by Janie Crouch
“Well, as long as you’re okay, hon.”
Molly kissed Mrs. Pope on the cheek. “I am okay, I promise. Thank you for letting us use your roof access.”
“No problem, but you get an extra key made soon.”
Giving Derek one more glare, she stepped out of the way. The layout of Mrs. Pope’s house was the same as Molly’s, so he followed her up one flight of stairs, then to a second stairway leading from a side hall to the attic. From the attic was the door outside.
“It’s a weird configuration. Obviously since the door is in the attic, it’s not really meant to be used a lot. But I always liked that my unit had the access. Mrs. Pope’s unit and mine are the only ones that do.”
They walked around the multiple years’ worth of junk Mrs. Pope had in her attic.
“Mrs. Pope seems pretty protective of you.” Derek was glad she hadn’t had a knife when she saw Molly’s bruises.
“Yeah, she kind of gets in my business sometimes, but that’s okay. I try to have a meal with her once every couple weeks or so. I know she’s lonely since her husband died about eighteen months ago.”
That was more than Derek knew about any of his neighbors and he had lived at his house for over five years. He had definitely never eaten with any of them. He’d never even considered it.
He stopped her as she was opening the door leading to the roof.
“I’m not sure what line of sight anyone may have with this room. Stay low and near me, away from the edge.”
Molly nodded.
Derek opened the door and peeked out. He doubted anyone had done enough homework on Molly’s building to know about this roof access, but he wasn’t taking any chances. He took his weapon out of his holster.
Bending low at the waist, he made his way outside. Molly was right behind him. They moved quickly and directly to the identical door that was attached to her unit. It was locked so Derek had to put a hard shoulder into it a couple times, grimacing at the noise. It couldn’t be helped.
The door gave way after the third good hit and they went inside. He kept his weapon in hand as they made their way downstairs. According to Jon, Molly’s house was empty, but that was only based on law enforcement reports. Others would not make their presence so known.
He could feel Molly’s hand on his back as he first looked around her guest bedroom, then her bedroom. Both seemed to be empty. After the noise they’d made to get inside, Derek was willing to bet no one was in the rest of the house, either.
“It’s clear. Let’s see if the evidence is still here.”
Molly rushed to her hamper and began digging through it. After a minute she looked up at him.
“It’s gone, Derek.” There were tears in her eyes when she looked over her shoulder at him. “My lab coat isn’t here at all. Someone must have taken it.”
Disappointment was a bitter taste in Derek’s mouth. They had been so close. “Okay, let’s grab you some clothes and get out of here. We’ll have to think of something else.”
He watched as she grabbed a pair of jeans and some undergarments. “Can I get my favorite shampoo, too? I still feel like I can smell smoke in my hai...”
Her eyes widened as her sentence trailed off.
“What?”
“It smelled like smoke. My lab coat and other stuff I was wearing that day. So I didn’t want to put them in the hamper. So I—” She broke off and ran into the bathroom.
Derek followed and found her bending into her bathtub.
“So I threw it all in the bathtub.” She stood and turned, a huge grin on her face. She held an undisturbed evidence bag in each of her hands.
Chapter Eighteen
Molly looked around the lab where Derek had brought her to do the initial examination of the evidence. Lab. She rolled her eyes. This could hardly be called a lab. She glanced over her shoulder at him, scowling.
“What?” he asked.
“This is not a lab. This is a...” Molly searched for the right word. “A preschool.”
They were at a police training facility outside of Denver. This was where future crime scene and lab technicians came to be trained.
Heaven help us all.
It was a step down from Molly’s lab at Omega. She scoffed. It was twenty steps down from her lab at Omega. She was amazed anyone could leave this place and know how to do anything except dust for prints and tie their shoes.
Molly had the items recovered from her house on the table in front of her. Knowing they couldn’t leave through her condo’s front door after finding the items, she and Derek had gone back up to the roof and down through Mrs. Pope’s house, explaining they couldn’t get in and would need to call a locksmith. Mrs. Pope had just continued to look suspiciously at Derek and escorted them to the front door.
She felt Derek’s hands encircle her waist behind her. He kissed the top of her head. “It’s all we’ve got right now. Omega is not an option and it’s not like we can get you into any police or federal labs, either. Not right now.”
“I’ll do my best. Let me see what they have. But I’m not making any promises.”
He kissed the top of her head again. “If anyone can do it, you can.”
Molly appreciated his faith in her, but she could only go so far as the electron microscope, DNA sequencer, gas chromatography and AFIS would take her. None of which seemed to be available here.
She looked at the items on the table. “You know none of this will be admissible in court. Not after the fire in the lab and me as the suspect.”
“I know. But if it gets us a name, it will be worth it. Hell, if it gets us anywhere out of this dead end we’ve found ourselves in since the lab blew, then it’s worth it.” He was still standing behind her and put his hands on her upper arms, squeezing them gently. “But whatever we’ve got there, someone was willing to kill and die for. So it has to be something.”
