Paradise Crime Thrillers Box Set

by Toby Neal

  By then, the depression swamping Sophie was so powerful, its pull so strong, that she had hardly been able to muster the strength to put up the tent, unroll her sleeping bag, and crawl inside with Ginger.

  Sophie registered the fullness of her bladder. The dog, sensing Sophie was awake, whined softly and nudged Sophie with her nose.

  Ginger likely had to urinate as well. Sophie sat up, unzipped the tent, crawled out, opened the door of the shed, and let the dog out into the very early morning.

  The last stars were fading from a deep cobalt sky just yellowing to the east, highlighted by the jagged silhouette of tree line encircling the property. Night-blooming jasmine planted in a clump nearby sweetened the dawn air. Coqui frogs filled the tropical air with their shrill, exotic song.

  Sophie went up the wooden stairs into the house, stealing up the steps and unlocking the security measures with a set of keys Matsue had given her. She used the bathroom, brushed her teeth, and consulted her stomach. She’d barely managed to force down one slice of pizza last night.

  As often was the case in her depressive cycles, she had no appetite. She drank a glass of water, however, knowing it was the right thing to do, and went back to her dim, cozy cave. Ginger met her at the door, and they withdrew into comforting darkness.

  The next time Sophie woke, it was to the sound of pounding on the wooden door of the shed. “Sophie! Are you all right in there?”

  Sophie forced her eyes open. She didn’t want to let on how bad off she was—she was supposed to be helping with security. She was supposed to be working. But all the events of the last days seemed to have rolled down and landed on her like a boulder, flattening her under its weight.

  “Yes. I am here. Just not feeling well.”

  Ginger backed that up with a loud woof.

  “You’ve been sleeping all day. Do you need anything?” Matsue’s voice sounded concerned.

  “I am ill.” There were many handy colloquialisms for this, but Sophie couldn’t seem to muster one. Her brain felt like a wrung-out sponge.

  “I have some leftover pizza we can heat, and a Skype meeting set up with my supervisor about bringing you into WITSEC. Are you well enough to join us?”

  She had to get up for that, though the thought of more pizza made her stomach pitch. Sophie unzipped her sleeping bag. “I will do my best.”

  Half an hour later, Sophie and Matsue sat at the kitchen table with Matsue’s laptop open to a secure video conferencing channel. The muffled blare of the TV in the next room testified to Holly Rayme’s usual activity.

  Sophie checked the artificial trace she’d attached to the screenshot she’d shown to Matsue. The trace had not been activated. Matsue had not shared the intel with anyone.

  How long should she wait before bringing Matsue into greater confidence?

  Maybe she didn’t need to, until further down the road of working together. After all, the misinformation she’d given was truth, just not in the details. She would have to contact Connor and see how he thought they should proceed…

  “Do you have any tea? Strong tea?” Sophie needed to be alert for this meeting, but getting to that state seemed impossible with the depression so heavy upon her.

  “There are Lipton teabags in the cupboard.” Matsue seemed frostier than her earlier demeanor. Sophie put the pot on for water.

  Sophie had just sat down when a beep from the laptop informed them of an incoming call. Matsue answered it.

  Matsue’s supervisor was a trim man with round steel glasses, a military bearing, and silver hair. “Deputy Marshal Matsue. I understand you have another possible witness for us?”

  “Yes sir. This is Sophie Ang. Sophie, meet Burt Felcher, Supervisory United States Marshal.”

  They nodded to each other, and Matsue continued. “Sophie is former FBI, and currently employed by a private agency, Security Solutions, to provide additional support on Holly Rayme’s case. She is also the only other reliable witness against Akane Chang. As I told you on the phone, she had an attempt on her life via shooter just the other night, and she was also present during the attack at the jail. We have reason to believe that she is in just as much danger as Rayme, and I would like permission to officially enroll her in WITSEC. She can stay here at the safe house with our witness until the trial, and actually will be a big help in managing Rayme, who’s a bit demanding.”

  “That sounds reasonable. I had a chance to run background on you, Ms. Ang, and you were quite the tech agent in the FBI.”

