Color Blind (41 page)

Yancy kept going, read the final paragraph of the letter. His heart dropped into his stomach. “Oh, no. Christ no!”

He grabbed his phone again, but when he pressed a button, the red light at the top blinked once. The screen went black.

“Oh, God! No . . .”

He left Lyra and the letter and ran for the car.

J
enna finally finished the appropriate paperwork at the prison. The state psychiatrist would take over now, and the FBI would bring in another forensic psych to evaluate Isaac Keaton. Even though he’d get another crack at the next psych, she’d made sure he wouldn’t be able to pull Claudia’s little trick all over again, and that was all that mattered.

Still, Hank hadn’t shown up with the folder. Thank God she’d been able to wear Isaac down without it.

Saleda eased open the door of the office Jenna was borrowing to fill out the necessary reports. She tossed Jenna’s cell phone to her, which she’d had to check with the guards earlier. “Long day. Anything from Hank?”

Jenna pulled up her texts. Nothing. Something, however, from Yancy.

“Oh, Jesus! Yancy . . . Thadius Grogan . . . Lyra—”

Saleda held up a hand. “Not to worry. The locals arrested Grogan at his house ten minutes ago. Found him in his daughter’s room, sleeping off a handful of Xanax. Lyra Mintelle wasn’t so lucky.”

“What do you mean?”
Yancy, what did you do?

“Dead. Nine-one-one had a call a while ago from her home. Injected herself with potassium chloride. Being a nurse opens doors when you have mental issues, I guess.”

“She called 911?”

“No, some guy. No sign of him, but she left a suicide letter. Most of it was a bunch of gibberish, but given everything we know, doesn’t look like there’s any reason to think someone else did it. Plus, the only set of fingerprints aren’t anywhere near the room where she shot herself up. Only in one place. Looks like the mysterious male tried to save her.”

Yancy.

Jenna stacked the papers, then clipped them together. She rose, handed Saleda the forms. “You mind taking care of these for me? I’d love to get home and shower before I head back to the hospital. I’m covered in days of this monster’s shit.”

“No problem,” Saleda said. “Let me know when you run into the fearless leader, hm?”

“You’ll probably see him before me,” she answered. “Think we can finagle a cop to escort me home?”

“Heh. I hear Moose has taken a liking to you. Doubt you’ll have trouble persuading him,” Saleda said, winking.

Great.

•   •   •

T
he ride home would’ve been relaxing, what with the case finally not hanging over her, only Moose insisted on telling her his life story about wanting to become a cop. The story might’ve been interesting, too, had he not taken every opportunity to interject his lack of a significant other.

Relief washed over Jenna as they pulled up to her apartment.

“Thanks,” she said as she climbed out.

“Need me to walk you in?” he asked, his voice shadowed with mild disappointment.

“No, thank you. I’ll be okay.”
Once you’re no longer hitting on me.

“Okay, Doc. Take it easy.”

With that, Moose drove off. Jenna entered the building and trudged up the stairs to her floor. Of all days she ought to have taken the elevator, this was it. Somehow she never thought about it until she was halfway up.

Upon exiting the stairwell, Jenna could see from down the hall that something about her door looked different. An envelope sticking out?

As she approached, though, it was obvious the obtrusive object wasn’t an envelope. It was Hank’s key, and it was left
in
the keyhole.

Hank would never . . .

The key was something Claudia would do. On purpose.

Jenna reached into her purse, extracted the Glock. Sweat crept down her neckline, slid toward her stomach.

The door pushed open, and from behind it she scanned the right side of the room. Clear. Pointing the gun muzzle downward, she swept into the room toward the left, ready to shoot at legs if someone was there. Nothing.

She pulled the door closed as she moved in. Some things you don’t forget, and one is not leaving your rear end wide open.

The kitchen would be scary. No cover, no partner for backup. She should call the cops and wait, but no time. If Claudia was here and had intercepted Hank, minutes mattered. Jenna ripped out her cell, dialed 911, then slipped it back in her pocket. The noise of a phone call would just act as an alert to her presence.

She pushed into the swinging door that led to the kitchen, and through deep, sharp breaths, she covered the 360-degree radius. No one.

Hallway.

Heat ascended Jenna’s collarbone, cheeks. Her arms tingled on high alert.

The key in the door.

Her feet shuffled faster over the carpet down the hall, and she cleared one room at a time. Ayana’s, hers, Charley’s. Empty.

At the end of the hall she came to her father’s room. The door hung open, and Jenna cut in with the Glock, pulse mounting.

“Motherfu—”

Jenna ran to Hank’s side, where he lay in a pool of blood right outside the door of the tiny bathroom. One glance told her no one was in the shower, on the toilet. Nowhere else in the room to hide.

She knelt next to him, checked for a pulse. Nothing. She’d already known there wouldn’t be.

He was shot three times in the chest at close range. His eyes stared straight in front of him, surprised.

The father of her child, the man she’d loved—tried to love—for so many years, gone. Angry tears sprung to Jenna’s eyes as she thought of Ayana. Her little girl’s laugh sounded like Hank’s; her nose was shaped just like his.

Jenna tipped her head so the tears would fall on the carpet instead of her cheeks. She couldn’t stand the thought of wiping them away right now.

That was when she noticed Hank’s holster unclipped. No gun.

Something back toward the living room rustled. Jenna’s head shot up. The living room door
.

