Stalked lk-5

by Allison Brennan

  “When did he do it?” Lucy asked.

  “When Peter was in Syracuse,” Sean said. “At least, that’s my educated guess.”

  Lucy suspected that Sean knew for certain but that he hadn’t found the information through legitimate channels. She worried that someday his hacking skills were going to get him in trouble, but she had to admit that they often came in handy.

  Lucy said, “They lost track of him when he ran away. Kip graduated from high school. Peter got his GED, then he went to college a year early. Kip would have been in college at the same time, and since Peter hadn’t legally changed his name or hid his identity, he was easy to find.”

  “And Alexis got close to him? To psychologically torture him?” Suzanne shook her head. “They’re sick.”

  “They’re methodical sociopaths.”

  “What I don’t get is how Alexis beat the FBI background check,” Joe said. “Don’t you guys run your new agents through a vigorous system?”

  “Yes,” Noah said, “but she didn’t lie about anything. Just because her sister was murdered doesn’t disqualify her from being an agent. When she interviewed, she lived in Denver, she was married, she had a daughter. All that was true. When she and her husband split, she amended her file. It’s all there, in her file, but unless you know what to look for, it’s not going to raise any concerns.”

  “Why go through all that trouble to become an FBI agent if you’re only going to leave in the middle of training?”

  “My guess?” Sean said. “They wanted information they couldn’t get without being an insider. Either on their sister’s murder investigation, or maybe they believed after Peter disappeared from Syracuse that the FBI knew where he was.”

  Noah concurred and added, “Also, I don’t think Alexis planned on killing Tony so soon after killing Weber. But when Tony himself went to New York, she panicked and poisoned his Scotch.”

  “Do we have a confirmation from the lab that his Scotch was definitely poisoned?” Lucy asked.

  Noah shook his head. “We’re waiting on more tox reports. Right now, an ERT unit is combing through her dorm room looking for trace evidence. If she’s guilty, we’ll find it.”

  “Why kill Rosemary now?” Lucy mused out loud.

  “Because,” Joe said, “Rosemary was looking into the Theissen subway accident. The day before she was killed, she requested the autopsy report, the police report, and all security footage. Maybe Todd thought she’d see something that would nail him. Though we can’t confirm from the security tapes that Todd was the person who tripped Theissen, he fits the general description.”

  “Theissen’s death set the chain of events into motion,” Suzanne said. “They’d quietly taken out Theissen. They may or may not have poisoned Bob Stokes. Kip Todd is keeping an eye on Rosemary-maybe he got the internship to see if she had information about Peter. Or maybe just to get close to her before he killed her, like Alexis got close to Peter.”

  Noah asked, “Did they conspire to kill Theissen? Or was that the brother acting alone?”

  “They had to be working together,” Sean said.

  “Why?”

  “The only way Alexis could have known Tony was working with Suzanne was if her brother tipped her off.”

  Suzanne said, “They’re both looking very guilty.”

  Lucy considered the facts they knew and all the conjecture and speculation. “I’m having a hard time figuring out which one of the siblings is dominant. Traditionally, it’s the male partner, but he was much younger when Camille was kidnapped. How his mother and his older sister responded to their grief would have a huge impact on him. He may have put himself into the protective role, that he needed to look out for them because he couldn’t protect Camille. Yet, Alexis went into the lion’s den-she was one of us. She ate with us, studied with us, lived with us. She kept up the act at all times. That shows an intense and controlled personality, capable of extreme emotional restraint.”

  “I’ve looked at this security footage a dozen times,” Joe said, “and she wasn’t trying to kill Peter. I think she wanted to disable Sean.”

  Sean concurred. “She wanted Peter to go with her. When I wouldn’t let him, she shot at me.”

  “She could be fixated on him,” Suzanne said.

  “If Peter isn’t a target, why was he stalked for so many years? In high school and college? Why did Alexis pretend to be someone else?” Lucy looked through the scrapbooks again. “Except…” She hesitated.