  “Indeed. That is true.” Sophie did not want to discuss her past. “I would like to see this situation resolved as quickly as possible. Is there any chance the trial could be moved up, and the venue changed? I believe Rayme, and myself, are more at risk here on the Big Island where the Changs have so much influence.”

  “We are doing our best. The change of venue motion has been filed. We will keep you apprised. In the meantime, stay vigilant.” Felcher signed off.

  The women stared at each other. Matsue closed her laptop. “You don’t look well.”

  “I don’t feel well.” Sophie stood. “I have a couple of phone calls to make, and then I’m going back to bed.”

  Rayme opened her door and peeked her head around the corner. “How much longer are we going to be trapped out here in the boondocks? I’m going crazy here with nothing to do but look at the two of you and Netflix.”

  Matsue rolled her eyes.

  Sophie took that opportunity to fill her water bottle at the sink and go downstairs to her tent as the marshal argued with Rayme about a trip into town.

  Sophie dug the bottle of antidepressant medication out of a pocket in her backpack. She had been missing doses, and that definitely wasn’t helping her current state of mind. There was too much going on for her to just sink into the pit and wallow!

  She tried to remember what the trigger had been for this latest episode, but her mind shied away. Getting shot at and losing the tree house? The meeting with her father and Ellie? Having to be stuck out here with Rayme and Matsue, with her life in danger?

  No. None of that, while stressful, hollowed her belly and squeezed her chest like saying goodbye to Alika after their night together.

  She’d tried so hard to forget, to minimize and ignore the wrench of that separation, but losing Alika was what was really getting her down. Her mind circled back and around, trying to find some other solution, but there was none. Even when this current crisis was resolved, her lifestyle just wasn’t compatible with his.

  Ginger trotted to the toolshed from exploring the yard and nudged Sophie with her nose. “Good girl. We should run, just because we should get exercise. But first I need to make a couple of calls.”

  Her voicemail light was blinking. Sophie saw messages from Jake, Marcella, and her father.

  Sophie didn’t listen to them, though; instead, she thumbed through her contacts to the number for Dr. Wilson. She called the psychologist and left a message canceling her appointment. “I’m sorry, Dr. Wilson, for the late notice, but I’m in a situation and can’t continue with counseling for the time being. I will get in touch as soon as I am able.” She ended the message with a press of the button on her phone.

  Sophie tightened her jaw as resentment rose up. She’d been trying so hard to have her own journey, her own experiences. Once again, her life was waylaid by a crime landing at her feet.

  Dr. Wilson’s question to her during one of their sessions bubbled up—was some part of her wanting to solve crimes more than anything else? If so, she was continuing to make her own destiny. She couldn’t seem to turn away when cases came to her, and she was closing the door on anything but this dangerous choice of career.

  Sophie tied on her shoes and, with Ginger at her side, ran around the yard, pausing to do sit-ups, burpees, and crunches until the tiredness she felt was that of the body, and not just the soul.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Boredom, tension, and incompatibility with Holly Rayme made time in the next couple of day
s seem to slow, sand grains falling individually through an hourglass. Sophie battled her depression by running, working out with makeshift weights, sleeping, and working on her computer.

  She called her father back—the Secret Service was talking to the CIA. They would get back to her when they had a plan.

  She didn’t return the call from Jake. She was too conflicted about him to deal with his intrusive concern. Instead, she texted him daily to keep him from being overly alarmed.

  She wouldn’t think about Alika—how his arms had been home, his touch a flame and a caress. How he must have felt, reading her note.

  She was done with men. Really, this time.

  Without being able to talk to Dr. Wilson, cut off and isolated, the depression deepened. Sophie decided to return Marcella Scott’s call; she needed to talk to someone. Sophie hit Call Back as she sat outside her toolshed abode in the onset of evening, days into what she’d begun to think of as exile.

  “Hey girl. Thought you’d dropped off the planet.” Marcella’s upbeat voice brought a frisson of energy to Sophie.

  The women had become close during her years of working for the FBI, and Marcella was still an active agent in the Bureau.

