Criminal Promises (2 page)

“What happened to
her?”

“We’re not releasing
details at this time.”

“Right.” She was sorry.
Sorry he’d brought death to her door again. Sorry a woman had
suffered a blatantly agonizing end. Sorry she couldn’t identify the
woman who deserved to have her full name in death.

Maggie shook her head and
handed him the photo. “I’ve never seen her.”

“Have you noticed
anything, anyone, unusual around the neighborhood
lately?”

“Aside from a black car
with dark tinted windows that occasionally drives by?” She leaned
forward and straightened the magazines still on the table. Time was
running out on the minutes. “No.”

An odd look crossed Harte’s
face as he tucked the picture in his pocket and pulled out his
notepad. “Can you be more specific about the car?”

“A new Audi. Four door.
Black. Expensive looking black rims.”

His pupils flared briefly
before he looked down at the notebook. “That’s pretty
specific.”

“Jason Statham drove the
same thing in the second
Transporter
.”

He nodded slowly in
apparent appreciation, either because she knew her cars or watched
action flicks. “So it isn’t a neighbor’s? Maybe someone’s
company?”

“Not unless a visitor
rolls past my house at idling speed without slowing at anyone
else’s home.”

“How often does this
happen?”

“Once a week at least. For
the last several months.” At least that’s when she’d noticed it
thanks to new sleeping habits.

“You notice quite a bit.”
Harte jotted notes without looking up. “Did you catch the plate
number?”

“I don’t sleep much. And
no.” The base of her spine itched with awareness of him as a man,
but also with knowledge he was holding something back. What?
Why?

“Thank you for your time.”
He stood to leave, pulled a card from his pocket and offered it to
her. “Please, let me know if you think of anything
more.”

She glanced at the card
before meeting his gaze. “I have your numbers.”

Call if you need
anything,
he’d said a year earlier as he
placed his card on the console table.
She’d thought of reaching out a time or two, but doubted he’d
really intended to make the offer. Still, his card was tucked into
her personal phone book by the phone.

“Right.” He cleared his
throat and slid the card back into his pocket. “Well, let me know
if you see anything. I’ll see myself out.”

“Sure thing.” She nudged a
few magazines aside with her foot and followed him.

“Hey.” He turned with his
hand on the knob. “Wasn’t your husband a professor?”

“He was a linguist. He
taught at University of Texas at Dallas.” Why would he ask that?
Was there a connection?

Harte nodded as he pulled
open the door. “Thanks again for your time, Mrs.
Sullivan.”

“I wish I’d been more
help.” She followed him onto the porch and fought against the
images of her breaking under the weight of searing agony. The grief
and pain she’d thought had eased flooded back tightening her chest
and throat in sympathy for an unknown family. She couldn’t shake
the thought something big was about to disrupt her
world.

“I hope you find your
answers.”

Maggie watched Harte’s
arresting and confident stride as he crossed the lawn toward a
black Audi. He was halfway to his car when she called out to him.
“Detective! About the car I mentioned.”

He stumbled as if the
ground had jumped under his feet. “Yeah?”

“It’s remarkably similar
to yours.” She tilted her head and looked past him. “Right down to
those rims that perfectly match the paint job. They’re more subtle
than traditional ones, which is what makes them
noticeable.”

“Interesting.” He nodded
and continued toward his car without looking back.

Yeah. Interesting.
Why had Detective Harte been checking up on
her?

On the other side of the parking lot of the
vacant warehouse, a man sat in his late model Monte Carlo with the
engine idling. Adalia pulled in and stopped her van several car
lengths away.

Anticipation of finally stopping the bitch
surged even as BD instinctively worked to keep his breathing level.
Before he could react or move in, Adalia shifted her hands on the
wheel and then gunned the gas.

Faster than her van closed the distance to
the waiting man realization struck. Someone wouldn’t be going
home.

Without remembering the details of his
actions, BD raced to Mike Sullivan’s car. He sat with the man
struggled to breathe with a shard of windowpane protruding lethally
from the side of his neck. The man’s every labored breath pumped
another spurt of blood onto his pristine shirt.

“Take care of Maggie.
Promise.”

BD jerked himself out of the quicksand memory
before it sucked him into a darker void. It was hard enough
fighting free of the nightmare each morning. He didn't need it
during the day.

“This goes back to however
she was involved with the husband.” He pulled on a pair of boxing
gloves and headed for the punching bag. “Any word on when and how
Adalia escaped?”

Craig Harrison, his partner and best friend
since childhood, took his position on the other side of the bag to
hold it still.

A year earlier they’d arrested Adalia Wood
after she'd driven into his car to make sure he didn't talk about
whatever he had been meeting her for. She’d brutally killed several
people and left taunting notes at each scene. Her methods of
torture and murder were so varied they’d only connected them by her
constant use of an ivory stationary with a Gryphon watermark.

“Middle of the night,”
Craig said. “There are gaps in the intel, but she had to have
help.”

“Son of a…”
Punch.

“Say it. You won’t offend
my virginal ears.”

He glared at Craig. “Help
like before?”

They’d suspected she had an accomplice, but
had been unable to find anyone connected to her. She was smart,
incapable of showing genuine sympathy to another person, and
completely isolated in her world. Male victims saw her as a
beautiful woman in need of saving. Female victims regarded her as a
friendly acquaintance. No one they had interviewed had been able to
do more than describe her appearance. She was most dangerous
because of her ability to blend in.

“Not sure.” Craig planted
his feet more firmly. “Wood’s cell mate confirms that she’s
targeted Sullivan’s widow, but doesn't know why.

