Cold Spite (Cold Justice: Most Wanted #5)

Chapter 14

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

D elilah sat in the warm Jeep working up the courage to make the phone call. Her fingers shook as she typed in her mom’s cell number.

“Hello?” The voice was wary.

“Mom, don’t say anything, okay?” A choked sob on the other end of the line twisted Delilah’s heart in a knot. “Are you alone?”

“Give me a moment.”

Delilah waited while her mother moved somewhere where she could talk in private.

“I’m in the upstairs en suite bathroom. What’s going on? I had the FBI Director on the doorstep first thing this morning offering me her condolences.”

Shoot. Of course, the director would take a personal interest. How would she react to the knowledge Delilah was still alive? Probably not well.

“I’m so sorry. I didn’t have any way of contacting you last night.” Not without being sure she couldn’t be tracked. “I’m gonna need you to carry on pretending I’m dead for a little while.”

“Are you in danger?”

She thought about the look in Joseph Scanlon’s eyes the day she’d arrested him. The threats he’d uttered. Had he acted on them? The thought of what he might have done to Val haunted her.

“I think I might be.” She tried to lighten the mood. “How are your acting skills?”

“When the life of my child is at risk? Darling, I’m worthy of an Academy Award.”

Delilah smiled even though what she really wanted to do was cry at the reassuring sound of her mother’s voice.

“Your father…”

She could hear her mother making herself say the words.

“As you can imagine, he’s very upset.”

Delilah wanted to curl into a ball and sob.

“Tell me what’s going on,” her mom insisted.

“It’s complicated.”

“I am not the one who’s lost their faculties, young lady. Tell me.”

“Okay. Fine. I went for a run last night and when I came home my condo was on fire and Valerie…” Her voice stumbled. “I think Valerie was inside, dead.”

“Oh, my goodness.” Horror was reflected in her mother’s tone.

Her parents knew Valerie well. Delilah had often dragged her friend home to family gatherings.

“I spoke to a firefighter who said there was someone inside the apartment—I assume it was Val. It hit me hard, so I went over to David Gonzales’ place, my partner at the Bureau, because he lives close by and we’re friends. I found him shot dead.”

It sounded fantastical.

If this was her case, she wouldn’t believe her version of events. She’d exchange a knowing look with fellow agents and work to put her at ease and then break her story.

“Why didn’t you tell anyone?” Her mother’s hushed whisper was confused. “Your coworkers?”

“I believe I know the person responsible, and he’s trying to frame me for the murders even in death. I don’t want him going to ground if he thinks I’m on to him, and he won’t think I’m onto him if he believes I’m in the morgue.”

“Delilah, you can’t go running around chasing dangerous killers on your own. You know better than that.” Her mother’s words were a forceful whisper.

“I’m not alone. I have a CIA friend helping me figure this out.” No way would she implicate Demarco.

“A CIA officer? How do you even know him?—”

“I worked with him on the Scanlon case.”

Her mother went quiet. She was the wife of a former top FBI official and knew when not to ask questions.

“Look, I’m not going rogue. I’m simply going dark until I can get this guy—me along with a task force of other officials.” That was her hope anyway. “I don’t have all the details figured out yet.”

“I don’t know how I’m going to tell your father you’re not dead. He was devastated earlier. This is going to confuse him even further. Make him really feel like he’s losing his mind because that’s how I feel.”

“Then don’t tell him.”

The silence suggested her mother was thinking about the merits of that.

“It has to be this way, Mom. If we don’t get this guy, I’m going to be looking over my shoulder for the rest of my life.” She heard the sniffle of tears. Delilah’s mouth went dry. “I’m sorry, Mom. Truly. I’ll come home as soon as I can. To visit and help out. Help look after Dad.”

“I know he made mistakes. He struggled to cope after losing Christian…”

She’d struggled with the loss too. They all had.

“If you’d seen him earlier today…”

“I don’t mean to hurt him. Or you.”

“I know, honey. I know.”

Delilah could tell her mother was crying and that made her feel wretched .

“I better get back downstairs. The caregiver is here, but Stephen’s upset, so I need to be there. I’m going to tell him the truth and hope he can hold it together and keep it a secret. The way he’s progressing, he may have forgotten everything in a few days anyway.”

Delilah squeezed her fingers into a tight fist. She hadn’t realized he was deteriorating so rapidly. Her father would have been a useful ally to have, but she couldn’t ask anything of him. Not in his condition. Few people knew of his cognitive decline because he was a proud man and that’s how he’d wanted it. She wouldn’t betray him.

“I love you, Mom. Give him a kiss from me.”

She hung up and turned on the radio to listen to the news. Her supposed death and David’s murder were the main headlines. Which was good, she reminded herself, steeling her heart against the emotions that wanted to wreck it. The coverage was exactly what Scanlon would expect.

She heard footsteps and glanced around as paranoia raised its ugly head. The Jeep was in shadow, and no one would expect her to be sitting there, disguised as a blonde, in a back alley in Coronado, but she needed to keep up her guard.

Demarco arrived carrying goodies from the coffee shop. He went to the passenger side and Delilah slowly buzzed down the window.

The look of him made her insides ache.

He handed her the tray with a smile. “In case you changed your mind about being hungry.”

Ignoring the effect his presence had on her, she took the tray, her stomach rumbling despite her earlier refusal.

He went around and climbed into the driver’s seat and grabbed one of the coffees and a donut.

Something on the radio caught her attention. She frowned and turned up the volume.