  Sophie cleared her throat—her voice felt scratchy and hoarse, unused. There wasn’t much she had found to say to Matsue in the last few days, and even less to Rayme. “Is this a secure line, Marcella?”

  “Does a penguin poop on ice? A bear shit in the woods? You’re calling an FBI agent on her personal cell phone.”

  “I suppose.” Sophie rubbed the scar on her cheekbone, running her fingertips along the numb-but-tingly ridge. “I’m in the Witness Protection Program. I’m supposed to have cut off all contacts with the outside world. But I’m going a little crazy here.”

  “Whoa! Back up the bus. What the hell is happening?”

  “Remember that serial case I was on with Jake?” Sophie filled in her friend on the events leading to the arrest of Akane Chang.

  In the house overhead, she could hear Matsue and Rayme arguing, and the clash of pots in the kitchen. Rayme seemed to be feeling better—but as she recovered strength and health, she had become more argumentative and belligerent. Sophie didn’t envy Matsue her job. “The apparent result was that a sniper tried to take me out when Alika was visiting at my tree house. Agent Matsue agreed to take me into the program until the case was over.”

  Ginger put her big square head on Sophie’s thigh, emitting a sigh, and she stroked the dog reflexively. What would she do without her canine companion? Ginger grounded her, got her out of bed each day and gave her a reason to run around the yard.

  Ginger lifted her head, her floppy triangle ears pricked as she looked at the darkening jungle surrounding the square of open grass that marked the perimeter of the safe house.

  “Holy crap. You should have called me! How long until the trial?” Marcella exclaimed.

  “A month. I honestly don’t know how I’m going to last out here. The depression’s bad, Marcella. And I…slept with Alika and said goodbye to him.” Sophie’s chest hurt with a pain she’d been trying to suppress. She pressed a fist against her heart.

  “Geez! You needed that complication like a hole in the head, girl! What about Jake?”

  “I told Alika about Jake. I told him I couldn’t be in a relationship with anyone right now. But Alika…said he loved me. And we’d just been shot at, and I was hiding with him in his hotel room…”

  “Oh my God. You and these men.” Sophie could clearly see Marcella in her mind’s eye, pinching the bridge of her nose in consternation. “Jake will shit a brick if he finds out!”

  “I told Jake I wasn’t with him. He understands.”

  “Right, he understands. He just doesn’t know this happened. And no wonder Alika’s been leaving me messages; he must be looking for you.”

  “Alika called you?” Sophie pressed harder against the thump her heart gave at that news. “He was almost taken out by the shooter who was going after me. After what happened to him before, I couldn’t handle it if he got hurt because of me or one of my cases. He’s a civilian. I’m a danger to him. I’ve totally cut him off. Changed my phone again, which I had to do anyway.”

  Sophie could practically hear Marcella thinking this over. Ginger put her head back down on Sophie’s thigh.

  “You’re going to have to stick to your guns, Sophie, and resist temptation, because from what I can tell, Alika’s not accepting goodbye,” Marcella said. “But I think you’re right to break it off with him entirely. Alika’s a great guy. He’s even got a lot of skills. But he’s not trained like we are, like Jake is. He’s not equipped to deal with your lifestyle.”

  Sophie hung her head, bowing around the pain. Her friend agreed. Alika needed to be kept far away from the train wreck that was Sophie Ang and her perilous, insane life.

  “You should probably scrub Jake too, right now, if the Chang case is this hot,” Marcella went on. “Those gangsters are ruthless. In fact, I hate to say it, but you should ditch this phone and not talk to any of us until the trial is over. Follow the WITSEC protocol. I want to see you alive at the end of all of this.”

  Sophie opened her mouth, then closed it again. She couldn’t tell her friend about the WITSEC leak—that knowledge was too sensitive.

  Ginger’s head flew up and the dog lunged to her feet with a “woof!”

  Overhead, Sophie heard the sound of shattering glass. “Gun!” Matsue bellowed. “Take cover!”

  The lights went out upstairs as Ginger galloped away across the grass toward the darkening jungle, barking.

