Untouchable

by Jayne Ann Krentz

  “The clerk overheard some conversation between the two shooters that led him and the police to believe this was intended to be a burglary. The shooters said something about finding a locker with a cache of drugs. They gave the clerk the impression that we were from a rival gang.”

  Winter frowned. “The clerk heard them say that?”

  “Evidently.”

  “Think he was in on it?”

  “I considered that but I’m inclined to doubt it. He looked too shaken. I think there’s a ninety-three percent probability the shooters intended him to overhear the conversation that led him to think it was a drug-related burglary.”

  Winter blinked. “Ninety-three percent?”

  “I never go with a hundred percent until all possibilities have been ruled out.”

  “I see. Well, your theory would explain why they didn’t kill him, wouldn’t it? They wanted to be sure the cops wrote off the murders as drug-related. They set up the clerk so he would point the police in the wrong direction.”

  Jack smiled a little. “Careful. That’s exactly the kind of thinking that can make people believe you’re a conspiracy theorist.”

  “Sometimes even conspiracy theorists are right. So the cops are going to waste a lot of time chasing phantom drug dealers.”

  “These days, drugs are the easy explanation for a lot of law enforcement problems,” Jack said. “And most of the time it’s the right explanation.”

  “I suppose so.” Winter straightened her shoulders. “But we’ve got another theory of the crime.”

  “Yes, we do. However, for now we are going to act like we’re good with the version of events that the cops and the clerk bought.”

  “We can’t just stand around and wait for Zane to send his killers after us again.”

  “I agree,” Jack said.

  “So? What’s our next step?”

  “We find a secure place to spend the night.”

  “Define secure. Will we have to camp out in the woods in order to avoid detection?”

  “I think we can do a little better than that.”

  “That’s good,” Winter said. “I really hate camping.” She looked at the remains of the red sofa. “There was only one more payment left on it.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

  “He’s back, isn’t he?” Octavia Ferguson said.

  Anson Salinas dropped his phone into the pocket of his shirt and looked at the woman he loved.

  “Looks like it,” he said. “At this point we have no choice but to go with Jack’s conclusion. He’s convinced Zane was behind the attack in the self-storage facility this afternoon. Unless we can find hard proof that this is not the case, we have to assume Zane has returned.”

  Octavia nodded and rose from her chair. She walked across the living room of her home and looked out at her spectacular garden. Anson was pretty sure he knew exactly what she was thinking. A few months earlier the garden had served as the setting for the wedding of her granddaughter, Virginia, and Anson’s son Cabot. It had been a day of joy for all of them, a day when they could forget about the past for a while. A day to look toward the future.

  But now that future was on hold for everyone who was haunted by Quinton Zane.

  Anson’s heart ached because he could not shield Octavia from the truth. Not that she wanted to be protected, he thought. Octavia was a strong woman. She would not thank him for trying to pretend there was no danger.

  After he had lost Madeline decades earlier he had never expected to love deeply again. He figured a man was unlikely to experience that kind of joy twice in a lifetime. But recently Octavia had entered his life and he had discovered that he had been wrong.

  Not that Octavia was anything like Madeline, he reflected. Maybe that was why he felt free to love her. They shared a unique bond because they had both suffered from the nightmare that Quinton Zane had ignited some twenty-two years before. Octavia had been among the anguished relatives who had arrived on the scene the day after the compound fire to claim their surviving family members. Octavia had been one of those who had assumed the task of picking up the pieces of a life shattered by violence.

  She had lost her adult daughter on that terrible night, but her granddaughter, Virginia, had been one of the kids trapped in the barn. Anson had managed to save the children. Virginia had gone home with Octavia. They had moved on with their lives just as Anson and his three foster sons had done. But the specter of Quinton Zane had hovered around all of them.

  “I had hoped that the bastard who murdered my daughter and all those other people was dead,” Octavia said.

  Anson got up and went to stand beside her at the window. He put his arm around her shoulders and pulled her close against his side; trying to lend her strength even as he absorbed some from her.

  “My sons and I always knew there was a strong possibility Zane did not die in that yacht fire at sea,” he said.

  “What made you so sure?” Octavia asked.

  “Zane was smart and he was a survivor. He was also a complete sociopath. It seemed likely that when he torched his California operation, he had an escape plan in place.”

  “Why has he come back now?” Octavia said.

  “I don’t know,” Anson said. “But if he is back, it’s because he’s got his endgame figured out.”

  “You make it sound as if he’s already light-years ahead of us.”

  “He’ll certainly think so,” Anson said. “But that kind of self-confidence carries its own risks. And we’ve got our own ace in the hole.”

  “Jack?”

  “He’s our first line of defense. Of all of us, he’s the one who has the best chance of anticipating Zane’s endgame. Once Jack gets a handle on that, we can come up with our own ending.”

  “Zane knows that, doesn’t he? That’s why he went after Jack first.”

  “Yes,” Anson said. “This won’t be over for any of us until Quinton Zane is dead or in prison for the rest of his life.”

