The Color of Death

by Elizabeth Lowell

  The look on Peyton’s face said that he didn’t like the advice his lawyer gave him: Shut up.

  Belatedly, Peyton realized it might be a good idea. Nobody had talked about any overseas accounts, so this was all just a mistake. A scary one. Really, really scary.

  A mistake, that’s all. He’d never killed anyone. Robbed them, sure. Tipped off some bad dudes about where and when the pickings were good, yeah.

  But he hadn’t ever pulled the trigger, so he wasn’t guilty.

  Plastic ties cut into his wrists. His stomach heaved. It wasn’t supposed to be like this. He was supposed to go to Aruba, not some federal lockup where the only women he saw were in his dreams.

  “My lawyer wants to talk to you,” Peyton said through pale lips. Then, almost desperately, he leaned closer to Doug. “I’ve never killed anyone. You have to believe me!”

  Doug didn’t bother to answer. He put the phone against his own ear and started going through everything from the numbers on the warrants being simultaneously exercised in L.A. and Scottsdale, to the specific federal laws that had been violated in the death of Lee Mandel.

  Sam didn’t listen. He’d heard it all before, so he just kept on exercising the rights granted by the search warrant. He unzipped Peyton’s fat black computer case and pulled out the laptop. Though tempted, he set the machine aside for later investigation and began going through the multitude of zippered pockets that covered the inside and outside of the case. It took a lot of fiddling to be sure he looked at everything. He’d seen less elaborate Chinese puzzles.

  “Look, at least tell me about this Lee Mandel,” Peyton said to Doug. “The name sounds kind of familiar, but hell, I know a lot of people. Where did he die? How? C’mon, help me out.”

  Doug put his hand over the receiver, closing out the lawyer. “Mr. Hall, I’ve noted your objections. Your lawyer has noted them. Do us all a favor and shut the fuck up.”

  Sam’s cell phone quivered into life again, tickling his belly. He ignored it because he’d just come across a shape that made his heart kick. He dug deeper in one of the side pockets and came up with an antacid container. Grinning like a wolf, he popped off the cap of the wide-mouth bottle and tipped the contents onto the coffee table.

  Bright, brilliant, sapphire blue winked among the powdery white discs.

  “Bingo,” Sam said savagely, watching the prisoner rather than the gems.

  Peyton was staring at the display with wide eyes and a dead-pale face. He swallowed hard. Twice. “Where did that come from?” he managed.

  “You saw where it came from,” Doug said. He tugged on Peyton’s arm. “Let’s go.”

  “No, they’re not mine! Somebody else—”

  “That’s what they all say,” Doug cut in, disgusted by the lack of originality in criminals. “I suppose you’re going to tell us the maid put them in there?”

  “I don’t know.” Peyton looked at the gorgeous blue sapphires and began to sweat visibly. “I’ve never seen them before in my life.”

  “Yeah, they grew there, like mold,” Sam said. “Funny, I never get fine gems growing in my Tums.”

  “I don’t even take antacids! Check with my doctor. He gave me something much better—”

  Sam’s cell phone kept vibrating. He tore it off his belt and snarled, “What!”

  “This is the—”

  “I know who it is,” he broke in. “What do you want?”

  “That list you gave us?”

  “Yeah?”

  “We got a match on three partials from the trunk of the courier’s rental car.”

  Sam smiled coldly. “Kirby? Or White?”

  “Neither.”

  “Peyton Hall? Ted Sizemore?”

  “Close. His daughter.”

  Sam looked like the phone had just pissed in his ear. “What?”

  “Sharon Sizemore. Right thumb, right index.”

  Sam remembered Kate standing alone in the hallway, waiting for them to arrest the wrong murderer.

  He headed for the door at a run.

  Chapter 70

  Scottsdale

  Monday

  9:25 A.M.

  Kate shifted against the wall and wondered how long it took to arrest someone. Then she remembered that the room had to be searched. She felt like banging her head on the wall. If she’d thought of that sooner, she would have argued harder against being left out in the hall. Not that it would have done any good. Sam had a stubborn streak in him that was as wide as hers.

