Allison Brennan - Fear No Evil

He was at a loss for words. He was a trained psychiatrist and all he wanted to do was hug her and tell her everything would be fine. But it wasn’t fine and he couldn’t lie to her.

“I called home and told everyone you were safe.”

Lucy didn’t say anything. Dillon continued. “We’re going to take you home tomorrow morning.”

“Fine,” she said, her voice far away. “I’m really tired,” she added, turning away from him.

“The doctor gave her a mild sedative,” Miranda explained.

Dillon said, “Okay. I love you, Luce.”

He turned for the door. Behind him, he heard Lucy’s voice. “Thank you, Dil.”

Miranda followed Dillon out. He rubbed his moist eyes, wishing he could trade places with his little sister. Miranda touched his arm.

“I know I don’t have to tell you that it will get better with time,” she said to him.

“I hate that she’s suffering.”

“Give her space. You want to help, she knows that. But you have to give her time to sort through what happened on her own.”

“I just wish I could go back to Thursday morning and change everything,” he said.

“You love her. That’s what she needs. Love. And time. Watch her, care for her, she’ll let you know when and if she wants to talk and who she wants to talk to. Every woman is different. You can’t put rape survivors in the same box.”

“I know that in my head, but in my heart-”

“She’s your sister. You can’t be her brother and her shrink. She’ll respond to your love and concern much better if she doesn’t think you’re waiting for her to fall apart.”

The elevator doors opened and Dillon turned to see Carina walking briskly down the hall.

Carina ran straight into Dillon’s arms, hugged him tightly. He returned the hug, letting his tears finally flow.

“Oh God, Dillon, it’s over.”

Dillon didn’t correct her. In the back of his mind he couldn’t help but think about Adam Scott waiting for his chance to get to Kate.

Carina stepped back. “Where’s Lucy?”

“In here.” Miranda led Carina into the room.

Through the doorway, Dillon watched Lucy reach for Carina, hug her tightly, and cry.

He turned away and saw Quinn Peterson approach. “How’s Lucy?” he asked.

“Alive. Safe. Thanks for asking Miranda to help.”

Quinn said, “Miranda knows what it’s like to survive Hell. Lucy is in good hands.”

Dillon rubbed his eyes, tired and weary. “What did Roger Morton have to say?”

“Not a word. Called his lawyer. We have him isolated. No phone calls, no visitors. I’m going to let him sit today and go back at him tomorrow.”

“But he could have key information about Adam Scott’s location.”

Quinn nodded. “Probably. But he’s not talking right now, and I can’t read his mind.”

“I want to talk to him.”

“I don’t think that’s a good idea.” He nodded toward Dillon’s hands, which were scraped and red from the beating he had given Roger.

“There’s other ways to get information.”

“You’re not going to beat it out of him.”

Dillon almost smiled. “No, not really my style.”

“Tomorrow morning. You can sit in on my formal interview with him. Hopefully his attorney will tell him to turn on Scott in the hopes of cutting a deal.”

“A deal?” Dillon exclaimed.

“I didn’t say we would. We’re talking the difference between life and death, not life and ten years. Roger Morton is never going to be a free man.”

“There are no leads on Scott?”

“Your brother Jack gave us a good description, so we used a forensic artist to update the old school picture we have based on Jack’s comments. It’s being sent to every law enforcement agency in the country and he’s now an FBI Most Wanted. I have a pair of agents in New York tracking down family and friends. His parents are dead. Car accident eight years ago.”

“Adam Scott is a methodical killer. He would have had a reason to kill his parents.”

“Money. Except that his father had disowned him years before, severed all ties with him. We don’t know why. So Scott received nothing from the estate. I have financial and legal experts going through the records, starting from when Scott was expelled. We’re going to try to piece together his past, but the car accident may be just that, an accident.”

“It’ll take weeks,” Dillon said. “We don’t have weeks. He’s going to go after Kate.”

“He’s waited for years to go after her. He’s patient,” Peterson said.

“True, but his entire network has been destroyed. He doesn’t care about Morton and Denise and the others on the island. It’s his financial network. Not being able to launder money through Ullman. Having his identity known. His legitimate assets seized. This is about revenge now. Payback.” Dillon frowned.

“What?”

“He has nothing to lose. Before, he had time and money to play with her. But now he’s going to be scrambling to stay one step ahead of us. His picture is all over the media. His money’s been cut off. He probably has alternate identification, but he isn’t going to leave the country without first trying to kill Kate. He sees her as the reason for his failure and will feel an urgent need to make her pay so he can rebuild. He has patience, but less than you think. I don’t think he ever knew where she was in Mexico.”

“But he said-”

Dillon shook his head. “He’s a liar. You can’t believe what he says. If he knew where she was, he would have gone after her instead of Lucy. He smoked her out, made her-and you-believe he knew where she was. That makes her a sitting duck because now he knows . He’s been savoring this revenge for five years.”

“We cut off some of his money and resources, but he didn’t lose a fraction of his assets then.”

“But a woman thwarted him. A woman figured out his game. That eats at him like nothing else. To him, women are receptacles to serve him. They only exist to give him pleasure. They are worthless and lesser humans.”

Peterson grabbed his vibrating cell phone off his belt loop. “Peterson. Okay, I’ll be right there.”

He said to Dillon, “Mick Mallory is in recovery. I have clearance from his doctor to talk to him. Want to sit in?”

Dillon followed Peterson to the elevator and they went down to the second floor. “Jack believes Adam Scott was using Mallory as a hostage to lure Kate off the mountain, or to see if she sent backup. Scott must have seen what happened on the island-we have checkpoints set up all around the San Juan Islands and he hasn’t shown. We found an abandoned boat in Bellingham that has evidence that Lucy was on it. We think he left the island to meet Kate in the mountains, and either one of his people told him about the raid on the island, or he watched it on the webcam before you destroyed it.”

Peterson glanced at Dillon. “He knows who you are now.”

“I think he’s always known who I was. And everyone else in the family. He wouldn’t have gone after Lucy without knowing. But why her?”

“I should be asking you that question.”

“If I had to guess it’s because she reminds him of someone. Or she was a challenge. Or she was easy.” Dillon rubbed his face. “Seriously, I think she responded to him online, the easy part, and he researched her, learned about her family. Considered Lucy a challenge. He despises authority. His father was a judge. He was expelled from school. He’s never worked for anyone other than himself. He’s always been in charge, even when he was younger. He doesn’t take orders or advice from others. Every decision is his, but when things go wrong he’ll be the first to blame the other people involved. They aren’t worthy, they aren’t smart enough, they don’t see his vision.”