Beg for Mercy

by Jami Alden

  Cole jumped in. “I can set up a meeting for you, away from the police headquarters, with someone I can guarantee is clean. You can give your statement and we’ll make sure you’re protected.”

  Talia snorted at that.

  Cole held up a hand. “If, as you say, there are people on the inside, then you’re right—it won’t be completely without risk to you. But we’ll do everything we can to make sure you’re safe.”

  Talia shook her head, and Megan’s stomach sank. Then Talia shocked her with her next words. “When I know that Rosario is safe”—she slanted a wary look up at Jack before looking to Cole—“I’ll tell you whatever you want to know.”

  Sean did another slow turn around the yard, then stopped, closed his eyes, and tilted his face to the sky. Drizzle fell on his cheeks, and he took a deep inhale of cold, wet air. Alone in his cell, he kept in almost constant motion, the frenzy of activity the only thing that could keep him from hitting the wall going ninety.

  He couldn’t fuck this up. He had to keep it together till the end, not let on how close he was to the breaking point.

  God forbid the state of Washington killed a crazy guy.

  This single hour a day was the closest he got to stillness. Air. Rain. Sky. He drank it in, filled himself with it. The only sensations he let himself feel anymore, the only things that could quiet his racing mind.

  The hours were dwindling. Part of him was sad at the thought of never feeling rain on his face again.

  Most of him was eager for the day he wouldn’t need this pitiful hour in the yard to survive the other twenty-three hours a day. Soon he wouldn’t need anything.

  The thought made him smile.

  “Yard in.”

  Sean’s stomach sank at the signal that time was up.

  “Maybe you didn’t hear me? I said yard in!”

  His shoulders tensed at the guard’s voice. He stood stock still, willing himself to relax, scrambling for the peace that had filled him just seconds ago.

  Another guard might have cut Sean a little slack, had a little sympathy. But Riley was a mean cocksucker who got off on throwing his weight around.

  “Give me a minute.”

  “Get your ass over here.”

  Black rage welled up, thick like tar, choking him. Sean struggled to block it down with each deliberately slow step across the yard. He was so sick of fat little turds like Riley directing every detail of his life. When he showered. When he ate the slop from the kitchens. When he could replace the dog-eared books and magazines he’d already memorized.

  Not too much longer now. One last deep breath of fresh air before he stepped inside. His stomach revolted at the stink of bodies covered by a thin veil of Lysol. He started to shake. Couldn’t make his feet move.

  Oh shit, he had to pull it together.

  “Move!” The shove barely budged him.

  A blow to his ribs with a baton made him gasp for air. He looked up and saw Riley’s smug face before the baton came down again, cracking against Sean’s forearm. Riley, with his fat, smirking face and beady rat’s eyes was getting off on beating him down.

  Something snapped. Sean knew he shouldn’t fight back but couldn’t stop his fist from crashing into Riley’s face. Flesh tore and teeth crunched. He grabbed Riley by the shoulders and flung him against the wall. The satisfaction was so great at first he didn’t hear the thundering of footsteps down the corridor or feel the blows on his back, arms, legs.

  He registered a baton swinging toward his face, too late to duck. Crack! Pain like a lightning bolt shot from his cheekbone into his skull. Another baton hit his head with a hollow thunk, and Sean fell to his knees. He tried to guard his face with his hands, but three guards shoved his face into the concrete, wrenched his arms behind his back, and cuffed him.

  Even then Sean didn’t stop struggling. He was like a wolf in a trap, the primitive beast taking over even when he knew it was useless to fight.

  Chapter 17

  Where are we going?” Megan asked as Cole pulled away from the curb.

  “I told you, we’re going to talk to someone we can trust with Talia’s information. If what she says is true, I can’t be a hundred percent sure about anyone.”

  “Who is it?” Megan asked for the hundredth time since Cole had gotten off the phone. “Why won’t you tell me who we’re going to talk to?”

