Winter Frost (A Chris Matheson Cold Case Mystery Book 2)

by Lauren Carr

  “I’d have to check on that. Do you believe there’s a connection between her murder and what happened last night?”

  “Most definitely,” Murphy said. “He was a paid assassin.”

  “Every man in that death squad was a killer for hire.”

  “Leonardo Mancini is a very heavy hitter,” Murphy said. “That means whoever is behind this has a lot of juice. If I knew what we were going up against, then I would have escorted Stephens to his home and he’d still be alive.”

  “Or you would both be dead,” she said. “Someone killed Stephens after collecting what information Mancini needed to intercept the target, who apparently was not Anne Kidman, but the wife of Vaccaro’s former partner—FBI.”

  “Someone? Not Mancini?”

  “Couldn’t have been Mancini. Too short,” she said. “A neighbor saw an extremely tall man wearing a cable utility company uniform working on the box outside Stephens’s house shortly before the murder. A van was parked in front of his house. The company confirms they had no trucks in the area yesterday afternoon.”

  “The tall man must have been working for Mancini.”

  “Well, our cleanup team found no extremely tall men among the bodies at the safe house. That means he’s still out there. Watch your back.”

  “I always watch my back.” He shot her a charming grin. “Their target was obviously Matheson’s wife, a communications officer with the state department—”

  He stopped when she raised her hand for him to stop. “Vaccaro briefed me on that part.” She pressed a button on the console next to her. “You have no idea how deep our people had to dig to get Blair Matheson’s paperwork and background check. I just sent her information to your phone. I also sent Chris Matheson’s information from the FBI. Is he on board with us?”

  “He assumed I was CIA. Then Nigel called me ‘Lieutenant.’ Now he thinks I’m active military on loan to the CIA.”

  “Then you haven’t totally blown your cover. Don’t do anything to contradict his assumption,” she said with a shrug of her shoulders. “It’s imperative that he, or anyone else for that matter, doesn’t find out about the Phantoms. Vaccaro says he can be trusted and believes he can be quite helpful in tracking down his wife. He’s brilliant, especially when it comes to thinking fast on his feet.” She gestured at Murphy’s encrypted phone. “You’ll see in his record that the FBI considered him one of their top agents—especially when working undercover.”

  “I saw that last night,” Murphy said. “Oh, speaking of that, there’s a red BMW parked in front of the safehouse. Matheson and I had to use it last night after we got ambushed. It’s stolen.”

  She held up her hand. “I don’t want to hear anymore.”

  While Murphy scanned the background information on Chris Matheson, she pressed a button on the console. “Bernie, please contact the police to pick up a red BMW from in front of our Capitol Hill safehouse. Make sure it gets back to its owner.”

  “The CIA operative who went missing in Switzerland,” Murphy said, “what was her assignment?”

  “That’s classified.”

  Murphy glanced up from the report. “Maybe if I had more information about what I was going up against last night Hayes and Stephens would still be alive.”

  “We now believe that Kidman’s assignment is irrelevant to her disappearance,” she said. “She went missing on the same day that Blair Matheson was reported killed. Of course, the two events were never connected because Kidman was CIA and Matheson was state department. No one in this town talks to each other. The state department found Matheson’s passport in a woman’s bag. She was supposedly on leave. The body had been hit by a truck. They assumed the victim was Blair Matheson.”

  “And they cremated the body so Chris Matheson had no idea that it wasn’t his wife,” Murphy said. “The woman killed in the terrorist attack was Anne Kidman.”

  “Unfortunately, we’ll never know for certain,” she said. “Chris Matheson called.”

  “Has he heard from Blair?”

  “I wish.”

  “What did he say?”

  “He had come to the same conclusion and wanted to confirm it,” she said. “However, he no longer has her ashes. He threw them off a mountain. Something about a place they used to hike.”

  “Bummer,” he said. “What else did he say?”

  “He was told that his wife was in Nice with an Australian,” she said. “Witnesses claimed she looked pretty tight with him. Our information says a member of the Australian Secret Intelligence Service had been murdered in the attack. Kidman was romantically involved with that agent. I believe we are safe to assume Kidman had given Matheson a new identity to escape the same people who had killed her boss. My guess is that she had Blair Matheson’s identification in her purse to destroy.”

  “And I think the Yellow Dragon had been hired to murder the medical examiner after she refused to cover up the communication chief’s murder,” Murphy said. “Everything’s connected.”

  “Blair Matheson must have used the passport that Kidman had obtained for her to return to the United States,” she said.

  “She stayed away from her family to protect them,” Murphy said. “What did she uncover?”

  “At this point, we can only guess. Blair Matheson was archiving old communications from bases and embassies. NSA had installed an updated system after that whole Snowden mess. Matheson was assigned to catalog and archive old communications records for the entire Central Europe region.”

  Murphy grinned. Ray Nolan had been right on target.

  “According to the communications chief’s administrative assistant, Marianne Landon,” she said, “Blair Matheson had a number of closed-door meetings with the communications chief in the days leading up to his death. At one point, they had a meeting with the chief of station, Ned Schiff. It became extremely loud. She heard them mention Lithuania and the car bombing several times.”

