Reckoning for the Dead sj-4 Page 2

  Tanya was one of the few people within the Sentinels who knew about Alexa’s personal relationship with her boss, Garrett. She considered the woman a trusted friend.

  “Isn’t anyone else concerned about this?” Alexa narrowed her eyes. “He’s head of our organization. What’s he been working on?”

  Tanya had been Garrett’s senior analyst and advisor for the last ten years. She usually kept close tabs on him. And he trusted her with every aspect of what he did. They were a team.

  “That’s just it. I don’t know.” The woman shook her head and put down her coffee. “And it’s got me worried sick. He’s never done this, Alexa. He’s always involved me with anything he touched. That’s why I wanted to talk here, at your place. Something’s been going on, and I’ve been cut out of the loop. The people Garrett answers to, they have to know something, but they’re not clueing me in.”

  “So who’s in charge with Garrett gone? I’ve never seen him work with anyone in particular who could step into his shoes.”

  “Yeah, I haven’t either, not with the secrecy above his level. But this can’t go on forever. If Garrett is AWOL, someone’s got to assume his duties.”

  “You have any idea who?”

  Tanya only shook her head. She was normally unflappable, but seeing the grimace on her face told Alexa all she needed to know about how concerned the woman was.

  “We’d have to be careful looking into this. We could blow his op and put him in danger if we barge in without knowing what’s going on.”

  “Does that mean you and Jessie will be looking into this?” Tanya asked. “I’ve tried tracking Garrett, but I’ve got nothing. Maybe if we trace other movements within the organization, we’ll have better luck.”

  Tanya was right. If Garrett was involved in a covert op that excluded his top analyst and his most trusted agent, it had to be really big. But that also meant the Sentinels’ resources would be dedicated to the operation. And if Alexa could handpick someone to dig through the veiled secrecy of the Sentinels—an organization of international vigilantes who operated off the global grid to dole out their brand of justice—she would have Tanya Spencer at the top of her list. The woman had connections in and out of the organization. And with her internal-systems knowledge, she could slip through virtual back doors without anyone’s noticing.

  “I’m meeting Jessie later for breakfast. She’s pretty new to how things work within the Sentinels, but we’ll see.” Alexa sat back on her sofa and crossed her arms. “If we do this, we’d need your help.”

  Tanya nodded, and said, “Count on it.”

  Alexa knew that what she was planning on doing—using the organization’s resources to trace a covert operation involving her boss and former lover—would not be a sensible thing to do. It could turn into a career ender, at best. Or a death sentence, at worst. And to involve her new partner, Jessie, would not be wise either—especially for Beckett’s sake.

  Relying on her gut instinct, she’d have to make that call when she talked to Jessie. If she read anything in her that raised a red flag, she’d let it slide and go it alone with Tanya. But one way or another, she’d take the risk for Garrett—because he would do the same for her.

  New York’s Lower East Side

  The ringing of a phone early in the morning was never a good thing.

  Jessie Beckett pulled the bedcovers off her face and fumbled for the light switch. And after she flicked on her lamp, she squinted at the alarm clock on her nightstand.

  “Six twenty? Who the hell—” She winced and grabbed the cell phone off her nightstand and flipped it open without looking at the caller’s number. “You better have a damned good reason for breaking into my beauty sleep.”

  The sun had barely made an appearance. And that meant she didn’t give a rip about winning Miss Congeniality.

  “Jessie? It’s Sam.”

  She recognized the voice of her best friend. Samantha Cooper was a vice cop in Chicago. And she had better sense than to call her at this hour if it wasn’t important.

  “Sam? What’s up? Is Seth all right?”

  Her worry barometer worked double time when it came to Seth Harper, a guy who had nestled into her heart and made a home. The whacked-out computer genius had a habit of getting into trouble, and not only because he knew her. The boy had a serious way of attracting it on his own. And with his recent recruitment into the Sentinels for his mad skills with a keyboard—the same organization Jessie worked for—Seth had more than doubled his gift for luring trouble.