  Cole’s hands tightened around the steering wheel as he guided the Jeep onto the freeway on-ramp heading north. He hadn’t told Megan because he knew her reaction wouldn’t be good. The animosity Megan had toward Talia Vega was nothing compared to the white-hot hatred she felt for Deputy Prosecuting Attorney Krista Slater. The woman had been relentless in her quest to get Sean convicted, vocal in her determination to settle for nothing less than the death penalty.

  Though the case had been led by District Attorney Benson, Slater had been the driving force in painting Sean Flynn as a conscienceless monster who had murdered Evangeline Gordon in a drug-fueled rage. The case had made Slater’s career and cemented her reputation as a hard-nosed, pull-no-punches prosecutor.

  Though he didn’t know her well socially—no one did, considering the woman practically lived at her desk—he liked working with her. She was ambitious but shared his appetite for justice. When others played politics, grew cynical, or compromised heavily in order to keep a high conviction rate, Slater maintained the same dedication she’d had when she’d first joined the PA’s office. Cole knew that when she was assigned to his cases, as long as his evidence was solid and clean, she’d do her damnedest to make sure the perp wasn’t able to plea down to a sentence that amounted to a slap on the wrist.

  She was also fanatical about making sure she had every shred of information relevant to the case and the suspect. He knew she wouldn’t shy away from truth, no matter how damaging it might prove.

  Though he trusted his partner, he knew Petersen would feel obligated to go to Lieutenant Chin and Agent Tasso with any information relevant to the Slasher case. And until he knew for sure who this mysterious “they” Talia was referring to and what their reach was, he didn’t want to risk the information getting into the wrong hands.

  “I still don’t understand why you couldn’t set this up over the phone,” Megan said. She was shifting in her seat, a ball of nervous energy. “We’re wasting time with this. We shouldn’t have let Talia out of our sight, and I still don’t trust Jack. They’re playing us—”

  Cole reached over and gave her thigh a warning squeeze. “They’re not playing us.”

  “How do you know?”

  Cole brushed his thumb over the top of her tight quad, as much to savor the feel of her under his hand as to soothe the tension radiating from the muscle. “I’ve been at this for a long time, and Irning sotten pretty good about knowing when someone is lying. Brooks is solid, and he’ll make sure Talia plays along.”

  She shook her head. “There’s something going on with him. He knows something about what’s happening there and he’s not willing to talk.”

  “He’s worked there only a few months,” Cole said. “He may suspect something, but only Talia knows how Evangeline Gordon’s murder plays into this. We need to make sure she cooperates.”

  “By leaving before she tells us anything?”

  “Trust me on this. She’s scared, and she needs time to get her shit sorted out. She’s not going to talk to anyone until her sister is secure, and that’s going to take some time. And in the meantime, I need to handle this meeting in person.”

  Megan emitted an exasperated sound and turned her face toward the window. She was in constant motion, fidgeting, jiggling her leg, but she didn’t remove his hand from her thigh. He let it rest there, pretending for a few seconds that they were like any other normal couple cruising down the highway, on their way home, on their way out to dinner, on their way out of town. Anywhere but on some desperate bid to see if there was any way to stop a man’s execution when he had no desire to stop it himself.

  Cole p
ulled up in front of a small ranch-style home. The garage was closed but the front window glowed with light. He got out and Megan did the same, shooting him a questioning look as she shut the door.

  He pulled Megan into his arms and gave her a quick, hard squeeze. “Promise me,” he whispered against the top of her head, “you’ll keep a hold of yourself and let me do the talking.”

  Megan stepped back with a miffed sound and followed him up the walk.

  The door flew open at the first knock. Slater stood in the doorway, hands on her hips, chin tilted back. “This better be damn good, Williams. I have to prepare for court tomorrow and shouldn’t be out of the office at all—” Her mouth snapped shut when she caught sight of Megan, half hidden behind him.

