Sasha turned to look. It was another Victorian, this one with a turret and wide wraparound porch. A dilapidated gazebo peeked out from the backyard, mimicking both the architecture and the current state of the home. Judging by the plywood nailed over the front entryway, and the missing glass in the front upstairs windows, it was abandoned.
“What’s the story?”
Russell rested his arm against a stone lion guarding the steps from the street to the front yard. “Clyde Wilson had a prosperous home heating business in the 1950s and ‘60s. He installed oil-fired furnaces in a territory that covered the entire county. That’s a lot of homes. But when the oil crisis hit in the ‘70s, he missed the handwriting on the wall. Instead of branching out into electric heat, he just clung to the idea that his market would rebound. Instead of cutting back, he continued to spend money like he had an endless supply. Anything his girls wanted, they got. His wife had family money, and they ran through it pretty quick. So, old Clyde went and got a high-interest loan and pledged everything, and I do mean everything, they owned as collateral. The bank called the loan and they lost their house, their furniture, you name it. The house was sold at auction to a developer who cut it up into apartments and rented it out. Over time, the caliber of tenants he could attract declined and it ended up, well, a flophouse. It’s condemned now.”
Sasha stared at the sad house. “What happened to the family?”
“They moved to the wrong side of the tracks. Clyde committed suicide and left his wife and two daughters destitute. They squeaked by, barely. The girls have done well for themselves. Their mom died a few years back.”
They started up the stairs to the porch. The wood boards creaked under their feet, effectively announcing their arrival, if the presence of the sheriff’s car hadn’t. The wide double doors swung open, and a woman stepped out to greet them. She wore her long hair in a braid and her peasant skirt billowed out above her bare feet. Sasha recognized her from the parking lot. Judging by the spark of fear in the woman’s blue eyes, she recognized Sasha, too.
“Melanie,” Russell greeted her, with a tip of his deputy’s hat. “Is Danny around?”
Melanie blinked and looked over her shoulder. She swallowed.
“Uh, he’s in the community lounge. You wait here, okay? I’ll get him.” She disappeared back into the dimly lit hall, pulling the door most of the way shut, but not closing it entirely.
Sasha glanced at Russell to see if he’d follow the woman inside, but he just grinned and deposited himself into a long wooden glider by the door.
After several minutes, during which they could hear the murmur of voices floating out through the open window just behind the glider, the door reopened.
The shorter man from the parking lot came out onto the porch and pulled the door shut firmly behind him.
Russell stood. “Afternoon, Danny.”
“Deputy,” Danny said with a nod. He turned his attention to Sasha, “We haven’t been formally introduced. Daniel J. McAllister, III.” He stepped forward with an outstretched hand and a wide smile.
Sasha took his hand but didn’t return the smile. “Sasha McCandless. Esquire,” she added as an afterthought.
The grin faded.
“So, Danny,” Russell said, “I guess you know why we’re here.”
“Let me start by saying I don’t condone violence in our movement.” His eyes darted between the two of them. He was nervous and trying to hide it.
“What do you call attacking an unarmed woman, Danny?”
He flinched. “That got out of hand, and I’m truly sorry. But, don’t forget, I did try to stop Jay.”
Sasha raised a brow.
“What about the vandalism, Danny? Slashing tires? Doesn’t that create waste? Now four perfectly good tires are ruined.” There was a hint of mockery in Russell’s voice, but Danny either missed it or chose to ignore it.
“We have some new members,” he told them. “Some of them don’t yet understand our philosophy fully.”
“That’d be this Jay character?” Russell rested a hand on the butt of his weapon.
“For one,” Danny agreed.
“Who else?”
“Well, he’s the main one, I guess. We have had several people join recently. None of them local. They responded to our web posting.”
“Jay was one of them?”
“Yes.”
“What’s his last name?”
“I don’t know it.”
“Where’s he from?”
Danny shrugged.
“Where’s he staying?”
Another shrug. Russell stepped close to the smaller man and stared down at him. Waited.
“Uh, he was staying here,” Danny admitted. “But, he didn’t come back after the . . . uh, incident at the lot. To be honest, I figured the state police had probably picked him up and I’d be bailing him out later. What happened after I left?” He directed this last part to Sasha.
“After you fled,” she said, “your new friend took another swing at my windshield, cracking it. I couldn’t wait for the police any longer, so I disarmed him and beat him with his branch.”
Danny swung around to Russell. “Is she serious?”
“She seems to be. Turns out Ms. McCandless here has some self-defense training. Your buddy probably has a hell of a headache right about now.”
He was silent.
Russell pointed over Danny’s shoulder into the house. “You know, I don’t ordinarily try to enter your premises. I have no interest in harassing you and your merry band of tree huggers. However, I want to satisfy myself that you’re not harboring a fugitive, which is what this Jay character is now, just so we’re clear. Plus, you’re going to need to get your checkbook, Danny. Ms. McCandless will take a check to cover the cost of her car repairs.”
Danny opened his mouth to protest then thought the better of it. “Okay. She waits out here, though.”
