Tempting Evil

by Allison Brennan

  He raised his hand to knock. Dropped it.

  Take it slow.

  The smart thing would be to wait until breakfast. He realized that as he stared at her door, a wall sconce illuminating the hall. He didn’t want to scare her, or even make her feel uncomfortable. Showing up now—near midnight—might do one or the other.

  He slowly paced along the hallway, trying to come up with a better reason to knock on her door.

  Hunger? No, that was dumb. His room had a small refrigerator with water, cheese, crackers, and grapes. The old man, Joanna’s grandfather, had told him if he needed anything else, there was a cabinet in the dining hall marked “snacks” and he could help himself.

  What if he said he couldn’t sleep and wanted to talk?

  No. That would make him sound like a schoolgirl.

  Perhaps he could disable something in his room. Ask her to fix it. But she might think he was weak, incapable of taking care of her.

  Aaron grew frustrated. He needed to see Joanna. But he didn’t want to blow it. Scare her.

  Love, Tyler.

  The urge grew and he walked away, down the stairs. Then back up the stairs. To her door. Slowly. Stealthily. He almost knocked.

  No.

  Down the stairs again.

  A noise stopped him. He walked across the lobby, toward the great room, and ran into the girl, Leah Weber, as she bounded across the room with the big Saint Bernard behind her. She wore red flannel pajamas under a red bathrobe, her long blonde hair braided down her back, her pretty face unconcerned at meeting a stranger in the foyer.

  “Late for you to be up,” he said. Buckley wagged his tail and Aaron scratched the dog on the back. He’d never had a dog of his own. His aunt Dorothy had two poodles—hardly worthy of being called dogs. More like oversize rats. Now Buckley, he was a real dog. A dog Aaron would have been proud to have as a kid.

  She grinned. “Shh, don’t tell my mom. I just had to get another piece of cake. Stan makes the best chocolate cake, and I know Aunt Jo is going to eat it all in the middle of the night.”

  Aaron agreed. “That was good cake.”

  Leah asked, “Do you need something?” She licked frosting off her finger.

  So young, so innocent. Aaron had always liked kids, and he felt as if he knew Leah Weber well.

  Her father Lincoln had talked about her often. Had her picture taped to the cell wall. She’d been younger then, five or six.

  Leah had grown into a lovely young woman. What was she now? Eleven, Aaron thought. On the brink of womanhood, but still a child. Still someone to protect.

  Aaron had done just that. Leah’s father was a crass, violent man who was better off dead. That he’d tried to kidnap the little girl disturbed Aaron on a level he didn’t like to think too deeply about. What would Lincoln Barnes have done to such a sweet child? No good, that’s for sure. He’d killed another child, Leah’s cousin.

  “It was an accident, I didn’t mean for the boy to die. I wanted what was mine. My woman and my daughter.”

  Lincoln Barnes’s words echoed in Aaron’s brain. Remorse from a killer? Aaron wanted blood. Because Barnes had killed a child.

  Aaron had avenged the child’s death. Someday, Joanna would understand that. Someday, she would get down on her knees and thank him.

  “I’m fine,” he told Leah. “Just walking around. I couldn’t sleep.”

  “I know,” she said, rolling her eyes as only a young teen could do. “My mom has me in bed at ten every night, and I tell her why? I’m going to be twelve next month, I shouldn’t have a curfew. It’s not like I’m going to school tomorrow.”

  “Enjoy your cake,” he said. “I think I’ll sit by the fire.” The hearth was contained in a huge inset, the flames doing a slow, quiet dance. The room was warm and comfortable.

  “See you in the morning.” She scurried down the hall to her room, calling for Buckley to follow her.

  Meeting Leah was fortuitous. He’d learned something important about Joanna.

  He sat on the floor in front of the fire. He would be waiting for his love when her sweet tooth called.

  Demo version limitation

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  NINE

  Mitch had known Hans for fifteen years, since they’d met on the transport to Kosovo as part of a special Evidence Response Team to uncover mass graves and help identify victims. They’d become friends, good friends. They’d worked together on a half dozen cases since. Hans had been the best man at his wedding.