  Sophie squelched an instant protective impulse to run after the Lab—the shooter was likely using a distance rifle. A moving dog wasn’t going to be his main priority.

  Sophie and Rayme were his main priority.

  “What’s going on?” Marcella’s voice was a squawk coming from the phone Sophie barely remembered holding in her left hand as she drew her weapon, stashed in a cargo pocket, with her right. She scrambled backward, taking shelter behind one of the thick wood pillars holding up the house.

  “We’re under fire. I have to go.” Sophie punched OFF and stashed the phone. “Are you all right up there?” She called upstairs.

  “Rayme is down. I’ve called for backup,” Matsue yelled. “I’ve cut the lights so he can’t see us. Stay behind cover!”

  “My dog…” Sophie’s throat closed on the words as Ginger reached the perimeter fence and slammed into it. The Lab yelped and leapt back from the electric charge, then made do with barking furiously at whoever was on the other side. “Ginger!” Sophie called the dog. “Ginger, come!”

  She ticked through her options, frantic to get Ginger out of harm’s way.

  The best thing she could do was to hold position out of the line of fire.

  Finally Ginger broke away from the fence and trotted back, tail waving, clearly convinced she’d vanquished the danger.

  If only that were the case.

  The leak at WITSEC had caught up to them—and Sophie, with her trip to town to visit her father and Agent Smith, had provided the protocol violation the mole would use to hide selling out their location.

  But had Sophie even been officially admitted as a witness when she made that trip?

  Maybe the assassin hadn’t come for Sophie, didn’t know she was even there. Had only come for Rayme. But now, he knew Sophie was here as well because Ginger was her companion. Ginger made her a target.

  Staying behind cover, Sophie dragged Ginger by her collar to the shed and shoved the dog inside, closing the door on her whimpering cries. “For your own safety, silly girl,” Sophie scolded, and ducked around the shed, heading for the stairs.

  A silenced bullet plowed into the wooden railing of the stairs beside Sophie with a thwack, spraying her arm with splinters. Sophie barely felt the sting as she hurtled up the stairs and dove into the house, slamming the door behind her and locking it.

  “Son of a bitch.” Matsue was directly in fro
nt of Sophie, kneeling beside Holly Rayme’s prone body. “I guess that answers the question about whether or not the shooter is still around.”

  Sophie crouched beneath the level of the windows and joined Matsue. The exterior sensor lights had come on, and in the reflected glow coming through the windows, the deputy marshal held a bunched towel pressed against Rayme’s chest. Blood soaked the white terrycloth Matsue held. The woman was ashen, her eyes closed, her breath a wet rattle. “She looks bad.”

  “She is bad. Ambulance is another ten minutes away.” Matsue’s phone was sandwiched between her ear and shoulder. “Hilo PD is on the way too.”

  “How did he get her?”

  “Rayme opened the blackout blind over the kitchen sink, and that’s all it took. He must have been watching us for a while.”

  Sophie glanced up at the broken window. Memory of her recent attack at the tree house surged back with way too much clarity.

  “You’re going to want to get that dealt with.” Matsue gestured with her chin.

  Sophie looked down. Several three-or-four-inch wooden splinters jutted from the meat of her bicep. As if in response to her visual survey, the area throbbed. Sophie reached up and grabbed a roll of paper towels off the sink. “I’ll cover the door in case he tries to come in.”

  “Good idea. Though I’m betting he’s done for the night. He likely knows we’re armed and help is on the way,” Matsue said.

  Sophie carried the paper towel roll over near the door. She took up a position beside the aperture and set her weapon down on the floor. Using one of the paper towels, she gripped the heavy wooden splinters and yanked them out of her arm one by one.

  “Gross, Sophie!” Matsue exclaimed. “I meant get medical attention, not do it yourself!”

  “The splinters impair movement, and this is my shooting hand.” As soon as the last one was out, Sophie’s arm felt and moved better, though fresh blood welled from the puncture wounds. Sophie covered the site with a clean paper towel and pressed down with her left hand. She picked up her gun with her right hand, propping it on her knee.