  It was one of the things she really liked about him.

  A sound caught Kate’s attention. Hopefully, she looked down the hall toward Peyton’s room. All she could see was a maid’s cart piled high with towels staggering down the hall toward the elevators. The young woman pushing it was too tiny to see over the towels. She barely missed a guest backing into the hallway close to the elevators, towing a suitcase.

  “Watch it,” Sharon said sharply.

  “Sorry, señora.”

  Sharon tugged her bronze jacket into place over her bronze trousers and black blouse, and headed for the elevator. She saw a casually dressed woman there, leaning against the wall as though waiting for someone. She looked familiar.

  With a mental shrug, Sharon punched the down button. Whoever the woman was, it no longer mattered. Nothing did. She was out of here.

  Kate smiled automatically at Sharon Sizemore even as she wondered if the other woman knew how badly she’d been used by her boyfriend.

  The two women waited for the elevator with the forced politeness of strangers sharing a public space. Kate was relieved when she saw Sam striding down the hall toward her.

  “That was fast,” Kate said. “Did you—”

  Then she saw the Glock held down along his right leg.

  Kate had a really bad feeling. It might have been the grim line of Sam’s mouth. It might have been the flicker of raw fear in Sharon’s eyes when she saw the weapon.

  Sharon reached inside her purse.

  Sam started to lift the Glock.

  The elevator door opened. Two kids holding pool towels and plastic swim goggles looked out.

  Sharon yanked a snub-nosed gun from her purse and leaped toward the open elevator.

  Without stopping to think, Kate threw herself at Sharon, knocking her to the side. The elevator doors jammed on her suitcase, tripping Kate.

  Sam got to the elevator just as the two women hit the hall floor, each slugging and kicking for an advantage. Kate had been ham-strung by the suitcase just long enough for Sharon to get on top. He saw the flash of a gun in her hand and lashed out with his foot. Sharon screamed as her wrist broke.

  She was still screaming when he kicked the gun away from her, yanked her head back by the hair, and rammed the muzzle of the Glock under her chin.

  “Don’t move,” he told her. “Don’t give me an excuse.”

  Sharon looked at his eyes and went completely still.

  “You all right, Kate?” he asked without looking away from his prisoner.

  “Yes. What about the kids?”

  “They’re fine, thanks to you.” He glanced for an instant at the children. “Right, girls? Don’t worry, I’m FBI. One of the good guys.”

  Kate looked at Sam’s blazing eyes and the gun jammed under Sharon’s chin. The older girl looked at him too. Then the girl shoved the suitcase out of the way, the elevator doors slammed shut, and the car went down.

  “Guess you didn’t look like a good guy,” Kate said.

  Chapter 71

  Phoenix

  Evening

  Five days later

  Kate sat on a hunter-green leather couch and watched Sam walk in from the condo kitchen carrying two steaming mugs of coffee. Like the condo’s decor, he was relaxed and masculine. He handed her one mug, picked up the TV remote from the coffee table, and settled onto the couch next to her. Right next to her, thigh to hip to shoulder. She leaned into his solid warmth and sighed.

  “You make better coffee than I do,”
she said, saluting him with the mug.

  “I grind my own beans.”

  “Yikes. Way too much trouble.”

  He kissed her nose and nibbled at the corner of her mouth. “Good is never too much trouble. Great is worth all kinds of effort.”

  She smiled and took a bracing swallow of caffeine. The last two weeks had been long on adrenaline and short on sleep.

  The television flickered to life. It was one of the plasma types, two inches thick and four feet wide.

  “Your TV makes mine look like it belongs in a museum,” she said, yawning.

  “It does.”

  “It still works. If something works, I don’t throw it away.”

  “I’ve noticed.” He looked at her intently. “You’re loyal.”

  “So is a cocker spaniel.”

  He laughed and wondered how he’d gotten through the years before he met Kate.

  Life hadn’t been as good, for damn sure.

  “Look, that’s Kennedy,” Kate said, pointing at the TV.