  So when Hans stepped back into the room, Mitch immediately detected a ripple of anger beneath Hans’s calm expression. Hans motioned to Mitch. “I need you for a minute.”

  On alert, Mitch followed him down the hall. Before the door had clicked closed, Hans said, “You lied to me.”

  Hans spoke with quiet rage, as only a man with complete control over his emotions and a steadfast equilibrium could do.

  “It was important.”

  “You used me.”

  “Hans, you don’t understand—”

  He raised an eyebrow. Mitch swallowed and paced. There were few people in this world that he respected more than Hans Vigo. Largely because Hans hadn’t given up the field. He still went where he was needed. He’d pushed to be assigned the Theodore Glenn case. He pushed for a lot of things and always got them.

  “You’ve used up your tokens, Mitch. You’d better talk fast. And I’m still sending you on the next flight back to Sacramento.”

  He should have factored in Hans’s friendship with Meg, but Mitch had needed Hans’s diplomacy and clout to get this far.

  He’d been this close to Thomas O’Brien. So close he could taste it. When a predator smelled his prey, when he visualized the capture, knew he was about to spring the trap…and then the entire plan went to hell.

  “The man saved my life.”

  “O’Brien?”

  Mitch dipped his head. “I was loaned out to the San Francisco regional office. With so many convicts on the loose and the locals focused on public safety and emergencies after the quake, they needed additional help. I was assigned O’Brien, but almost immediately was pulled off. I called Meg, she hadn’t done it. It came from higher up, and not in the FBI. She told me to pull back—since when does Meg pull back?”

  “Megan plays by the rules.”

  Mitch bit back a stinging comment. He and Meg had a complex history, and at first he’d thought that’s where all the crap was coming from. Now, he wasn’t as certain. “I was following a fugitive.”

  “Protocol demands that you inform the local field office of any leads. Your supervisor expressly told you not to go to Salt Lake City.”

  Mitch had no response.

  “Then you ask me to meet you. I trusted you, Mitch. I came without so much as a question. And then Meg calls me and says you disobeyed a direct order and haven’t returned her calls.”

  “Look how close we are!”

  “You have to return to Sacramento.”

  “No. Dammit, Hans! You need me.” Hans raised an eyebrow. “You know what I mean,” Mitch clarified. “I’m one of the best. I’ll find them.”

  Hans didn’t say anything, just stared at Mitch.

  “You can talk to Meg, explain it to her,” Mitch said.

  Hans asked, “Explain what exactly? All I see is an arrogant FBI agent who thinks he doesn’t have to answer to anyone. You go off half-cocked, don’t tell your boss, don’t tell anyone and think that you’ll be forgiven? Meg went out on a limb for you—”

  “Don’t go there.” His ex-wife was the last person he wanted to be indebted to.

  “You want me to talk to Meg, you tell me what I’m supposed to say. Because right now I’m ready to send you up the river. I will not be lied to, I will not be used, and I will not let even you, a man I call a friend, tell me to manipulate someone I like and respect.”

  When Mitch didn’t say anything, Hans said, “I was best man at your wedding, and
I was there when the marriage fell apart.”

  “You knew it would.”

  “Call me psychic.”

  Hans was pissed. In all the years Mitch knew him, he’d rarely heard sarcasm.

  Mitch told Hans everything that happened during the Goethe shoot-out. “I lost track of O’Brien in San Francisco. Then he calls me a day later. I have no idea how he got my phone number, how he even knew to find me. I think he was following me while I was trying to pick up his trail again. He tells me where Goethe’s gang is hiding out. That they’re about to take down another store, but will be back. And to wait for his signal.

  “We stake it out and he’s right. They come back. He’s with them. Armed. I’m thinking, what the fuck? He’s going to get himself killed. Or he set a trap for us. But something he said made me wait. SWAT wanted to go in as soon as they had a shot, but I—O’Brien told me he’d been the one to catch three of those guys. The man has balls, I give him that. And I didn’t want him dead. I wanted to talk to him. Hell, I don’t know. Being pulled off the case, then having O’Brien call me? My gut just said wait, so I held everyone back. I’m waiting, waiting—and he looks right at me. He sees my hiding place.