  Megan’s eyes narrowed into a feral glare. “Her? You’re coming to her with this?”

  Slater’s already determined chin jutted out a few more notches. “Please tell me that cryptic phone call was not about Sean Flynn’s case.”

  Megan’s hands balled into fists, but to her credit she didn’t launch herself at Slater. Instead she wheeled around and took two steps down the walk before Cole’s hand shot out to grab her. “We found some new information connecting Evangeline Gordon with the Slasher’s most recent victim.”

  Slater’s arched brows snapped together over the bridge of her nose. “I’m listening.”

  Cole drew Megan closer and gave her a warning look as Slater ushered them inside. He started by telling her about Stephanie’s murder while waiting to meet Megan and Megan’s subsequent attack. He then gave her a rundown on Megan’s theory about the video camera, the possibility the medical examiner had misinterpreted e Sine Gordon’s knife wounds, and the speculation that Evangeline, Bianca, and Stephanie had been involved in a high-end prostitution ring somehow connected to Club One.

  “Let me get this straight. You want me to reopen the Flynn case based on the possibility that the Slasher is an ambidextrous psychopath capable of framing Sean Flynn for murdering a woman who may or may not have been a prostitute?”

  “That and because Talia Vega has additional information regarding both cases.”

  Slater grabbed her briefcase and tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. “Which she’s already told Special Agent Tasso, right?”

  Cole shook his head. “She’s afraid she and her sister will be in danger if it’s discovered she talked to the police.”

  “Discovered by who? The Slasher?”

  Cole couldn’t suppress a grimace. “Among others. She seemed to think he has contacts within the force. But she won’t say anything until her sister is secure, and then only to someone I guaranteed she can trust. That’s where you come in.”

  “I’m flattered by your high regard for me, Cole, but I’m not sure I understand what it is you want from me.”

  Megan started to open her mouth and Cole shot her a warning look. “Take her statement, find out what she knows. And then you decide what to do with it.”

  He could see she was intrigued, could see the glint in her eyes as her mind snapped closed on the idea that something might have been missed in the investigation—or worse, that someone had deliberately misled them. Still, she wasn’t convinced. “I don’t like going behind Tasso’s back on this. The feds could really screw things for me down the road.”

  “My brother is going to die in four days if we don’t do something,” Megan said. “I know you think he’s guilty, but are you sure?”

  Slater’s mouth pulled into a tight line, and Cole could see the same doubt that was gnawing away at him settle in. She looked at Cole, her gaze coolly assessing. “What do you think, Cole? Do you think there’s a connection?”

  He blew out a breath, Megan’s stare burning him like a laser as she waited for his answer. He wasn’t sold on Sean Flynn’s innocence, not by a long shot. But that didn’t banish the gnawing feeling that important details were missing. “Between what we learned from Craig Baranski and Vega’s admission that she didn’t reveal everything, I’m getting a bad feeling someone didn’t do all of their homework before sentencing Sean Flynn to death.”

  “I’ll try to ignore that dig,” Slater said, then gave a short nod. “Fine. Set up a meeting with Vega and I’ll talk to her.” She accepted Sean’s case file from Cole, which included the new information about Craig Baranski, his FacePlace page, and copies of the photos of Evangeline with Bianca. Slater opened the folder and flipped through the first few pages. “Even if I do want to get involved, there’s no guarantee Benson will let me reopen the case. If you want to buy your brother some more time, you better convince him to file anothr appeal.”

  Megan didn’t bother to say good-bye to Krista before slamming out the front door. Cole thanked Krista and caught up with Megan halfway down the driveway. Her shoulders were stiff as she took out her phone and dialed. “I need to speak to the warden.” She was silent a few seconds. “This is Megan Flynn, Sean Flynn’s sister. I want to put in a request for a visit this week.”

  Cole looked over at Megan’s sharp gasp. In the gray afternoon light, her skin was chalk-white as she listened to the warden. “I see,” she whispered, and hung up. “Sean got in a fight with one of the guards. The only person he’s allowed to see is his attorney.”