“A fight broke out sending
several inmates to the infirmary. She was stabbed and disappeared
when the responding ambulance took her to a hospital for surgery.
The warden is emailing a scan of Wood’s file and visitor
logs.”

BD grunted as he landed another punch. He’d
suspected Maggie was going to be involved when he saw the body in
the park. He'd known it when she confirmed her husband had been a
professor. What he couldn’t figure now any more than he could then
was the connection between Mike Sullivan and Adalia.

Maybe an affair, but somehow that didn’t sit
right in BD’s gut. It wasn’t a strong enough reason for a woman
like Adalia to kill a man or go after his wife a year later.

Regardless, death was back at Maggie’s door
and he had a promise to keep. The potential ramifications of
spending time around her had pressure building at his temples.
She’d pulled at him, sexually and emotionally, when he’d shattered
her world. Her allure had grown with time, judging by his earlier
reaction.

“What good does it do to
put murderers behind bars if morons let them go?” BD ground his
teeth. They had to redo a job they’d already done because of
incompetents.

Punch.
He’d prefer himself or Craig being the targets. They were
trained.

A target on Maggie… He may as well have been
gut punched by a three-hundred-pound thug on a high. He didn’t
stand a chance of blocking the force of such a hit any more than he
could remain unaffected by the exotic looking widow with her dark
hair and compelling gaze.

Adalia was crafty and planned everything ten
moves in advance, which meant BD was going to have to get close to
Maggie. She needed protection and sitting in his car each night
wouldn’t be effective.

“Adalia mentioned a
professor in the note on Michelle Dane.” Thankfully they’d
identified the woman in the park. “Maggie’s husband was a
professor, but what’s the logic behind targeting her?”

“Vindication?” Craig
ventured. “Maggie was at the trial for most of the closing
statements. Women can latch on and turn small grudges into vengeful
ones.”

“No.” BD slammed his fist
into the polycanvas bag. “Family members of her other victims were
there too. They haven’t been identified as targets.”

What did Mike Sullivan have to do with
Adalia? What hat she wanted to keep him from talking about? She
wasn’t crazy. She had reasons for every action—even if BD couldn’t
pinpoint them.

Craig braced the bag and
studied him. “She got to you again.”

“Maggie?”
Punch.
“No.”
Yes.
Seeing her threw
him back in time. He recalled every emotion crossing her face when
he told her he was responsible for her husband’s death. That had
been the second time he’d failed to react fast enough. Nothing
would distract him this time.

“BD—”

Punch.
Ignoring the suspicion in Craig’s tone, BD jerked his head.
He’d have to put more into his punches if he wanted to move the
bag. Moving Craig could be like moving a mountain.

“She dressed more primly
today, but I still see her in Pepto-Bismol pink cleaning gloves
with a rip in her jeans and her chin jutted out in
defiance.”

Her house had been cluttered with kid stuff
last time he’d been there and her hair had been in a messy
ponytail. Aside from photographs in decorative frames of a relaxed
Maggie and the mess from the raccoon, she now portrayed an
obsessively controlled person. Nothing in her life was allowed to
slip from its approved slot. She hadn’t even been able to look at
the magazines on the table without straightening them.

Punch.
Facing her again ripped open old wounds and awakened the
memory of her body pressed against his. His heart trembled with the
echoing memory of her pain.

“She’s a job.”
PUNCH.

Craig grunted and stepped back with his right
foot.

Punch. Punch.

“Right.” A job and nothing
more. So why had he avoided women since meeting her?

Yeah, his thoughts about the widow were
inappropriate. The temporary—and intense—attraction he’d felt while
offering comfort to a grieving woman made him the lowest kind of
sleaze. Damn if he hadn’t felt a stronger attraction today.

Her pleated slacks and silk tank top
accentuated her curves. Elegance radiated from her even as she
chased a raccoon with a broom, and the instinctive attempt to take
him down when he’d startled her… Her spirit was arousing.

“That case was tough for
you.”

BD pictured Adalia’s face
and put the full weight of his body into the next swing.
Punch. Punch.

He knocked Craig back two steps. Bouncing on
his feet, BD rolled his shoulders. That felt good.

“I did what I needed to do
to stop a murderer.”
And a man lost his
life, a kid his dad.

Craig stepped over to the open mat in the
middle of the floor and held his hands out to his side in
invitation. BD pulled the Velcro on his gloves with his teeth.
Maybe hand-to-hand against Craig would release the need to throttle
someone. He couldn’t ask for a tougher opponent.

Shaking his arms, then legs, loosening his
muscles, BD stepped in front of Craig and assumed a defensive
stance. He’d gotten good at defenses. Even if he didn’t clear his
mind, he might sweat out some aggravation.

Craig swung a test punch at
his face. “And then you took it further.”

BD swooped in. He landed a right jab to
Craig’s chest sending him back a step. He had twenty pounds on
Craig and should be able to knock him flat on his see-all-hear-all
ass.

“I promised her husband
I’d tell her he loved her.”
Promised to
protect her without knowing what or who from.

“You didn’t promise to
comfort her.”

Anger ran off him with the sweat, but nothing
washed it away. Craig had no right to question his actions, even if
he was the closest thing to a brother BD had.

“What’s that supposed to
mean?” He spun and aimed a kick at Craig’s head.

Craig raised his arm and
blocked the blow with little effort. “It means you went above and
beyond.
Way
beyond.”

“I did what I had
to.”
Liar.
He had
wanted to turn away from her, but guilt had sent him to her side.
The desire to hold her while she grieved had made him stay. Nothing
could have erased her pain, but maybe he’d helped a
little.

He circled Craig, looking for a chink in his
guard. Unpredictability and the challenge of finding a defense
flaw, of out-thinking a worthy opponent, made the sparring
effective.