Dead End

by Lisa Phillips

  The floor creaked.

  She spun again, half expecting Wyatt to have come back for some forgotten thing. It wasn’t him.

  Mr. Thomas stepped into the room.

  He wore a suit, much the same as the last time she had seen him, years before. His hair was gray but still stylish, and his tan was highlighted by the pale lines on the sides of his face where he’d been wearing sunglasses.

  “Hello, Nina.”

  Nina’s feet were frozen to the floor, her muscles solid. “It’s you,” she said. The landline phone was three feet to her right on the end table beside the couch. Could she get there? What did he want?

  Mr. Thomas’s cheekbones were high, his lips pursed as he surveyed her. For an old man, he was remarkably handsome. Probably in his seventies, at least, but he could easily pass for someone younger. Nina could almost see how a woman could fall for his charm—not knowing he was a murderer. A murderer who’d come to kill her.

  “Why are you here?” The question left her lips before she realized she said it. Did she want to engage him or just run?

  His eyes flickered. “You tell me, Little Mouse.”

  Lunch turned over in Nina’s stomach. He’d called her that, and she’d forgotten until now. Little Mouse. “Why did you kill her?” She wanted to know. She needed to know why he had murdered her mother. Though no reason on earth could justify what he’d done, she still demanded the reason. “Why?”

  She didn’t see a gun, but it could be behind his back. He could be carrying all manner of weapons—just like she had hidden around her condo. Now she just had to make it to the closest one so she could force him to leave...after she got him to admit what he’d done.

  It was a shame she couldn’t record his confession.

  “I’ll take the first question.” The words rolled from his mouth as sweetly as a frozen treat.

  She repeated it. “Why are you here?”

  “Curiosity, I must admit. That is the biggest reason.” He halfway grinned. “That my Little Mouse has come back after all these years, scurrying around and trying to dig up information best left buried. For everyone’s sakes.”

  “Because you killed my mother.”

  “And you won’t let it rest.”

  “Why should I?” Nina asked. “Why ever would I let you get away with it when I can get the evidence—”

  “There is none to be found.”

  “I’ll figure something out.”

  “A confession?” He sneered. “Unlikely.”

  “Shame I don’t have a recording device.” She shot him a look in return. “But now I know you’re threatened by me digging into the past. Otherwise you wouldn’t be here. And you certainly wouldn’t have tried to run me over earlier.”

  “A simple scare tactic. I had considered it beneath me, but I can’t deny there was a certain...rush. It turned out to be quite a pleasant excursion.”

  “How nice for you.” She accented the last word and lifted her right arm to show him the road rash she’d acquired to keep from hurting her left thumb any more than it already was. There was no need to let him know she’d been scared out of her wits. “All to warn me off getting my mother’s file?”

  “No one will benefit from the past being resurrected, Little Mouse. Some things just need to be laid to rest and left undisturbed.”

  “Not when my father was wrongly convicted. Not when he died in prison before he ever got the chance to be exonerated. I’ve spent years trying to find you, trying to bury what happened. But I can’t escape it. I can’t seem to escape you.” Nina sucked in a breath. “And now I suppose you’re here to kill me, too?”

  She needed to know either way. The not knowing was making her antsy, and then she would say something to attempt to end this and wind up making it worse. Nina prayed she hadn’t just done that anyway.

  “Perhaps.”

  Nina rushed to the phone, snapped it up and pressed the button. He hadn’t moved or made any attempt to come after her. When she listened and heard no dial tone, he laughed. “Nice try.”

  Nina threw the phone handset and the base at him. The cord snapped taut and it landed on the couch. The closest weapon was in the kitchen, as was her cell. There was pepper spray in the hutch and a baton under the couch, but one was too far and the other she had to crouch low for.

  Nina looked around for what else she could throw at him. The lamp, maybe?

  He drew something long and thin from his pocket. Did she even want to know what was in that needle? Nina reached for something to say that would divert his attention. “So you’ve been keeping tabs on the case all this time?”

