by Vicki Hinze
“You’d better explain,” Max said, steel in his voice.
Jackson did. “And that’s it. They were caught cold with the jewels and the money.”
“Oh for pity’s sake, Jackson.” Gabby huffed a sigh. “It was a setup—probably by the same man who shot Max, took the potshots at us on the road to Abernathy’s, and blew up Candace’s Porsche. I swear it wasn’t these guys. They’re highly decorated, above reproach.”
“So they said.” Jackson sighed. “But they claimed Elizabeth could vouch for them and she’d never seen them and they’d never seen her. We haven’t been able to verify who they are.”
“Damn it, Jackson,” Gabby said. “I just did.”
“I’m backing that.” Max stepped to her side. “We’re vouching for them.”
“Okay.” Jackson took the keys from his belt, opened the cell door. “I’ll get Darlene to handle the paperwork.” He walked down the hall to the office.
Max looked over each man on the team. “Forget your orders, they’ve been changed. Get back to Home Base.”
“Gabby.” Jackson stuck his head in the door. “Sissy will talk with you.”
Gabby tried not to act surprised, but she figured she had a one-in-five-thousand shot. Why Sissy agreed to talk with her on tape, Gabby couldn’t imagine. But she didn’t linger. The last thing she wanted was for the woman to change her mind.
Jackson led her to the interrogation room, started the tape, and then closed the door.
Gabby sat down. Sissy looked pale and weary, but whether from grief or fear or a combination of the two, Gabby couldn’t be certain. “I’m supposed to remind you that this conversation is being taped and that anything either of us says can be used against you in a court of law, if things come to that.”
“Jackson told me, Gabby.” She sipped water from a white plastic cup. “My poor children. Who’s going to comfort my children?”
“You will, Sissy. You’ve always been there for your children.”
“Don’t patronize me.” The sadness in her eyes hardened. “We both know why you’re here. And we both know I’ll be in prison, nowhere near my children.” She cleared her throat, but her voice still shook. Obviously her thoughts troubled her deeply. “Soon they’ll never want to see me again or even speak to me. Do you know what that’s going to be like, Gabby? To watch the children you raised turn against you because you protected them?”
“No, I don’t,” she answered honestly. “I know what it’s like to feel alone, though, and I imagine that’s what you’re feeling now.”
“You all know the truth, don’t you?”
Gabby nodded.
“It’s so humiliating. I heard him on the phone, talking about the Consortium and his women and—and … oh, God, it was horrible. I couldn’t believe he would do such things. He destroyed our family!”
She sobbed, long and hard, and when she regained control, and the wails turned to sniffles, she dabbed at her eyes and the tip of her nose with a crushed tissue. “I had to release the mosquitoes at the lab. I learned what they were doing, and I had to stop them. I hated putting Covers in that kind of danger, but I just had to get this to the attention of authorities outside the Cove. I didn’t know everyone involved here, or what else to do. So I waited until Candace was in the building. I knew she’d hear the alarm and stop them from getting out.” Sissy’s tears spilled and anguish contorted her gentle face. “Then she got so sick and I was so afraid I’d hurt her, too. That’s why I asked her to come with you to the house when Carl died. Miranda said Candace was really okay, but I just needed to see for myself.” She lifted a hand to her face. “Poor Elizabeth probably hasn’t been off her knees since all this started.” Sissy’s voice caught, choking on tears. “She’s probably worn out her rosary.”
“She and Candace are okay, Sissy.” Gabby didn’t elaborate. The less she said, the better the odds Sissy would keep talking.
“I had to do it, Gabby.” Resolve settled over Sissy like a shield. “I couldn’t stop Carl, but he had to be stopped, and no one in Carnel Cove could do it. He would have killed Jackson, too.” She sucked in shuddered breath. “So I broke the lab window and smashed the tanks.”
Something was off. Seriously off. Sissy was too forthcoming. Or she would be if she were anyone but Sissy. She was weary of the deceit and lying and pretending everything was fine when inside she was falling apart. This burden was just too heavy for her to carry.