“A third person was discovered dead in his car early this morning. The FBI are refusing to confirm reports that he was a Confidential Informant linked to the two dead FBI agents.”

She sat frozen, staring at the radio in alarm. Had she misjudged this whole situation?

“Who’s that?” Demarco noted her reaction.

She swallowed. Hard. “It could be David’s CI. We were supposed to meet him this morning.”

“Are you saying this whole thing might be related to an active case? Not Scanlon?” Demarco’s golden eyes were laser focused on her face.

Delilah shook her head. “It makes no sense. Clarence Carpenter was a low-level player. He scheduled a meeting with the mayor of La Mesa City. Rumor has it the guy is taking bribes. It’s a Public Corruption case but hardly Watergate and hardly worthy of a triple homicide.”

“Might be to someone who feels threatened. Who knew you were meeting with him?”

She pursed her lips together. What if she was wrong about all of this? “I only found out myself yesterday afternoon. David arranged it all.”

Demarco tapped his fingers on the steering wheel in a habit she’d forgotten he had. “So, either you’re mistaken, and this situation is related to one of your current cases, or…”—he held up a finger and she wanted to bite it off—“Scanlon has gone to a lot of trouble to throw investigators off his scent. Why didn’t he anticipate your friend, Valerie, being in the apartment if she’s been staying with you?”

Delilah stared through the window. Forced the emotions into a dark pit. Grasped at logic. “She was gone the last two weeks on a cruise. Only got back yesterday morning for an audition downtown.”

“That timing makes sense. He’s been out of prison for three weeks. Presumably, he’d wait a week before beginning recon on revenge plans that would put him right back inside. ”

Demarco believed her…but she’d been wrong before where this man was concerned.

She ignored the protest of her stomach, thrust her croissant into the brown paper bag, and put her coffee in the cup holder. Doubts assailed her. “What if I am wrong?” She grabbed her head between her hands. “What if someone discovered Clarence was talking to us and killed him to prevent him passing on anything incriminating and then went after us?”

“That would suggest some major-league corruption.”Those rich yellow eyes watched her. “Even if that’s the case, why frame you for your partner’s murder? If this was related to a Public Corruption case, why murder you and try to make it look as if you killed your lover?”

Lover?

He thought she and David had been lovers? She opened her mouth to correct him and then changed her mind. Perhaps if he thought she’d been involved with someone else, it would help keep a wedge between them. She knew how charming he could be. How charismatic. How susceptible she was to him despite everything she knew to be true. Fighting that attraction, despite what he’d done to her, would be difficult, which was humbling to admit even to herself.

“To discredit me?”

Demarco shook his head. “Once he added this Clarence guy to the mix, he stirred things up a little too much… Unless he somehow incriminated you in that murder too?”

“How? I was already supposed to be dead.”

“We don’t know when Clarence died.”

True.

“Did you have any kind of personal relationship with this Clarence guy?”

She shook her head. “He was David’s CI. He flipped and cultivated him. I’d seen Clarence in passing, but today was the first time I was going to be directly involved with him.”

“I think that by killing the CI, Scanlon overplayed his hand. ”

“I don’t think the FBI will see it that way.”

“How could Scanlon have found out about the CI or the meet?”

She chewed her lip. “David met with Clarence yesterday morning. He didn’t say where but probably some parking garage somewhere. Someone could have followed him, but David would have noticed.”

Cas shook his head. “Scanlon is a former Navy SEAL sniper. He might be rusty, but he knows how to surveil without being spotted. But easier to put a tracker on his vehicle.”

Her breath hitched. “David often parked his Bucar outside his garage. The killer could have stuck a transmitter inside. Picked up the conversation and knew the location before I did.”

Cas nodded. “That would be my bet.” He tapped the steering with his thumb. “I want to take a look at the bodies.”

She reared back. “Why?”

“Because. Scanlon was a sniper and a damned good shot, but SEALs know how to snap a neck or use a knife. I want to know how each victim died.”

She was breathing heavily, and she forced herself to calm down. She’d seen dead bodies before, but it was different this time. Two of these people were dear friends.

“How are you going to get in there?”

He flashed her a grin. The one that had made him so irresistible to the foolish young woman she’d been.

“I’ll change into a suit and show my very bright shiny shield and tell them I’m a friend of the family who’s come to confirm your identity.”

She hunched her shoulders. She bet he’d charmed his way into many situations and beds in the past five years. “What am I supposed to do? Wait in the parking lot with every Sheriff’s Department Deputy walking by?”

“I’ll drop you back at the hotel. Get something to eat. Try to sleep. The military transport does not offer in-flight meals.”

“Fine.” She knew too many people who might frequent the San Diego County Medical Examiner’s Office to risk hanging around the parking lot. She hesitated. Forced her bitterness aside. “Thank you. Thank you for helping me.”

He took her hand and squeezed. She jolted in shock at the familiar heat and strength of his fingers.

“There are very few things in this world that I have absolute faith in, Delilah, but I have always believed in you. Always.”

As much as she wanted to treasure the words, she knew them for lies. She pulled her fingers away and nursed her hand in her lap as if she’d been stung.

His eyes shuttered, and he turned away to start the engine. Perhaps he believed what he said. Perhaps he’d forgotten the other words he’d said to her five years ago. But she hadn’t. And she hadn’t forgiven.

No matter what happened, she didn’t think she’d ever forgive Cas Demarco. Maybe one day she’d tell him why.