by CJ Lyons
Luka and Krichek stared at the photo. It was a man, dressed in black motorcycle leathers, holding a gleaming silver hatchet in one hand and his helmet in the other. Behind him, duct taped to a chair was Ian Wright.
“Jesus,” Krichek whispered. “Boss, we got her.”
Felt way too easy. Luka asked, “Any way to trace where the photo came from? ID the man?”
“Way ahead of you. Ran him through our facial recognition—guy has a record. Served time at Rockview for vehicular manslaughter. Name’s Allan Broderick.” The photo was replaced by Broderick’s pertinent information. “Sorry, no current address. Nothing after he was released, not sure what the deal is there.”
“Brody.” Luka felt a surge of energy revitalize him. “Sanchez, you’re drafted. Help Krichek find me everything on Broderick, any ties to Leah Wright. And a current location.”
Both Krichek and Sanchez sat down at the table and got to work. Luka paced the length of the room, detailing items to take to the DA for an arrest warrant. He carried Cherise’s cobalt blue mug, remembering how she’d laugh whenever he’d been faced with a problem in school and needed to walk it out, the rhythm and movement helping his thoughts to flow. Once Harper ID’d Broderick as her attacker, he’d have more than enough to arrest him on a multitude of felonies.
But Leah Wright? Despite the fact that his coffee was long gone cold and bitter, he raised the mug to his lips, envisioning Cherise. She had nothing in common with Leah, not really, and yet, ever since he’d seen Leah in the crime scene video last night, that stubborn set of her jaw, the determined look in her eyes as she cradled her child, protecting her from the carnage surrounding them… it was the same look Cherise got when she talked about why she wanted to become a lawyer. “Too many people don’t have anyone willing to stand up for them,” she’d say. “I want to fight for them. Protect them from a system that doesn’t give a damn. Show them someone cares.”
That was why he hadn’t been able to see Leah Wright as a viable suspect. His own personal blind spot. Luka came to a stop in front of the whiteboard, the photo of Broderick standing over his helpless victim filling his vision. He forced himself to look beyond Broderick, to focus on Ian Wright. Reminding himself that he served the victims who couldn’t speak for themselves. Victims like Ian. Then he turned away and set his mug down, abandoning it on the table.
“As soon as we have Broderick’s location, we’ll need ERT for the arrest,” he said, thinking aloud. The Emergency Response Team went in heavy and hard, ready for armed resistance. Given Broderick’s capacity for violence, it was the best way to keep Luka’s people safe during the arrest.
“What about Leah Wright?” Krichek asked. “Do we have enough for a warrant for her?”
Luka shook his head. “No. An attorney could argue that anyone could have sent the photo to her phone as a threat like with the roses. And we still have no proof that she bought the roses. We need more. But first, we need to find Broderick, see if he’ll roll over, give us the widow.”
Lucky for Luka, there was a federal agent who might be interested in helping. He called Radcliffe, filled him in on the events of the night.
“Where’s this Broderick now?” Radcliffe asked.
“We’re trying to locate him—if you have any info, it’d be appreciated.” According to the records, for some strange reason, Broderick had been released from prison after only serving sixteen months despite being sentenced to three to five years. He wasn’t on parole, a judge had reduced his sentence to time served, so they had no current address. “We’re trying to figure out if there’s any personal connection between him and Ian or Leah Wright.”
“We’ll get right on it,” Radcliffe promised. “Keep me informed.”
As soon as Luka hung up, his phone rang. Ray. “Harper confirms, Allan Broderick is the man who attacked her. Address he gave the hospital is a phony, though.”
“Great. I’m calling the ADA, getting an arrest warrant started. Tell Harper good job and come on back home.” Luka dialed the Assistant District Attorney. After he filled her in, he called Commander Ahearn to update him as well. He was on hold with Ahearn, waiting for permission to mobilize the emergency response team when Ray arrived back in the conference room, shaking snow off his jacket, eager to help.