  “What?” Noah prompted.

  “There are two distinctly different targets. Those who elevated Rachel’s murder and minimized Camille’s-in the eyes of the Todds-would be Rosemary Weber and any law enforcement involved in either investigation. Then there is Peter. Peter had nothing to do with any of it. He didn’t talk to Rosemary Weber; he didn’t do anything to make himself the center of attention. If anything, he diminished himself and became inconsequential. He moved, changed his name, disappeared. And still, they sought him out.”

  “Or,” Suzanne said, “one of them did.”

  “You’re not thinking that Alexis isn’t part of this whole thing,” Joe said, “or being manipulated by her brother? She attacked a federal agent and shot a civilian.”

  Lucy considered Joe’s comment. “I think Alexis is fully cognizant of her actions. I don’t think she’s being manipulated by her brother. They planned everything out, from Agent Theissen to Rosemary Weber to Tony Presidio to Hans. It’s Peter who doesn’t fit. Especially since Sean says she aimed to kill him, not Peter.”

  “Alexis and Kip could be in the middle of a falling-out,” Noah said. “And we need to capitalize on it.”

  Suzanne and Lucy laid out their theory about Kip and Alexis Todd to Peter. He didn’t say anything for several minutes. Lucy didn’t blame him-it was an incredible story.

  “Why do they hate me? What did I ever do to them?”

  “Nothing,” Lucy said. “You became the object of their sociopathy. When their sister was killed, they had no one to blame. They blamed the police, the media, your family, everyone, because they felt helpless.”

  Suzanne added, “You were a convenient target for them.”

  It was clear that Peter didn’t believe them, not completely.

  “There may be another factor we haven’t uncovered,” Lucy said. “There’s a lot we don’t know about their childhood. There’s a lot we don’t know about their relationship. Detective Mead gave Sean your file, which helps with the time line.”

  Suzanne slid a recent picture of Kip Todd in front of Peter. “Do you recognize this man?”

  Peter stared at it. He shook his head.

  Suzanne then slid a picture of Kip Todd from Peter’s yearbook ten years ago. Kip had changed a lot-his hair was darker and he was heavier in high school.

  “What about him?”

  Peter stared and frowned. “Maybe.”

  “Maybe?”

  He shrugged. “I remember a short, pudgy kid when I was a freshman. We didn’t have any classes together, but his locker was near mine. He talked to me a few times, but I didn’t have friends and didn’t want to make any friends.” He looked at them. “My grandmother had just died. My mother was a slut. You’d think after everything that happened, how humiliated they were when their sex parties were exposed, that she’d clean up her act. Instead, my mom goes to one extreme and sleeps with every breathing male, and my dad goes to the other extreme and becomes a fire-and-brimstone-preaching dictator who says sex is evil. I missed my sister, but I missed her even more after Grams died.” He paused, looked at his clasped hands. “Which seems weird after five years.”

  Lucy said, “It’s not weird.” She hesitated, then said, “When I was seven, my best friend-my nephew-was killed. He was practically my brother; we saw each other every day. Like Rachel, he was kidnapped from his bedroom. Senseless. I still miss him, and every once in a while, even now, I feel almost overwhelmed with loss. It comes and goes quickly. On the one hand, I want to hold on to th
at feeling because I want to remember him; on the other, it feels so real, so painful, I never want to feel it again.”

  Peter seemed to find peace in her understanding.

  Suzanne showed him a recent picture of Alexis. “Do you recognize this woman?”

  “It’s Cami. But different.”

  “But you think it’s the same woman.”

  “I know it is. I loved her. She had lighter hair back then-I knew she’d dyed it, but I never saw her with brown hair. And her features are a little different-maybe fuller? Rounder? But it’s her.”

  “Her name is Alexis Todd Sanchez.”

  He frowned. “She’s married?”

  “Divorced.”