  “My work is to be appreciated. Of course I stay connected.”

  “And you tried to run me over because I was asking about my mother?” They’d already been over this point, but misdirection involved confusion. She needed to make him wonder if she was the one misinterpreting their conversation, or if he was.

  “Nice dive, by the way.”

  “The truth has to come out.”

  Mr. Thomas frowned. “Not the right choice.” His face had reddened, and the vein on his neck puckered. “I’m afraid I can’t let that happen, Little Mouse. That’s why you’re coming with me.”

  “You’re the one barking up the wrong tree, Thomas.”

  “That’s Mister Thomas,” he hissed.

  Nina stood straighter. At the first chance, she had to run for her phone. She couldn’t let him best her, couldn’t let him take her where he’d be able to kill her and bury her. Not when no one would ever know what had happened. She would be the victim. Yet another mysterious death, with only herself to blame.

  He came forward then. “Come quietly, Little Mouse. It will be better for both of us.”

  She shook her head. “No way.”

  He lunged. Nina ducked and kicked out with her leg. The close proximity of the couch meant she didn’t get as much momentum as she wanted, but she slammed his knee as hard as she was able.

  Thomas grunted. He swung out with the needle and she slammed her forearm into his. They grasped each other’s free hands and grappled. Strength for strength matched in a battle for her life.

  Nina gritted her teeth and struggled. He was older, but muscled. She had training.

  Eyes locked with his, she kicked out again.

  As though expecting it, he countered the move. Pain burst in her shin and Nina’s grip loosened. She pushed back against his hands hard enough to shove him two steps back, then turned and ran the couple of steps to the end table, and the lamp.

  She whipped it around at the same moment she felt a sting in the back of her shoulder. Nina rotated and slammed him on the side of the head with the lamp. The needle end broke off, still stuck in her shoulder.

  Thomas cried out.

  Nina ran for the kitchen. She cleared the doorway far enough ahead of him to pick up her cell phone. Her fingers were slick, but she’d preprogrammed a quick-dial setting while Wyatt was cooking lunch.

  “Nina?”

  A hand grabbed her hair and yanked.

  Nina dropped the phone and screamed as she was dragged backward. The phone cracked on the tile floor as he pulled her across the threshold into the hall.

  * * *

  Wyatt pushed open the door of Nina’s building to the sound of sirens from approaching police cars. He hit the button for the elevator and tapped his foot as the car ascended to the twenty-second floor. “I’m sure she’s okay.” He muttered the words into the empty car, not because he was actually convinced. More like trying to fool himself into believing it.

  Wyatt just wanted to get up there. He’d called Nina back after she screamed, and then he’d called Parker. Neither he nor his partner had gotten through on either her landline or her cell phone during the ten minutes since her call, until now. />
  He drew his weapon as the elevator slid open to reveal the building’s security guard outside the door to Nina’s condo. “She isn’t answering, but there’s thumping. Like I said on the phone, sounds like someone is in there with her,” the guard reported.

  Wyatt nodded. “You did good, waiting for me.”

  The couple of minutes had probably felt like a lifetime. Still, Wyatt didn’t want an old security guard getting hurt. Wyatt turned away, lifted his foot, and kicked the door open. He swung around, gun up, and started a room-by-room search.

  “Nina?”

  Kitchen was clear. Her phone was broken on the floor, a path through the debris like something had been swept through it. The hall looked exactly the same as when he’d left not long ago.

  A dark figure crossed the hall at a dead run.

  Wyatt raced after him into the bedroom. He’d clearly spooked the man, but was it in time to save Nina? The balcony door was open. Air blew back the long curtain with the night breeze. The man glanced over his shoulder, half out of the window.

  “US Marshals.”

  The man just stared. Long enough for Wyatt to get a good look at his face. Silver hair. Regal nose. The man shoved at the screen and jumped out. Wyatt raced to the window, where he rappelled from a rope attached to the balcony down to the ground floor. Who was this guy?

