The Missing McCullen

by Rita Herron

  Stay sharp, Bobbie. No letting the past intrude.

  Once behind the police barricade, the uniforms released Anna Evans, and she almost collapsed on the pavement before they could catch hold of her again.

  “We need a medic,” Bobbie shouted. She moved toward the woman. “Are you injured, Mrs. Evans?”

  She shook her head, her eyes red and swollen from hours of crying. “Are you Detective Gentry?”

  “Yes, ma’am. We spoke on the phone a little while ago.” The woman appeared unharmed and reasonably composed for a terrified mother. Let this be a good sign.

  Anna Evans drew in a shuddering breath. “He says he’ll let the children go if you—” her pleading gaze latched on to Bobbie’s “—come inside and talk to him.”

  “I can do that.” The sooner those kids were out of harm’s—

  “The hell you say!” Miller roared. “That’s all we need is another hostage in there!”

  “Hold up, Miller.” York turned to Bobbie. “We can do this,” he offered in the modulated tone negotiators were trained to use. “I’ll go in with you.”

  While Miller launched another protest, Anna Evans hugged her arms around her trembling body and moved her head adamantly from side to side. “He said you have to come alone, Detective Gentry. Unarmed and alone.”

  “Not going to happen, Bobbie,” York stated, his voice hard now. “You’re—”

  Bobbie held up a hand for both men to shut up. “Did he say anything else, Mrs. Evans?”

  Fresh tears welled in her puffy eyes. She shook her head. “Just that he...he would let the children go. Please.” She wrung her hands together in front of her as if she intended to pray. “Don’t let my babies get hurt.”

  Bobbie removed her service weapon from its holster at her waist and passed it to York. “I’m going in.”

  “I’m calling Chief Peterson,” Miller warned. “The rest of the department might believe that you being his college buddy’s daughter and all gives you free rein in this town, but I don’t. You’ll play this by the rules exactly like the rest of us.”

  His accusation made Bobbie want to unleash the volatile emotions simmering just beneath the surface of her carefully schooled facade. Montgomery was the second-largest city in the state, but the department was like a small village. There were few secrets. Eventually everyone got the lowdown on everyone else—especially as it related to the chain of command or any perceived special favors. She’d understood from day one that the time would come when someone would have the balls to say those words to her face.

  Bobbie snatched her cell from her belt and offered it to him. “Go ahead, Miller. Call the chief. He’s in my favorites list under Uncle Teddy.”

  “Enough of that nonsense,” York growled, his fierce gaze focused on Miller.

  Since Miller didn’t take her up on her offer, Bobbie snapped her phone back onto her belt. “I’m going in.”

  “Think about what you’re doing, Bobbie,” York called after her. Next to him, Miller made good on his threat and put through the call on his own cell.

  Bobbie didn’t look back. She headed across the street. If any hope whatsoever existed that Evans would let those children go, she was willing to take the risk. A twinge of pain twisted in her right leg and started to keep time with the throb in her head. She ignored it. She would do some extra stretches tonight before her run.

  Assuming she was still alive. As long as she got those kids out of there, little else mattered.

  If you get yourself killed, who’s going to get him then?

  She hushed the nagging voice as she hustled up the sidewalk. At the end of the block, television cameras and the eagle eyes of reporters would be straining to see what Montgomery’s most damaged detective was doing next. Let them gawk. She didn’t care what they wrote about her.

  Shouldering the weight of York, Miller and the rest watching, she opened the front door and slipped into the living room. The interior was as quiet as a tomb. One would never know that half a dozen MPD cruisers, a SWAT van and crisis negotiation vehicle, along with a horde of reporters, were on the street. Not to mention two ambulances.

  As she crossed the living room and entered the hall, she called out to the man responsible for all the excitement this sweltering summer morning. “Mr. Evans, it’s Detective Gentry.”

  She paused at the door to the first bedroom on the left. Oddly, the man had chosen a bedroom at the front of the house, giving SWAT a reasonably clean view between the slats of the partially open blinds. Had he planned on committing suicide by cop and chickened out at the last minute?

  Never take a gun in your hand unless you’ve got the guts to use it. The words of wisdom her father had shared so often after she announced her intent to follow in his career-cop footsteps echoed inside her. If they were all lucky, Evans lacked the courage to use the weapon he’d waved around at his wife. Shielding himself with the children was certainly the act of a coward.

  “I’m here to talk, like you asked,” she reminded him when Evans failed to respond. She wiped her sweating palms against her trousers and braced for his move.

