Love Inspired Suspense March 2015 - Box Set 1 of 2: Protection DetailHidden AgendaBroken Silence Page 5

  “You have any idea which way the perp headed?” Chase asked, jogging up beside him, Valor sniffing at the ground and then the air, his ears perked, his tail still.

  “I’d guess he went into the woods. No way would he head toward the road. Not with police everywhere. If he’d gone toward the back of the house, Valor would have heard him.”

  Chase nodded. “You want me to take Valor in to look for him while you fill the DC guys in?”

  What Gavin really wanted to do was go into the woods himself, hunt the guy down. But he’d been at the scene, spoken to the perp, looked in the guy’s eyes.

  “Yes,” he responded reluctantly. “Radio in if you find anything.”

  “Will do!” Chase raced away, Valor loping along beside him.

  Gavin jogged back to the house. Three officers were inside, two hovering over Cassie as she pressed what looked like a dish towel to Paul’s shoulder.

  The third was beside Glory, murmuring something to the dog that Gavin couldn’t hear. Glory’s tail thumped, and she managed to get onto her feet, her gait a little stiff as she walked to Gavin’s side. No blood that he could see. No evidence of a knife wound.

  He frowned, touching what looked like singed hair on her flank.

  “Looks like a Taser,” one of the officers said. Young with gaunt face and a narrow frame, he looked like a high school kid. He was right, though. It seemed as though Glory had been Tased.

  If that was the case, she’d recover well.

  Relief coursed through him, and he scratched behind her ears, looked into her eyes. “Good job, Glory,” he said, offering the praise she craved.

  In their three years working together, Glory had never been injured, never been ill, never missed a day of work. She loved her job, and even now, she seemed excited, her tail wagging, her eyes bright.

  Paul, on the other hand, had lost every bit of his color. Gavin knelt beside him, nudging in close to Cassie, feeling the corded muscles of her shoulder and arm as he set his hand over hers, added more pressure to the wound.

  “How far out is the ambulance?” he asked, glancing at one of the officers, wondering if he could apply enough pressure to staunch the blood. Wondering if it was too late for that to do any good.

  “Should be coming up the driveway now.”

  “Someone needs to bring them in. We’re on limited time.”

  “Not that limited,” Paul murmured, his eyes still closed. “I got a fifteenth wedding anniversary coming up. I die, and my wife will kill me.”

  If the situation hadn’t been so dire, Gavin would have laughed. “You’ve got big plans for your anniversary?” he asked. He needed to keep Anderson conscious and talking.

  “Cruising to the Bahamas. Wife’s been planning this trip for years. If I don’t make it, she’ll kill me.” He opened his eyes, offered a smile that was more a grimace. “Also, I got a score to settle with someone, and I’m not going anywhere until I settle it.”

  “You’re not going anywhere, period,” Cassie cut in, her tone brusque and matter-of-fact. Her hand was steady beneath Gavin’s, her expression calm. “Except the hospital. Where they’ll fix you up and get you ready for that big anniversary trip.”

  “Right,” Paul rasped. Gavin wasn’t sure he believed Cassie’s words, but he was putting on a good show, making an effort to stay conscious.

  Gavin had seen people live through worse injuries. He’d seen them die with lesser ones. God was in control of the outcome. Not willpower. Not medical intervention. It had taken a long time for Gavin to believe that, to accept it.

  An ambulance crew hurried in, and Gavin put a hand on Cassie’s elbow, helping her to her feet as the medical team moved in and began to stabilize Paul.

  A living room opened out to the left of the foyer, and he brought her there, waiting as the crew stabilized Paul and lifted him onto the gurney.

  “I’ll ride along with them,” one of the DC police officers offered.

  Good. Gavin didn’t want Paul to be alone, but he wasn’t willing to leave Cassie and the kids. The perp hadn’t been playing games, and he hadn’t intended for Cassie to survive.

  Gavin met her eyes, saw the fear she’d been keeping at bay.