  “Matheson must have discovered additional information about the bombing that killed Ambassador Brown,” he said. “Did Schiff act on it?”

  “That twerp?” She scoffed. “Ned Schiff only became deputy director of the CIA’s intelligence directorate by kissing Daniel Cross’s butt.”

  “The same Daniel Cross who had been stationed in Lithuania when that car bomb killed Ambassador Brown and the chief of station,” Murphy said. “That attack put Cross on the fast track after he uncovered the extremist terrorist group responsible for the bombing.”

  “After Les Monroe, the communications chief, committed suicide and Matheson died in a terrorist attack, Ned Schiff came home to become deputy chief of the intelligence directorate, directly under Daniel Cross,” she said. “Do you think maybe that promotion was a nice reward for playing ball?”

  “Schiff must have ordered Matheson and her boss to cover up whatever it was they’d found,” Murphy said. “When they didn’t go along, he killed the communications chief and hired a hitman to take out the medical examiner who refused to cover it up. Matheson escaped and assumed a new identity. The big question is, what did they uncover?”

  A slow grin crossed her lips. “That’s where it gets interesting. The last communication that Agent Kidman’s handler had received from her was on the morning that Blair Matheson had supposedly died. Kidman reported that they had uncovered a possible spy working out of the American embassy in Lithuania.”

  “Inside the embassy?” Murphy noticed that Bernie had pulled the limousine up in front of the Panera Bread in Dupont Circle where he was meeting Francine and Tristan.

  “Keep in mind that was three years ago,” she said. “The CIA did a security sweep through that embassy and conducted a complete investigation of all personnel after Kidman’s handler forwarded that message up the line. They found nothing. Either the handler misunderstood Kidman, or it was false information.”

  “Or the bad
guys got wind of it and covered everything up before the security team could get there,” Murphy said.

  “That’s what makes you such a good Phantom, Lieutenant.” She allowed herself to smile. “You’re a cynic.”

  Chris Matheson’s bedroom suite occupied the top floor of the three-story farmhouse. It was the same room he had slept in when he had been a teenager demanding privacy from his parents. Thirty years later, when he returned with his family, his mother understood that her grown son needed a place to escape the overpopulation of females.

  Spacious, the attic had everything he needed, including a full bathroom. It was removed from the bedrooms on the second floor. His mother’s suite was on the other end of the house.

  Also, a lone male among a pack of female critters, Sterling could often be found stretched out across Chris’s bed. Preferring Doris’s company, Sadie and Mocha rarely went up to Chris’s room. However, Thor, who had grown quite fond of the German shepherd, could often be found tucked against Sterling.

  After abandoning his breakfast, Chris stopped on the second floor upon hearing the anniversary clock’s chimes in the dining room marking the eight o’clock hour.

  The farmhouse had been in the Matheson family for several generations—over which time furniture and antiques had been passed down as well. Among those possessions were two grandfather clocks and two anniversary clocks. The big grandfather clock in the living room and the other in the study. The gold anniversary clock was on the fireplace mantle in the dining room and another in the sunroom. Each clock announced the hour with various tunes, chimes, and bongs. As hard as Doris tried, she could not get them in sync. Every hour was announced with a clock works version of “Row Row Row Your Boat” played over the course of two to three minutes.

  The family had become so used to the hourly symphony that they had tuned it out.

  That morning, Chris found the musical broadcast annoying. He stopped at the top of the stairs to count the bongs from the grandfather clock in the study.

  BONG! BONG! BONG! BONG! BONG! BONG! BONG! BONG!

  Eight o’clock.

  In the next beat, one of the anniversary clocks started its tune. While it’s notes were higher, they were louder since the clock was located at the bottom of the stairs.

  The last chime ended and the clock in the sunroom took up the next round. Then, like the grand star of a major production, the big grandfather clock in the living room seemed to rock the house with its deep bongs.

  The last bong echoed throughout the house until it died away.

  With a sigh, Chris made his way down the hallway to the stairs to take him up to his room—taking him past each of his daughter’s bedrooms. Every door was closed except for Emma’s. She kept her door open for Thor, who liked to sleep among the stuffed animals that filled her bed.

  The light notes of a song floated from her room.

  Thinking he was imagining it, he paused to listen.

  The faint notes continued.

  Am I hearing what I think I’m hearing? That couldn’t possibly be Emma’s angel clock. He charged into the bedroom to determine what had prompted the music box in his daughter’s clock to start playing on its own.

  Emma Matheson’s bedroom reflected her personality. Her room was decorated in pink with stuffed bunnies, kittens, puppies, horses, unicorns, and angels were everywhere. Like her mother, Emma had developed a fascination with angels. The centerpiece of her collection was an ornate gold pendulum table clock that rested on the top shelf of her bookcase. A gold angel watched over her from the tip top point.

  Ivy Dunleavy had delivered the clock to them on Emma’s birthday, ten days after they had learned of Blair’s death. Blair had shipped the clock and the Rolex watch to Ivy along with an order they had made from an exclusive clockmaker in Switzerland.

