Winter Kill - lanyon Josh (электронные книги без регистрации TXT) 📗

He closed the door firmly, stripped off his own filthy clothes, dropped them in the closet hamper, dug out clean jeans and a shirt he knew he looked hot in.

At least according to his pal in Klamath Falls. Shane. Shane was a nice guy and the sex was great, but Rob had never felt a fraction of what he felt for Adam. He had known from the first that he never would, and maybe in a way that had been part of the attraction.

Which made his reaction to Adam all the more disturbing.

He showered downstairs in the guest bath, and then got back to fixing dinner.

He was just putting the chicken in the oven when he heard Adam coming downstairs, and his heart sped up.

“That was great,” Adam said. “Thank you. I feel one hundred percent better.”

Rob glanced around, gulped at the vision of Adam in his green plaid shirt—Adam’s eyes were gorgeous—and said, “Have a seat. Dinner will be ready in about forty-five minutes.”

“Anything I can do to help?”

“Nope. Under control,” said Rob.

Adam walked over to the counter, studying the array of bowls and dishes. “Are you sure this isn’t too much trouble?”

“Nah. We have to eat, right? Did you want another drink?”

Adam laughed self-consciously. “Better not. You definitely make ’em strong. I’m actually feeling buzzed.”

“That’s from not eating all day.”

“Probably.”

Well, hell, they could probably keep up the polite conversation for the rest of the evening.

Please pass the salt.

With pleasure.

Thank you.

You’re very welcome.

Given how little time they had—Rob had—he decided to drive right over the No Trespassing sign.

“What was Zeke talking about earlier? That kidnapping case where the victim died.”

Adam was still smiling—wryly—but the easy relaxation was gone from his face. “The one I fucked up royally?”

“Don’t take anything Zeke says to heart. No one else does.”

“Zeke isn’t alone in his assessment.”

He could tell when Adam was on guard or wary because he started to slip into FBI-speak. Like he was narrating a documentary.

“What happened?”

Adam looked down at the granite counter, then flicked Rob a funny, almost uncertain look. “Bridget Conway was the seventeen-year-old daughter of a wealthy Bakersfield rancher. She was taken on her way to school one morning, and the Bureau was brought in. I was the Special Agent in Charge. The kidnappers demanded one million dollars for her release. That was a figure easily accessible to Tom Conway, so he was able to put the ransom delivery together very quickly.”

“But the kidnappers didn’t release Bridget?”

Adam sighed. “It’s a bit more complicated than that. What we didn’t understand was Bridget was complicit in her own abduction. In fact, there’s a strong possibility the original idea was hers. She was seeing a young man her family didn’t approve of—partly because he was too old for her, and partly because Paul Douglas had a juvenile criminal record.”

“Girls go for that bad boy shit,” Rob said.

“Do they? Well, I guess some girls do. I guess Bridget did. Anyway, Bridget and Douglas cooked up this scheme to get money from her father so they could run away together. But they needed help to pull it off, and so Douglas brought in a friend by the name of Gary Black. Black was a moronic thug. That’s really beside the point. All of this is beside the point. I’m just giving you the background.”

“Go on,” Rob said.

“The kidnappers gave orders that the police were not to be brought in.”

“Of course.”

“But Conway phoned the Bureau first thing and we—I—” Adam stopped. “I’ll give you the abridged version. When the time came to make the ransom drop, I insisted that we use tracking devices on Conway’s car.”

“That would be the smart thing to do.”

Adam’s smile was distracted. “Thanks, Rob. Unfortunately the tracking equipment shorted the electrical system on Conway’s car. The alternator failed, the car died, and Conway was stuck on the highway in the middle of the night with no way to contact the kidnappers. He missed the drop completely.”

“Hell.”

“Finally the kidnappers called Conway on his cell. Conway explained the situation. He said he had the money, he still wanted to make the exchange, and they should come and pick up the ransom. And so they did.”

Rob was watching Adam’s face. “Conway was on his own?”

“No. He was supposed to be, but no. I insisted on hiding in the backseat.”

“So far I don’t see you making choices anyone else wouldn’t have made.”

“The kidnapper arrived on a motorcycle to pick up the money. Things weren’t going according to plan, so he was already rattled. And then Tom recognized him as Paul Douglas—”

Rob knew what was coming. Which was probably pretty much how Adam had felt in those final seconds as it all played out on that lonely stretch of highway.

“Douglas panicked and tried to shoot Tom. I shot Douglas. When Douglas didn’t return with the money, Black also panicked, executed Bridget, and tried to flee the state.”

“Jesus.”

“He’s about the only person who wasn’t on the road that night.” Adam sighed. “Maybe I will have another drink.”

“That is one horrible story,” Rob said. “But I don’t see how you’re to blame for anything that happened.”

“Yes, well, what it boils down to is Conway, like a lot of parents, would rather have died than lose his daughter. He argued against the tracking system, and he argued against my being in the backseat of the car. We-I-overruled him. And I ended up being wrong.”

“Not from most people’s standpoint.”

“From the Conway family’s standpoint. And probably from Bridget’s standpoint. I promised them that I would get Bridget safely back. I promised them that if they did it my way, she’d be home safe and sound.”

“You don’t think maybe Bridget and her boyfriend were a little bit to blame for what happened?”

“Bridget was a kid, and regardless of her role in the kidnapping, it was my responsibility to get her home safely. I failed to do that. And part of why I failed was it wasn’t enough for me that we get Bridget back. I wanted to catch her kidnappers. I wanted the credit. I wanted another gold star. That’s the truth.”

“Gold star?”

Adam made a face. “Another letter of commendation.”

The timer went off. It was a relief to get away from the pain on Adam’s face. Rob turned to the stove, poured marinara sauce over the chicken, sprinkled with cheese, and shoved it back in the oven.

He said, “I think I understand now why you believe Tiffany could be involved in her mother’s murder.”

“I did think there was a strong possibility at first. Despite the fact that Joseph was stripped, there didn’t seem to be a sexual element to her murder. Azure’s death doesn’t fit.”

“Unless Tiffany’s a serial killer.”

“That’s really hard to believe,” Adam said. “There are teenage serial killers. Not many, and they’re mostly male.”

“But you do believe Frankie’s right? We’ve got a serial killer on our hands? Just not Tiffany.”

“It’s too soon to say. We don’t know that Azure was killed by the same offender. It doesn’t seem like the same weapon was used.”

“Now there you’re thinking like a city boy,” Rob said. “I think it’s likely Cynthia’s killer took that knife home, cleaned, polished, and sharpened it. He didn’t take it for a souvenir, that much I’ll guarantee.”

Adam looked startled. “That’s a good point. I was thinking he’d regard the knife as a relic, a sacred object, but it could be both a weapon and a sacred object.”

“Nobody around here would leave a perfectly good knife rusted and useless.”

“You’re probably right about that.”

“It’s still hard to believe we’ve got a serial killer running around Nearby.” Or maybe he just didn’t want to believe it. Rob wasn’t sure.