought out a notebook and jotted down some of the things she’d said.
She flipped open the top of one of her sketchbooks and held out the first picture. “This is the guy I think is in your photograph.”
It was a quick rough sketch, and yet it captured the bearded man in their photographs perfectly. As Talon looked at the drawing, he remembered just how gifted an artist she had been. But she’d never done portraits before. “Since when did you start doing faces? You always hated them.”
“I hated a lot of things back then. And what I was doing wasn’t working, so I decided to switch and find something that would work.”
He studied her face, sensing so much more behind her words, but she wasn’t giving anything away. He flipped through the pages, but they were blank. He grinned. “You still hate reusing a book, once you’ve drawn on the first page, don’t you?”
She shrugged, self-conscious. “I’ve gotten better at it. I can’t just keep using the top page and not the others,” she admitted. “But I do tend to keep a lot of blank pages in between. The rest of that book is empty.”
He handed the sketchbook to Laszlo.
Laszlo whistled. “This is really good,” he said admiringly.
She chuckled. “Thanks.”
“No, I mean it. This is good. Do you do this professionally?”
She shrugged. “I have an art gallery that’s interested in my work. The owner has been trying to get me back to my art. He says it doesn’t matter when I do the show, just to pick up a pencil again.” She gave him a lopsided smile. “I told him that I wasn’t sure I was staying in town, and he didn’t seem to care. Said paintings were shipped all over the world.”
“Chad’s death?” Talon hazarded a guess.
She nodded. “I was doing a lot of artwork as a way to get through my terrible marriage. Then I got separated and lost Chad. That kind of made me hit the brakes. It’s been hard to get my mojo back.”
“We both understand that,” Talon said. “But you’re very talented. Don’t quit.”
Self-consciously she opened the next sketchbook. “I saw them at the coffee shop. This is what I did afterward. I don’t think you will be able to identify him from it.” She handed the second sketchbook to Talon.
And again on the top page was a restaurant scene with the men farther in the distance, one very identifiable, and thankfully very dead, and the second one sitting across from him, both huddling over coffee, heads closer together as if talking privately. He studied the second man’s face, then shook his head. “I don’t recognize him.” He handed the book to Laszlo, then froze and motioned for Laszlo to hand it over again. “I don’t recognize him, but …” He lifted his gaze. “There’s something almost familiar about him.”
“And that’s even worse,” Laszlo said. “Because it’ll just sit there and bug you until you figure it out.” When Talon handed the image back, Laszlo took a turn, twisting the image side to side; then he glanced at Clary and asked, “Do you have any others like this?”
She shook her head. “No. I had a lot that I drew leading up to this,” she admitted. “But, once I got those down, I just tossed the rest. Honestly I had forgotten about them. When Chad started to look into the issue, it just went away.”
“I suspect what they did was change targets,” Laszlo said.
“But why us?” Clary asked.
“No way to know for sure,” Laszlo said. “You might have seen them without knowing it. They may have panicked. Before that, there was nothing to link you to them.”
“My brother is a link to Talon,” she protested. “Surely that’s something.”
Talon nodded. “And, as long as you haven’t seen anybody since, then you’re probably in the free and clear.”
“Except I just saw him a month ago.”
“But he didn’t see you, right?”
She frowned. “I don’t think so. And, even if he did, I don’t think he’d have recognized me. I’m not sure anybody would have recognized me actually. I’d been at a costume party and was wearing a cosplay outfit from The Legend of Zelda.”
He stared at her in surprise. “Really?”
She nodded. “I went as an anime character first to the parties. Then I decided to go as Link.”
Laszlo chuckled. “Depending on how well you were dressed up, maybe he didn’t recognize you.”
She walked over to the credenza on the far wall, where she picked up an envelope. It was a large brown business envelope. She pulled out several prints. “This is a picture of me from that night.”
The two men laughed.
“That’s great,” Talon said. True enough she looked identical to the main character. “And you’re right. He probably didn’t recognize you. And that’s a good thing.”
“Why?”
“Because, if he didn’t recognize you, he won’t worry that you recognized him.”
“What difference does it make?”
“Because, if he is still around, he hasn’t finished his business. If he’s still around, chances are he’s still keeping an eye on you. Have you had that weird sensation of being stalked anymore?”
She sat down with a thump. “No, not really,” she said slowly. And then she stopped.
Talon leaned forward. “But?”
“I found the house doors unlocked a week ago, and then, a few days ago, the living room window was wide open.” She shrugged. “I’ve never opened these living room windows, and I’m very cautious about the doors being locked because it’s just me here now. I’m always looking after my parents’ house and this one.” Then she shrugged and said, “I’m sure it’s nothing.”
“Oh, it’s more than nothing,” Talon said, his voice hard. “As a matter of fact, I’m pretty damn sure it’s a very big something.”