  Lucy considered something. She opened the file and looked at the birth records of Missy Sanchez. Alexis said she’d just turned four. That meant she could have been conceived in October, right before Alexis left Syracuse after allegedly putting the dead pig in Peter’s bed-Lucy needed Alexis’s medical records to know for certain.

  Or they could call her ex-husband.

  “Excuse me,” Lucy said.

  Suzanne looked at her oddly, but Lucy slipped out.

  Noah and Joe were watching through the one-way mirror in a room next door.

  “What are you thinking?” Noah asked Lucy.

  “The time frame-what if Alexis wasn’t the one who put the pig in Peter’s bed?”

  Noah was skeptical. “She scrubbed down the apartment, lied about where she lived, was never a student. She lied about everything.”

  “They were having sex. I think he’s Missy’s father.”

  “That’s a big leap.”

  “The timing is right.”

  “She’s involved, Lucy. Even if Tony was poisoned in New York, or if his death was truly a coincidence, she attacked Hans.”

  “I think she did both, no doubt in my mind. I think she’s as much involved in all of it as her brother. Except for Peter. I think she truly wanted to warn him, to protect him.”

  “I trust your hunches,” Noah said, “but that doesn’t help us find her, or her brother.”

  “I have an idea to draw Alexis out,” Lucy said. “But I need to confirm my theory.”

  “All right,” he said. “What do you need?”

  “To talk to her ex-husband.”

  CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

  Peter had quietly agreed to the plan when they debriefed him, but Lucy wasn’t at all sure that he was psychologically ready to confront Alexis. She’d been the first person he’d trusted after what happened with his sister, and Alexis had done more than destroy his trust-she’d killed his hope. He’d become a hermit, outside of teaching young kids. He had no friends, no social life, no future.

  Because Alexis and possibly Kip had seen Sean, Sean would be Peter’s visible bodyguard. Alexis also could have seen Sean at Quantico and know that he was involved with Lucy, but they would have to take that chance. Lucy was banking on her psychological analysis that Alexis would come to warn Peter or try to justify what she’d done.

  Lucy had enough experience with psychopaths and sociopaths, plus a master’s in criminal psychology, to make this call, but she’d always had backup. She’d always had Dillon or Hans to help talk things out. Now she had no choice but to go it alone.

  Sean and Peter went up to Peter’s apartment. Joe was coordinating NYPD on the street. Sean set up a camera so that Noah and Lucy, who were in a vacant apartment down the hall, could watch and listen. Suzanne would remain hidden in Peter’s apartment.

  Lucy’s theory was that Alexis would act quickly, possibly tonight and no more than twenty-four hours from now.

  Noah shook his head at the screen as he watched the living room of Peter’s apartment through a phone that Sean had programmed to transmit to his laptop. “Sean has all the toys,” Noah told Lucy.

  “Private sector,” Lucy said. “It pays better.”

  Sean was trying to get Peter to loosen up a bit, but Peter was wooden and worried. Finally, Sean turned on a baseball game that had been played earlier in the day, keeping the volume on low. It was late, after one in the morning, and Peter drifted off to sleep in his chair.

  Lucy asked Noah, “Have you heard about Hans?”

  “Same condition, but the swelling has gone down. If it continues, they’ll perform surgery tomorrow morning.”

  “That’s just as dangerous as the accident.”

  “It’s the only thing that will save him.”

  “That’s what they told us about Patrick, and he ended up in a coma for nearly two years.”

  “You never told me what happened.”

  “I assumed everyone knew. It’s in my file.” She didn’t know where the bitterness came from. She was used to this.

  Noah said quietly, “I only read what I had to know when I was investigating the vigilante murders. I knew about the coma, but not why.”

  Lucy stared at the screen.

  “You don’t need to talk about it, Lucy.”

