Deathwatch Page 10

  The hit man was a serious psycho. The bloody crime scene photos Murph paged through on his computer turned his stomach and squeezed his lungs, brought back memories of gunfire and explosions and his friends dying around him.

  Rauch meant smoke in German, he found out. Probably because the man was as elusive as smoke.

  Asael was one of the names used for the devil.

  And that was just one of his dozen creepy aliases.

  * * *

  The small apartment grew cold in the mornings. The windows let wind whistle through, the hideous country curtains not nearly enough to stop the draft. Mordocai could afford better. He could have demanded that the super fix things, but he didn’t. The character he played wouldn’t. He wore the apartment like a costume on stage, like he wore the character’s clothes, the makeup, the voice he created for this particular time and place.

  He gripped his disposable cell phone and listened to the man on the other end, one of a handful of people who knew how to reach him. A listing put on a certain popular online auction site with the right keywords, and Mordocai would call.

  “It needs to be done very quietly and very fast,” the man said.

  “How fast?”

  “By the end of the week. The idiot cannot be allowed to talk at the press conference that’s scheduled for Monday. It’s imperative for the client. He’s willing to pay the rush fee.”

  “Do you have all the information I need?”

  “I’m posting it right now. It’ll self-delete in ten minutes. He’s in Canada.”

  They used an obscure internet chat room, with name, address, license plate, anything and everything they had on the target, posted in code. Anyone who chanced on the posting would take the few lines of text for computer error. But most likely, nobody would stumble on it during the short time before it disappeared.

  Mordocai hesitated but for only a second. He’d had his fun stalking and catching up to the witness bitch. He’d talked to Kate. He'd reached out and touched her. He’d been inside her house. Now that he had her in the cross-hairs, the thrill was waning. He needed to finish and move on. “Tell the client to consider the job done. Any specific instructions?”

  “It has to look like an accident.”

  Mordocai hung up, went to the chat room and picked up the contract information, then reserved a one-way ticket to Montreal for Friday night. That would leave him three days to deal with Kate.

  He’d been waiting for either her or the man to move out. He didn't have exact plans for how to end her, but he knew he wanted to play with her a little first, which would be best done in private. He frowned at the thought that he might not get that.

  He would just have to be creative. Knowing the time limit helped him focus. Suddenly he knew exactly how he was going to do it. Decapitation. No one asked for that anymore, but he liked the medieval mood of it. Made him feel like a warrior.

  Yes. That was the right way. In three days’ time, he would have Kate Bridges’ head on a platter. Then he'd go and take a suite at the best hotel Montreal had. He glanced around the cramped room. He was done with this dump.

  * * *

  Since Fred had her car, Kate had to walk to the mechanic shop after her shift. She didn’t mind, even if the weather was a little nippy. She felt perfectly safe in broad daylight, all of Main Street’s shops open, the sidewalks busy.

  “Hey, Kate.” One of her regular customers passed her, a retired schoolteacher.

  “Hi, Verna. Nice coat.”

  “A gift from my sister.”

  Verna stepped into the Irish bakery, and Kate kept walking.

  She tried not to think of Murph, or the almost kiss. They'd both been half asleep. Nothing happened. And nothing would continue to happen. First step was to stop her lips from tingling every time she thought of him. Maybe if she didn't keep reliving the moment.... She forced her attention to her surroundings.

  She liked the town, more so than any other place where she’d hidden so far. Main Street was all red, white and green, the Christmas decorations still up everywhere, even on the gazebo/bandstand in the middle of Broslin Square. The bandstand was usually decorated in red, white and blue, but some elf had added evergreen garlands to the railing for the holidays.

  “Hello, Kate.”

  “Hi, Mrs. Miller.”

  An Amish buggy passed by, horseshoes clopping on the pavement, the sound making Kate smile. The horse parking spots at the grocery store still tickled her funny bone every time she saw them.

