Fatal Exposure

chapter 17



Parker drifted into consciousness, loud voices and the thunder of footsteps dragging him from sleep. He opened his eyes a slit, disoriented by the sudden brightness, and battled the urge to succumb to oblivion again. He scanned the white sheet covering his legs, the IV attached to his arm, the monitors beside the bed. To one side was a skinny table bearing a cup filled with chips of ice and a remote control unit attached by a cord to the bed. He was in a hospital—but where?

He frowned, trying to clear the fog muddling his brain and remember exactly what had put him here. Images sprang to his mind—Brynn being held at gunpoint. His desperation as he tried to save her. The shock of betrayal in her eyes. Crawling under the cabin. Lowering the kidnapped girl from the window. The terrible panic that overtook him when he’d realized Brynn was gone.

Where was she? Had she survived? He sat bolt upright, his heart in a frantic race. He had to get out of here and find her fast.

Then another memory slashed through the turmoil—Brynn standing beside him, her face ashen, as they’d wheeled him into the hospital. He slumped back against his pillow in relief. She’s alive. He was sure of that.

The remainder of the night clicked into place—Lieutenant Lewis barking out orders. Riding in the helicopter to Shock Trauma. The whomp of the rotor blades. Learning that the police had captured Hoffman, that both Brynn and the child were safe.

But would Brynn forgive his deception? He’d seen the hurt in her eyes when Hoffman had revealed that Parker worked for him. Dread taking up a drumbeat inside him, he struggled to sit up again. He couldn’t let it end like this. He had to find her and beg her forgiveness. He had to explain about Hoffman and make her give him another chance.

Shouts in the corridor caught his attention. More footsteps raced past his room. He frowned at the door, unable to ignore the ruckus in the hall. Something was going on. Some kind of emergency, judging by the noise.

He tossed the blanket aside, but a sudden wave of dizziness plowed through him, and he closed his eyes. Damn. His entire body trembled as if he’d just run a marathon. He didn’t even have the strength to stand.

Another shout came from the hall. He wrenched himself into motion, knowing he had to investigate—no matter how weak he felt. He gauged the distance to the door, then eyed the IV connected to a pole. He’d have to haul it along.

He pushed aside the railing. The nurse call button’s cord got in the way, and he looped it over the side. Then he swung his legs over the edge of the bed and waited for another bout of light-headedness to subside. Air hit his naked back, and chills prickled his skin. Great. Not only was he unarmed, but he was bare-assed, wearing one of those ridiculous hospital gowns.

Suddenly the door flew open and crashed against the wall, making him start. Brynn. He took in her flushed face and panicked eyes, her red hair wild around her face. A dark bruise stood out on her cheek.

But his surge of relief instantly faltered. Brynn wasn’t prone to panic. Something was terribly wrong. His stomach took a precipitous dive. “What is it?”

“Delgado. He’s here. We need to leave.”

“What?”

She raced to his side, her bum arm wrapped in a sling. “He just murdered Hoffman. And the guards. I don’t know how. It just happened, down the hall. Now he’s on the loose. He’s going to come after you next. We need to go somewhere safe.”

Parker gave his head a swift shake, trying to make sense of her disjointed words. But Hoffman’s claim of innocence winged into his mind. So he was telling the truth. He really didn’t kill Tommy. But Delgado had—and now he was after them.

His thoughts raced as he struggled to rise. “Lieutenant Lewis. We need to tell her what’s going on.”

“She already knows. I told her about him last night. She’s got people looking for him.”

“But then...” Parker paused, suddenly confused. Delgado wasn’t dumb. He would be monitoring police communications, and he’d know they were after him. “Why would he come here? Why would he risk getting caught?” He should be miles away, trying to stay incognito, not waltzing into the hospital where his coworkers could recognize him. “And why would he kill Hoffman? It doesn’t make any sense.”

Brynn shook her head, her frantic eyes pleading with his. “I don’t know. Does it matter? Hurry. We need to hide somewhere fast.”