“I still need a location,” Luka told him. It was just after three in the morning. Which hopefully meant Broderick was sound asleep in his bed at home. Not for long, he thought with a smile. “And floor plans, photos. For ERT. As soon as Ahearn signs off. Can you call McKinley, make sure his team is good to go?”
Ray nodded, grabbed a landline and called the ERT commander. “McKinley? Want to have some fun? Yeah, I know it’s snowing—jeezit, you guys are wimps.” He paused, made a quacking motion with his hands.
Ahearn came back on the line. “It’s a go,” he told Luka. “Keep me informed.” Then he hung up.
Luka tapped Ray on the shoulder, took the phone from him. It took a bit of convincing but he finally got McKinley on board to take action tonight. If they got a location on Broderick.
Krichek looked up after Luka hung up. “Let me guess, McKinley doesn’t want to get his shiny boots all muddy.”
“Not until I told him who we were after. Chance to make the news? He’s all in.”
Sanchez rapped the table, calling for their attention. “Found an address. He’s renting a place out past the old church on River Road. No floor plan, but got some pictures.”
Ray joined Luka as they peered at photos of an ancient stone farmhouse. “Walls are solid,” Ray said. “Think thermal will even work?”
“House that old, there’ll be a cellar as well. McKinley is going to have his hands full.”
“Harper mentioned he had a kid.”
Sanchez frowned, his fingers typing furiously. “No mention anywhere of a kid. Not that that means much if the mother didn’t list him on the birth certificate.”
“Prison record is clean. Looks like he cut a deal to get out early,” Krichek said. “Must’ve ratted on someone.”
“What was the original crime?” Luka asked. He knew how violent Brody was now—the image of Ian Wright’s body still haunted him—but had he always been that way?
“Broderick was seventeen at the time. Ran with a Pittsburgh gang, they were out at a movie theatre, getting payback for an earlier drive-by done by a rival gang,” Krichek answered as he scanned the court files. “An innocent couple got caught in the crossfire. No, wait. They were in the parking lot. Broderick claimed he had no idea his buddies were planning the hit, so when the guns came out, he jumped in a car and took off, didn’t want to have anything to do with it. But in his panic, dodging bullets, he ended up running over the husband. Killed him. Wife right there watching the whole damn thing.”
“Right,” Ray scoffed. “Poor baby, didn’t want anyone to get hurt. Jesus, these guys and their phony sob stories just slay me.”
There was a rap on the door and McKinley gestured for Luka. But then, Sanchez jerked his head up, muttering, “Got it, I’ve got it!”
Luka turned to his second in command. “Ray, can you fill them in on the tactical details? Tell them I’ll be right there.” Ray left with McKinley.
“I know how Leah Wright and Allan Broderick met up,” Sanchez said, sounding triumphant. He patted his computer. “It’s all right here. Four years ago, in Pittsburgh, she saved his life.” A newspaper clipping appeared on the whiteboard. “She literally brought him back from the dead.”
“Just in time for him to go out and kill someone else a year later?” Luka said.
“Talk about your bad karma,” Krichek added.
Luka skimmed the article. Allan Broderick, sixteen, shot in a drive-by shooting in Pittsburgh’s South Side, victim of gang-related violence, dead for over ten minutes before being resuscitated by Dr. Leah Wright. It was dated June, just a month before Leah moved from Pittsburgh to Cambria City to care for her great aunt.
“She might not have even known about Brod
erick going back to his gang, killing that guy,” he said. “It was almost a year later.”
“Yeah,” Krichek said, bent over his own keyboard as if in competition with Sanchez. “There’s an article about the trial that says Broderick was just getting out of the rehab hospital and his friends were throwing him a welcome home party. His lawyer said he knew nothing about the planned violence, yada yada. Guy pled down from felony homicide to vehicular manslaughter.” He looked up, first to Luka then to Sanchez. “But still, it’s a connection. She saves the guy’s frickin’ life, he gets out of jail, comes here just in time for her to ask for payback, convince him to kill her husband.”
He turned to stare at Luka. “We gotta bring her in, boss. Even if she lawyers up. Think of her kid.”