  She shook her head. “Adam Scott had me on an island outside of Seattle. He falsified coordinates and sent them to Kate. Kate didn’t believe the information, she thought there was something wrong, but the FBI verified them and the agent in charge of the investigation took a team down to Baja, California. It was a trap. Scott had used the cabin in the past; he rigged it to explode. He was watching through a video feed. My brothers Patrick and Connor went down with Jack’s mercenary team, along with four agents. Scott watched through a video feed-I know, because he showed me-and when they breached the cabin, he blew it up.” Lucy would never forget watching Patrick half-running, half-thrown from the cabin. It still haunted her.

  “Patrick had a severe head injury that required surgery, but he was conscious and joking on the way to the hospital. He didn’t regain consciousness after the surgery. The doctors didn’t know for certain, but suspected it was a rare reaction to the anesthesia. When he was younger, he’d had his appendix out and slipped into a coma for several days.”

  “Did they operate again?”

  “No. He just woke up one day. Out of the blue.” She smiled. “The last couple years hasn’t been easy for him. Not just the physical deterioration. San Diego PD replaced him in the cybercrimes unit. Patrick had taken it from next to nothing to state of the art. But as you know, cybercrime is constantly changing. Patrick could have had his job back, but working for someone else. He was a lot like Sean-had an intuitive understanding of computer security. He lost his edge.

  “Connor, our other brother, is a P.I. and asked Patrick to join him, but Jack wanted Patrick at RCK, and Patrick needed to get out of the family nest.” She paused. “I love my family, but it’s hard to forge your own path when everyone tries to do it for you.”

  “He’s a good man.”

  Lucy smiled. “Yeah. He and Sean became close. I don’t think Patrick realized when he went to Sacramento to work for RCK that he was going from one over-protective family to another. Sean and Patrick opened up RCK East to get out from under the thumb of their big brothers.” She glanced at Noah. “You and Sean are good now, right?”

  “As good as we’ll ever be,” he said.

  “Why does that sound ominous?”

  Noah didn’t say anything, and Lucy didn’t push. She didn’t want to make waves. She liked Noah and owed him a debt for training her, supporting her, helping her become a good agent. She considered him her closest friend, outside of her family.

  But she loved Sean. He was her best friend. It was as simple as that. She didn’t want to choose sides between career and Sean. She wanted both.

  Everything mattered more-her career, her family, her life-because she had someone to share it with.

  Noah’s phone, set on intercom, beeped. It was DeLucca. “Heads up, possible Sanchez entering building. She has a key.”

  “Roger that; hold your position.”

  Noah said to Suzanne, “Did you get that?”

  “Roger.”

  They waited. It felt like forever but was
only three minutes before Alexis used a key to get into Peter’s apartment. On the screen, Lucy watched her quietly close the door. She walked down the short hall and looked at Peter, now pretending to sleep on the chair. She then turned toward Sean on the couch, also pretending to sleep.

  “Suz,” Lucy said, “she has a gun in her right hand.”

  She raised her gun toward Sean.

  Suzanne came out of the bedroom and karate chopped her arm. She dropped the gun, turned to face Suzanne, but Suzanne kicked her legs out from under her and had her on the ground in seconds, her knee in Alexis’s back.

  Sean hobbled over and put his gun on Alexis while Suzanne cuffed and searched her. By the time Alexis was on her feet, Noah and Lucy were in the apartment.

  Peter rose from his chair and stared at her. “Why?”

  “He knows where you are. He’ll find you.”

  “Let him come,” Suzanne said, sitting Alexis down in a chair. “We’re ready.”

  She shook her head. “He won’t come now. He’s the smartest person I know. And patient. He’ll wait.”

  Lucy sat down across from her. “Alexis, tell Peter the truth. He deserves to know why you went to Syracuse.”

  Tears welled in her eyes. “You don’t understand how hard it was for us after Cami disappeared. She was just … gone. We didn’t know where, if she was dead or alive. Kip blamed himself because he was there, at the park with her. Mom told them, watch out for each other.

  “But it wasn’t until you came back that Kip changed. He wanted so desperately to be your friend. He wanted to talk about your sister, and his sister, and you wouldn’t. He became fixated on you and everything about Rachel and the investigation.”