  The doorknob turned, and Bobbie held very still, her breath stalling just shy of her lungs. The steel of the backup piece strapped to her ankle suddenly felt hot as blazes and far too heavy.

  A small face peered up at her from the narrow crack made by the barely open door. Bobbie’s heart fractured as memories of another child she couldn’t bear to think about attempted to intrude. Seeing this little boy’s face sent a jolt of urgency through her. What was this guy doing? How could he risk the lives of his own children?

  Like you have room to talk.

  “Come in,” Evans called, “and I’ll send the children out.”

  The little boy drew the door open wider, and she stepped into the bedroom. She confirmed the four children—three girls and one boy, all still dressed in their pajamas, trembling and red-faced from crying—appeared to be uninjured. Her tension eased marginally. The walls of the room were a soft pink. The twin beds were unmade, cartoon-character bedcovers hanging this way and that. Dolls and a plastic tea set littered the floor. In the center of the room, between the two beds, the children stood in that ominous circle around their father. She easily spotted the daughter with the health issue; she was thinner and paler than the others. After numerous rounds of cancer treatments, she’d lost her hair, but it was growing back now and was almost as long as her little brother’s. Poor kid. Evans should be ashamed of himself for putting her through this.

  Booting aside her anger for the moment, Bobbie lifted the sides of her jacket from her torso. “I’m unarmed just like you requested, Mr. Evans.”

  The small boy, three or four years old maybe, who’d opened the door stood next to the huddle, staring at Bobbie. She purposely kept her attention away from him. Those memories of another little boy, not much younger, kept whispering through her mind.

  Can’t look. Can’t look.

  When Evans said nothing, she gently prompted, “It’s time to make good on your promise and let the children go, Mr. Evans.” It would go a long way in turning this crappy day around if the guy stuck by his word. She might even be able to breathe again, and maybe the world would stop expecting her to fail every time the pressure was on.

  Ten endless seconds passed before he spoke. “First, close the blinds,” he ordered.

  Bobbie walked to the window and did as he asked. Miller would go ballistic and the no-more-negotiations clock would start ticking louder. She hoped like hell Evans understood he was on borrowed time.

  “What now?” Careful to keep her hands up, Bobbie readied to tackle Evans. So far she hadn’t spotted his weapon.

  “Go outside and wait with your mother,” he said to the children.

  The older girl reached for the small boy’s hand and herded the others out the
door. When the sound of the front door slamming behind them echoed through the house, Bobbie felt as if an elephant had been lifted off her chest. Sensing the shift in her tension, Evans lifted the .38 clutched in his right hand and aimed it at her.

  Take it slow. Get him talking. “How can I help you, Mr. Evans? We all want to see a favorable resolution to this situation. Your wife and children need you.”

  Carl Evans was a tall, thin man. He sat cross-legged on the floor in his T-shirt and boxers. His face was pasty from the long hours at the office; his shoulders sagged from slumping over a desk. As if he felt the weight of her assessment, he sank back against the bed behind him. What had taken this forty-three-year-old number cruncher down this ugly path?

  He shook his head. “It’s too late for happily-ever-afters, Detective.”

  “It’s never too late, Mr.—”

  “Just listen.” He cut her off. “I don’t have much time. What I did was...wrong.”

  “Tell me what happened, and maybe I can help.”

  “You need to listen!” He jerked at the loud sound of his own voice reverberating in the small room.

  Bobbie’s tension cranked up a few more notches. “Okay. Okay. I’m listening.”

  “It was necessary.” He shook his head, tears slipping down his cheeks. “I didn’t stop to consider how it would end.”

  The muzzle of the weapon angled downward as he spoke, his attention shifting inward. All she had to do was keep him talking and when his aim strayed far enough, she would make a move.

  “I did what I had to do,” he said, his voice resolute even as his hands shook. “I would do it again. Anything to save my little girl.” He fell silent for another moment. “I didn’t think you would be hurt—not really, I mean. I had no idea...”

  Bobbie’s attention swung from the muzzle to the man’s face. “Me?”

  His lips quivered. “I was desperate.” He searched her face as if looking for understanding, his eyes glimmering with emotion. “I had no choice.”

  “You love your children. No one can fault you for that, Mr. Evans.” She felt bad for the family, but the man wasn’t making a whole lot of sense. What did this have to do with her? “What can I do to help?”

  He scrubbed his face with his free hand. A sob tore loose from his throat. “I need my family to know it was for them.”

