Deadly Justice (13 page)

Most people have bits and pieces of time missing from their records.  A couple of weeks between jobs.  A vacation where they flew under the radar and fell off the grid.   Andrea's past was too perfect, not a single day unaccounted for, which meant there was probably some pretty fancy computer skills making it look good. 

“I'd like to have my laptop back.”  She got a pained look before adding, “Please.” 

It was the please that sealed it.  She was looking for something.  Good thing Carlisle installed a keystroke tracker when he'd duped her hard drive, so they'd know every move she made. 

“Sure.  I was getting ready to bring it to you.”  He picked up the computer and handed it to her.

She clutched it to her chest, wrapping both arms around it, as though afraid he might snatch it back again.  No, he'd wait to see what her next move might be.  He'd become an expert at waiting.  He leaned back in his chair and steepled his fingers, watching her.  No fidgeting, no shifting from foot to foot, no nervous telltale gestures.  No, she stood quietly watching him as if determining his worth.

She exhaled on a sigh, and placed the laptop back on the edge of his desk and plopped into the wingback chair before running her hand through her hair.

“Please don't make me regret this.”  With a swift move she leaned forward and flipped open her laptop and powered it on. 

“I had Zach send me everything he's got on Simco and Jacob Simmons.  Do you want me to shoot it all over to Carlisle?  Or does he already have access to my cloud account?”

“He duplicated your hard drive earlier, and set up a keystroke tracker.”  Carpenter decided he'd be honest with her, since she planned to share information.

“I suspected as much.  Where's the laptop case?”

Carpenter reached into the drawer and pulled out the collapsible carrier and handed it over.  Watched her dig into a pocket and pull out what looked like a charm bracelet with several animal charms attached.  She promptly pulled the head off the small panda bear and revealed it to be a thumb drive.  Crap—had Carlisle copied it when he'd done the hard drive?  He hadn't noticed the bracelet when he'd taken the laptop out of its carrier earlier, but then he hadn't been looking for anything except the computer.  Most people left their thumb drives at home as a backup in case their computer was misplaced or stolen. 

  “I don't keep everything on my hard drive, too risky.  The important files are kept on thumb drives or on an external hard drive. Plus there's my brother's computer for backup, and it's not connected to the internet.”

“Smart.  Our sensitive files are on a computer not connected to the internet also.”  Thanks to his paranoid professional hacker. 

“I called Zach a little while ago and had him send everything.  Let's take a look at what he's got.”  She inserted the thumb drive and opened several files.  He stood behind her chair, watching her work, noted how her slender fingers flew across the keys.  She was no stranger to a computer keyboard.  Standing this close, her perfume wafted up and he caught the subtle scents of citrus and woman and hoped she didn't notice her effect on him, though it was hard to hide. He bit back a grin, wondering what' she'd thought of his choices.  Earlier that morning, he'd contacted one of the personal shoppers at Neiman-Marcus and had them send a selection of clothing, outfitting her from the skin out, and he'd chosen a scent he thought suited her.  He'd been right—it was perfect.  

“These are the files pertaining to the interaction between Simco and my brother's company.  Like he told you this morning, he decided not to work with them, since they were too small to have any appreciable return on investment.  But Zach's thorough when he's checking out new companies—ah, here's what I was hoping he'd have.”

She swiveled around in her chair to look at him, her green gaze intense.  “I'm trusting you here, Carpenter.  Don't make me regret sharing my info with you.”

Hitting the enter key, a photograph popped up to fill the laptop's screen and Carpenter bit back the curse that immediately rose to his lips. 

“This is a picture of Jacob Simmons.”  Andrea's soft voice finally broke through his intense concentration on the picture. 

“The hell it is.  That's Richard Webster.” 

She shook her head.  “I was afraid you were going to say that.  I'm getting really good about adding two and two.”

He watched her lower the lid of the laptop and pointed a shaky finger to the seat beside hers.  “You may as well sit.  I think it's time we laid our cards on the table, don't you?” 

