Trip Wire

by CJ Lyons

  It was those sick, twisted feelings that had made her hate herself—and had driven her to insinuate herself into Jenna’s life. In many ways, Jenna was more like Morgan than Adam ever could be, and thus a better role model. If Jenna could find happiness, even if it wasn’t the fairytale-come-true idyllic life Morgan imagined Adam having, then Morgan had a chance at happiness herself.

  At least she hoped so.

  “You don’t have surveillance on Adam and his family?” Micah asked, startling her from her reverie.

  “No.” She couldn’t bear the temptation of watching Adam and his wonderful life. She wasn’t sure if it would inspire her to be better or burn away at her like acid, leaving nothing good behind. “I hadn’t taught myself all that back then. I haven’t seen him in over a year.”

  “Not even when your father escaped prison?”

  “Definitely not. The last thing I wanted was to risk leading Clint to Adam.”

  “So instead you took on your father and his gang all by yourself.”

  She liked the hint of pride that colored his voice, and she slid her hand across the seat to take his. “Not all by myself. I had you.”

  When they reached the tiny town that boasted a population under five hundred, Morgan drove past Adam’s house so that Micah could take a look. This was the main residential street, but only half the homes were occupied, giving it a lonely feeling of despair. At least until they reached Adam’s house: a small wood-framed ranch painted bright yellow and featuring an array of garden gnomes clustered throughout the front yard and lining the drive.

  “Guess they’re better than pink flamingos or fake deer,” Micah said, as he stared out the window. Adam and his foster mother were in the driveway washing the family cars: a Nissan Pathfinder that had seen better days and a vintage yellow VW bug. Even with the car windows up, Morgan could hear their laughter. They were bonded by something even more powerful than blood: love.

  She circled the block and finally parked behind a detached garage at the far end of the alley that ran behind Adam’s house. The alley sloped uphill, so they had a direct view of Adam’s backyard plus the east side of his house and most of the front. He and his mother were still in the driveway, the cars forgotten as they threw soapy sponges and sprayed hoses at each other.

  An unfamiliar ache stirred inside Morgan. Could that have ever have been her? Micah sensed her pain and held her free hand as she stared through her monocular. “Once I’m in position, call the landline. Let it ring. If the machine answers, call back. We need one of them to go inside—text me and let me know which one.”

  “Are you sure you want to confront Adam on your own? Maybe I should go? He’s never seen me.”

  Morgan hesitated. She was reluctant to let Micah out of her sight. Not because she didn’t trust him; not because she didn’t trust Adam or his new family.

  Because she did trust her gut. It had kept her alive all these years, helped her escape Clint and evade arrest, and right now it was warning her. Something was wrong here. She couldn’t see it. But she felt it like a flame against the back of her neck. She could feel it in the way her scalp felt too tight against her skull and in the urge to hold her breath and focus out of the far corner of her eye.

  Someone was watching.

  Watching her.

  Chapter Fifteen

  “Change of plan,” Morgan told Micah. “You’re going to make the approach.”

  “Really?” An edge of excitement colored his voice.

  She handed him the car keys. “Really.” She didn’t tell him that while he kept Adam and his mother busy, she hoped to be circling back unseen to find whoever was watching them—hopefully the bomber. Which meant this might all be over in time for Micah to get home to his mothers for dinner.

  “What do I say?”

  “Just tell them you’re an art student from Pittsburgh. You’re taking a film class, and you heard about a historic railroad that ran through here and you thought it might make a good subject. It’s called the East Broad Top. Tell them you’re lost, and ask for directions to it.” Pretty much all the truth, but that was how the best lies were built—and Micah was one of the worst liars she’d ever met, so it was best to keep things simple.

  “I can do that. Where will you be?”

  She gestured with the monocular. “Watching. Out of sight so I don’t scare them. All you have to do is keep them talking.”

  “What will you be doing?”

  Now it was her turn to lie. “I’ll sneak into the house and leave a message for Adam, warning him and asking him to come meet me. That way it’s his choice; I’m not forcing him to do anything.”