  Sam looked. “Yeah, that’s Kennedy.” Front and center and being adored by Tawny Dawn’s wide, wide blue eyes.

  The camera angle shifted, drawing back.

  “And there’s Doug Smith, and…” Kate hesitated, trying to remember.

  “Raul Mendoza,” Sam said. “He’s the strike force’s federal entry from Homeland Security.”

  “Who’s that other one?”

  “A Phoenix PD captain. Ralston, I think.”

  “Where’s Mario?” Kate asked, frowning. “He’s Phoenix PD.”

  “At home with his wife and kids, if he’s lucky.”

  “But didn’t he really help with—” Kate objected.

  “The whole crime strike force wouldn’t fit on a TV screen,” Sam said before she could finish her question.

  Kate reached for the remote and switched on the sound.

  “—being here tonight with us,” Tawny said in an unusually husky voice. “I know how tight your schedule is.”

  Kennedy nodded, managing to appear both busy and gracious.

  “He looks more important on camera than in person,” Kate said.

  “Are you saying you like him at a distance?” Sam asked dryly.

  “Yeah. The more the better.”

  “We’re all sleeping soundly again in Phoenix, thanks to the FBI. Mr. Kennedy, could you tell us in your own words how you cracked this murderous gang?”

  “The usual way,” Sam muttered. “Underlings and gofers.”

  “Ssshhhh. I want to hear.”

  He rolled his eyes and took a drink of coffee.

  “First of all, I want to make it clear that although it is an FBI supervised crime strike force, we had the help of the Bureau of Homeland Security and many police departments across the United States, from New York to Florida, Chicago to Phoenix to Los Angeles.”

  “Cut to the chase,” Kate said under her breath.

  “That is the chase,” Sam said. “Just one big happy family of crime busters taking a bow in front of the taxpayers.”

  “Working together, we brought to justice one of the most vicious gangs it has ever been my misfortune to discover on American soil.”

  “The Teflon gang,” Tawny said eagerly. She knew a good sound bite when she had it in her mouth.

  “Exactly.” Kennedy gave her the kind of smile a man gives a dog that does tricks on cue. “This evil gang wasn’t content with robbing couriers and hardworking businessmen. When the crime strike force started closing in on them, the Teflon gang began murdering people who had information the gang wanted kept secret.”

  “Is that what happened to the Purcells?” Tawny asked.

  “I’m not at liberty to say for fear of prejudicing any future jurors.”

  Annoyance flashed over Tawny’s face. “I understand that there is a connection between the Teflon gang and two recent murders in Los Angeles, those of José de Santos and Eduardo Pedro Selva de los Santos.”

  “Yes. We believe that the Teflon gang overlapped with the South American gangs that have been preying on couriers.”

  “Is that true?” Kate asked, turning to Sam.

  “It is now.”

  “…investigating multiple leads that show cross-connections among the gangs,” Kennedy continued.

  “But really?” Kate insisted.

  Sam hit the mute button. He’d heard enough self-serving bullshit for one evening.

  “The whole point of a press performance like this,” Sam said, “is to define what is real for public consumption now and in the future. Kennedy was forever publicly baying after South American gangs. He can’t just suddenly admit this crime spree was completely home-grown, now can he? Wouldn’t look good.”

  “And that’s what it’s really all about,” she said, waving her hand at the TV. “Looking good.”

  “Everyone up there will get an ‘attaboy’ letter from the president within a month. Promotions soon to follow.”

  “But you were the one who did most of the work!”

  “So what?”

  Kate opened her mouth. Nothing came out.

  “I bet you were going to say something about ‘fair,’ ” Sam said, giving her a hooded look.

  “Um…”

  “I cut a deal with Kennedy that I’m happy with,” Sam said. “That’s all the ‘fair’ I care about.”

  She sat up straighter. “What deal?”