  Oh, hell. “I’ll make sure they know,” Bobbie promised. “But, Mr. Evans, whatever trouble you’re in, you don’t have to do this. Your family needs you. I can help you.”

  His shoulders stiffened, and he steadied his aim at her. Anticipation coiled in her muscles.

  “You can’t help me. You are the reason he came looking for me.”

  NO DARKER PLACE

  by Debra Webb

  Available March 2017

  wherever MIRA Books are sold.

  An explosive new case...

  A suspect with a hidden agenda...

  and a Special Agent whose past

  could cost her everything!

  Keep reading for a sneak peek at the first episode of

  TOUGH JUSTICE: COUNTDOWN (Part 1 of 8)

  by New York Times bestselling author Carla Cassidy.

  Copyright © 2017 Debra Webb

  Tough Justice: Countdown (Part 1 of 8)

  by Carla Cassidy

  Episode One

  A year after FBI Agent Lara Grant put her past—in the form of a very personal manhunt—behind her, the Crisis Management Unit is called in to take lead on a shocking new assignment. A serial bomber is targeting some of the most powerful people in in the city, threatening to expose their deepest secrets.

  And soon Lara will face a deadly foe—with an army of skeletons just waiting to fall out of her own closet…

  Prologue

  Dammit, he’d been so careful. And now this.

  A trickle of sweat worked down the side of his face and he closed his eyes as fear tightened his lungs and squeezed his throat. He’d been in a simmering panic since he’d received the email.

  He opened his eyes and reread the damned thing.

  12:01a.m., from yourworstnightmare@nowhere.net:

  I know what you did with all that money. I’ll keep your secret but it will cost the lives of innocent people. Or confess to the press and nobody gets hurt. The choice is yours. You have until noon tomorrow.

  The lives of innocent people? What did that mean? His gut tightened as nausea overcame him.

  Things like this weren’t supposed to happen to him. He’d done everything right in his life. He’d had high hopes. He had big ambitions. The New York Times was running a cover story on him next week that he hoped would launch him to a new level of success. Everything was in place and now this.

  Somebody knew his secret.

  He twisted his gold wedding band around and around his finger as he stared at the grandfather clock across the room. He had to make a decision fast. Time was running out.

  Coming clean would destroy everything he’d worked for. Hell, it wouldn’t only destroy him, it would also destroy his wife.

  How much could this anonymous person know? Did the emailer know about all the gifts, the secret hotel visits and the faux business expenses?

  Just last weekend they had spent two days together at a luxury hotel upstate, ultimately paid for by taxpayer dollars.

  Four minutes…he had four minutes left to make a decision. He should have contacted his brother when he’d received the email. But what could he have done to help? What could anyone do?

  Three minutes. A rivulet of sweat rolled down the center of his back while his fingers poised over his computer keyboard. It was too late to call for a press conference. But it wasn’t too late for him to type something up on social media…confess to the affair and to the misuse of public funds.

  If he didn’t do that innocent people would die. Jesus, what kind of a choice was this? What kind of a monster asked someone to make such a decision.

  The back of his throat closed up again. He didn’t want to be responsible for anyone dying. He blew out several short breaths in an effort to calm himself.

  Two minutes to go. Surely it was a hoax. It had to be some sort of an outrageous bluff. How could he take this seriously? More sweat dampened him as the acrid scent of his fear wafted in the air. His fingers trembled with indecision.

  One minute...oh, God, what should he do? Was this real? Would something bad really happen?

  Thirty seconds. His phone dinged with a text message. Quickly he grabbed it up and stared at the text.

  Ticktock.

  A sharp pain shot through his chest. This couldn’t be real. It couldn’t be…could it? The grandfather clock ticked off the seconds.

  Five.

  Four. His fingers hovered over his keyboard.

  Three.

  Two. Oh God. He hesitated. It was too late to type something now.

  One.

  As the clock began to chime, a ding indicated another text message.

  With dread he looked at it.

  Boom.

  Don’t miss a single exciting installment of the new FBI thriller

  TOUGH JUSTICE: COUNTDOWN

  by New York Times bestselling author Carla Cassidy, Tyler Anne Snell, Emmy Curtis and Janie Crouch.

  On sale February 2017 wherever Harlequin ebooks are sold.

  Copyright © 2017 by Harlequin Books S.A.

  ISBN-13: 9781488012686

  The Missing McCullen

  Copyright © 2017 by Rita B. Herron

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  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events or locales is entirely coincidental. This edition published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.

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