Deacon snorted, then sobered. ‘Let’s ask her again. Maybe she’ll remember a detail that didn’t seem important before.’
His phone started blasting ‘Dead Man’s Party’. It was Carrie Washington, the ME. He hit ACCEPT. ‘I’m with Deacon. Can I put you on speaker?’ When she agreed, he put his phone down on the table. ‘What can you tell us about Voss?’
‘Cause of death, heroin overdose. What was left in the syringe was a potent concentration. He was a long-time user. He may have simply built a tolerance to his old dose and took too much trying to reach the same high. Time of death is three a.m. Sunday, plus or minus four hours. That was harder to pinpoint, with the heat turned up and the fireplace going.’
Adam did the math. ‘He died after the cops arrived to guard the outside.’
‘So it would seem,’ she said. ‘I may have more by morning. The full set of tox results will be ready by then, plus this is just my preliminary exam.’
‘Thanks, Carrie.’ Disconnecting, Adam rubbed his temples. ‘I need to talk to Quincy, to find out what he got from Voss’s house.’
‘I already talked to him – while he was driving here from Voss’s. He’d found nothing so far. In fact, so much nothing, that it might be something. At first glance, all Voss’s computers are wiped clean. Factory resets.’
‘Shit,’ Adam murmured. He wondered what time Diesel Kennedy had broken into the man’s system, because it hadn’t been wiped then. ‘I know there was data on Voss’s hard drives at nine p.m. last night.’
Deacon raised his brows. ‘Because your confidential informant told you so?’
‘Yes. The computers were wiped clean later. We could be talking murder.’
Deacon nodded. ‘Yes, we could. Except that somebody would have had to murder Voss and wipe all of his data, all while CPD sits outside both the front and back gate. How’d that happen?’
‘I don’t know,’ Adam said grimly. ‘But we’re sure as hell going to find out.’
Cincinnati, Ohio,
Sunday 20 December, 10.40 P.M.
The knock on the door had Meredith looking up as she sat next to Kate’s bed in the ER. ‘Kate?’ she asked. ‘Should I see who it is?’
Staring at the opposite wall, Kate shrugged. ‘I don’t care.’
Meredith sighed. Kate was blaming herself big time. Wouldn’t look at any of them. Normally Meredith would have been compassionate and patient, but she was tired and irritable and her own head still hurt. ‘Stop it,’ she snapped in a quiet voice. ‘No one is to blame here, except the asshole who tried to grab Mallory.’ The light knock on the door was a welcome relief from Kate’s silence.
Meredith peeked out, then opened the door wider for Deacon and Adam. ‘Come on in. Did you get my message?’ she asked Adam.
He smiled at her and she had to remind herself that things were bleak because her heart soared. ‘That Wendi and Colby came for Mallory?’ he asked. ‘Yes, Colby found us. They’re waiting with Mallory in one of the consultation rooms until we sort out getting her protection placement.’
That took Meredith a second but then she blinked. ‘Oh. I guess they can’t take her back to Mariposa House.’ Her cheeks heated with embarrassment. ‘That was stupid of me. I just assumed they’d take her home, but that would put the other girls at risk.’
Adam tipped her chin up. ‘It was not stupid of you. That old house is about as safe as they come. It’s solid rock. But we have to figure out how the shooter knew where you two were going to be yesterday before we can be sure it’s safe there for Mallory.’
That should have occurred to her too. ‘Because he had to know where we’d be. I don’t remember telling anyone except for my friends. I’ve been racking my brain.’
He kissed the top of her head. ‘Regardless of where we place Mallory, I want you to stay at the condo until this is settled. Okay? You may not be a target now, but I still want you safe. Your house isn’t secure.’
She wanted to ask if he would stay at the condo with her, but was completely conscious of Deacon standing right next to them. ‘I’m not going to fight you on it. Besides, my things are there.’
‘Things meaning guns?’ Deacon asked. He was studying Kate who lay on the bed, her arm in a sling, her eyes closed.
‘Among other things,’ Meredith allowed.
Deacon glanced at them, his arched brow a commentary on the way she and Adam were holding each other, then turned back to his former partner who hadn’t stirred. ‘How is she?’
‘Awake,’ Meredith said pointedly, so Kate could hear her. ‘Even though she’s pretending to be asleep. She’s ornery. Feeling guilty. Maybe you two can shake her out of it, because she’s not listening to me.’
Adam gestured for Deacon to take the lead. Deacon and Kate had been friends and colleagues for years. None of their group knew Kate as well as Deacon Novak.
Deacon approached the bed, frowning. ‘Eighteen stitches? That’s all? And you’re lying here like a lump?’
‘Fuck off, Deacon,’ Kate said, very quietly.
‘I’d much rather be home doing exactly that with Faith, but that’s not the hand we were dealt today.’ He took the chair nearest the bed. ‘Stop this. You brought an injured person into a hospital. You believed you had backup. And you know what? If you hadn’t, we’d all still think that Meredith was the target and Mallory would be walking around unprotected because she wouldn’t know the truth. Now we know. Now we know we might be looking for a fucking cop. Now we need your help.’
Kate blinked at that. ‘What?’
Adam glanced at Meredith. ‘You didn’t tell her?’
Meredith shrugged. ‘I tried. She told me she’d knit me a ball gag if I didn’t shut up.’
Adam swallowed a startled laugh. ‘O-kay.’
‘I did not,’ Kate snapped, then sighed. ‘All right. I might have. But the doctor gave me drugs.’
‘Not that many drugs,’ Meredith said. ‘Or not enough.’
Kate glared over her shoulder, then back at Adam and Deacon. ‘What’s this about a cop?’ she demanded, then her face went slack as comprehension dawned. ‘Oh God. The cop she was afraid of. The one who raped her.’ She struggled to sit up, then fell back against the pillows, eyes clenched, mouth tight with pain. ‘We should have looked for him.’
‘We did look,’ Deacon said firmly.
‘We should have looked harder,’ Kate said, teeth clenched.
‘We investigated, Kate,’ Deacon insisted patiently. ‘She couldn’t describe him except to say he had a birthmark. And there was no record of a police visit to the house where she was being held. We had no leads, Kate. Now we do.’
‘A cop,’ Kate whispered thinly. ‘All this was a cop?’
Deacon gripped her uninjured hand. ‘At a minimum, a friend of a cop. I know you’ve had a helluva night, but we need some information. We know you went looking for Mallory. We know that when the dust settled, we had three injured Feds – you and Agents Helder and Carroll out in the van. We know you got the shooter’s gun, his rifle, his knife and his SUV. We know about the eighteen stitches and’ – he peered at her head more closely – ‘a really bad bruise on your forehead. But there are a few pages missing in the middle.’
Kate sighed. ‘I heard Meredith yelling at the shooter, so I doubled back. Mallory was in the SUV, the gunman was standing there, his gun pointed at Meredith, and Meredith was trying to trade herself.’ She glanced at Meredith. ‘Goddamn idiot,’ she said without heat.
‘That’s been established,’ Meredith said dryly. ‘Tell us what we don’t know.’
‘I came up behind the guy, ID’d myself as FBI, had him drop to his knees and drop his gun. I kicked the gun away, Meredith got Mallory out of the van, they started walking. I’d called in for backup and kept hoping it would get there. I didn’t know what had happened to Helder and Carroll. What did?’