  “No, Seth is fine, I guess. I haven’t seen him lately, but I was calling you about . . . something else.”

  “Oh?”

  Her friend cleared her throat and stalled. And that wasn’t like her.

  “Spit it out, Sammie.”

  “Chicago PD received a bulletin from a police chief in La Pointe, Wisconsin.”

  “Where the hell is that?”

  “It’s at the northern tip of Wisconsin. On Madeline Island in Lake Superior, to be exact. I looked it up on a map.”

  “Thanks for the geography lesson.” Jessie ran a hand through her dark hair. “Explain why I should care about this?”

  Sam cleared her throat again. Definitely stalling.

  “You should care because the police there are working an old cold case. A pretty gruesome murder that happened over twenty years ago.”

  “Twenty years. We were both kids back then. Why are you calling me about this, Sam?”

  Jessie didn’t like where this was headed. Twenty years ago, she was a kid in the hands of notorious pedophile, Danny Ray Millstone. At least, that was what she believed. She had been too young to really know the truth about how she ended up with him—or maybe she’d blocked it out. And insult to injury, after she was rescued by Detective Max Jenkins of the Chicago PD, no one from her family stepped up to claim her. Not even the national media coverage afterward shed light on what had happened to her. That aspect of her past had remained a black hole. And she’d given up trying to find where she’d come from.

  Looking into the details of her childhood nightmare had always been too painful.

  “Yeah, well, back then DNA wasn’t used to solve crimes like it is now,” Sam said. “But an old case caught the eye of this local police chief. And he sent in evidence he had stored in archives to the state crime lab. When the lab ran its findings against the CODIS and NCIC databases, the chief told me he got a hit on DNA evidence—and his first new lead in over twenty years.”

  Jessie’s mind worked double time, thinking how a DNA test would link to her. The FBI maintained both the Combined DNA Index System and the National Crime Information Center. The first held DNA profiles in a database, while the other was a repository for specific criminal records on known fugitives, missing persons, stolen property, and other details. Such database information was available to state and federal law-enforcement types and was meant to be shared across jurisdictions. Since she’d been a missing person as a child, her gut twisted with the implications of where Sam might be going with this.

  “He got a hit . . . on what?”

  “Since you were a missing kid, your DNA is on record, Jess. The Wisconsin crime lab got a hit on your DNA. It puts you at that crime scene over twenty years ago.”

  “What?” Jessie grimaced. “I don’t understand.”

  “I didn’t either. That’s why I put in a request for that DNA report. I could have our crime-lab boys take a look at it, decipher what it means. When I get it, I’ll let you know.”

  “That’s great . . . I think.”

  “I also called that local LEO in La Pointe. His name is Tobias Cook. I only asked questions and didn’t tell him anything. I wanted to talk to you first,” Sam told her. “According to him, that DNA hit on you was a dead-on match. Unless there’s a serious mistake, it looks like you’re connected to that murder somehow, but that’s not all.”

  “Oh, great. The hits keep coming.”

  “Chief Cook was asking about your m
other. He’s looked into your story, Jess. He knows about Millstone and what happened to you as a kid. He asked why no one ever came forward and claimed you after the rescue.”

  “What did you say?”

  “I told him I didn’t know anything about that. And he’d have to talk to you about it.”

  “You did good, Sammie. Thanks.” Jessie swallowed hard. “Did he say why he was asking about my mother?”

  Hearing the word “mother” always flashed her back to a haunting memory that had been with her since she was a little girl. She remembered a sunny day with fall colors and a woman’s smiling face. She held those images close to her heart, of a woman playing with her in a park. She must have been someone very special because the memories always made Jessie happy. Although she still couldn’t be sure the woman in her dreams was really her mother, Jessie needed to believe she’d once had someone who loved her like that.

  She’d always fantasized that if she saw the woman again, she’d know it. Something in her eyes would give it away. At least, she’d always hoped that would be true.

  “The chief only told me that he was running down leads, something about kids being seen at the house where the murder took place.”