  Micah nodded. “So I just need to distract them long enough for you to leave a message? That shouldn’t be too hard.”

  “Exactly. Give me a few minutes to get into position and then circle around the block to Adam’s house.” She left the car, not bothering to hide the movement. After all, the whole idea was to get the attention of whoever was out there. Besides, there was no way they wouldn’t notice Micah moving over to the driver’s seat.

  The trick would be spotting the watcher and finding his blind spot, so she could turn the tables.

  Morgan began by circling around the garage they’d parked behind, hoping that the watcher would need to move to try to follow her. She kept low, moving fast along a decrepit privacy fence, leaping over a ratty evergreen hedge into Adam’s neighbor’s backyard, sprinting across it, then pushing through a row of arborvitae twice her height into Adam’s side yard. She squatted down between his deck and garage, squinting through the window in the door that led into the garage. The garage was empty, the two cars still out in the driveway, but Adam and his foster mother had vanished.

  She opened the garage door, sidled inside, and crept to the main opening, her back against the wall as she listened. A silver SUV, too expensive and new to be local, pulled up to the front curb and idled. The house’s front door banged open, and she heard footsteps. “Have to go, Mom. I’m late.”

  “Have fun, honey,” his foster mother called from the front porch, not six feet away from where Morgan stood. Adam rushed down the driveway without looking back and opened the passenger door.

  The SUV—it had to be the bomber. But why was Adam getting into it, as if he knew the driver? This was wrong, all wrong.

  She wanted to hit pause, stop time, do something to buy her some breathing room while she asked questions, examined the answers, analyzed every option. But there was no time. The SUV was pulling away from the curb, and every fiber of Morgan’s being was shrieking at her to stop it.

  She ran past the parked cars in the drive and hit the street just as the SUV pulled away. “Stop! Adam, come back!” she shouted, not even sure if he could hear her.

  The driver saw her, though, honking his horn with a jaunty, quick double tap. Then he sped up.

  Desperate, Morgan drew her pistol, a compact 9mm, and aimed at the SUV. Her first shot hit a taillight—at least it would be easy to follow with one light out—and the second dinged off the rear fender.

  “No!” Adam’s foster mom reappeared at the door. “Stop it!” Then she disappeared back inside.

  Morgan took aim. The growl of an engine roared behind her, and she glanced back to see Micah speeding toward her in the Forester.

  What the hell was he thinking? she wondered as the Subaru raced right at her. She threw herself onto the lawn. At the last moment it swerved, screeching to a halt in front of her and blocking her aim.

  Morgan rolled upright, aiming once more for the bomber’s SUV. A woman’s scream came from behind her as the foster mom rushed back outside, now holding a phone. “Stop! I’m calling the police!”

  Micah opened the passenger window. “Morgan, what the hell? You could have shot someone!”

  Her attention divided, Morgan was torn between defending her shooting skills, evading Adam’s foster mom now striding across the lawn, the phone pressed to her ear, and tracking the SUV. She holstered her weapon
and opened the Forester’s door—better to get the hell out of here and tail the SUV the best she could.

  Movement came from down the road. Instead of escaping, the SUV had stopped; and then began actually reversing toward them. Why? Why come closer to the girl who’d just been shooting at them?

  Then it stopped a few doors down the street. She swiveled to where Adam’s foster mother had made her stand on the other side of the Pathfinder, using it as cover between Morgan and her as she talked to the police. “There’s some madwoman shooting at my son. No, he just left. Who are you?” she shouted at Morgan. “Why are you here? The police are on their way!”

  Too late, Morgan realized what was happening. “Get back!” she yelled to the woman. “Get away from the car! There’s a bomb!”

  The woman’s face went wide with surprise and confusion. She opened her mouth as if to argue with Morgan.

  But the only sound was the blast of the explosion.