The panic in her voice convinced him. He grabbed the IV pole and pushed himself upright, the floor tiles cold against his bare feet. But his head began to swim. His vision hazed, and he swayed, his knees threatening to collapse. Brynn lunged over and caught him, her soft, slight body propping him up. He leaned against her, black spots dancing before his eyes. “Damn.”

“Sit down,” she said.

“But—”

“I can’t hold you. Not with one arm. Just sit down for a second, and we’ll try again.”

He perched on the edge of his bed, disgusted at how wobbly he felt. He must have lost a lot of blood. “Sorry. Just give me a minute.”

But more shouts rose in the hall. The door abruptly slammed open, and his heart sprinted into overdrive. He reached for his gun out of habit—but it wasn’t there. A spasm of fear put on a lock on his lungs.

But Lieutenant Lewis appeared in the doorway. She strode into the room, accompanied by another cop, and Parker released his breath in a rush. Thank God it’s her. If that had been Delgado, they’d both be dead.

She took a quick look around, then turned to the other cop, a detective Parker didn’t recognize. “Everything’s fine in here. I’ll stay inside. You stand guard in the hall.” He left with a nod, and she closed the door. Then she strode to the bed and stopped.

He’d never seen her look worse. Her short, gray hair was disheveled. Her usually crisp uniform was wrinkled, as if she’d been sleeping in it for days. She carried a leather satchel, her white-knuckled grip revealing her nerves. The harsh overhead light emphasized the lines in her narrow face, aging her several years.

He didn’t blame her for feeling stressed, considering the public relations nightmare she faced. Parker had been shot by a fellow officer. Colonel Hoffman—a prominent member of the community and the protégé of Senator Riggs—had turned out to be a child molester who’d used his camp to torture girls. Sergeant Delgado was a former gang member, a murderer who’d killed Tommy and Allen Chambers in that warehouse years ago. And now Delgado had brazenly murdered Hoffman, along with the police guards protecting him. No wonder she looked ready to explode.

“What’s going on?” he asked her.

“Colonel Hoffman’s dead.”

So he’d heard. “What happened?”

She opened her mouth to answer, but a thump came from the door. She whirled around, one hand going for her gun in its holster. But after several seconds, when nothing more happened, she turned to face them again.

“Move over there,” she told Brynn, motioning to the side of the bed farthest from the door. “Stand near the wall and behind the bed.”

Brynn shot him a questioning look, and Parker nodded for her to comply. Lieutenant Lewis was taking precautions, getting a civilian out of the line of fire in case shots broke out. But it also made it harder for Brynn to escape.

An unsettled feeling took root inside him, a sliver of alarm clamoring hard. Something about this situation felt off. Something besides the obvious. “Why would Delgado kill Hoffman?” he asked Lieutenant Lewis.

She held up her hand. “Hold on.” She went back to the door and peeked outside, her voice low as she consulted with the guard.

The feeling of wrongness hit him again.

He rubbed his unshaven jaw, trying to clear his mind. He knew he was missing something important, a detail wavering just beyond his reach. Cursing the painkillers turning his brain to sludge, he struggled to figure out what.

Delgado had murdered his brother. Both Delgado and Colonel Hoffman had worked in Homicide at the time. One of them, presumably Delgado, had intercepted Brynn’s photos, destroying crucial evidence that could have convicted him of the crime.

Vern Collins had been Hoffman’s partner. He’d investigated Tommy’s case. He’d eventually left the force and taken a job at the Hagerstown prison, where that gang member had been released. Hoffman had probably asked him to do it, hoping to hide his pedophile activities by killing Brynn.

All that seemed to make sense. But why would Delgado kill Colonel Hoffman? Had the colonel found out about the murders? Was Delgado trying to keep him from revealing the truth? But why kill him now, after Lieutenant Lewis had caught on to his activities—when it wouldn’t do any good?

Blowing out his breath in frustration, Parker ran through the facts again. Vern Collins was Hoffman’s partner. Collins had left the force after Tommy’s case was closed, due to a sexual harassment charge...which in itself was rather odd. There hadn’t been that many women on the force back then. And sexual harassment had been a hot topic, mandating sensitivity training and workshops. Even the most bullheaded officers had understood that any insinuation of harassment could ruin their careers.

