Allison Brennan - Killing Fear

The reporter bristled. “I’m not being stupid, Robin. I know what I’m doing.”

“Do you?”

“I think he’s after Will Hooper.”

“I’ll alert the media,” Robin said sarcastically, a pang of fear in her chest. She didn’t want Will dead. “That’s no big revelation. He killed Detective Sturgeon, the other cop who arrested him. It makes sense that he’ll go after Will, too.”

“It’s personal with him.”

“Isn’t murder always personal?”

“Why are you asking me the questions?”

“Why are you buying Theodore Glenn’s act? I knew the man. He’s the biggest manipulator on the planet. He thrives on these twisted games.”

“He knew about you and Will,” Trinity said quietly.

He saw us. Watched us, that night in the bar.

Will’s words from last night came back to her.

He’d told her Glenn had watched them, but she hadn’t asked how he’d come by that information. Now it made sense; a sick, twisted, obscene sense.

Robin said, “You told Will about this?”

Trinity nodded.

“Who else?”

“No one.”

“Really?” She stood to pour herself a shot of her favorite Reposado tequila and slammed it back; the smooth, flavorful liquor coating her senses.

“I told Will in private,” Trinity said. “I didn’t put it into the official record. I probably made a big mistake, but I like Will. I don’t want him to be hurt by this.”

“What does he want?”

“Will?”

“Glenn.”

“He wants to find out who killed Anna Clark,” Trinity said.

Robin slammed her fist on the counter. “He killed Anna!” she shouted.

She turned, head down, and put her hands on her knees. Took deep breaths. What was going on with her? Theodore Glenn was succeeding in breaking her. God, what if he really was after Will to hurt her? Why? Because she refused his advances? Because she never played his little games at RJ’s? Because she knew exactly who and what he was and steered clear of him?

You never thought he would kill.

Not until it happened, then she couldn’t imagine how she hadn’t seen it sooner. Found a way to stop him.

“I think he wanted you,” Trinity said quietly. “He said something to me that only makes sense now that I know he wasn’t lying about you and Will Hooper.”

She stared at Trinity, lips drawn tight.

“I didn’t tell Will. I meant to, but after I told him about Glenn watching you and Will being intimate, Will got all weirded out.”

“What didn’t you tell him?”

“You were supposed to be next, but you refused to go out with him. And he was furious.”

The words sunk in. Robin sat down heavily on a bar stool, unable to stand.

“I think Glenn got jealous,” Trinity said quietly.

“Jealous?”

“Of Will. That you chose Will over him. And he wants to make someone pay for it. You? Will? I don’t know, to be honest, I’m not a shrink. But he’s obsessing over both of you, I saw that when he talked to me. I need your help, Robin.”

“My help? What can I do? Believe me, I will shoot Theodore Glenn before I talk to him.”

“I don’t think he killed Anna Clark.”

Robin pleaded with Trinity. “Don’t believe a word he says! He’s a killer. You can’t listen to him.”

“I’ve been going over the court transcripts and all the evidence. Anna doesn’t fit the profile. She never had a relationship with Glenn.”

“Serial killers change M.O. all the time,” Robin said. She’d read too much about serial killers in the last few years; trying to understand why Anna died and she didn’t, why Theodore Glenn wanted to kill her friends in the first place. Nothing made sense to her, maybe because she couldn’t think like a killer.

“In your testimony, you said that Anna was supposed to be in Big Bear visiting her mother.”

“Yes.”

“And you thought she’d be gone for a week.”

“Yes.”

“But she came back after only two days. Why was she back in the apartment that night? Why didn’t you know?”

Robin had wondered the same thing for a long, long time.

“I don’t know why she didn’t call me, but Anna didn’t like being alone. Since her mother was late, she might have decided to just come home and drive back at the end of the week. They had a complex relationship, I didn’t really understand it at the time.”

“But you stated that everyone at RJ’s thought Anna would be gone all week, right? It was no secret.”

“I don’t understand what you’re saying.”

“Anna was not the intended victim.”

Robin stared at the reporter.

“I think you were. And I don’t think it was Theodore Glenn who wanted you dead. I believed him when he told me he didn’t kill Anna. What other enemies did you have, Robin? Who else would want you dead?”

Their meeting with the Fed had just broken up when Will’s cell phone rang. He was at first surprised to see Robin’s business number on his cell phone, then worried that something might have happened.

“Hooper.”

“Why didn’t you tell me that Theodore attacked a reporter?” Robin demanded.

“Trinity? I-”

She interrupted. “You didn’t tell me Glenn told Trinity about our relationship! Or that he’s telling everyone he didn’t kill Anna. I can’t believe you’d keep that from me!”

“Robin, calm down. I’ll come over and we can talk about this-”

“What’s there to talk about? You don’t believe him, do you?”

Will swallowed. He wasn’t certain what he believed, but he had to look at the facts and right now, Glenn just didn’t look good for Anna’s murder. Will wasn’t ready to declare him innocent of that death, but Causey had okayed him to quietly look into the case with Agent Vigo. Vigo was willing to take the heat if something went south on the case-including putting himself up to the media as the whipping boy-which placed him way up there on the good guy list for Will.

“You do. You believe him. How could you, Will?”

“We need to talk, Robin-”

She hung up.

Hans Vigo approached. “Everything okay?”

“That was Robin McKenna. She’s not ready to accept that Glenn might not have killed her roommate. Shit, why did Trinity go talk to her in the first place?”

“She’s searching for answers. Maybe she thinks Robin knows something important.”

“She doesn’t. She’s been traumatized enough.”

“We’re going to need to talk to Robin later. She might know something she doesn’t realize is important. If Glenn is truly not guilty of killing Anna Clark, we have a lot of work to do.”

“On the QT,” Will added.

“Absolutely.” Vigo paused. “What do you know about Jim Gage?”

“You don’t think-”

“If Glenn isn’t guilty, we need to look at people who have the access and knowledge of evidence collection-”

“I vouch for Jim. He dated my partner for three years. I just can’t see him as being capable of murder-he’s one of the most even-tempered people I know.”

“We’ll probably need to bring him in on this, but he can’t talk about it with anyone else. And you need to have a talk with that reporter,” Vigo added. “If she keeps flapping her mouth, she could be putting herself in the middle of a train wreck.”

“No argument there,” Will concurred. “But don’t discount that Glenn could just be playing with us.”

“I haven’t. But I don’t see what benefit he gets from it. You’re going to have to accept the fact that someone else might have killed Anna Clark, and the only person who would have known each detail of the crime would have been someone who worked at least one of the previous three crime scenes.”