  “It’s going to be okay—”

  “It’s not going to be okay, Cole! I need to talk to him and tell him what’s happening before it’s too late. And what if he’s hurt? They wouldn’t tell me anything.”

  “It’s going to be okay,” Cole repeated, firmer, as he guided her to his car. “I’ll take care of it.”

  Krista closed the door behind Cole and Megan and shook her head. She might have thought this was a sick joke, but Williams wasn’t exactly known for his sense of humor. She had always liked him and the way he worked. His cases were rock solid, the evidence clean and everything done by the book. If he thought there was something more to Sean Flynn’s case, some key piece of information Talia Vega could provide, she couldn’t in good conscience dismiss him out of hand. Even if it was possible he was thinking harder with his little head than his big head.

  Krista would have liked nothing more than to blow Cole off as horny at best and delusional at worst. Despite her conviction that they’d convicted the right man, it wasn’t an easy thing to know she’d helped sentence a man to death.

  She already had trouble shutting her brain down enough to sleep at night. The last thing she needed was to add doubt to the equation.

  She wanted nothing more than to push it aside, but she trusted Cole and his instincts as a cop. She’d never forgive herself if she didn’t at least humor him, talk to Talia Vega and review the case with the new information in mind. She sat down at her kitchen table, flipped open the folder, and started skimming the familiar contents.

  Crime scene photos. Witness statements. Court transcripts. It was all here, in black and white. Every shred of evidence, down to the fingerprints on the knife pointing to Sean Flynn.

  She picked up a page of Talia Vega’s testimony, and as she did so, a photo slid out onto the floor. It was a picture of Flynn, decked out in his full army dress uniform. With his dark green eyes, chiseled features, and dark hair clipped close to his skull, he looked like a hero. The exact kind of man you wanted on the front lines protecting truth, justice, the American way.

  He didn’t look like a cold-blooded murderer.

  Yet she’d never doubted they’d nailed the right man. And there was nothing in the evidence to make them think otherwise.

  A perfect case, gift wrapped and handed to them. So perfect that Detective Suarez, who’d taken over as lead investigator after Williams was off the case, had never seriously pursued any other suspects.

  Too perfect?

  What if Williams was right? What if Talia Vega hadn’t told them the whole story? What if there was a connection between Evangeline Gordon and the Slasher’s other victims?

  Coincidence. A connection doesn’t make Sean Flynn any less guilty.

  But what ha
rm could come from taking a second look?

  The streetlamps cast an eerie glow through the fog as she and Cole pulled up in front of the Walls. It was after midnight, but Megan was keyed up even after the long drive. Cole parked across the street from the entrance gate and pulled out his phone. “We’re here.”

  On impulse, Megan leaned over from the driver’s seat and gave Cole a quick hug. “Thank you. Thank you so much for this.” She had no idea what kind of favor the head guard owed Cole; all she knew was that he was cashing it in for her. And for Sean. “I still don’t totally understand why you’re doing all of this for me.”

  She could just barely make out Cole’s rueful smile in the shadows. “Because I didn’t before.”

  A man appeared at the gate and motioned to them before Megan could get her brain wrapped around that.

  “Let’s go,” Cole said.

  Megan got out of the car, shivering a little as she followed Cole. Cole and the man who introduced himself only as Joe shook hands.

  “Thanks for doing this,” Cole said as Joe led them between two buildings of the compound. Megan had never been to this part of the prison before.

  “Anytime.”

  “We’ll go in through the infirmary.”

  “Stay close,” Cole said, and wrapped his hand around her arm.

  Megan didn’t need to be told twice. Joe led them through a maze of dim, silent hallways, around corners and through reinforced steel doors. At the end of a long corridor, Joe opened a door that led to a covered passageway connecting the medical wing with the IMU where death row inmates were held.