  He called in what had happened to the police and requested roadblocks and a sweep starting where he landed. “Nina?”

  “In here,” Sienna yelled.

  He ran to the living room, where nearly the whole team had arrived. “You’re here.”

  Parker nodded, on his phone.

  A socked foot was visible at the far end of the couch, and a broken lamp lay discarded on the floor. Sienna huddled over Nina. Wyatt rounded the couch, stowed his weapon and crouched. Nina was facedown on the floor. New raw red scratches covered her right hand and forearm. He brushed back hair from the side of her face and winced.

  “Nina. Can you hear me? Nina?”

  She didn’t move.

  Sienna grabbed his hand. “Parker’s calling an ambulance.”

  * * *

  Nina’s head felt like an elephant had sat on it. She blinked against the fluorescent lights of the room and looked around. Not her bed. Not her clothes, a hospital gown.

  Beside her, on a chair, Wyatt Ames sat with his head in his hands.

  “Hey,” she managed to say.

  “You’re awake.” He shot up from the chair and perched on the side of her bed. “How are you feeling?”

  Nina tried to swallow against the arid desert in her mouth. Wyatt reached for a cup and held the straw to her. Nina pushed up on the bed. “I can sit up.”

  “Okay, but take it easy.”

  She took a drink. There was a knock on the door, and two cops entered. Wyatt nodded to them, and then asked, “Want to tell me what happened?”

  Nina pushed back the hair that hung over her eyes, the ends tickling her cheek. “Sure.”

  One of the officers pulled out a little notepad and a pencil. How could they arrest Mr. Thomas when she—or they—didn’t even know the man’s whole name?

  “But I don’t know how much good it’s going to do.”

  Wyatt replaced the cup on the table. “Let us worry about that. I gave a statement myself. I saw his face, and I’m going to head to the office after this to look at mug shots and see if I can identify him.”

  Nina nodded. It hurt enough to breathe that she wondered if Thomas might have cracked a rib or two. “He was in my condo after you left. He was mad because I wasn’t prepared to go with him. He was going to drug me, but the needle end broke off. I called you and it connected, and I yelled, and it was like he...snapped.”

  “He?”

  Nina shut her eyes. She could see his enraged face as he stood over her. Fine, if Wyatt needed her to identify the man aloud, she would do it. Nina steeled herself and opened her eyes. “It was Mr. Thomas.”

  She caught Wyatt’s surprise before he could cover it. “The man in your condo was the man you believe killed your mother?”

  He thought it was someone else? “I know he killed her. He as much as admitted it.”

  Wyatt swallowed what he’d been about to say. Had he thought the suited, silver-haired man in her apartment was some kind of thug?

  Nina sighed. “I know you don’t believe me. I know you think that I just want to believe it wasn’t my father and that I’m making up a story.”

  Wyatt started to shake his head. “That’s not—”

  “I’m not asking you to believe something you don’t know, Wyatt. You weren’t there that day, but I was. My father didn’t do it. It had to have been Mr. Thomas. There’s no other explanation.”

  She sucked in a breath to control the riot of emotions. Tired and beat-up, she probably wasn’t in any frame of mind to do this. But if Mr. Thomas thought she was going to leave things alone now, he was delirious. There was no way Nina would let this lie. Not after he’d attacked her.

  She gritted her teeth. “He found out I’ve been asking questions about my mother’s death, and he came after me because of it. That means he’s guilty.”

  She turned to the officers and gave them her mother’s name. The date. If she’d had the file already she’d have given them the FBI’s case number.

  Nina turned to Wyatt. “Did you call the FBI and ask them about the file?”

  He shook his head. “Not yet, but I will.”

  It hadn’t been long since he’d made lunch in her kitchen. She hoped he really would do that. She had a serious problem with anyone who said they were going to do something and then didn’t, and she had ever since her life had been consumed with warring parents who made outlandish promises to her just to one-up each other. They had never found it necessary to keep their promises. Then one day both of them were gone.