Parker’s gaze went to Brynn. She stood beside the bed, a frown creasing her face, that bruise standing out in sharp relief on her pale cheek. He shifted his gaze to Lieutenant Lewis, who was walking back across the room.

A memory floated at the edge of his awareness, something he couldn’t quite grasp. Something about Lieutenant Lewis... She stopped beside the bed and met his eyes. And, suddenly, it clicked into place. “You were there, too—in Homicide, back when Tommy died.”

Surprise rippled across her face. She whipped open her leather bag and pulled out a gun—with a suppressor screwed on the end. “Don’t move.” The gun swerved between Brynn and him.

He stared at her aghast, the realization sinking in they were trapped in the room with a killer.

Why hadn’t he figured it out before?

He stole a glance at Brynn. Her eyes were dark with shock.

“That’s right,” Lieutenant Lewis confirmed. “I’d been detailed there.”

On temporary duty—which explained why she wasn’t on the list. There would have been a personnel order floating around back then assigning her to the unit, but until she was posted there permanently, they wouldn’t have entered her name in the books. “And they didn’t pick you up.”

The lieutenant’s eyes flashed. “I didn’t want to stay there. I wanted something bigger than homicide. Intelligence was a better choice.”

Of course. And an EEOC victim—the victim of an Equal Employment Opportunity Commission violation—had power. The commissioner would have bent over backward to avoid adverse publicity, giving her any job she desired.

Then another realization sank in. “You invented the charge.”

Her mouth formed a little smirk. “Collins was a fool, like most men are. It was easy to set him up.”

And it began to make sense. The person behind the pillar in the warehouse had been a woman—a tall, thin woman—not a man. “You were the gang leader, the one who ran the City of the Dead.”

“No, I wasn’t. I never belonged to the gang. I don’t approve of that type of thing.”

“But you killed Allen Chambers.”

“I had to. My cousin Dustin got in over his head. He didn’t understand what being in a gang really meant. And when they ordered him to execute that man, he chickened out.”

“The other gang member was your cousin?” Hell, no wonder he’d looked familiar. He’d resembled Terry Lewis, a woman Parker had known for years. They had the same oddly narrow face.

She shook her head. “I told you, I wasn’t a gang member. But I had to bail Dustin out. The gang would have killed him if he didn’t come through. And I’d practically raised him. He was my only family. I couldn’t let him die.”

“So you shot Allen Chambers,” Brynn said, her voice trembling. “And then you killed Tommy.”

The lieutenant curled her lips. “Allen Chambers was a heroin addict, a useless piece of humanity. And Tommy...” She shrugged. “He got in the way.”

Parker worked his jaw, struggling to control his own rage now. “He was my brother.”

The lieutenant spared him a look of disdain. “He would have died sooner or later. You know what the mortality rate is for drug addicts. I did him a favor, just like Chambers. I saved them both from an overdose.”

Parker stared at her in shock, her complete lack of remorse robbing him of words. He’d worked side by side with this woman for years. He’d respected her. He’d admired her moral rectitude. And she’d murdered his brother without a flicker of guilt.

“And then you tried to kill me,” Brynn cut in, sounding just as numb. “You tried to kill my friends.”

“That was your own fault. You never should have been there that day. And you took those photos.”

“Which you destroyed,” Parker said, drawing her attention back to him.

Terry Lewis sighed. “I told you. I didn’t have any choice. I had to protect Dustin. And there was no way I was going to prison for killing an addict. He was worthless. No one cared if he died. I did the world a favor by getting him off the streets.”

“A favor?” he scoffed. “Is that what you just did for Hoffman and those guards?”

“They had to go.” Her eyes burned. She leveled the gun, and his heart leaped into his throat. They didn’t stand a chance. The instant they moved, she was going to fire. And the noise wouldn’t alert the guards, not with a suppressor on the gun. He couldn’t even sacrifice himself to save Brynn.

“Don’t move,” she warned, as if guessing his thoughts.

He swallowed hard, knowing the only solution was to overpower her before she could murder Brynn. But she’d positioned them perfectly, making it impossible for him to move in time.