  “Then you know what the guy does? He shouts, ‘Drop your weapons! This is the police!’”

  Mitch shook his head, remembering the scene vividly. “O’Brien has cover, SWAT drops in, takes everyone out immediately. Two of Goethe’s gang fall. I walk into the scene, gun drawn, and out of nowhere a woman screams and jumps on me with a knife. Blackie’s girlfriend.” He rolled up his sleeve, showed Hans the fresh scar to add to a dozen others. “She sliced my arm. O’Brien was right there, took her out, and then Blackie went after him. O’Brien didn’t hesitate. He fired, then disappeared.” Mitch shook his head. He didn’t know whether to admire O’Brien or lament the fact that a dozen cops had missed him. “I still don’t know how he did it.”

  Hans said nothing for a long moment. “You feel like you owe your life to this man. You know he’s a killer.”

  Mitch nodded.

  “Why did you lie to me? To Meg? To everyone you work with?”

  “I don’t want him to get himself killed. I can talk him into turning himself in.”

  “He eluded SWAT in a secure building. He’s not going to turn himself in.”

  “I think he’s looking for something.”

  “Are you telling me everything?”

  Not quite. “All I know, Hans.”

  “Meg is furious.”

  “I know.” Mitch had been avoiding her calls for two days. “I’m sorry to drag you into the middle of this.”

  Hans sat on the edge of the table. “If I didn’t like you and Meg so much, I wouldn’t be here right now. But that doesn’t change the fact that you breached protocol and can be suspended or fired over this.” He held up his hand before Mitch could say anything. “I’ll talk to Meg, but only if you return to Sacramento.”

  “But—”

  “But nothing. O’Brien isn’t with Chapman and Doherty. You know it, and I know it. From what the caller said, it must be O’Brien. Chapman and Doherty must have figured out who he was or were suspicious. Tried to get rid of him. The man has nine lives, I’ll say that much.”

  “I’m not leaving you here on your own.”

  “The Helena field office is perfectly capable of providing backup, and Sheriff McBride is solid. I did some background work on him last night and he can more than hold his own.”

  “There’s no way Helena can get here in twenty minutes before you leave for the lodge.”

  “But they’ll be here soon enough. I promised Meg you would be on the next flight to Sacramento.”

  “In this weather?”

  Hans shrugged. “So, next flight might not be for a couple of days. You might as well put yourself to good use and help us track a couple fugitives.” He paused, then added softly, “I know how a case can get under your skin so bad you’ll do anything to work it.”

  “Thanks, Hans.” Relieved, Mitch started to open the door.

  Hans pushed it shut, stared at him, and spoke with a firm voice. “Don’t thank me yet, Mitch. You violated my trust, and I won’t forget it anytime soon.”

  Aaron had come downstairs early, while everyone but Stan Wood slept. The old black man worried Aaron yesterday—something about the way he’d looked at Aaron in the foyer that set off his warning bells.

  After ten minutes, Aaron learned Stan was like that with everyone. Suspicious. But when Aaron offered to help with breakfast—“I need something to do with my hands”—Stan handed him a butcher knife and told him to dice up a pile of potatoes.

  “You’re a long way from L.A., John,” Stan said.

  “Yes, sir.”

  “What brings you up here?”

  Aaron paused for effect, though he had his story down. “A major decision.”

  “Life-changing?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “This is a good place for thinking. Sometimes people come up here to think and never leave.”

  “How long have you lived here?”

  Stan sipped black coffee. “Going on thirty years.”

  “It’s so—quiet.” That had been the first thing Aaron noticed when he woke up early that morning. Dead silence. The storm had kept the wind whipping half the night, but now it was calm. Some might call it peaceful.

  It made Aaron nervous.

  “That it is,” Stan agreed.

  “And you’ve been thinking for thirty years.”

  Stan laughed, a deep, guttural sound that made Aaron think the man didn’t laugh much. “When we stop thinking, we die, young man. But I did my heavy thinking years ago. Now, I contemplate lesser evils than my past. Like how long it’s going to take you to dice up those potatoes.”