It made sense—except Luka still had doubts. Nothing logical, nothing he could express in words, just a niggling feeling deep down in his gut. But cases weren’t built on gut feelings, they were built on facts.
And right now, Leah Wright had a lot of facts to explain.
“She’s staying with that other doctor, the psychiatrist, Jessica Kern. Ray and I will fill in the ADA, head out with ERT to Broderick’s. You start prepping warrants. We’ll probably need Children and Youth involved as well.”
“Sure you don’t want me to come with?” Krichek asked, looking like a puppy dog left behind while his family went on holiday.
“Get me those warrants and you can go after the widow. But run them past me and the ADA first—we can’t risk her slipping out on a technicality.” Luka thought. “Oh, and don’t forget about the search for Cochrane—he might still be involved.”
“Yes, boss.” He slumped in his chair.
“Need anything more from me?” Sanchez asked.
“Can you get more info from that photo on Wright’s cell? Seems weird that there’s nothing else on it—she mentioned getting texts and DMs all day, it’s one of the reasons why she swapped it out for a burner.”
“Sure, no problem.”
Luka grabbed his coat and opened the door. “Call me if you find anything.”
“Be careful, boss,” Krichek called after him. “Lord only knows what a nutjob like Broderick might do when he’s cornered.”
Thirty-Nine
Leah rushed from Good Sam’s ER, dialing Jessica as she strode past friendly faces trying to stop her with their gushes of sympathy.
“Leah?” Jessica answered. “Are you done with the police already?”
“It’s Brody,” Leah said, entering the parking garage. Her heart stuttered at the memory of Ian’s final present to her. Then she steadied herself, focusing on the fact that no one was near Ruby’s truck, peering through all the windows before opening the driver’s door. “Did you know?”
“Know what? What does Brody have to do with anything? Leah, slow down, you’re not making sense.”
Leah got into the truck and locked the doors. She sat there, torn between a desire to make sense of everything and her need to get to Emily. “Brody. He attacked Officer Harper. He killed Ian. He might have followed you home, might be after Emily—” Her words tumbled over each other and she forced herself to breathe. “Is she, is Emily—”
“She’s fine. Sound asleep, exhausted. Ruby and I were just having a drink by the fire. Everyone’s fine, Leah. Calm down, you don’t want to get into a wreck. I have a ton of security—honestly, this place is like a fortress. You’ll all be safe here. Did you tell the police? Are they coming?”
“Harper told Jericho. They’re hunting for Brody—” She started the truck, her hands trembling as they gripped the steering wheel. “I’m on my way. Could you do me a favor? Double-check your security? I know I sound paranoid, but—”
“After everything you’ve been through, it’s not paranoid. It’s common sense,” Jessica assured her. “But why would Brody target you? I thought you said you saved his life?”
Leah pulled out of the garage. The snow was coming down hard, a blustery wind whipping it into a fury. This early in the morning there was little traffic, but the snowplows and salt trucks also hadn’t been out yet to clear the streets. Grateful for the truck’s all-wheel drive, she steered toward the bridge.
“I don’t know,” she finally answered Jessica. “He’s also somehow erased all records of Charlie—do you think he’s planning to kidnap him? Or maybe he already has? Maybe Charlie isn’t even his to start with?” The thought of what a monster like Brody could do to a sick child had her stomping harder on the accelerator until the truck’s wheels slipped on a patch of black ice. She didn’t brake, instead eased off the gas and regained control.
“One problem at a time. You concentrate on getting here safely—the roads are hell, and up here cell service is almost non-existent, so let me handle the police. I’ll call them, tell them everything I know about Brody and Charlie in case it helps them find them faster.”
“Okay. Okay.” Making sure Emily was safe was Leah’s one and only priority. Jessica could deal with the rest. “Thanks. See you soon.”
Fear banished her exhaustion as she gripped the steering wheel. Suddenly, she felt Ian’s presence beside her in the car, also urging her to hurry. Her stomach clenched. She’d made a mistake, an awful mistake, leaving Emily, letting her out of her sight. It didn’t matter that Ruby and Jessica were with her, every fiber of Leah’s being screamed with the need to have her daughter by her side where she could protect her.