Yeah, she was probably right, but that didn't make it any easier.  He didn't want to relive the night he'd been betrayed, how he'd been the fool who trusted a friend and nearly lost everything, including his own life.  But he owed her an explanation and this would be his chance to find out exactly what kind of game she was playing and what her endgame was, because he had a sinking suspicion they were both hunting Webster for their own reasons.  He decided to remain quiet, let her spill her guts first.

“Two years ago my entire life changed because of Richard Webster.”  She sat back in her chair and crossed her legs.  His eyes immediately caught on the hint of thigh showing above her skirt.  “My fiancé was a police officer killed in the line of duty at a drug bust.” 

Her voice cracked right at the end, and his own breath hitched in his chest.  He knew she'd been engaged, that much they'd discovered right at the beginning of their investigation into her background.  From the sadness in her voice, she'd obviously loved him. 

“Webster was involved.”  His voice came out harsher than he meant, but she didn't seem to notice.  Instead, she nodded.

“John wasn't supposed to be working that night, but there was a flu epidemic going around and the station was shorthanded, so he got called in.   They'd received an anonymous tip about a shipment, and he along with three other cops got sent to check its validity.  It turned out to be a much bigger rendezvous than they'd been clued in to, and were seriously outnumbered and outgunned.”

“Let me guess, they were captured and shot through the head execution style.”  It had become Webster's favorite method of eliminating any potential witnesses.  A bullet to the brain pretty much ensured nobody was left to testify against you, even if they managed to survive.  A vegetable can't point a finger in court and say you're guilty. 

“All four of them were killed.  The police were able to track down a couple of the lower level mules, and they all pointed the finger at Webster, but he'd disappeared along with the money and the drugs.”

Carpenter huffed out a breath.  “Yeah, he's really good at disappearing.” 

“Things didn't add up for me afterward.  John was a good cop.  He was older than me, and he'd been on the force for a long time.  He didn't make careless mistakes, and moving in without sufficient backup wasn't something he'd do.” 

Carpenter leaned forward, noting the sheen of tears in her beautiful green eyes, though she fought to keep them from falling.  “What made you start looking into Webster?  I'm sorry your fiancé died, but something else must have put you on a collision course with the man.”

She rubbed her hands against the arms of the chair before answering him.  “At the funeral, they were honoring John and his fallen comrades.  I remember how angry I felt he'd been stolen away from me in such a senseless fashion.  I know cops die in the line of duty all the time, but this wasn't a hit and run at a traffic stop, or a bank robbery.  They hadn't even entered the building before they were surrounded.  Things were too convenient, too orchestrated, to have happened by accident.  Every instinct, every ounce of my being, said he'd walked into a setup.  I remember looking at every face who paraded past offering condolences.  They were etched in my brain because I needed something to focus on, and memorizing each one gave me an outlet for my building anger.” 

She stood and walked around the desk until she stood by the large French doors leading onto the extended patio.  Dappled sunlight filtered through and bathed her in subtle highlights of gold, and she appeared to glow like a heavenly apparition. 

“Of course, there were tons of people I didn't recognize, but I needed a purpose, something to keep me from going insane.  After the funeral, I began matching the faces of the people with the names signed in the guest book.”  She turned and met his gaze.  “I know, it was stupid and futile and foolish, but it gave me something to focus on, to keep me from thinking about John lying on broken asphalt in a deserted alley in a pool of blood.”

At her words, his mind flashed back to Brownsville and he winced.  Yeah, he understood exactly why she'd want to erase that image from her mind. He still had nightmares about seeing his downed teammates, murdered by his former partner, who'd set him up to take the fall. 

“After a couple of weeks, with the help of a lot of computer searches, I'd narrowed John's guest book list down to a dozen people I couldn't place.  That's out of about three hundred and fifty.”

“Very impressive.  And a hell of a lot of work.” 

“It kept me busy.”  She leaned against the doorjamb, her whole body appearing relaxed, but he could see the faint tremor to her limbs and knew she wasn't as calm as she tried to portray. 

“How'd Webster tie into your fiancé's funeral?” 

“Call it women's intuition or whatever, but the whole time I sat staring at John's casket, I felt like somebody was watching me.  Whenever I looked around, I couldn't spot anybody, but the feeling of being stalked never left.”

