Sandra Brown - Lethal

“But the main reason I came with you has to do with Eddie.”

“What about him?”

“You’ve raised two questions that I want answered. One, was his death really an accident?”

“It was made to look like it, but I don’t think it was.”

“I have to know,” she said with feeling. “If he died of an accident, that’s one thing. Tragic, but acceptable. Fate. God’s will. Whatever. But if someone caused the crash that killed him, I want them punished for it.”

“Fair enough. What’s the second question?”

“Was Eddie a bad cop or a good cop? I know the answer to that one. I want you convinced of it, too.”

“I don’t care one way or the other,” he said, meaning it. “He’s dead. All I care about is identifying The Bookkeeper and putting him out of business. The rest of it, including your dead husband’s reputation, makes no difference to me.”

“Well, it makes a huge difference to me. And it will to Stan.” She gestured to the cell phone still in his hand. “I should call him, tell him we’re okay.”

He shook his head and pocketed the phone.

“He’ll be beside himself when we turn up missing.”

“I’m sure he will be.”

“He’ll fear the worst.”

“That you’re at the mercy of a killer.”

“He won’t know otherwise. So, please-”

“No.”

“That’s cruel.”

“So’s life. You can’t call him. I don’t trust him.”

“You mistrust on principle.”

“Now you’re catching on.”

“But you trust me.”

He looked at her askance. “What gave you that idea?”

“To have dragged me along with you, you must trust me to some extent.”

“Not as far as I can throw you. Probably even less than you trust me. But, like it or not, we’re dependent on each other.”

“How is that?”

“You need my protection to survive. I need you in order to get what I came after.”

“I’ve told you repeatedly-”

“I know what you’ve told me, but-”

“Mommy?”

The kid’s voice interrupted him. Honor dragged her vexed gaze off him and looked back at her daughter. “What, sweetheart?”

“Are you mad?”

Honor reached over the car seat and patted Emily’s knee. “No, I’m not mad.”

“Is Coburn mad?”

Hearing the kid say his name caused his gut to clench. He’d never heard his name spoken in a child’s voice. It sounded different.

Honor pasted on a smile and lied through her teeth. “No, he’s not mad either.”

“He looks mad.”

“He’s not. He’s just… just…”

He did his earnest best not to look angry. “I’m not mad.”

The kid didn’t buy it. Not entirely, but she switched subjects. “I have to tinkle.”

Honor looked at Coburn, a silent question in her expression. He shrugged. “If she’s gotta go, she’s gotta go.”

“Can we drive to a gas station? I could take her-”

“Un-huh. She can go in the bushes.”

Honor debated it for about fifteen seconds, then was prompted with a plaintive “Mom-mee.” She opened the car door and got out. As she helped Emily from the backseat, she told her that they were going to have an adventure and led her by the hand to the rear of the car.

Coburn heard nothing more except a few conspiratorial whispers. Emily giggled once. He tried to block out the practical implications of a female having to pee in the great outdoors and instead to concentrate on more pressing problems. Like deciding what to do next. As Honor had said, they couldn’t keep driving around in a stolen car.

So where could they go? Not to his place. It was sure to be staked out. He didn’t trust Stan Gillette to safeguard them. He was in thick with the Hawkins brothers, so chances were good he was crooked. Honor was certain of his love and loyalty to her and Emily, but Coburn wasn’t ready to accept that, not without seeing evidence of it for himself. Gillette could also be a law-abiding former Marine who would feel honor-bound to notify the authorities immediately. In which case he still had to be rejected.

The deed done, Emily opened the passenger-side door and grinned across at him. “I did it!”

“Congratulations.”

“Can I ride in front?” she asked.

“No, you cannot.” Honor guided her into the backseat.

“But I don’t have my car seat.”

“No, you don’t.” Honor shot a condemning glance at Coburn for abandoning the kid seat along with her car. “We’ll break the rule just this once,” she told Emily as she helped her to buckle up.

When Honor was once again in the passenger seat, Coburn asked, “Do you know of someplace we can go?”

“You mean to hide?”

“That’s exactly what I mean. We’ve gotta stay out of sight until I can get through to Hamilton.”

She nodded thoughtfully. “I know where we can go.”

Tom VanAllen was awakened early that morning with the startling news that Fred Hawkins was dead and that Honor Gillette and her child were missing from their home. Both the murder and the kidnapping were attributed to Lee Coburn.

When Tom shared this news with Janice, she registered total disbelief, and then remorse. “I feel terrible about the unflattering things I said about Fred yesterday.”

“If it’s any comfort to you, he would have died instantly. He probably didn’t feel a thing.” He told her about Doral’s finding the body.

“That’s horrible. They were so close.” After a moment of silence, she asked, “What were they doing at Honor Gillette’s house?”

He told her about the discovery of the boat. “It was a few miles from her house, but near enough to worry them, so Fred went to check on her. According to Doral, when Fred arrived he found that the house had been tossed.”

“Tossed?”

He described the condition of the house as it had been described to him by Deputy Sheriff Crawford. “Fred’s body was lying just inside the front door. Coburn apparently came up behind him.”

“Just like he shot Sam Marset.”

“Looks like. Anyway, I need to go, see it for myself.”

He hated having to leave the house before helping her with the arduous morning routine of getting Lanny cleaned, dressed, and fed. Because he couldn’t chew or swallow, Lanny got his nourishment through a feeding tube. Mealtimes weren’t pleasant.

Janice, however, was understanding about duty taking him away. She told him she could handle things at the house and for him not to worry. “This is a crisis situation. You’re needed.” As she saw him off, she whispered in his ear, “Be careful,” and even went up on tiptoe to kiss his cheek.

Most of his work was done sitting behind a desk. He supposed that the exciting elements of this case represented to Janice more of what she’d had in mind when he told her he wanted to become an agent for the FBI. He surprised and pleased her by kissing her back.

He got lost twice on the back roads but finally found the Gillette place, arriving just as Crawford was about to leave. The two introduced themselves and shook hands. Crawford brought him up to speed.

“I’ve turned it over to our CSU. They’ve got their hands full with this one. Your agents have come and gone. They’re meeting me back in town, where we’ll set up phone lines, organize a task force, divide the labor. Tambour P.D. has offered us space for a command center on their top floor.”

“Yes, I talked to my men on my drive down. I emphasized that cooperation is key, and that priority one is to find Mrs. Gillette and the child before they come to harm.”

Crawford looked at him with an implied Duh , which Tom tried to disregard. “Anything enlightening come from Doral Hawkins?”

“Not much. He says he received an excited call from his brother just as dawn was breaking. Got here as fast as he could. Fred’s boat was tied up at the dock. First sign that something was out of joint, the front door of the house was standing open.”