  Out at the edge of town toward Lancaster, Amish farms dotted the landscape, but Broslin had plenty of modernized farms, too, and a lot of places that raised horses. Pennsylvania horse country, the locals called it and told her to wait till she saw how cute the spring foals were.

  Except, she’d be gone by then, disappearing in the night with nothing but a note to Eileen about a family emergency. A day or so later, she’d call to make sure Eileen wasn’t worried enough to call the police, Kate pulled her coat closed against the wind.

  She’d tell the boss she wasn’t coming back. She’d make up a story, lie through her teeth to people who had never done her any harm, had given her nothing but kindness. No forwarding address would be given.

  Moving kept her safe. She couldn’t afford to get complacent, she thought, even as a dark-blue sedan caught her eyes because it was moving at a snail’s pace, snarling traffic.

  Following her?

  She walked past the Italian butcher, then turned down the next street. She kept an eye on the traffic that passed her, but didn’t see the dark sedan again.

  By the time she got to the mechanic shop, Fred was waiting for her, wiping grease off his hands. “Just finished. Good as new.” He patted the hood of her ancient green Chevy with affection.

  A few scratches etched the doors, two shallow dings decorated the hood, but it was hers and paid for. The car got her where she needed to go, and was cheap enough so it wouldn't kill her if she had to abandon the clunker in a hurry.

  “Not freezing on my way to work will be nice. Thank you so much. How much do I owe you?”

  “Sixty-eight bucks.”

  She counted out the bills from her tip roll. She worked strictly on a cash basis. A bank account and bank card could be tracked too easily.

  “You kicked that pesky landlord out yet?”

  “He might be slightly less annoying than I first thought. How’s the knee?”

  He folded the bills into his pocket. “Better. I’ve been doing the exercises you said. When the young whippersnappers aren’t watching.” He glanced toward the younger mechanics in the back of the shop who were checking her out. “I get enough old man jokes as it is.”

  “Don’t listen to them. You’re the best of the bunch and everybody knows it.”

  Fred’s wrinkled face stretched into a proud grin. “At least I can still tell what's wrong under the hood, without a dang computer.”

  “Exactly.”

  She drove home, slowing as she neared her driveway. A dark-blue sedan sat by the curb a few houses up, then pulled into traffic as the driver—nothing but a black shape behind the wheel—drove away. She could almost swear it was the same car she’d seen earlier.

  She backed into the driveway, facing out toward the street. Better have the car ready, in case she had to make a speedy escape.

  * * *

  Murph stood at the stove, watching her come in. She was beautiful even after a long shift of running around at the diner. “I’m cooking tonight. You take a break. ”

  He’d gone to the store, although he didn’t have to get much. Kate kept the fridge well-stocked. His dark cherry cabinets held enough food to survive a month-long blizzard. He wondered if having a lot of food around made her feel safe, if it all went back to being hungry as a kid.

  Since the thought of her being beaten up and starved filled him with cold rage, he focused on the stove. “I’ll take care of everything. You just relax.”

  “How very modern of you.” She fl
ashed him a quick smile. “So what’s for dinner?”

  Her sparkling sky eyes knocked him off balance a little. “Steak and potatoes.”

  She glanced at the counter. “And beer?”

  “It’s practically a vegetable.”

  She rolled her eyes and mumbled something about men.

  “It’s made from a plant.” There, let her try and argue with that.

  “How about I toss together a salad?”

  “Ever heard of vegetable overdose?”

  “Not really.”

  “It’s underreported.”

  She shook her head, but she was still smiling. And she came into the kitchen to make that salad.

  He’d been looking forward to her coming home, he realized. For the last couple of months, all he’d wanted was to be back home and alone at last. But now that he was here, he didn’t mind company as much as he’d thought he would.

  She grabbed lettuce from the fridge and went to wash it in the sink. “The other day,” she looked at him, “when you said you thought there was someone in the house. What made you say that?”