He met Brynn’s eyes. Her gaze flicked to the bed, then back. He frowned, not sure what she was signaling, but then he understood. The nurse call button. He’d draped it over the railing. She couldn’t reach it, but maybe he could.

Trying not to draw the lieutenant’s notice, he slid a glance at the cord. The control was dangling off the bed, out of her line of sight. But could he reach it without tipping her off?

“So why did you kill Hoffman?” he asked again, needing to distract her. “What was the colonel’s role in this?” Praying she wouldn’t notice, he inched his hand toward the edge of the bed.

“Hoffman.” She grimaced. “Talk about a waste of humanity. He was a sleazy little pervert who didn’t deserve to live.”

“So you knew what he was like?” He reached the cord and tugged.

She nodded. “I found some photos he kept in his desk. Really nasty stuff. And after that...”

“You blackmailed him.”

“We had an agreement. I kept quiet about his twisted hobby, and he did favors for me. But he screwed up in the end. He needed to get rid of Brynn, but he was too squeamish to do it himself. He put Markus Jenkins on her trail, but you found her first. And when it seemed you’d joined forces and weren’t going to bring her in, we decided you both had to go. But Markus Jenkins failed to kill you, too. And now it’s up to me.”

“But why kill us?” Brynn asked, the desperation in her voice gutting his heart. “Why not let us go? We didn’t know you were involved. We never would have connected it to you.”

“Parker would have.” She waved the gun at him, and he froze, thinking she’d seen him move. But she continued speaking, and he seized the remote control. “Once he joined up with you, I knew he’d figure it out.”

“Still—”

“Look.” Her voice hardened. “It doesn’t matter. I have my orders to kill you. I’m not the only one who wants you dead.”

Parker blinked, her revelation making him pause. Someone else wanted to kill them? “Like who?”

But Lieutenant Lewis only shook her head. “I can’t tell you that. This thing is huge. It goes way up the chain. Powerful people are involved, more than you’ll ever guess. You have no idea how big this is.”

She cocked the hammer on her gun.

Parker’s pulse raced. Knowing he only had seconds, he ran his finger over the buttons, trying to decide which one to push. He didn’t dare hit them all and risk tipping Lieutenant Lewis off.

Sweat popped out on his brow. He tried to envision the remote control, but he’d hardly glanced at it as he’d shoved it aside. He slid his finger to the button in the center, then paused.

Brynn cleared her throat. He spared her a glance, and she raised her chin in a barely perceptible nod. His heart warming, he sent her a mental thanks, then jabbed the button to call the nurse.

A signal trilled down the hall. The red light beside the bed turned on. Parker silently swore, hoping Lieutenant Lewis wouldn’t attribute it to him.

But then a shout rang out. Footsteps pounded in the hall. Lieutenant Lewis glanced at the light, and fury blazed through her eyes. She jerked her gun toward Brynn. “Don’t move or she’s dead,” she warned, freezing Parker in place.

The door swung open behind her, and Enrique Delgado appeared in the room, flanked by several cops. They all had their weapons drawn.

“Drop your weapon,” Delgado ordered.

The lieutenant stilled. Fear flashed through her gaze, every shred of color fading from her face. But her gun never veered from Brynn.

Parker sat frozen in horror, understanding how this would end. The lieutenant knew she couldn’t escape. She wouldn’t leave here alive. But if she was going to die today, she intended to take someone down with her—Brynn.

The lieutenant’s hand began to shake. Sweat glistened on her waxy face. Then her expression changed, her eyes filling with resignation. And Parker knew in that instant she was going to shoot.

Desperation screamed through his skull. He had to do something. He had to stop her somehow. But the slightest move, and Brynn would die.

Her trigger finger moved. Knowing it was hopeless, Parker dove off the bed toward Brynn, flinging himself toward her with all his strength. But she was too far away.

The gun went off, the suppressor silencing all but a quiet pop. Brynn cried out. Her eyes flew to his, her shock turning to pain. Blood welled through her shirt. She clutched her chest with her free hand and staggered toward him, then sank to the tiled floor.

Gunfire broke out, the officers mowing down Terry Lewis where she stood.

But he’d arrived too late to save Brynn.