“Fine by me,” Sasha told him, sinking into the glider. “The smell of patchouli gives me a headache.”
Russell smirked at the comment and followed Danny into the house.
Sasha passed the time on her Blackberry. She texted Connelly explaining why she’d been delayed in Springport and composed an e-mail to the General Counsel and the Vice President of Operations at VitaMight to let them know they’d won the motion to compel. She was just about to call her mother to get some ideas for a birthday present for her dad, when Russell reappeared.
He was alone and holding a blank, signed check, which he folded in half and handed to her. “With Danny’s sincere apologies.”
She stuck it in her jacket pocket. “No sign of Jay, I take it?”
They stepped off the porch together.
“Nope. He did leave behind a duffel bag in the room he was using, but it had no identification or other items of interest. Just a tie dye t-shirt and a pair of jeans that probably could have stood up by themselves they were so dirty.”
“No one else knows anything about him?”
Russell shook his head. “Danny’s the only one who has any kind of focus. I don’t know if the rest of them are high or lazy or what, but they couldn’t agree on where this guy was from, how long he’d been here, nothing. They did say he didn’t have a car. He claimed to have hitched his way in from somewhere. They were hazy as to where that was. I find that hard to believe. Not too many folks around here would stop and give a ride to a stranger. Not these days. But, if he doesn’t have a ride, he won’t get too far.”
Russell held the passenger door open for her. “Speaking of rides, let’s go see if Bricker’s has yours ready yet.”
CHAPTER 7
Carl Stickley was irritated. He was the sheriff, dammit. He didn’t need to be running all over the county serving eviction notices and warrants. For one thing, it was beneath him. For another, his knees were bad.
But of his two useless deputies, one had gone missing. Russell had better have a watertight excuse for this nonsense, he thought.
He’d just returned from serving a domestic relations warrant on a dirtball out in Copper Bend, and the squalor of the man’s shack still clung to him. He was going to ream Russell but good when he turned up.
A light rapping at his door interrupted his musing about what he’d say to his errant deputy.
The door swung open, and Russell’s flushed face peered in at him.
“Claudine said you wanted to see me, sir?”
Stickley waved a hand. “Get in here.”
The deputy hurried around the door and pulled it shut behind him. He hung there, right by the door. Everyone on Stickley’s staff did that: they’d just barely creep into the office and then hang back by the door. He liked it. Figured it meant they were intimidated.
He narrowed his eyes and glared at the deputy. “Where you been, son?”
Russell cleared his throat. “There was an attack on a lawyer, sir.”
Stickley leaned forward. “In the courtroom? Why wasn’t I notified, deputy?”
“No sir. A female attorney who parked in the municipal lot interrupted some vandals who were slashing her tires. Most of them ran off, but one of them stayed and attacked her with a tree branch. She called the state police and Maxwell dumped her in our lap. You were at lunch when he brought her in.”
Stickley shook his head and gave a low whistle. “She hurt bad?”
Russell chuckled. “No sir, she gave the guy a whooping, to hear her tell it. She’s just a tiny thing, but she knows some kinda self-defense that the Israeli Army uses.”
“Krav Maga?”
“Yeah, that’s it.”
Stickley nodded. “Good on her. Any id on the attacker?”
“One of Danny Trees’s people. Goes by the name of Jay. He’s not local. The attorney and I took a drive over to Danny’s place while Bricker’s Auto worked on her car. Danny claims not to have seen him since the attack. I took a look around. He left a duffel bag there, so maybe he’ll be back.”
Russell finished his report and stood there at attention, waiting for Stickley to dismiss him.
Stickley waved his hand again. “Go on, get out. Make sure you write it up and send a copy to Dogwood Station. I swear those troopers get lazier by the day.”
Russell grabbed the doorknob and raced out of the room. Stickley watched him go and grinned at his eagerness to escape. Then, he swiveled his chair around and thought. A violent environmental protester. Seemed like there should be a way to use that to his advantage. He turned the piece of information over in his mind, examining it from all angles. He’d come up with something.
CHAPTER 8
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
Monday evening
Sixteen hours and twenty minutes after she’d left Pittsburgh for a twenty-minute discovery hearing, Sasha pulled back in to her reserved parking spot at her condo. The sun, which had not yet risen when she’d set out in the morning, had long since set. She was tired, hungry, and cold.
She trudged through the parking lot and into the warm lobby. She was tempted to take the elevator instead of the stairs, just this once. But that was how it started. Take the elevator tonight because she was tired and her feet hurt from having been trapped in three-inch stilettos all day, and then tomorrow she’d want to take it because she was running late. Then, the next thing she knew she’d be taking elevators all over the place because she got winded climbing stairs. Besides, stairways gave more options in the event of an assault. Get attacked in an elevator and you were a sitting duck.
She straightened her back and adjusted the weight of her bag over her shoulder. Then she pushed through the metal door to the stairwell. To make up for her moment of weakness, she took the stairs two at a time.
That small burst of activity improved her mood slightly. The smell of spices and roasting meat that emanated from her unit put a smile on her face. By the time she opened the door to see Connelly waiting for her with a glass of red wine in his hand, she’d forgotten to be miserable.