  Blair had asked Ivy to deliver the clock, which was also a music box, to Emma on her birthday. The clock with the angel on top had become Emma’s most prized possession. She would twist the turnkey to play the song last thing before climbing into bed at night.

  Chris followed the song across the room to the clock and put his ear to it. It was “Fly” by Celine Dion, a song about an angel flying up to heaven. He picked it up.

  As soon as he touched it, the song ended. The room fell silent.

  He turned the clock over to examine the turnkey in the back. Everything appeared normal.

  Puzzled about the music box going off in an empty room, Chris placed the clock back on the shelf and backed away. He took one last look around the room before closing the door

  Having ditched the Pilgrim hat, Sterling lay at the foot of the bed with Thor stretched out between his front paws. The bunny had a pleased expression on her face as the dog licked her back.

  What an odd couple. In any other world, the bunny would be prey for the predator. In this world, they’re best friends.

  Chris dropped down sideways across the middle of his bed and stared up at the ceiling fan above him.

  Sensing his master’s melancholy mood, Sterling stretched over to lick Chris’s cheek. Displeased about being abandoned, Thor thumped the bed with her hind legs. When that didn’t work, she crawled over to wedge her body between them until Sterling had no choice but to resume licking her.

  Chris remembered the expression on Blair’s face when she had seen him. Surprise. He was also surprised. More so. Afterall, he’d thought she was dead.

  He wondered if she knew that he had sold their home and moved in with his mother. Did she know his father had passed away a little more than a year after she had—no. She didn’t die. After she … faked her death.

  That had to be it. She was alive. She had to know that the state department had reported her dead. She didn’t correct them. She’d made no attempt to contact him or their children.

  Chris felt anger brewing inside him. His teeth clenched. With a groan, he sat up and buried his face in his hands.

  Blair was ambitious. She wanted to be more than a wife and mother. She aspired to move up the ladder in the state department—but always, it seemed, just when she was on the brink of a great position or a promotion, someone else always seemed to swoop in ahead of her to snag it.

  Either that or she blew it somehow. During one job interview, she was well on her way to the position until the last interview when the manager pushed the wrong buttons. Blair was usually a calm person. She would keep everything bottled up inside until someone pushed the wrong button. Then, she’d explode.

  Since Blair had been so unhappy with her professional life, Chris and the children tried to make her home life stress free. The endeavor was fruitless. A failed homework assignment, a forgotten chore, an abrupt out of town case that meant juggling of schedules—any of those was enough to fuel an explosion of Blair’s pent-up frustration.

  As much as Chris hated to admit it, the Matheson home became much calmer after Blair had gone to Switzerland. It was difficult being a single dad, but even that was easier than walking on eggshells.

  Still, he loved her, not just because she was the mother of his children, but because he knew the woman underneath it all. She did love her family—in her own way.

  He got up from the bed and went to the dresser. He opened the jewelry box and dug through the few items inside until he found the Rolex. It was plain as far as designer watches go. The gold watch was as shiny as it had been on the day Ivy had given it to him at Emma’s birthday party.

  What a waste of money? She had to know I’d never wear it.

  He turned it over to read the inscription.

  Darling Chris,

  Fly Away with me.

  Your Angel, Blair.

  Weird.

  Chris had called Blair by the usual pet names. Dear. Sweetheart. Darling. Never “Angel.” Where did she come up with that? It must have been on her mind. Most likely the Rolex was an impulse buy when
she’d bought the clock for Emma. At least she was thinking about me.

  Narrowing his eyes, he studied the engraving. Below the last line there were tiny numbers. They were about half the size as the letters in the message. He had noticed them when he first received the watch:

  06-28-04

  Their wedding date. Another slap in the face because their wedding date was the twenty-sixth, not the twenty-eighth.

  Maybe it was the jeweler’s mistake. Maybe not.

  He tossed the watch back into the jewelery box and slammed the lid shut.

  Even so, she was his wife and he had grieved her death. So did their children.

  They grieved over their loss and then moved on with their lives. He had reconnected with the love of his life and things were going well. He gave horseback riding lessons to Helen’s daughter Sierra every Saturday. It was something the two of them shared—a love for horses. They had been conspiring to convince Helen to allow Sierra to have her own horse. He could see making plans with Helen to join their two families together.

  Out of the blue, Blair is back and there goes all of my plans.

  Chris lifted his head and looked at his reflection in the mirror.

  Blair’s back and running from some very dangerous people. Who?

  There was one thing he did know. He had to protect her—no matter what it took.

  Chris reached for the burner phone that Murphy had given to him. Murphy still had his phone after confiscating it the night before. He’d better give that back to me—along with my suit. That meant he didn’t have his contacts.

  He went to his laptop to search his contact list. It was questionable if he still had Ivy Dunleavy’s information. Even if he had it, he couldn’t be sure it hadn’t changed since he had last spoken to her.

  Ivy and her husband had been friendly and comforting at Blair’s funeral. Then, something changed.

  The Dunleavys had dropped out of their lives. It wasn’t a huge surprise. Ivy had been Blair’s friend. Apparently, with Blair gone, there was no reason for the Dunleavys to remain in the Mathesons’ lives.