  “I would prefer dead,” Octavia said.

  “So would I.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

  “As promised, we are not camping out,” Winter said. “Heck, this place even has indoor plumbing.” She looked around the hotel room. “Do you think we’re safe here?”

  “Safe is always a relative term,” Jack said.

  “Thanks for that upbeat observation.”

  “There’s a high probability that we’re safe here, because when I checked in, I used another set of ID’s and I paid cash. As far as the front desk and the hotel computer are concerned, we’re just a couple from Arizona.”

  He had taken other precautions as well. After the interview with the police they had left her belongings, including the ruined sofa and her cell phone, in the locker at Cassidy Springs Self-Storage. Jack had kept his phone because, as he had explained, Xavier was sure its encryption was good enough to protect them.

  After dumping the van at the rental agency they had caught a taxi, paying with cash, and used the new ID’s at a different agency to pick up another vehicle.

  Winter managed a wan smile. “Don’t sugarcoat it for me. I can handle the truth.”

  “I know,” Jack said. “That’s why I gave it to you.”

  He was, she concluded, dead serious. On second thought, make that very serious. Under the circumstances, dead seemed like a poor word choice.

  They were spending the night in another chain hotel. It was located near a freeway interchange on the outskirts of one of the cascade of suburban towns that flowed down the San Francisco peninsula. The place was as anonymous as such an establishment could get. Everything, from the carpet to the bathroom vanity, was done in various shades of boring.

  Jack had requested connecting rooms again. She was not sure how to take that. It was possible he was being a gentleman. It was also possible that he was not inter
ested in spending another night in the same bed with her. And it was probable that she was overthinking the entire matter.

  They were currently in her room, seated at the small table in front of the window. A short time ago room service had removed the dinner they had ordered. In spite of the harrowing afternoon, or maybe because of it, they had succeeded in downing two large Caesar salads, a couple of grilled salmon entrées and the large basket of sourdough bread that had accompanied the meal. They were in the process of finishing the last of the wine.

  After checking in they had each retreated to their respective bathrooms to clean up and change clothes. There was nothing like almost getting killed to make a woman want to take a shower, Winter decided. The hot water had rinsed away the sweat of stress and fear but it had done nothing for her nerves. Neither had the wine. She was in the grip of a strange restlessness.

  That was certainly not the case as far as Jack was concerned. After his shower he had changed into a fresh pair of khaki trousers and a fresh white shirt—he evidently had an unlimited supply of both—and now he was clearly in his element. She envied him. His conviction that they were chasing Quinton Zane—or being chased by Quinton Zane—had infused him with energy and purpose. He was fully engaged in his mission.

  “Do you always travel with a lot of cash and fake ID’s?” she asked. She held up one hand, palm out. “Not judging. Just asking for a friend.”

  Jack’s mouth curved in a very brief, very grim smile. “Tell your friend the answer is yes. My brothers do, too. What can I say? It’s sort of a family tradition.”

  “Inspired by Quinton Zane.”

  Jack stopped smiling. His eyes were icy-hot. “We’ve always packed a couple of sets of fake ID’s because we knew that if Zane ever did show up, one of us or all of us might have to go off the grid with little or no warning. After what happened a few months ago in the Night Watch case in Seattle, Max and Cabot and I got a few new sets of ID’s. When you go down a conspiracy theory rabbit hole, you prep for the worst-case scenario.”

  “I get it, believe me.”

  “We’ve all kept go-bags and cash on hand for years. Recently Max and Cabot both got married. They’ve made similar provisions for their wives. After Xavier began interning at Cutler, Sutter and Salinas, Anson made sure he got whatever he might need to disappear for a while, too.”

  “Wow. I’m impressed. You all have multiple fake identities? How in the world did you manage that?”

  Jack gave her a pitying look. “Haven’t you heard? You can buy anything online.”

  She widened her eyes. “Really? You just went online and ordered up a lot of fake identities?”

  Jack lounged back in his chair and stretched out his legs. “All right, it’s not quite that simple. Until recently we relied on my brother Max’s connections. He used to be a profiler for a government agency. He knows people.”

  “But now?”

  “Now,” Jack said, “we’ve got our own in-house IT department.”

  “Xavier.”

  “He’s much better at going into the dark corners of the Internet than the old-school government intel crowd.”

  “I see,” she said.

  The restlessness was getting worse, she thought. The hotel room felt small; like a trap that was slowly closing on her. She set down the empty glass, got to her feet and began to prowl the room.

  Jack watched her, his eyes tightening at the corners. “Are you okay?”

  “I need to meditate,” she said. “I need to breathe. But I’m too wired.”

  “I’m wired, too. No surprise. We’ve both taken a couple of heavy adrenaline jolts in the past few days.”

  A tiny ping of awareness sparked across her senses. She paused in mid-stride and turned to look at Jack. The cold fire in his eyes told her that he was doing one of his quiet, intense burns. She was pretty sure it wasn’t the same nervy sensation that was agitating her, though. Jack was in hunting mode.

