The Perfect Victim

She looked up to find him studying her intently. "I'm still grappling with what happened to Mom and Dad. I never would have imagined ... murder." She didn't like the way the word felt on her tongue. The ugliness of it aggravated the slowly healing wound in her heart.

 

He stopped eating and watched her carefully from across the small table. "I'm sorry it worked out this way. And I'm sorry you have to go through this."

 

"It's okay I needed to know the truth." She ate some of the soup, but her mind wasn't on eating. "What exactly did you see down in that ravine that makes you think someone forced their car off the road?"

 

"There was white paint on the bumper and on the left rear quarter panel," he said. "Had I not been looking specifically for that, I would have missed it, just as Sheriff White had."

 

"The paint was from another vehicle?"

 

He nodded. "I took some photos and scraped off a paint sample to take back to Van-Dyne for the lab. I'm going to try to get the Denver PD interested in this case."

 

"Isn't this out of Denver's jurisdiction?"

 

"Yeah, but you're not. Neither is Bernstein's case."

 

She bit her lip, struggling to put aside the uneasiness slicing through her. It still hadn't quite sunk in that someone had murdered her parents. That the same murderer had shot Jim Bernstein. Or that the same someone might be trying to kill her. The notion was so outrageous her mind just couldn't absorb it.

 

"I need to know why," she said. "I can't accept any of this until I know who's responsible and why."

 

"My guess is that someone doesn't want you to know your birth parents."

 

His words ricocheted around inside her head like a stray bullet, shattering the illusions of safety and security she'd held her entire life. Simultaneously, a new and infinitely terrible thought engulfed her. "Do you think they've also murdered my birth father?"

 

"It's possible—"

 

"He could be in danger."

 

"My priority right now is to keep you safe."

 

"My god, we have to find him. We have to warn him—"

 

"If anyone can find him, Jack can," Randall cut in. "Trust me. He's good at what he does."

 

Half-heartedly, Addison picked at the soup. "So, we're relatively certain whoever killed my parents is the same person who murdered Agnes Beckett and Jim Bernstein," she said, thinking out loud.

 

"And tried to kill you at your coffee shop," Randall reminded her.

 

"The common link is my adoption."

 

''That's the only connection I can see."

 

''Why now?" The next thought struck her like a blow. "Oh, my god."

 

Randall's eyes narrowed. ''What is it?"

 

"I keep trying to think of an impetus. Why this happened now." She looked at him, felt the pain and guilt slinking through her like a fast-growing cancer. "My search. I'd just begun when my parents were killed. Oh, God. Oh, Randall, you don't think—"

 

''This isn't your fault."

 

"If I hadn't started searching for my birth parents, maybe none of this would have happened." The words were too ugly, too horrible to comprehend. It was bad enough losing her parents. But to know they had been murdered in cold blood because of something she may have done was infinitely worse.

 

"Don't go there," he said firmly.

 

"Four lives snuffed out in cold blood because of—"

 

"Goddammit, don't do this to yourself."

 

She stared at him, stricken.

 

"It's not your fault," he said fiercely.

 

Addison looked down at the soup, realized her appetite had vanished. ''Why would somebody go to such lengths? What could they possibly have to gain? I don't understand."

 

"That's the ten-thousand-dollar question." Setting his spoon aside, he slid the skillet in her direction. "Eat. While it's still hot. Then I'm going to see to that cut on your face."

 

She ignored the soup. "My parents were decent, hardworking people. They never hurt anyone. They didn't have enemies."

 

''This wasn't personal, Addison." He spoke softly, as if expecting her to shatter if he said the words too harshly.

 

She wondered if he'd stick around to pick up the pieces if she did.

 

"I need to know why, Randall. I can't rest until I know why this happened. I can't accept it. I won't—"

 

"All right," he said. "Maybe your mom and dad knew who your birth parents were. Maybe someone didn't want that information getting out." He contemplated her from across the table. "After a baby is put up for adoption, sometimes the adoptive parents are allowed to meet the birth mother. It depends on the agency involved and, of course, mutual consent. But it happens."

 

She mulled over the possibility that her parents had met with Agnes Beckett all those years ago. She wondered what seeing a tiny, unwanted newborn had been like for them, if they'd loved her instantly, if they'd been anxious and afraid about taking her home.

 

She wondered if they'd been murdered for the knowledge they'd possessed. "You've done your homework," she said.

 

"Crash course on the Internet." He paused. "Did your father know Jim Bernstein back then?"

 

''They went to college together.” The connection tightened, solidified in her mind. "You think Jim handled the adoption?"

 

"I'll bet the farm he did."

 

"There's got to be a paper trail."

 

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