She crossed the bridge and turned onto Route 15. A sudden gust of wind slammed into the truck and Leah fought to control it as the tires slid on the ice-covered road. She slowed down, leaning over the steering wheel as if that would help the road appear in the near white-out conditions. She inched along, frustrated by her slow progress. Finally, she reached the even more narrow road leading up the mountain to where Jessica’s house was—no, not house, a mansion, built in the 1850s by a coal baron. She’d once visited it with Nellie, delivering hand-crafted chocolates for a wedding.
Jessica had joked about her work with the DOD, but clearly it paid well. Better than working in the ER, Leah thought as she steered the truck over the icy roads. She remembered the mansion from when she was a kid—rumors said it was haunted, cursed. The coal baron who’d built it had been driven mad by delusions that his workers, his staff, even his wife and children were trying to kill him. In the end, he’d hidden alone, barricaded behind an iron fence topped with sharp pikes, perched on top of his mountain with a view of everything he owned but could not visit for fear of being assassinated.
Leah made a mental note not to share the house’s history with Jessica. She rounded a switchback, the truck trying to spin out on the steep curve, bringing her attention back to the here and now. The snow wasn’t too heavy except when the wind picked up. Maybe four or five inches fallen since Leah had left Nellie’s house a few hours ago—but with more promised by morning.
As she crept up the mountain, Leah searched for the entrance to Jessica’s property. About two thirds of the way to the top of the mountain, the road began to descend along the other side. She must have missed the turn in the snow and fog. Leah cursed, searched for somewhere to turn around, and made a three-point turn. She kept her speed to a crawl, scanning the night.
Finally, her headlights spotted the steel gates guarding the entrance to Jessica’s estate. She pulled the truck up to them, rolled down her window, and clicked the intercom. No one answered but the gates swung open, allowing her to pass. She glanced at the clock—three twelve.
She wasn’t going to wait for morning, she decided. She’d use the storm to cover their departure, make it harder for Brody to track her and Emily.
Finally, she reached the top of the winding drive and parked in front of the mansion’s doors. Leah stepped out of the truck, shuddering in the wind gusting around the side of the mansion, fighting to reach the shelter of the veranda. The front doors were huge, at least twelve feet of solid oak towering over her. She pressed the bell but couldn’t hear it ring beyond the doors.
Forty
The tactical briefing was mercifully short, interrupted only by the ADA delivering warrants for both Allan Broderick’s arrest and a search of his house. Luka stood at the rear of the room and listened as McKinley outlined his plan. Ray sat at the school-like tables with the operators, taking notes and listening intently—he loved tactical operations, had tried out for the ERT twice when he was younger, before joining the investigatory side of the department.
Luka worried that McKinley might use the bad weather to stall, merely setting up surveillance until it cleared, but the ERT commander had surprised him. Instead, his plan used the poor visibility to their advantage. The plan was simple and elegant: deploy his men in a cordon surrounding Brody’s house, using the snow as cover, converge, then kick in the door. The presence of a child in the house was the only complication, which McKinley addressed by having his strike team leaders deploying nonlethal weapons until their subject was isolated.
The ERT team had their own pool of vehicles, marked and unmarked, so while they drove off in their armored vehicle, Luka commandeered an unmarked black Suburban for himself and Ray. Ray seemed more than a bit disappointed that he wasn’t riding on the armored vehicle as he climbed into the Suburban’s passenger seat.
Luka wasn’t sure if it was the SUV’s height, its fitted leather seat that made him feel like a pilot in a cockpit, or the way the all-wheel drive shredded the snow beneath the wheels, but for the first time since he’d walked into Leah Wright’s house last night, he felt in control. He felt as if he understood what was going on.
“You guys were right all along,” he told Ray. “About the widow.” This was a primal crime of passion, nothing more. The window dressing—the extreme overkill, the torture, the drugs, the possible national security connection, the widow’s rescue of the daughter—all distraction. Smoke and mirrors designed to keep them off balance.