  “What’s wrong?” she asked. She folded her arms. “I mean besides the obvious?”

  “I need to think,” Jack said. He tapped one finger on the table in a slow, controlled pattern. “I’ve missed something important. I need to figure out what it is. We’ve been moving so fast since the night Moseley attacked you that I haven’t had time to process the new data that has come in.”

  “We’ve got new data?”

  He looked surprised by the question. “I’ve got a lot more to work with now than I had forty-eight hours ago.”

  “Because of what happened at the self-storage place today?”

  “Among other things. For example, I’m sure the clerk survived because he had a role to play, although he didn’t know it. He heard what the shooters wanted him to hear. He believed that it was a for-real drug heist, and now the cops believe that, too.”

  Winter gave that some thought. “If you’re right, the pair who shot at us must have been very good actors.”

  “Not good actors,” Jack said softly. “Pros.”

  A chill iced her nerves.

  “As in, professional killers?” she asked.

  “I’m thinking professional mercenaries.”

  “Let me guess, you can find talent like that on the Internet, right?”

  “If you know where to look,” Jack said.

  She shuddered. “I suppose it makes sense that Zane might have hired a couple of mercenaries to do his dirty work. Judging by what you’ve told me, he can afford the best.”

  “Huh.”

  “Now what? Another ping?”

  “Maybe.” Jack tapped the tabletop again. One time. “Zane never just hires talent. You can’t get real loyalty simply by paying a good salary and offering benefits. And Zane always demands loyalty. He only uses people he can trust. People who are bound to him by fear or some equally powerful emotion. People he thinks he can control. He seduces the people who possess the skills he needs by promising them what they want most in the world.”

  Winter considered that for a few seconds.

  “But doing it for the money is sort of the basic job description of a mercenary, isn’t it?” she said finally. “What could Zane promise a couple of professional killers except a lot of cash?”

  “That,” Jack said, “is a very good question. It may even be the second most important question I need to ask tonight.”

  “What is the most important question?”

  “Who is Zane hiding behind? He always uses human shields. It’s one of his signatures. Once I get the answer to that question it should be easy to figure out what he promised his two mercenaries.”

  Jack gripped the arms of his chair and pushed himself to his feet. He started toward the connecting door.

  “Where are you going?” Winter asked.

  He paused in the doorway and looked back at her. “I need to take another look at my Recent Suspicious Fires file. Each of the cases in it has some element that makes me think Zane could have been involved but until now I haven’t been able to isolate whatever it was that didn’t look right. Now that I’ve got more data I can try to eliminate a few.”

  “Go,” she said. She waved him away into the other room. “I need to meditate.”

  He nodded once and disappeared into the other room. He left the door partway open.

  She sat down on the side of her bed and composed herself.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

  “Winter?”

  Jack’s voice brought her out of the light self-induced trance. She opened her eyes and saw him looming in the doorway between the two rooms. There was a new intensity in his eyes. She could have sworn that the energy in the atmosphere was charged lightning-hot.

  She got to her feet. “You found something?”

  “Not yet, but I’m close,” he said. “Very, very close. I’ve narrowed the list of possible cases down to a handful. One of them is import
ant. I’d stake my life on it. But I’m losing my focus. The problem is that I’ve studied these cases from too many different angles. They’re just a jumble of facts now. Chaos. I need to find the butterfly that flapped its wings. I think you can help me do that.”

  “How?”

  “I want you to look at the data in my files with me.”

  “Okay, but I’m not exactly a trained forensics investigator.”

  “I just want you to review the details with me and ask questions. Lots and lots of questions. Anything. Everything. You’ll bring a new perspective to the information because you’ll be seeing the data for the first time. I’m hoping you’ll ask the question that I haven’t asked. The right question.”

  “How do you want to do this?”

  “I want you to put me into a trance and walk through the cases in my hot file one by one. Interview me.”

  “You want me to hypnotize you?”

  “Promise me you won’t make me squawk like a chicken.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

  She sat down at the small table. Jack took the opposite chair. She was surprised when, without a word, he put the small chunk of black obsidian on the table. She had not known that he had brought it with him.

  All the lights were off. The room was lit only by the otherworldly glow of the screen of Jack’s computer. She was shivering a little.

  “Feels like we’re going to hold a séance,” Jack said.

  “Ignore the theatrics,” she said. “I turned the lights off for my sake, not yours. The darkness will help me to concentrate on asking the right questions.”

  She knew she was not the only one who was affected by the edgy vibe in the room. Everything about Jack was sharp and focused. Like a soldier preparing to go into combat, she thought.

  “Before we do this you need to focus on your escape word for a moment.”

  He smiled. “Don’t worry, I’m not going to forget it.”

  “I’m serious,” she said. “Pay attention. When I do this with other people, I control the trance. I tell them what to look for. I ask the questions. When the session is over, I pull them out of the trance. But you’re different.”