  “Was the murdered woman . . . my mother? I mean, did my DNA match . . . hers?”

  She ached with the thought that her mother might have been dead all these years. And the very thing she’d longed for was never going to happen.

  “Sorry. He didn’t tell me anything more about his case. Believe me, I asked, but he got a call and had to jump. That’s why I wanted to see that DNA analysis myself. I swear, Jess. The minute I get that report, I’ll call you. Promise.”

  “Yeah, thanks.”

  “We don’t know if your mother was there at all. Without a peek at the DNA report, there’s no sense buying into more trouble. Even if she was there, she could have been a witness.”

  “Or a suspect.”

  Jessie had a hard time thinking about her mother after all these years, but she had an even tougher time considering what dark scenarios had put her at that crime scene.

  “Don’t go there, Jessie.”

  “Either way, I don’t see a family reunion in my future. My luck doesn’t work that way.”

  “You’re still breathing, aren’t you? I’d say your luck is better than most.” Sam heaved a sigh. “Besides, if your mother had been connected in some way to a murder, that would explain why she never came forward after you were rescued.”

  What Sam said made sense. It had always pained her that no one had claimed her after her ordeal with Millstone, especially with all the national media coverage. Given the scant memories she had of a woman she believed to be her mother—a child’s wishful thinking—Jessie didn’t want to even think about the woman’s being involved in a killing. The life she led before Millstone had been a black hole so far, but maybe this local cop could fill in the gaps. Jessie would have no way of knowing anything for sure unless she contacted him.

  “So now what?” Sam asked. “People here at CPD know we have a connection. They’re letting me handle this bulletin request for information, but I can’t stall them.”

  “No, and I don’t expect you to.” Jessie chewed the inside corner of her lip. “Give me the 4-1-1 on this chief dude.”

  Sam gave her the man’s name and phone number.

  “Chief Cook asked you to call him. He thinks he can clear things up over the phone.”

  “Not good enough. Not for me.”

  “What are you saying?”

  “I’m flying to Chicago as soon as I can arrange a flight, Sam. I’ll call you when I get there.”

  “You want me to pick you up at O’Hare?”

  “No . . . I’ll get Harper to do that. But I’ll call when I get a chance, okay?”

  “So what are you going to do?”

  “I’m driving to La Pointe. You can tell Chief Cook that I’ll see him face-to-face late tomorrow. I gotta know what evidence he’s got on that case. And if there’s a connection to my mother, or a reason why I ended up with Millstone, I have to know.”

  “Look, Jess. I know this is hard for you, but if you need to talk, call me.”

  “Thanks, I will.”

  Her past never went away. For the first time in her life, Jessie had a future and prospects, working for the Sentinels. She wasn’t just a bounty hunter drifting from case to case, living in a crappy apartment on the fringe of society in Chicago. And since Seth Harper had nudged his way into her life, she also felt good about herself. He had known about her past and accepted her. The scars she carried on her body and on her soul weren’t an issue with a guy like Harper.

  So why now? Why did this damned cold case in Wisconsin have to bite her in the ass now?

  It scared her to think that her only memory of someone who could be her mother might have been wrong. Was she ready to kill the only good thing she remembered of her past?

  “I can never catch a damned break,” she muttered as she got out of bed.

  Dressed in a tank top and boxers, Jessie trudged into her living room and logged onto her laptop to look for a flight to Chicago. She had breakfast plans with Alexa Marlowe that she could still make on her way to LaGuardia. Her new partner would need to know that she was leaving town, but Alexa didn’t need to know everything.

  Very few people knew the details about the nightmare of her childhood ordeal, and she preferred to keep it that way.

  Two hours later

  Norma’s Restaurant in Midtown West was packed. Bright and bustling, the place had high ceilings, wood paneling, and faux-silver-edged tables that gave a modern yet comfortable feel. It was a popular café for breakfast and lunch, located in the Le Parker Meridien Hotel lobby. Norma’s was too expensive and trendy for Jessie’s taste, but Alexa knew her partner had suggested it for her sake. Being a former bounty hunter, Jessie had dealt with the dregs of humanity and would have been satisfied with any hole-in-the-wall greasy spoon.