Her hand stiffened, her grip on her Glock tightened. She crouched, then stood and crept swiftly down the hallway. Charley’s room was the perfect cover between her and the kitchen, so she eased behind the door and waited, barely breathing. She could hear steps on the tile, then the muffled sound of feet hitting the carpet.

The intruder passed Charley’s room. Now was the time.

Jenna burst out of her brother’s bedroom, gun trained on the perp.

“What the fuck?”

Yancy turned around, his own gun aimed at her. He lowered it.

“Jenna! Christ! I almost shot you!”

“Ditto. What are you doing? Where have you been?”

“No time to explain. Claudia knows this address, she’s probably on her way . . . it’s not safe!”

“I know,” Jenna answered. She stood rooted to the spot, shaking. “Yancy . . .”

He moved toward her, face written with concern. She fell into him, clutched him with every ounce of strength she had left.

“Jenna. Hey. Hey. It’s going to be okay. What happened?”

She pulled back from him, stared in his eyes. Then she took his hand and led him to the back bedroom.

Upon seeing Hank, Yancy swallowed hard. “Called the cops?”

“Oh, shit.” Jenna grabbed the phone out of her pocket, picked up the 911 dispatcher. She relayed who she was, what had happened. They said they’d send help, and she hung up.

“Why wouldn’t Claudia stay and wait for you? Charley?” Yancy asked.

She left the key. She wanted me to know she’d been here.

“Oh, no,” Jenna said. She rushed back to Hank’s body, panic crashing over her.

Hank’s gun was missing. What else? Jenna frisked him furiously, already afraid of what she’d find.

“No cell phone!” she said, jumping up.

The safe house. Dad. Ayana.

“I’ll drive,” Yancy said, fast on her heels.

They stumbled down the steps of the building. Jenna’s mind raced to keep up with her feet. Claudia couldn’t know where the safe house was located. Even if she had Hank’s phone, he didn’t keep the address of the place in there.

This was Claudia. She’d figured it out.

“It’s why I came,” Yancy explained as he huffed and clanked down the stairs. “The suicide letter. Lyra said she gave Joey’s . . . Isaac’s . . . oh, whatever the hell his name is . . . she gave his mom their sister’s address. Lyra knew what would hurt you the most, even if she wasn’t planning to stick around to see Isaac out of jail!”

They hit the bottom floor and reached the car. Yancy cranked it as Jenna climbed in, and they peeled out.

“Where am I going?” Yancy asked.

“West Norfolk Street past East and Seventh. I’ll get you there after that,” Jenna answered, dialing Saleda for backup. She’d tell Jenna not to go, to wait for help. She’d say it was a horrible idea, playing into her mother’s hands.

Saleda was also the person who’d lost Claudia the first time.

“Floor it!”

H
ank’s FBI SUV sat in the driveway of the tiny cottage that was the safe house. Claudia was here.

No one else was.

Jenna had Yancy park in front of the house two mailboxes down. Surprise was a good thing, though surprising Claudia probably wasn’t in the cards. After all, they weren’t so much crashing a party as showing up as invited guests.

Either way, Jenna had backup this time, which was always better than being alone.

The softest entry point would be the cellar door. Jenna might not have been here before, but when they’d moved Ayana and her dad there, she memorized the layout of the place, top to bottom and side to side. What had been paranoia at the time was now turning out to be a useful bit of obsessive-compulsion.

Jenna’s key would open it, and they could sneak in without anyone realizing they were there. The difficulty was in climbing those steps without alerting anyone to their presence. Coming in from below might be stealthiest, but it didn’t offer the best vantage point. Still, better than knocking on the front door.

Jenna and Yancy climbed over the back fence of the house next door and crept toward the crawl space, then to the cellar door. Jenna slid her key in, turned.

When she opened it, the bloody, bruised body of the FBI agent assigned to the safe house met her. Dead.

This would be Claudia’s idea of a welcome mat.

So Claudia knew Jenna would enter this way. To continue or not. Yancy lifted his arms as though to ask.

Claudia thought Jenna would come in here. Therefore, Claudia wouldn’t watch other areas of the house. Even so, Claudia wasn’t the potted plant, conk you on the head type of bitch, either.

“She won’t be near the door. Won’t be watching it. She’ll make us go in deeper either way. We’re keeping this way.”

The layout of the safe house was fairly simple: Through the cellar door, up into the kitchen, which led to a dining area. Off the dining area was the living room, then bedrooms from there. Tiny, compact. Its dense structure was one reason they’d chosen it.

Jenna hoisted herself up the cellar ladder without lowering her gun. No way she’d put the Glock down now. Yancy climbed behind her. Jenna stopped when they reached the door. He stepped up level with her.

“Left,” Jenna said. The dining room would be at her left.

She turned the knob, peeked through. Nothing. She let the door fall open.

Jenna and Yancy entered back to back like they’d been partners forever, and Jenna swept the dining side, corners. No one. Jenna crouched forward into the dining room, Yancy covering her rear.

“Jenna, tsk, tsk. You know better than this nonsense, right? We’ve played hide and seek before.”

Claudia’s voice made Jenna’s skin prickle from head to toe.

Yancy shifted, prepared to aim low, as though he could tell from Claudia’s voice her position in the room, but Jenna put a hand to his chest.

“You’ll not want to come in guns blazing, dearie. Not when Grandma has your wee-bitty-baby girl on her lap.”