Molly nodded. In one bag was a set of prints. Derek had told her that the prints belonged to a man who had killed himself at the scene a few days ago. She pushed that to the side. She couldn’t run them now, although she would check to see if she could access the federal fingerprint database AFIS from here. The other piece of evidence looked like some sort of communication device, although much of it had been destroyed by the house fire. But still it had the potential to tell them a lot, if she could get whatever working pieces were still left out of the melted outer shell.
She didn’t want to take the evidence out of the bags until she was ready to actually begin working on it. That meant she needed to take stock of what was available in this teaching facility.
Molly was hoping for iodine and silver nitrate to lift latent prints, but she wasn’t holding her breath.
If they didn’t have magnesium powder and ultraviolet light, then she might as well hang it up right now. Not to mention this place should close its doors as a teaching facility. There was no way to observe and record any latent fingerprints without those items.
She took her hair and quickly braided it so it would be out of her way. She rolled up her sleeves and donned latex gloves. It was time to get to work.
* * *
AS SOON AS MOLLY began braiding her hair he knew to get out of her way. This Molly was the one he had known for four years. And she was every bit as sexy as the woman he’d been in bed with a few hours ago.
He knew not to get in her way. She was focused, albeit frustrated at not being in her own lab, and she would work the evidence until she’d gotten as much information from it as she could.
Jon and Liam would be showing up here as soon as they could. Jon had gone to his house, hoping to finally lose whoever had been tailing him. Liam would be coming straight from Omega HQ.
What Molly said about not being able to use whatever evidence she found in court was definitely true. But
Derek really didn’t care. He wanted to be able to move forward, not just to figure out who was behind the Chicago bombing. He also wanted to be able to know that Molly was safe. Until they knew who was behind this, she would have a target on her back. So would Derek, but he was more used to it, and more capable of taking care of himself.
Not that Molly wasn’t capable. These past few days she had proven herself more than capable and much stronger than he’d given her credit for. Okay yeah, she had pulled the covers up over her head at the hospital, but when it had counted she had shown strength and fortitude.
Including when he had told her about his past.
He hadn’t expected her to run screaming from the room, but he had thought it would give her pause. Pretty damn considerable pause. Not that she had been flippant about it.
Instead, as was exactly her way, she had looked at it from an angle he’d failed to consider. Derek generally did that—tried to look at situations from multiple angles to get the best possible understanding—but it was a lot harder to do when you were talking about yourself.
Derek’s burner phone buzzed in his pocket. Liam was here. Derek crossed to let him in the door. Molly was so engrossed in what she was doing that she didn’t even notice.
“Hey.” Derek let Liam in, then quickly closed the door that led to the back parking lot of the building. “This was a good idea. Nobody will be looking for us here.”
“It’s the best forensic lab I could think of that might not have any law enforcement looking for Molly,” Liam responded, slapping Derek on the back in greeting.
“Well, she called it a preschool, so I don’t think she’s overly impressed with the facilities.”
Liam laughed. “I’m just glad we actually have some evidence to try and process.”
Derek nodded. “Me, too. Were you able to update Drackett about what’s going on?”
“Yes, since it’s nearly midnight most of the Internal Affairs, or whatever they are, are gone. Steve looks like he’s been hit by a train.”
“When was the last time he went home?” Both men knew their boss didn’t have a family, but everyone needed to go home sometime.
“Honestly, I’m not sure he’s been home since the lab explosion. Probably just caught a few hours of sleep on the couch in his office here and there.” Liam shrugged, his respect obvious. “Where’s Jon?”
“On his way. He couldn’t shake his tail earlier so Molly and I got into her house to get the lab coat. Good thing, too. It wasn’t where she’d remembered it being. If Jon had been looking for it, he might not have found it.” Derek’s phone buzzed again. “There he is now.”
Derek let Jon in. “Finally shake them off?”
Jon rolled his eyes. “I must be losing my touch when I can’t manage to shake five different people following me. I’m pretty sure they think I’m inside my house watching TV. I snuck out a side window and walked a couple of miles, then took a cab and walked another couple of miles. How’s it going?”
“Molly’s in her element. She’s already been at it a couple hours. I tried to help a while ago, but she gave me such a glare that I decided I’d better leave it alone.”
Both men grinned at that.
“So what is our plan?” Jon asked.
“Dependent on what Molly finds, we’ll have to move from there. It’s not going to be legally binding, but it is at least going to point us in the right direction.”
“You’re going to need to check in at Omega, Derek,” Liam told him. “I have made up every story about you that I could about why you haven’t been there. Hell, I even had a pretend conversation with you, with the Internal Affairs guys just a few yards away, about how you were sick and would be in tomorrow. I was supposed to bring you soup, by the way, so if you don’t show up, I’m pretty sure someone will be coming to your house.”
Although Liam had a great gift for storytelling, Derek was sure what he said was true. He needed to show his face at Omega tomorrow.
“And, bad news,” Jon said.
“What?” That’s all they needed was more bad news.