  “You okay?” he asked, and she nodded, her gaze skittering away.

  “Fine.” She shrugged away from his hold, marched through the living room and into the kitchen. The place looked like a war zone—broken window, blood, shards of glass and bits of wood.

  “This is a crime scene, Cassie. You need to stay out until we can process it,” Gavin said because it was true, and because he didn’t want Cassie anywhere near the broken window or door

  “Can I wash my hands?” She held them up. They were covered in blood and shaking. A lot.

  “How about you do it in the bathroom upstairs?” He took her arm, felt her muscles trembling as he turned her around and guided her back into the hall. It wasn’t much better in there. Blood on the floor, door open, soot staining the walls and floor.

  Officers were there, processing the scene and collecting evidence, but he kept himself between Cassie and the door as they walked to the stairs. The perp was bold, and he had plenty to lose. No way was Gavin going to give him another shot at Cassie.

  She didn’t look at him and didn’t speak.

  He let her have her silence.

  They’d have to talk eventually, but he’d give her time to clean up, get her thoughts and emotions together. It was obvious she needed to do both. She was visibly shaking, her teeth chattering as she walked up the first three steps. She reached the fourth and swayed, grabbing the railing with bloodstained hands.

  He touched her back, steadying her. “Want to sit down for a minute?”

  “I’m fine.”

  “You look a little shaky.”

  “I am, but I’m not going to fall on my face or tumble down the stairs and break my neck. The kids need me.”

  “It’s okay to be upset, Cassie,” he said.

  “I didn’t think I needed permission, but thanks.”

  “Your sarcasm is charming,” he responded. The best thing he could offer her was something to focus on besides the blood on her hands and on her shirt, the bruise on her cheek, the memory of whatever she’d been through before he’d arrived.

  “Thanks for trying,” she said, glancing over her shoulder and offering a wan smile. “But a sparring match isn’t going to distract me. Not when I can smell the blood on my hands. Not when I can still hear the glass shattering, see Officer Anderson falling.”

  “You’ll feel better once you get cleaned up,” he said, and she shook her head.

  “No. I won’t. I’m not going to feel better until I hear that Officer Anderson is going to be okay.” She reached the top of the stairs, paused outside the bathroom. “But, I’m going to get cleaned up, anyway. I told Virginia to tell the kids everything was okay and keep them in their rooms. I don’t want any of them to see me like this.” She plucked at her shirt and frowned.

  “Good idea. We don’t want them any more scared than they already are,” he responded, knowing that she was more concerned about that then about herself and the trauma she’d been through.

  “Exactly.” She stepped into the bathroom, flicked on the light. She didn’t turn on the water. Just stood staring at the chipped sink as if she didn’t quite know what she was supposed to do there.

  He reached past her, turned on the water. “There you go. Wash up.”

  “Sorry. Thanks.” She grabbed soap, shoved her hands under the water.

  He waited, his gaze dropping to the little chip in the white porcelain. He knew how it had gotten there. Knew how long it had taken to hang the oversize mirror on the wall, how many tiles it had taken to finish the floor. He’d helped Harland do both the year he’d turned sixteen. Part of his restitution for stealing the congressman’s wallet. That was how they’d met. Gavin, a brash and angry foster kid who’d barely qualified for his Junior class trip to DC, and Harland, a veteran congressman who
liked to eat lunch near the Washington Monument, sitting on a bench and enjoying the spring weather. Gavin had seen the wallet hanging out of Harland’s back pocket as he walked by with his class, and he hadn’t been able to resist.

  He’d grabbed it, had about two seconds to celebrate the victory before Harland snagged the back of his shirt and told him to give it back.

  He pushed aside the memory, forced himself back to the present. Cassie seemed intent on scrubbing every bit of skin off her palms.

  “I think your hands are clean.”

  She frowned, staring at her scrubbed hands. “They don’t feel clean.”

  “That might take a little longer,” he responded gently, turning off the water, offering her the hand towel that hung from the little rack he’d installed.