  Chapter Sixteen

  “So, your father,” Andre said, after they left Peter and Becky at the hotel and were on their way to meet Jenna’s mother for drinks. Jenna was driving Peter’s Cadillac, the LA traffic already giving her a headache. Or maybe it was the thought of the argument she was certain to have with Helen. “He’s really—”

  “Self-centered, vain, narcissistic, borderline personality?” she finished for him. “It’s okay, you won’t insult me. Probably not him either. He’s heard it all before, decades of it, from my mother. He just tunes it all out.”

  There was an awkward silence—unusual enough that she glanced away from the traffic over to Andre. “What?”

  “I was going to say that your father is really excited about being a dad again. I was wondering how that made you feel?”

  She shrugged one shoulder, saw an opening in the faster moving lane, and viciously cut the wheel and defied several laws of physics to take advantage of it. Then the lane stopped moving and the one she had left sped up. “It makes me feel like crap. But there’s nothing I can do about it. But,” she paused, thinking about it, “I have to admit, it’s nice to see him so happy. Like maybe this time he’ll stick around and get it right.”

  He laid a hand on her thigh, squeezing the tension from it. “You turned out pretty all right, I think.”

  “Oh, you do, do you? And you’re an expert?”

  He smiled and nodded. “Yep. When it comes to you, I’m an expert.” He leaned back in his seat. “So, tell me about your mother.”

  “Take everything wrong with my dad, multiply it by a hundred, and you still won’t even come close.”

  “Seriously? She can’t be that bad.”

  “Seriously, she is. At the courthouse they call her Judge Robot.”

  “Yeah, but you want a judge to be logical and neutral. What was she like, growing up?”

  “A robot.” Jenna spotted their exit coming up and maneuvered through four lanes of traffic to reach it. “You’ll see.”

  Helen hadn’t chosen a restaurant near the appellate court where she might be recognized, Jenna noticed. Instead she’d picked a modest bistro on South San Pedro. When Jenna and Andre walked in, she spotted Helen waiting at the steel-topped bar. She was dressed in a simple celadon silk sheath, her auburn hair pulled back in an elegant French twist, and was twirling a Martini glass in her hand as if they were so late that she’d become bored. They were actually fifteen minutes early.

  The bistro was half-empty—it was barely cocktail hour by LA standards—but Jenna didn’t care, she was hungry. Even though she knew the sparse patronage was yet another reason Helen had chosen to meet now. When Jenna had called to tell her mother that they were coming to LA and why, Helen had not suggested that they stay with her at the Galloway family mansion. In fact, they wouldn’t even have been meeting face to face at all if Jenna hadn’t insisted that her mother had ten free minutes somewhere in her crowded schedule.

  “Mom,” Jenna made introductions. “This is Andre Stone. Andre, this is Helen.”

  “Judge Galloway,” Helen corrected, not offering a hand to Andre and barely favoring him with a glance. Instead she turned to the bartender. “Do you have a bar menu?”

  “Of course.”

  “Put his order on my tab.” She slid down from her stool. “Feel free to order anything you like,” she told Andre. “We won’t be long.” She gestured to the hostess, who joined them.

  Jenna began to protest. “Mom, he’s not the chauffeur—”

  “No,” Andre interrupted her. “It’s fine. You two have a lot to talk about.”

  Jenna followed her mother and the hostess through to the rear of the restaurant where there was a small outside courtyard with a dozen tables, only two of them occupied. The hostess began to show them to one centrally located, but instead Helen insisted on the most remote table, farthest away from the other diners.

  “I’ve already ordered for both of us,” she told Jenna, as the waitress appeared with two glasses of pinot noir and steak Carpaccio but only one plate. “You eat. I have another engagement.”

  The appetizer looked amazing, but Jenna didn’t take the bait. She knew if she began eating, her mother would take the opportunity to say whatever it was she wanted to say and then duck out before Jenna had a chance to speak at all.

  “I need access to the Judge’s case files,” Jenna started.

  “No. You don’t.”

  “If you don’t arrange for it, I’ll go through my federal contacts. But I thought it would be more discreet if you got them for me.” She knew damn well Helen had access to everything the investigators had found.

  “No. You don’t need them. You’ve wasted your time coming out here. Your Pittsburgh bomber has nothing to do with your grandfather.”