  “I wouldn’t give interviews about Ted Sizemore’s murderous daughter who only brought along one pair of exam gloves, slit the fingertip on a sharp piece of trunk, and ended up leaving some partial prints on a car rented by Lee Mandel.” Sam took a sip of coffee. “I wouldn’t talk about how she milked Sizemore Security Consulting of information, used it to fatten up several overseas accounts, and stole the Seven Sins to frame her lover Peyton Hall for everything, including Lee’s murder.”

  Kate’s mouth opened.

  Sam kept talking. “I wouldn’t tell any reporter how John ‘Tex’ White admitted that Kirby received orders from a mechanical voice, including the orders to kill the de Santos men. I wouldn’t tell reporters about the voice distorter, blonde wig, and gel bra the cops found in Sharon’s L.A. condo. I wouldn’t tell anyone how Peyton Hall was humping Sharon and at the same time taking information off her computer screen, information he used to beef up his own overseas account by cutting deals with the damned South American gangs, including money laundering. And that was as close as the whole mess got to Kennedy’s wet dream.”

  “Sharon and Peyton. What a pair.”

  “They deserved each other.”

  Kate frowned and watched the politic words crawl across the bottom of the TV screen. “Why did she do it? Did she hate her father that much?”

  Sam appeared to consider the idea. “I think she hated the old-boy club as much as she hated her daddy. She wanted to prove she could make fools of them.”

  “She did, for a while. And then they made a fool of her.”

  “Did they?” Sam asked. “Left on his own, Kennedy would have booted this case to the far side of the moon. It took a stubborn, gutsy, and very bright woman to bring down Lee’s murderer. That’s you, darling.”

  “And a stubborn, gutsy, very bright FBI man with her.”

  Sam laughed humorlessly. “Not very bright or I’d be lined up on the TV with Kennedy’s pets.”

  “That was the rest of the deal, wasn’t it?” she said after a moment of silence.

  “What was?”

  “You don’t get any credit, public or private, for breaking the case.” Her voice rose angrily and she swiped her hair away from her face. “That stiff son of a bitch Kennedy gets it all.”

  “He can have it. I got what I wanted.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Yeah.”

  “What was that?”

  “You.”

  Kate blinked.

  “Kennedy had already cut my transfer orders to Fargo,” Sam said. “I didn’t figure you’d want to work gems in North Dako
ta, so I made a little deal with a big horse’s ass and the transfer papers were shredded. Of course, I can’t guarantee I’ll keep out of FBI trouble for the next three years, ten months, and seventeen days…”

  “But who’s counting, right?” she asked, smiling.

  “Wrong. I am. That’s a long time to stay on Kennedy’s good side.”

  “Does he have one?”

  Sam shrugged. “I haven’t found it yet.”

  “Don’t kill yourself looking for it. As long as you bring me coffee, I’ll happily cut gems anywhere.”

  He gave Kate a long look, the kind that made heat uncurl through every part of her.

  “You sure about that?” he asked intently.

  She met his eyes. “Very sure.”

  “I’ll hold you to that.”

  “I’d rather be held by you.”

  “It’s a deal.”

  E-Book Extra:

  Excerpt: No Escape by Heather Lowell

  No Escape

  by

  Heather Lowell

  Read the exciting new romantic suspense thriller from HarperTorch paperbacks and HarperCollins e-books.

  She’d follow them.

  It made perfect sense. Tessa gritted her teeth and managed to wedge herself into the tight space at the head of the pickup’s covered bed. The vehicle came to a stop, and she concentrat-ed on keeping her breathing shallow but even, telling herself the men had no reason to suspect that there was a stowaway aboard. No reason, that is, until one of them slammed shut the plastic bin she’d hidden beneath. She hadn’t even realized they had opened it, and started badly when the whole thing reverberated half an inch from her nose.

  Her cell phone fell with a clanging noise onto the metal truck bed.

  “What was that?” a male voice demanded.

  “Shhhhhh,” the other voice hissed.

  At that moment, her cell phone received a text message. It lay against the metal of the truck bed and vibrated like a crazed hornet. She snatched it up, hoping the men hadn’t heard it. But, of course, they had. Ricky Hedges threw back the black tarp covering the pickup’s bed and shined a flashlight inside.