  “Thanks.” She smiled. A real smile. A sweet one, and he found himself looking at her. Really seeing her. The long red lashes and deep green eyes. The freckles on her cheeks and nose. She was a beautiful woman. No doubt about that. She was also his key witness, and he had to keep her alive, keep her talking, keep her remembering everything she’d seen. “Gavin! You upstairs?” someone called.

  Gavin knew the voice. He’d been working with Adam Donovan long enough to recognize it. The guy had a keen ability to separate important details from extraneous. He and his Doberman, Ace, were well known for their success in tracking criminals.

  “Right here.” He walked to the top of the stairs, Glory padding along beside him. She seemed okay. Better than okay. She seemed back to normal. Being Tased didn’t seem to have done any long-term damage.

  “Glory okay? I heard a call went out for the vet.”

  “She’s good. I’m going to have the vet take a look at her, and I’m not working her for a while, but she seems to be fully recovered.”

  “You want me to go out and find your guy?”

  “Chase is already out with Valor, and there’s at least one DC K-9 team with them. It might be better if you help with evidence collection. We’ve got a lot of information to sort through and several crimes. A murder. Two shootings. A potential attempt at arson.”

  “I saw the hazmat team as I arrived,” Adam said. “You call them in?”

  “We’ve got an accelerant on the back porch. I thought it best if they take care of it.”

  Adam nodded. “You think there’s a connection between what happened tonight and the body that was found at President’s Park? The woman was Harland Jeffries’s maid.”

  “I don’t know, but I think we need to look into it.”

  “Are you talking about Rosa Gomez?” Cassie walked out of the bathroom. She must have splashed water on her face. The edges of her hair were damp, a few tendrils curling along the line of her jaw.

  “That’s right.” Adam smiled, but his gaze was sharp. He was as good at questioning witnesses and victims as he was at tracking criminals. “Did you know her?”

  “Yes. She used to bring her son over every few days. She helped with some of the cleaning, and the kids and I watched Juan.”

  “He’s here now, isn’t he?” Adam asked.

  He knew the answer.

  It was common knowledge that two-year-old Juan was staying at All Our Kids until his mother’s family could be located. Since no father was listed on the birth certificate, relatives of Rosa’s were the only option for giving him permanency outside of the foster system.

  “Yes. We’re just an interim placement for him. CPS is trying to locate extended family. If they’re able to do that, it will be the best place for Juan.”

  “I’m sure it would be,” Adam agreed. “You ever have any long talks with Rosa? She ever mention who her son’s father was?”

  Subtle, Gavin wanted to say.

  He kept his mouth shut, waited for Cassie’s answer.

  “No. She never talked about anything personal.” Cassie brushed a strand of hair from her cheek, her fingers trembling slightly. “Is there some reason why you think her death is connected to what happened tonight?”

  “Yeah,” Adam responded. “I don’t believe in coincidence. Two people connected to the congressman are killed in less than three days. It’s a stretch to think the deaths aren’t related.”

  “I thought Rosa’s death was an accident.” Cassie frowned.

  Gavin cut into the conversation. “It might have been.”

  The fact was, Rosa’s death hadn’t been ruled an accident by anyone but the media. Congressman Jeffries’s housekeeper had been found at the bottom of a cliff, her purse and wallet missing, her cell phone gone. Police suspected foul play, but in the absence of physical evidence and witnesses, they couldn’t prove it. They were digging hard, trying to find a suspect and motive, but so far, they’d come up empty.

  “Which means it might not have been,” she added. “So, how about you explain why you think her death might have been murder.”

  “How about we just concentrate on figuring out what happened tonight?” Gavin tried to reroute the conversation, get it back to where he wanted to be.

  “How about I go downstairs and see if the DC team has come up with anything useful?” Adam said dryly. “Then, I’ll head back to the congressman’s house. Brooke left for…” He glanced at Cassie, frowned. “The potential witness’s house an hour ago. She should be calling in soon.”