“I thought Carl was having an affair, so I waited until he was asleep and I read his journal. He was. She was a redhead, Gabby. That’s what he called her—his redhead.” The shock of learning that drained from her face and disbelief replaced it. “I thought I wanted the truth. That’s why I violated his privacy and read his journal. But I got a lot more truth than I bargained for. I saw Carl’s dark side in it, and it was the most evil thing I’ve ever encountered in my life.” She shivered, crossed her chest with her arms, and wiped the goose bumps from her skin. “He had already killed Judge Powell, and it was clear that Abernathy would be next.”
Gabby had to ask, and prayed she wasn’t making a mistake by interrupting the flow. “Was it Carl who killed Judge Abernathy?”
“He was there. But he had one of his thugs do the actual killing.” She stared down at the table. “Carl wouldn’t dare to dirty his own hands.” She looked at Gabby as if she were a child who needed to be led by the hand. “William Powell was a fine man. He would have talked to the Justice Department in New York, and Carl knew it. He hired those animals to kill him. And then Judge Abernathy retired—you terrified him. He told Carl you could destroy them. Frankly, I couldn’t see it. I mean, you’re a local judge and you weren’t in the Cove when they started all this. You couldn’t hurt them. But Abernathy swore you could. And he convinced Carl, too. He was going to get those awful men to kill you, too, Gabby, and only God knows how many others. He had to be stopped.”
“So you stopped him.” She was in shock, but she wasn’t falling totally apart. She knew she was sealing her jail cell door, but oddly, it didn’t seem to matter. That struck Gabby as strange.
“I couldn’t stop him. He was the father of my children, and there’s no way I could have left him and taken them with me. I threatened to, when I first found out what he was doing with that Consortium group of his. But he swore he’d hunt me down and kill the kids, too. I had to stay. Then I didn’t know what to do.”
“That’s when you gave me his journal,” Gabby said. “Why did he keep one? It’s such damning evidence.”
“Insurance. None of the Consortium members could turn on him. He had hard evidence implicating them.” Sissy pulled a fresh tissue out of the box on the table between them. “ ‘The chairman always covers his assets,’ he used to say.”
“Chairman?” Gabby frowned. “I thought he was the director.”
Sissy paused, paled. “Director for the Consortium, chairman for the bank.”
Truth? Or protecting her children? Gabby wondered. It felt like a lie. “Are you sure Carl was the head of this Consortium?”
“Oh, yes. Read his journal. You’ll see.” She sniffed. “I was terrified, but I stole the journal, praying that the hurricane would keep him too busy to notice too quickly. I brought it to you, and then went to the lab. Outside authorities would fix everything. They could stop Carl.”
“So what triggered his actual death?” Gabby leaned across the table, folded her hands together atop it. “Did he miss the journal? Was he afraid he’d been caught? What?”
“He shot himself in the mouth,” she said, not meeting Gabby’s eyes. “I don’t know why.” Her red face flushed brighter. “I hated him for what he was doing to our family. Long before his death, we were barely on speaking terms. Maybe his redhead knows why. I don’t.”
Definitely lying. “Sissy, you know Jackson is going to run tests on your hands. He’ll find powder residue that will prove you pulled the trigger.”
Sissy dipped her chin, looked down at her lap for a long moment
and then checked her watch. That struck Gabby as an odd thing to do. It wasn’t as if Sissy was going anywhere. She had been stripped bare and broken, lost everything that mattered, and she had nothing left to lose.
“It’s time, Gabby.” She lifted her gaze, calm and resigned. “I’ll spare Jackson the trouble. I shot Carl in the mouth with his own gun. I don’t regret it, either. I’d do it again. He was deliberately hurting people, spraying those god-awful chemicals. Destroyed so many lives. He didn’t care. It was about the money. Always about the money.” She scowled. “Greed made him a terrible bastard and horrible man. A monster. I killed the monster, Gabby.”
“He just sat there and let you shoot him?”
“Of course not.” She took in a deep breath and sat back at the table. “I waited for him to fall asleep in his chair. Every evening after dinner, he takes Baxter for a walk. When they get back, he snoozes in his chair and Baxter curls up at his feet.”
Their beagle. “So you waited for him and Baxter to go to sleep, and then what?”
“I had a cup of tea.”
Gabby tried hard to remain patient. “And then?”