  “Things inside my bag weren’t as I left them.” Hell of a thing was he couldn’t be completely sure. He’d been loopy from exhaustion and jet lag still. Had he dug through the bag and forgotten it later?

  She hesitated. “Today, on my way home, I thought a car was following me. Going slower than traffic, just acting weird.” An annoyed frown flashed across her face. “Then again, it could have been some distracted teen, texting. The longer I’m on the run, the more I start thinking that everyone is out to get me. I wish the FBI would catch Asael already. This is driving me crazy.”

  Murph turned the steak, dark premonitions circling in his mind. “I saw a dark, four-door sedan parked a couple of houses down the road the night I got home. One person behind the wheel. He just sat there, alone in the dark, then took off.”

  She paled. “It could have been anyone.”

  “Maybe. But the smartest thing to do is operate under the assumption that Asael is here.”

  She stared at him for a moment, then set the salad into the glass bowl on the counter and wiped her hands, a stricken expression erasing all her earlier lightheartedness. “I have to go.”

  By the time he asked, “Where?” she was halfway down the hallway.

  He turned off the broiler and went after her, found her tossing clothes into her suitcase. “You’re taking off? Just like that?”

  He didn’t want her to go. A stupid thought. He’d come home to find some peace and quiet. Doug had let her into the house, without permission. She had no business still being here. If she left now, his life could return to normal, everything going back the way it was before his deployment, which was what he wanted.

  Or was it?

  Murph swore under his breath. Leave it to a woman to completely mess up a man’s head. “I think you should stay. You can't run for the rest of your life.”

  “Running implies that I’m still alive, so yes, I can.”

  He hated the thought that she was in danger. But he didn’t think she’d be any safer if she left. “Running puts you out in the open. You’re going into unfamiliar territory. You lose cover, you lose home court advantage, you just make yourself an easier target.”

  “I’ll take my chances.”

  He moved in front of her and put a hand on hers as she was about to zip up her suitcase. “You could take your chances and make a stand.”

  She stared at him. “Against a professional assassin?”

  Okay, if she wanted to put it like that. And yet. “He’s just a man. We’ll call in the police, the FBI for protection, whoever you want. Set a trap. They’ll take him out. Then it’s over. Then you’re free forever.”

  She didn’t move as she considered his words. He could see in her eyes that she wanted that freedom, but fear had the upper hand.

  “I’m not some action heroine from a movie,” she said at last, pulling away a few steps, taking the suitcase with her.

  “You’re fighting for your life. That kind of motivation makes heroes out of ordinary people.” He didn’t want her on the run, out of his sight, someplace he couldn’t protect her. “Unless you’re willing to reconsider the Witness Protection Program.”

  She shook her head.

  He leaned against his rickety pine dresser. He was going to buy new furniture once the house was finished. “Bolting is a terrible idea.”

  Various emotions crossed her face, hesitation, hope, compassion. “This is not that vineyard in Afghanistan. I know your friends died because you didn’t stay put. But you don’t know what might have happened if you hadn’t moved. Maybe the whole team would be dead. Maybe you wouldn’t have made it back.”

  The words felt like a bucket of ice water being thrown into his face. He went completely still. Was that it? Was she right? Could she reach, that easily, to the heart of him and see things even he couldn’t?

  “Holing up when you’re in trouble is common sense,” he said, suddenly on the defensive. “You won’t be alone. I will help you.”

  Her glance dropped to his bad shoulder. “You’re injured.”

  He held her gaze. “An injured bear is a dangerous bear.”

  She shook her head. “You don’t know how much I want this nightmare to be over. To be able to go home. That’s all I ever wanted. But moving is surviving. Keeping in motion has kept me alive for the past eighteen months.”

  “And before.” He shoved his hands into his pockets. “When things were really bad at home, a social worker came, moved you somewhere else where you were safe for a while.”

  She blinked. “Until they gave me back to my birth mother.”