  Good. Gavin was anxious to hear what Erin had to say about her visit to the Jeffries mansion. “Sounds good. I’ll want an in-person update from her once she’s spoken to the witness. How about we meet at headquarters in a couple of hours?”

  “You want the entire team?”

  “Everyone who’s not on duty.”

  “Will do.” He walked away, and Gavin turned his attention back to Cassie.

  “I need to interview you, and then I’ll need to talk to the kids.”

  “The kids—”

  “A man is dead,” Gavin cut in. “Two more have been injured. I think that’s a good reason to ask a few more questions. I’ll start with you. Then, I’ll need to speak with everyone else. One at a time.”

  “Fine,” she conceded. “We can talk in my office. It’s upstairs.”

  *

  She was going to puke.

  She really was.

  Cassie only hoped Gavin wasn’t around when she did it.

  She swallowed down bile, caught another whiff of blood.

  Gagged.

  Officer Anderson had almost died.

  His blood had been gushing over her hands, and there’d been absolutely nothing she could do but apply pressure and pray.

  Please, God, let him live.

  She’d chanted that over and over as she’d waited for help, was still chanting it, because she believed that God would hear, that He would act. She hoped He would.

  “You okay?” Gavin asked. He smelled like the outdoors—clean and fresh with just a hint of earth and rain mixed in.

  That was so much better than the scent of blood which seemed to cling to Cassie’s skin. She swallowed hard, trying to keep the little bit she’d had for dinner in her stomach. “I will be.”

  “If you need some time to get out of those clothes or—”

  “No. I don’t want to waste time. I’ll change after I answer your questions.” She broke in, because there weren’t many things that could make her cry. Not sad kids. Not sad movies. Not her own grief or past sorrows. Kindness though? That got to her faster than just about anything. And Gavin? He had that look on his face. The one people wore when they felt pity or sympathy or compassion.

  “It will take you two minutes to change.”

  “Two minutes that you don’t have. You were right. A man is dead. Two men were injured.”

  And then there was Rosa.

  Like everyone else, Cassie had believed what the media reported—a tragic accident, a fall that had led to a young mother’s death.

  Had Rosa been murdered?

  The thought had never occurred to Cassie. Rosa had always been kind and sweet. She had obviously loved her son, obvi
ously enjoyed her job. She’d never said much about her family. Never mentioned parents, boyfriend, husband. Cassie had her own secrets. Things that she didn’t tell anyone about her past, where she’d come from and why she’d become the woman she was. So she hadn’t asked anything more than what Rosa was willing to tell.

  Maybe she should have. Maybe pressing for details would have saved Rosa’s life or helped the police find her killer.

  Cassie jogged up the stairs and hurried down the narrow hall. The third floor wasn’t nearly as open and airy as the two lower floors. Harland had designed the house to serve as a home for at-risk kids, children who’d worked their way through so many foster placements that they’d have ended up in group homes or juvenile detention. They were the hard-case kids, the ones who social workers worried about, lost sleep over.

  The ones Cassie loved, because she’d been one of them…until she’d walked into Miss Alice’s home.

  The upstairs contained two offices and two bedrooms for respite foster care, a storage room and a small library that Cassie used when one of the kids needed a time-out.

  She opened the door to her office. It was the only space in the house that was just hers. No kids allowed. She had paperwork in there, files—locked up in a cabinet—containing information about each child. She also had a computer, a small mahogany desk that Harland had bought her for Christmas two years ago and a couple of chairs. Three shelves of books that she’d been meaning to read. Most were educational. A few were fiction.

  She took a seat behind the desk and smoothed her hand over a thin layer of dust. She hadn’t been in the office since David’s illness. Not that she ever spent much time there. Her life was too hectic to do much more than file papers.

  “You want to know about the mitten,” she commented as Gavin took the chair across from her, Glory dropping down on the floor beside him. The dog was bigger than most of the shepherds Cassie had seen. It was also more muscular, its coat thick and glossy.