“I never discount intuition.  It's saved my life more than once.”  Carpenter leaned back in the chair, but inside his gut was telling him to listen up, this was important.  That little voice was practically screaming, so he tamped it down and focused on her words. 

“Once I'd narrowed down matching faces with names and had the dirty dozen left, I was stuck.  I'd exhausted my computer hacking skills, so I called in my brother.”  He watched the corners of her mouth turn up at the mention of Zach, and he had an overwhelming desire to find her stepbrother and smash his fist right into his pearly whites. He paused, not understanding where the flare of jealousy had come from.  He had no claim on Andrea—at least not yet.  Instead, he settled for cracking his knuckles and remained exactly where he was.

“Zach's got a lot of amazing IT guys working for him and a couple of professionals who work—outside the system.”  She glanced toward him.  “I'm sure you know what I'm talking about.”

He didn't answer on the grounds that, hell yeah he had guys, but he didn't need to confirm or deny their existence. 

“Anyway, he put me in touch with this girl who had access to some of the latest facial recognition software.  Better than even the stuff the FBI uses.”

He rattled off the name of the software Carlisle used, and she started in surprise.

“How'd you know about that?  My friend said it's not even close to being released yet—it's still in beta testing.”

“Your friend must know Carlisle then, because he wrote the program.” 

She chuckled.  “Zach really wants Carlisle to work for him.  Don't be surprised if he tries to steal him out from under you.” 

Carpenter snorted.  “Fat chance, babe.  Carlisle isn't going anywhere.” 

“I figured as much, but hey, you've been warned.  Zach doesn't always play by the rules when there's something he wants.” 

Carpenter smiled.  “Neither do I.” 

“We're getting off topic here.”

She turned and faced him, her back against the wall with her arms crossed, which pushed her breasts higher, and his eyes zeroed in immediately on her curves.  The afternoon light streamed in through the panes of glass, spilling across her in sparkling prisms of color and his hands gripped the arms of his chair to keep from bounding from his seat to take her in his arms.  What was it about this woman that drew him like no other? 

“Anyway, my friend used the facial recognition software and helped me narrow down even more the remaining twelve people at the funeral.  They were all local residents or officers from neighboring towns paying their respects to a fallen comrade.  That only left one person I couldn't identify.”

“Webster.”

“I didn't know it was him at the time, but yeah.  During the interim, the cops had picked up two of the lower level dealers, and Webster's name shook loose.  Stella was able to find a photo of Webster from his days working for the government, and he's definitely the guy who came to John's funeral.”

“Stella?”

Andrea chuckled.  “She's my brother's hacker friend.” 

Carpenter stood and paced a couple of steps away from her, still running possibilities in his head.  “Why would he risk coming to the funeral of a cop?  That doesn't make any sense.” 

“I've never been able to figure out why Richard Webster does a lot of the things he does.  I finally caught a break, though, when Lawrence Mitchell came to visit my family.  He and my mother have known each other for years and he'll occasionally drop in.  Usually when he's between wives.” 

Carpenter chuckled.  “Yeah, I heard mention he's been married a few times.” 

“Well, about four months after John was killed, Lawrence showed up.  Actually, he was looking for Zach, but he was out of the country on business.  Something in his demeanor felt off, though I couldn't put my finger on it.  He was nervous, antsy.  Even Momma noticed.  He played it down, spouting some line about being tired because he'd been putting in long hours since his assistant had disappeared.  Left without notice, leaving him high and dry.  At loose ends and still reeling from John's murder, the thought of moving to Dallas, away from all the memories…”

“Sometimes time and a lot of distance make the best healers to the soul.” 

She looked at him, her intense gaze boring into him like an ice pick to the chest before lowering her eyes.  “Very perceptive, Mr. Carpenter.”  He winced at the formality in her tone.  Damn, he'd really blown it with her.  Damage control just moved higher up on his to-do list. 

“Lawrence decided not to wait for Zach to get back, leaving a message for him to get in touch.  He seemed thrilled that I'd volunteered to come to Dallas and work with him, though a bit surprised I'd want to.  Truthfully, I was a little overqualified for the job.”  He watched the pretty pink blush steal across her cheeks.