“I heard him snore,” Sissy said. “Carl has a horrible snore.” She pulled her purse into her lap, and opened it.
Gabby automatically reached for the gun in her waistband, but Sissy was fishing for her lipstick, not for a weapon.
She pulled out a compact and, looking in the mirror, applied a swipe of coral. “I intended just to shoot him and take my chances with telling the children and Jackson why. But when I got the gun and went in there, he was rocking back with his mouth hanging open, and I remembered hearing on TV that a lot of men shoot themselves in the mouth, so I shot him in the mouth.” She closed her compact and dropped it and the gold tube of lipstick back into her purse. “It made a horrible mess of my antique rug. The children will never get the stains out.”
Gabby had no idea what to say to that. Obviously Sissy had snapped. Shock made people react in bizarre ways, and worrying about rug stains definitely ranked as one of them. A pungent scent caught her attention. There was no food anywhere in the interrogation room, so why in the world did she smell almonds?
Sissy shrugged and smiled at her. “Well, that’s about it, Gabby. You can feel badly for my children, but don’t waste any sympathy on Carl.” The look in her eyes turned dark, hard. “He got a lot more mercy than he gave anyone else. Do you know he bought his redhead an island? He thought I didn’t know for the longest time, but I did. I’ve known since the very day he signed the contract to buy it.” Smoothing her hair down, she sniffed. “Remember to tell the children about the island, will you, dear? The deed won’t show up anywhere. It’s in Carl’s private box at the bank. I don’t think the children know he has a private box.”
“You can tell them, Sissy. You’ll see them.”
“No, dear. They might see me, but I won’t see them.”
“What do you mean by that?”
“It doesn’t matter.”
The woman was heartbroken and raw, and it touched the compassion in Gabby. “I’m so sorry, Sissy.” How tragic to feel betrayed and driven to murder, knowing it would cost you your kids and the life you’d built. By ending Carl’s life, Sissy had ended her own. Figuratively, of course, but all she had known until that point was gone.
“I wonder if Jackson will let me call and say good-bye to the children.”
“Good-bye?” Something was seriously off. So far off, it gave Gabby the creeps. Sissy spoke with such finality.
“Yes, Gabby.” Sissy smiled. “When you came into the room, I was drinking water, remember?”
Gabby nodded, a cold fear crawling up her spine. That almond smell when she had opened her purse. Oh, God, cyanide! The woman had swallowed cyanide! “Tell me you didn’t, Sissy. Your kids can’t lose you, too. How can you let them lose you, too?”
“A mother who killed their father? A mother in prison for the rest of her natural life?” Sissy snorted. “They’ll be relieved and we both know it. It’ll be so much easier for them without me here reminding them of what happened.” Tears shimmered in her eyes. “I would like a nice funeral.” She dabbed at her eyes. “I won’t be buried in consecrated ground, of course—suicide is a mortal sin, you know.” That worried her into eating a streak in her coral lipstick. “Father McDowell will tell the children how best to handle it. Tell them not to put me near Carl. Not even in the same cemetery. Promise me, Gabby.” When she nodded, Sissy went on. “I want pink roses with white baby’s breath. Three dozen—no more. Soft pink, not that brassy blue pink. I like the gentle ones.”
She’d definitely taken cyanide. Gabby ran to the door, shouted, “Jackson! Jackson, hurry!”
Sissy smiled. “Calm down, dear. It’s too late.” She stiffened, grimaced, and tears leaked out of her red-rimmed eyes. “It’ll all be over in a matter of …”
Sissy Blake slumped forward and died.
Chapter Thirty-eight
Two hours later, Gabby and Max went to the Logan Industries lab to do a secure remote report to Commander Conlee.
On the walk from the building to the lab, Gabby tried not to let dread overwhelm her. “He’s going to be supremely pissed that Sissy Blake poisoned herself in my presence, Max.”
He clasped her hand in his. “Technically speaking, she took the stuff before you entered the room. Diluted, true, otherwise she would have been dead before you actually talked to her, but still, before you got there.”
Gabby glanced over at him. “Do you think that’ll make any difference to Conlee?”
“No.” Max answered without hesitating. “But he’ll be more supremely pissed that the second Warrior got close enough to you to bomb Candace’s car and you didn’t take him out.”