  When Alexa arrived, she noticed that Jessie had gotten there early and scored a table, a small carafe of coffee, and two shot glasses of the restaurant’s complimentary smoothie du jour. After her partner waved her over, it didn’t take Alexa long to notice the carry-on luggage under the table.

  “Planning on staying the week? The blueberry pancakes are good, but come on,” she joked to cover up her surprise . . . and disappointment.

  “I’m on my way to the airport, heading for Chicago. Something personal has come up.” Dressed in a T-shirt and jeans, Jessie leaned across the table. “I know this is short notice, but I don’t have a choice.”

  Alexa narrowed her eyes and dropped her smile. “Anything I can do?”

  “No, nothing.” Jessie shook her head. “I’ve got it covered.”

  Jessie had hesitated, enough to tell Alexa her trip to Chicago wouldn’t be for pleasure.

  “And I’m guessing you probably don’t want to talk about it.”

  “Bingo.” Jessie grabbed her coffee cup and hid behind it.

  Her partner was a woman with secrets, and Alexa respected her privacy. The scar over Jessie’s eyebrow had a story behind it, one Alexa had never been privileged to hear. Even though not too long ago, Alexa had gotten a glimpse into something Jessie had barely survived as a child, her partner had never confided in her, and she hadn’t pushed.

  And Alexa also guessed that Jessie had feelings for the computer genius, Seth Harper. Maybe her trip had something to do with him. The guy was a new recruit for the Sentinels, but he’d opted to stay in Chicago rather than move to New York, so he could stick close to his mentally deteriorating father, who lived in a nursing home. Those had been her first thoughts about Jessie’s trip; but with her partner, she might never know for sure.

  “How long will you be gone?” she asked. “I mean, in case something comes up.”

  “Maybe a few days. Not long.”

  “Okay.” She nodded. “Will you call me if you need anything?”

  “Yeah . . . I
’ll do that. So what’s good here?” When Jessie flipped open her menu, her eyes grew wide. “Oh, my God! They have a lobster-and-caviar omelet for a thousand smackers. Who the hell are they kidding? That’s just . . . insane.”

  As fast as Jessie stuck her nose in the menu and changed the subject, Alexa knew her partner would never take her up on her offer. Jessie had a tough, independent streak. It was one of the things she liked most about her, but sometimes that made it hard for anyone to get inside. As a partner and a friend, Jessie was an acquired taste.

  But with Jessie going out of town—completely distracted by her personal agenda—Alexa knew she’d be working with Tanya alone. Once her partner got back and could focus, Alexa might ask for her help, but for now, Jessie was out of it. And there was no sense telling her anything about Garrett. Jessie had enough going on in her life without adding the guilt trip of leaving her in the lurch—because that was exactly how Jessie’s mind worked. She’d feel guilty over something she’d have no control over.

  As if she’d read Alexa’s mind, Jessie looked up from her menu, and said, “You look tired. You getting enough z’s?”

  Alexa ran a hand through her blond hair and heaved a sigh as she propped her elbows on the table.

  “I’d be doing better if you’d dose me up.” She forced a smile as she shoved over her empty cup. “Pour me some coffee, will ya?”

  While her partner filled her cup, Alexa turned her thoughts to Garrett. Something was terribly wrong. As an experienced operative, she sensed it in her bones, especially after talking to Tanya and hearing that Garrett’s top analyst hadn’t heard from him either. That clinched it. She had to do something.

  When they were together, Garrett had been an attentive and aggressive lover and quickly become her obsession after she’d come off the high of her near miss with fellow operative Jackson Kinkaid. Her one-sided feelings for Jackson had been tough to let go. They had chemistry, no doubt, but she needed more than he had to give. And, after working with him on a hostage-rescue mission in Cuba not too long ago, the emotional roller-coaster ride with him had not changed for her. She still had it bad, especially after Jackson told her why he’d kept her at a distance.