  Aaron busied himself at the task, a little disturbed at being criticized by Stan, but with an urge to please him that he didn’t understand.

  Aaron barely remembered his father. Aaron and his mama moved around so much that Aaron didn’t see his dad for months at a time. Even when he stayed with his paternal grandparents, his dad rarely visited.

  Joe Dawson hadn’t wanted him. That’s what Ginger Doherty said.

  There were few male figures in Aaron’s life, and none that lasted more than a couple months. His paternal grandfather had been a foreboding man, not one Aaron could confide in or ask for advice. And the last time he’d seen his dad? He’d been six or seven.

  “Don’t bring him here again.” Grandfather glared at Aaron’s mother. “I won’t have you putting Lottie through this again. She cries for weeks after you take the boy.”

  “He’s your grandson. Your flesh and blood,” his mama said. No one knew Aaron was eavesdropping. He was good at hiding.

  Even when he didn’t hide, people often didn’t notice him.

  “I told you we would take him in if you’d stop coming by.”

  “I’m not giving you my son!”

  “But you’d sell him fast enough, wouldn’t you?”

  Grandma Lottie came into the room, tears in her eyes. “Ginger, I love Aaron. Please let him stay here. With us. We’ll provide for him. Give him a good, stable home.”

  “And what about me? He’s my son!”

  “You haven’t acted like a mother since the day you gave birth!” Grandma Lottie said. “You complained that you were fat and then had a tummy tuck!”

  “How can I provide for my son without a husband? Oh, wait, you didn’t teach your own son to take care of what is his.”

  “Leave Joe out of this.”

  “What, he has a couple minutes of fun and gets out of his responsibility, but I have to pay for it the rest of my life?”

  “We’ll take care of Aaron. Give up your parental rights, and we’ll give him a real home.”

  Aaron sat around the corner just out of sight, arms hugging his legs, back flat against the wall, breath caught in his chest. He didn’t know what he wanted. When he was here, he missed his mama something awful
. He loved the way she smelled, the way she held him, the way she told him that he was her little man. But Grandfather was smart and Grandma Lottie let him lick the spoon when she made sugar cookies. And she told him he was the best angel in the school choir…

  Mama hadn’t even come to the play.

  He wanted to be with his mama, but he didn’t want to leave Grandfather and Grandma, either.

  What were parental rights? Sometimes his grandparents would talk when they thought he was sleeping. They said bad things about his mama. Especially Grandfather. Why did they hate his mama? Why couldn’t they all live together and be happy? Why did his mama make him move all the time and live with strangers?

  “How much?” Mama asked.

  Grandma Lottie sobbed. “We don’t have a lot of money, Ginger! We’ll buy Aaron’s food and clothes and we can start up a college fund—”

  Mama laughed. “College? I never got sent to college. I love Aaron and he’s mine. He’s the only thing that is all mine, and you’re not getting him. Not unless you have a good reason for me to give up parental rights.”

  “Aaron is not a possession!” Grandma cried.

  Silence. It lasted nearly forever to Aaron as he huddled alone.

  “Get out.” Grandfather had spoken. His voice was barely audible, but Aaron started shaking.

  No, Grandfather, I don’t want to go. Don’t make me leave.

  Grandma Lottie started crying. She ran around the corner, saw Aaron. Her eyes widened and she gathered him into her arms.

  “I love you, Aaron. I’ll always love you.” Her tears soaked into his cheek and shirt. He wanted to tell her he loved her, too, but he couldn’t talk.

  “Aaron!” his mother called.

  Grandma Lottie ran into the living room with Aaron around her neck. “We can sue for custody. We can fight for him.”

  Mama laughed. “No judge is going to give grandparents custody over a baby’s own mother.”

  “He’s not a baby anymore, Ginger,” Grandma Lottie said. “He’s a little boy and you’re going to ruin him.”

  Anger flashed in his mother’s eyes. “Ruin him? No more than you ruined your own son. Give me my boy.”