Gabby bristled. “Did you have to remind me of that right now?” The one nerve she had left was frayed. “My head’s already on the platter, remember?”
“So is mine.” He smiled at her.
The man was actually smiling? He knew Conlee had to be ruthless, and yet he could smile about this? “Did you get one whiff too many of that pesticide, Max?”
He stopped, tugged her to him, and planted a sound kiss on her lips. “Maybe. I’m thinking that if I have to die, I’m glad it’s with you.”
“You want me dead, too?” She smacked his chest. “You really know how to make a woman feel special, Grayson.”
“You know what I mean.” His playfulness disappeared. “You are special, Gabby. To me, you’re very special, and you make me feel special. I want you to know that. It has nothing to do with the job, or anything else. It’s just the truth.”
She stilled and just stared at him, caught somewhere between terror and awe and a joy that ran so deep it warmed the marrow of her bones. The back of her nose burned and her eyes stung. She blinked hard to keep welled tears from falling, and whispered, “Thank you, Max.”
He nodded once, and then moved toward the lab door, as if what he had said surprised him as much as it had her.
But it was a good surprise. And one she’d hold close in her memory for a long, long time—provided Conlee didn’t kill her.
Fifteen minutes later, they were standing before the lab table, side by side, briefing the commander. When they finished, he was, as predicted, pissed. While he ranted, Max eased his hand to Gabby’s under the ledge of the lab table, lacing their fingers, pressing their palms. It was the most pleasant ass-chewing Gabby had had in her entire career.
“Kincaid, why the hell are you smiling?” Conlee shouted, nearly blowing out her eardrum.
“Every moment is precious, sir.” She looked over at Max. “I’m not wasting them.”
“Oh, for God’s sake.” Conlee snorted. “I’ve rescinded the cancellation orders. Now can you two please give me your full attention?”
Rescinded them? Gabby’s heart knocked hard on her chest wall, and she felt the same reaction in Max, who squeezed her hand until she swore he’d break the bones. “Yes, sir.”
�
��Of course, Commander.”
He was happy. They were happy. It was an odd time for a perfect moment, but Gabby had had too few perfect moments in her life to squander even this one. She stroked Max’s thumb. “Have Burke and Erickson been successful on their vaccine?”
“If you’re asking if they’ve discovered why the combination worked, the answer is not yet.” Conlee sounded irritated by that. Of course, he would be. He took every aspect of his mission to protect the people of the United States very seriously—as indeed he should. “Dr. Richardson recommended we manufacture both and give double injections to everyone infected. Since we can’t really do anything else, and if we don’t do that their situations are pretty much hopeless, we’re going that route. We’ll have what we need to vaccinate everyone infected shortly. Strictly voluntary, of course.”
“Considering the alternative is certain death, I think the response will be good, sir.” In her book, anything looked better than death.
“I agree, Gabby.” Conlee harrumphed, clearly not happy with what he had to say next, but too much the realist to deny it. “The nature of this attack being not in the lab incident but in the spraying as a response to the lab incident warns us that we’re in yet another new era.”
It did. And there had been far too many new eras since the attacks of September 11. The Consortium and Global Warriors had had the Special Detail Unit and FEMA do ninety-five percent of the work for them, ordering, arranging, and paying for the spraying. It was an awful thing, seeing government programs bastardized by terrorists to harm the very people those programs were charged with protecting. Maddening and frightening, too.
“It’s a challenging development, sir,” Max said. “All the Consortium really had to do was substitute the chemicals. If Sissy Blake hadn’t created the lab incident, Dr. Swift or the missing Global Warrior would have done it. It was an extremely low-budget mission for them.”
“Unfortunately, it was, which means we’ve got to make it substantially more expensive for them—to act as a deterrent. At least Carl Blake is dead now and his Consortium is shut down. Lieutenant Gibson is following the paper trail. Mayor Faulkner is clean, though he was clearly manipulated by Blake, as is Dr. Erickson. He’s as devoted to finding a cure as any man on a mission I’ve ever seen.” Conlee’s tone shifted, became weary. “We’re not a hundred percent convinced about Candace Burke—”