“Molly’s status has been officially upgraded to dangerous fugitive. So that means even uniformed cops are going to be looking for her. I wouldn’t be surprised if she showed up on the news.”
Damn it. Someone was definitely trying to put the squeeze on Molly. He needed to get her out of here as soon as possible. Out of the city, back to his cabin. Jon or Liam could stay with her while he went into Omega.
Derek didn’t like the thought of Molly being with anyone except him. He trusted these two men like brothers, knew they had his back, but the thought of either of them with Molly in that cozy cabin, near the bed where they’d made love all afternoon?
No, he definitely didn’t like it. He’d allow it for her safety, of course, but he didn’t like it one damn bit.
“Okay,” he told the guys, trying not to grimace. “We’ll take turns out at the cabin. We’ll have to make sure we’re not followed, which will be tough, but it’s pretty secure. Remote. No reason anyone would be coming out there unless it’s to purposely get to the cabin.”
“Okay,” Jon said. “It won’t work for long, but the most important thing is getting Molly out of Dodge right now. Even getting pulled over for a routine traffic stop with her in the car could be disastrous. We’ve got to get her as far away from any type of law enforcement as possible.”
Molly walked over with the evidence bag in her hand. “Hey, you guys are going to have to get me into Omega Headquarters.”
Chapter Nineteen
Derek met Jon’s and Liam’s eyes and they all turned to her.
“No.” It was in unison.
Molly blinked and looked at the other two men. “When did you guys get here?”
Jon rolled his eyes. “A while ago, Molls. I’m hurt.”
“You can’t go to Omega, Molly. Everyone is looking for you,” Liam explained. “Things have escalated. Cops down to the last crossing guard have been told to bring you in. That you’re a dangerous fugitive.”
She held up the evidence bag. “There’s a set of prints on here. Those I was able to get off with no problem, even with the substandard equipment.” Her disdain was evident. “And I matched them to your dead guy’s. I don’t know who he is, but I know he touched this. I’m running him through AFIS, to see if we get a hit, but the computers are about the same speed as snails, so we should get it by the time we’re all fifty.”
Derek shook his head at her melodramatics. He was glad she was able to manually get the print, but Molly was right, a print didn’t help them without a name.
“But this.” She held up the bag and pointed at something on the communication device. “I’m pretty sure there’s a drive on here that has active data. Pictures, documents or something else, I’m not sure. But I can’t access it here. There’s too much damage from the fire and I don’t have the equipment I need. If I try, I’ll probably lose the data.”
He saw how she stretched her shoulders and neck, so he moved behind her to rub her shoulders and help work out the kinks. The past couple of days had definitely taken a toll on her body.
“Fine, give it to us and we’ll get the data off of it,” Derek said to her.
Molly looked over her shoulder at him, and gave him a smirk. “No offense, but you can’t do it.”
“You can tell me how, and I’ll do it. You can walk me through it. Or we can bring in one of your technicians. One that you trust.”
Derek looked over at the guys to get them to back him up. But they were both staring at him and Molly with their mouths all but gaping. Derek realized it was because he was rubbing her shoulders.
“What?” he snapped.
That got their attention. “Um, Derek is right, Molly.” Jon spoke first. “You’ll need to let someone else do it. We
can’t get you into Omega. As soon as we carded you in you’d get arrested.”
Molly’s sigh was tired. “I’m not being conceited. I just don’t think anybody from Omega can get the information off this drive except me. It’s a specialization. The process is too delicate and is going to involve the use of both lasers and acid. It needs to be done in a sterile room. There will only be one chance to get the data drive separated from the casing in any sort of operational fashion.”
“Even if we could get you in, Molly, there is no lab at Omega right now.” Derek kept rubbing her shoulders, and pulled her back closer to him.
“Yes, there is.” She glanced at him before relaxing into his chest. “The old lab, down in the basement.”
Derek could remember it, vaguely. It hadn’t been used in years.
“She’s right.” Liam nodded. “They kept it for overflow cases.”
“Not that we ever have enough personnel in the lab to get to overflow cases.” Molly sighed again. “But yeah, everything I need should be there.”
Derek looked over at Jon and Liam. They were both nodding.
Using the old lab changed the factors quite a bit. It was in the older part of the building, less security clearance was needed there. She’d still need a swipe card, but she wouldn’t have to go through a live guard to get to the lab.
“It’s definitely possible,” Jon said.
“Although bringing her into a law enforcement building housing a multiagency task force filled with top-trained agents may not be the wisest thing we’ve ever done,” Liam said. “But then again, not the most stupid thing, either.”
Molly turned around to face Derek and smiled. “I’m going to pack everything I need. I’m assuming that since I’m already a fugitive, taking a couple items from here won’t really be a problem.”
She stood up on tiptoes to kiss him, but that didn’t even get her lips all the way up to his. Derek bent the rest of the way to meet her.
“Take your time,” he murmured against her lips. “It’ll take us a few minutes to figure out the details.”