  “You can’t know that.” Jenna tried another approach. “Mom,” she couldn’t remember the last time she’d called Helen that, “he’s targeting the people I care about. You might be next.”

  “Jenna, trust me—”

  The words, the tone, were exactly the way Jenna remembered them. “That’s what you said when you dumped me at the Judge’s house. ‘Trust me, it won’t be for long.’ But it was two years. Two years before you came back for me.”

  Helen frowned, seemingly surprised by the sudden change of subject. “What choice did I have? Things were so busy at the firm, your father and I were trying to reconcile…”

  Jenna wanted to hit something, or someone. She shoved the beef aside, her stomach soured, and tried to do the same with her feelings—showing emotion would only drive Helen away.

  “So,” Jenna said, “having your only child around—the product of your and Dad’s great, undying love—would only get in the way of you two getting back together? Again.” It had been the pattern that had determined her entire life: Mom and Dad falling passionately in love, fighting and almost destroying themselves with Jenna caught in the crossfire, separating, then reuniting to fall in love all over again. A twisted melodrama, with their child paying the price for their passion and fury. “And you just left me there.”

  “I needed your father.” Helen shrugged, as if Jenna’s stolen childhood was a small price to pay for her own happiness and freedom. “A love like ours, it’s simply larger than life.”

  “That’s Dad’s line. By the way, you know Becky’s expecting? It’s a boy.” Jenna slapped the words down, hoping for pain, for some kind of reaction.

  “Your father is wedded to a certain manner of living. If that child is his, he’ll never acknowledge it. He can’t. Not with our pre-nup. He’d be cut off from everything he values.” Her raised eyebrow made it clear that Jenna wasn’t among those prized possessions. “He’ll come crawling back. He always does.”

  Jenna resisted the urge to roll her eyes. How many times had she seen this play out, a never-ending saga of infidelity, hostility, and manipulation? She took a large gulp of wine, feeling it burn all the way down, and forced herself to focus on why she was here. “How can you be so certain that the bomber targeting me and
Andre isn’t the same man who killed the Judge?”

  Helen made a tiny noise. Not a scoff or a sound of dismal; more like a deeply satisfied sigh. “I’m sure.”

  Another long silence as the waitress brought a plate of oysters Rockefeller—more food that neither of them would be eating, mere props and set dressing for the staged theatrical production of a mother and daughter sharing a delightful meal in public so that nothing real could actually happen between them. The hell with that.

  “You promised I’d be fine. When you left me. With the Judge.” Jenna crossed her arms over her chest, hugging herself against the memories of exactly how fine she hadn’t been, alone in that house with her grandparents. With him.

  Nights had been the worst. Waiting there, lying awake, hoping yet fearing, straining to hear the thud of his footsteps, the way he’d clear his throat before reaching her door, giving her just enough time to run her hands through her hair, spreading the copper strands he loved so very much over her pillow like an angel’s halo, and then closing her eyes, pretending to be asleep until he kissed her awake like Sleeping Beauty.

  God, how she’d loved him. Had basked in the warmth of his affection like he was her only sun, the giver of life.

  Now, as an adult, she could see the manipulation. The emotional coercion—showering her with the praise and affection she was starving for and never received from her parents. Alternating that affection with total dismissal, making her spend every breathing moment thinking of him, wondering what she’d done wrong and how to get him to look at her, smile, touch her again…

  She blinked away the memories and focused on her mother, finally facing the suspicions she’d hidden so long and had fought so hard to deny: the Judge wasn’t the only monster in the Galloway family. “You knew. You knew what kind of monster he was, yet you left your own daughter there with him.”

  Helen said nothing, eyeing Jenna over the rim of her wine glass. Her lips twisted hard enough that lipstick feathered into the creases around them, making her suddenly look older than she was. She set the wine glass down and placed her palms on the table. “Your grandfather, he was a good man. But he had his own demons; impulses he couldn’t control. When I was a little girl—” She stopped, and her lips clamped together, locking her words inside. She took a breath and tried again. “When I was young, he—”