  He kept control of the dark rage that rose inside him at the broken look in her eyes. “Until they gave you back.”

  She sank onto the bed behind her, onto the pretty patchwork quilt that was too small for his sprawling mattress. She closed her eyes and buried her face in her hands. A long moment passed before she looked up.

  “I associate safety with moving around with my family. My father, my real father, not the biological, was the person who set up new locations for his company in various states. We moved almost every year, and I loved it because I thought maybe my birth mother wouldn’t be able to find me.”

  A small, sad smile played above her lips. “Ellie told me I was legally adopted, that the birth mother's parental rights were terminated and she could never get me again, but I didn’t believe it. So every time we moved, I felt safer. I figured if she couldn't find me, she couldn't take me back.”

  “Running is your go-to coping mechanism, and it served you well until now. That’s difficult to abandon.”

  Kate nodded, looking a little stunned at the insight. Then she focused on him. “And you’ve just been through war, the horrible tragedy of losing teammates. You want to hole up and stay in place.”

  He thought for a few moments. “Okay, so we both have baggage. Who doesn’t? The thing is to look at this situation with as much impartiality as we can and chart a course of action that will lead us to the most desirable outcome.”

  She shook her head. “Spoken like a soldier.”

  “We are, or could be, under surveillance right now. Targets.” He moved forward to kneel in front of her on the ancient braided rug by the bed, the way she'd knelt in front of him to take away the pain from his back in the middle of the night. He reached for her hands, her slim fingers disappearing as he folded his around them.

  She didn't pull away. “I am a target. You’re not. You don’t need to be involved in any of this.”

  “I choose to be involved, dammit,” he snapped, impatient that she would still push him away. Did she think he was going to stand aside and hide while she was hunted and killed?

  She drew a slow breath, her troubled gaze holding his. “If the killer is around, why hasn’t he tried to come and get me yet?”

  Good question. “Maybe he’s still getting the lay of the land. Then I showed up. You
’re no longer alone in the house at night.” He leaned closer. “You need to call the authorities in on this.”

  “You’re a cop. That’s what cops do. Tell people to call the authorities if there’s trouble. If you were in my place, is that what you would do? Honest answer.”

  She was right. He gave advice like a cop. If he was in her shoes…he’d think like a soldier. Because he was that, too, and fresh home from war, battle still in his blood.

  “I’d set a trap and take him out.” He looked her straight in the eye. “I’m not saying that’s the right thing to do, but that’s what I’d do.”

  “With the FBI?”

  “No. Just the bastard and I. Mano-a-mano.” Okay, so that might have sounded like stupid macho stuff, but she wanted honesty.

  She considered his words for a long moment, straightening her spine when she was done. “Then that’s what I want to do.”

  “No. That's completely different. You're not a soldier.”

  “Somebody once told me the right motivation could make heroes out of ordinary people. I don’t trust the police. I don’t trust the FBI. They couldn’t protect Marcos and they couldn’t protect me before.”

  “Anybody you do trust?” he asked, exasperated.

  “You.”

  He stared at her. She trusted him—with her life. That was a lot. Maybe too much.

  Then she threw him even more off balance by saying, “I have a gun, you can teach me how to set a trap. Then you leave.”

  “Still trying to get the house for yourself?” he joked because, hell, what else was he supposed to say? She was completely out of her mind, obviously.

  “Will you help me?”

  “Absolutely not. You need to go into witness protection. Setting a trap for Asael yourself is a terrible idea.”

  “It’s what you would do. I’d like to be free of Asael forever. I want my life back.”

  Her quietly spoken words affected him more than if she'd shouted.

  “Let the FBI set a trap,” he said.

  “Because the first time worked so well?” Desperation filled her gaze. “You could help.” She swallowed. “You're right. I can't run forever. If he caught up with me here, he'll catch up with me again. He'll get me when I'm not expecting it.” She fell silent, pressing her lips together.