It had been six months since Leo Connelly had entered her life in the oddest way imaginable. Sasha never would have guessed that her longest relationship to date would be with a federal air marshal whose nose and finger she broke while disarming him in the apartment of a murdered stranger. But, as her nana used to say, there’s a lid for every pot. So here he was, Agent Leo Connelly. Her lid. At least for the present.
“How are you doing?” The corners of his eyes crinkled with concern as he handed off the wine glass and leaned in to kiss her.
She gave herself a minute to relax in his arms before pulling back.
“Better now. Dinner smells amazing.”
She raised her glass in tribute to his cooking skills before heading up the stairs to her loft bedroom to get out of the high heels and change into a sweater and jeans.
Over a second glass of syrah and between mouthfuls of Connelly’s lamb tagine, she filled him in on the goings on in Springport. He listened without interrupting, nodding along as he processed the information. She could see him mentally sorting and cataloging it between bites of food for later analysis.
He put down his fork and raised a hand to stop her when she got to the part about Danny Trees’s blank check.
“Do you still have it? You haven’t deposited it yet, have you?”
“No, I just wanted to get home. I’m not sure I’m going to anyway. It could be viewed as settling any claim I might have against Danny and PORE for the cost of the repairs. I think I’ll give it a day to make sure they didn’t mess with anything else.”
For all she knew, there was sugar in her gas tank.
He cracked a grin. “Spoken like a true lawyer. If you give me the check, I can run his bank account through the database and see what pops.”
The database was Guardian, into which law enforcement agencies from around the country fed suspicious activity reports, called SARs. Six months earlier, while investigating a plane crash, Connelly had accessed the classified database to make a connection between a dead city laborer and a psychotic technology developer, leading him to the apartment where they’d met. But that had been official business. This was . . . not.
She looked at him closely. “Are you sure that’s a good idea?”
He looked away, but not before she saw in his eyes that he wasn’t sure at all.
“I’m sure,” he said.
CHAPTER 9
Tuesday afternoon
Sasha’s eyes burned and the characters on her computer screen swam together in a blur. She checked the time. No wonder. She’d been staring at the monitor for nearly five hours. She’d even eaten her lunch at the computer. It was well past time for a break.
She unrolled the purple yoga mat that she’d stowed under her desk. She worked through the three Warrior Poses, holding each for several minutes. She willed her mind to be still and focused only on her lengthening muscles and her slow breathing. She stayed there until the chimes from a nearby church drifted through the window as the bells struck three. Then she sank into Child’s Pose.
Connelly had brought yoga practice—along with home-cooked meals—into her life. Despite his high-risk, stressful work, he was uniformly placid. He didn’t overreact. He didn’t worry.
She’d noticed that, no matter the demands on his time, he always managed to fit in a quick yoga session. So she had decided to find a way to squeeze yoga in between her Krav Maga training and her running schedule.
The fifteen minutes she spent on the asanas each afternoon rejuvenated her. She wished she could return the favor and give Connelly a tool to deal with his borderline obsessive compulsive need for order.
After rolling up her mat, she walked over to the coffee station she’d set up in the corner of her rented office and poured an oversized mug of fresh black coffee. The one-room Law Offices of Sasha McCandless, P.C., located on the second floor of a storefront in her neighborhood, were a far cry from the opulent, Class A downtown real estate her former law firm called home, but she had taken one play from Prescott & Talbott’
s play book. Fresh coffee was always available. Only hers was stronger. And no longer free.
Break over, she returned to her desk, sipping the coffee and turning the information on her computer over in her head. Early that morning, not long after Sasha had unlocked the door to the building and gone upstairs to turn on the heat in her office, she’d heard the tinkle of bells that announced a visitor downstairs. The retail space below was vacant, so she hurried down the staircase to greet whomever had wandered in.
She’d come face to face with a UPS guy on his way up the stairs with a delivery for her. It was a slim letter envelope. Inside she found a CD and a cover letter from Drew Showalter, which said the CD contained all the documents Judge Paulson had ordered Keystone Properties to produce. The letter went on to ask VitaMight to agree to an early close of discovery, since it now had all the documents.
The package was remarkable for two reasons.
First, it was almost a certainty that the CD had been prepared in advance of the previous day’s hearing. Sasha thought it extremely unlikely that Showalter would have rushed back to his office and spent his afternoon compiling the e-mails to get the CD burned and out for delivery by the UPS deadline. Given the lack of spark Showalter had shown at the hearing, she’d go so far as to call it impossible.
Either way, the e-mails were either already ready to be produced when they argued the issue or were so few in number that they could be prepared by a lazy man in less than a day. This raised the obvious question of why Keystone Properties hadn’t simply turned over the e-mails before the hearing. Showalter had to have known he would lose his opposition. There was no good reason to keep the e-mails from VitaMight. So, Sasha surmised, there must have been a bad reason: there was something in those e-mails that Keystone Properties had wanted to hold back from VitaMight for some period of time.
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