  Wyatt frowned. “We should let you rest. Not that they think any of the tranquilizer in that needle got into you. It’s being tested for fingerprints. But still...”

  Nina lay back in bed. Her shoulder was sore where the needle had broken off inside her. But fingerprints? She didn’t think he’d been that careless. Had he been wearing gloves? “It was Mr. Thomas who tried to run me over this morning. It was him who pretended to be a clerk at the federal courthouse in Baltimore to keep me from getting the file.”

  What else was she forgetting to tell him?

  Wyatt shook his head. “I just don’t want you to worry yourself. You should worry about resting until you’re healed.”

  Nina shot him a look. Wyatt opened his mouth to argue with her, but the door swung open.

  “She’s awake?” Sienna rushed in, Parker right behind her. She virtually shoved Wyatt out of the way and hopped up on the bed.

  The two officers slipped out before the door shut. Wyatt got up, and he and Parker huddled in the corner to converse quietly about who knew what. Probably the imaginary man who had killed her mother and how she could have dreamed up him being in her condo—and attacking her.

  Okay, so she was making assumptions. He had said that he saw Mr. Thomas himself. Maybe Wyatt was starting to believe her.

  Nina found herself enveloped in a hug. She blinked back tears, and her friend leaned back with Nina still in her embrace. Sienna tipped her head to one side. “He found you, and now he’s trying to kill you?”

  “Looks that way.”

  “So now we have to find him and catch him first?”

  “You’re married. Why would you want to be traipsing around after someone who no one thinks exists when you could be at home doing...I don’t know what. Dusting?”

  Sienna blinked. “You think I dust?”

  “Okay, maybe not.” Her best friend hired a cleaner. Sienna had always hated cleaning toilets, and basic
ally every other part of housekeeping except baking. “But seriously...” Nina shifted her eyes toward Parker, and then back at her friend.

  “Parker will help. He does that.” Sienna smiled.

  For years it had been the two of them. Did Nina have to actually like the fact that Parker was around all the time now? Sienna didn’t have to rub her face in it.

  “You’re not smiling. You have grumpy face.” Sienna paused. “Does it hurt that bad?”

  Nina shrugged.

  “While you were on the floor of your condo, Wyatt chased Mr. Thomas out your bedroom window. I heard him giving the description to the cops. He saw him.”

  Nina slumped back on the bed. Wyatt, chasing a man like Mr. Thomas from her place. Then he sat there like it was no big deal to her, and just asked questions. As though she was some witness he had to get information out of. “I’m tired and sore.”

  “Maybe so, but you’re also mad. I’ll make some calls and we’ll find out who this Mr. Thomas guy was. Is.” Sienna’s eyes were narrow. “Then he’ll know why it’s a bad idea to try and do in my best friend.”

  Nina rolled her eyes, though she didn’t doubt her friend’s skills. She had been keeping Sienna updated on her lack of progress, but that didn’t mean her friend was going to be involved in clearing Nina’s father. If Mr. Thomas was going to show up and do things like this, Nina wasn’t going to let the outcome ripple outward and hit people she cared about. Innocent people.

  “Just let me know what you find,” Nina said. “I’ll figure out what to do about it.”

  Sienna didn’t look impressed.

  “She’s right.” Parker set his hand on her shoulder. “And yes, Nina, we’ll pass you and Wyatt whatever we find out.”

  Wyatt? Why did Parker think his partner was involved in her business? Lunch had been Parker’s idea, and she might have called him, but that didn’t mean there was anything between them.

  “That’s our cue to go.” Parker escorted Sienna to the door, but not before she gave Nina one last light squeeze.

  Wyatt stepped over to her, but she didn’t look up.

  “What’s with the face?”

  Nina ignored Wyatt’s question and hit the button for assistance. As soon as a nurse or doctor came in she’d find out how long she had to stay here. Then she could continue her search. Because now that she knew for sure Mr. Thomas had killed her mother, there was nothing to stop Nina from figuring out who he really was.