Gabriel (6 page)

Maybe it was true a person couldn’t help who they loved, but it was madness to butt
her head against a wall for fifteen long years, never seeing a single crack in the
defenses, and yet still continue hoping for entrance. Someday.

Maybe it was time for the madness to end.

Chapter Seven

So, her Deep Throat client was right.

A couple of hours later, Leah reclined in her office chair. She stared at the computer
monitor and sighed, feeling resigned by what she’d discovered. Or rather, by what
she
hadn’t
discovered.

Over the past twenty years, the social security number assigned to Richard Gregory
Pierce had not been used to purchase property. No new credit queries had been processed
on the number. No charges had been made to the credit cards he’d possessed at the
time of his disappearance. W-2s or 1099s hadn’t been issued, nor had tax returns been
filed with the IRS for Richard G. Pierce for two decades.

According to this information, not only had he vanished from Boston, but off the face
of the earth.

She closed her eyes. Richard was most likely dead, just as her secret client had claimed.

The evidence had been there all along. She hadn’t wanted to accept it. Richard had
had everything going for him—wealth, social and business connections, his health,
a great, loving family, and a committed relationship. There hadn’t been a reason for
him to walk away. Death appeared to be the only sensible conclusion to the mystery
of his disappearance.

Sorrow welled up in Leah’s chest and pounded her sternum as if it were a punching
bag. She squeezed her eyes tighter.
Ridiculous
. In spite of Gabriel’s childhood assurances that Richard had surely left Boston,
she’d suspected the truth for years. But there’d always been a tiny part of her clinging
to the naive hope he would turn up one day.

“Damn,” she muttered and wiped away renegade tears. She was becoming a regular water-head
today. First she’d cried on the drive into the office, and now, here at her desk.
“Just…damn.”

Richard hadn’t been in her life for years, but to this day she missed him. She missed
his laughter, the way he’d tickled her until she’d wheezed and begged him to stop.
She missed his patience when her father had none to spare on a grieving child. Richard
had attended her spring choir recitals, had celebrated her first-place win at the
second-grade spelling bee. In many ways, he’d been her surrogate father.

And he was dead.

Restraining a sob, she grabbed the edge of the desk and rolled herself forward. Now
was not the time to submit to grief. The opportunity to mourn him would come later—after
she found out who killed him and why. For every instinct screamed he’d been murdered,
and her intuition had never been wrong. The one time she’d ignored her intuition,
she’d wound up with a bullet in her hip, months of rehab, and an end to her career
as a police officer and her dreams.

Twenty months ago, she’d answered a routine burglary-in-process call. The first cops
to arrive at the Jamaica Plain storefront had taken the store entrance, and she’d
covered the side door in the bordering alley. After fifteen minutes, she’d received
the all clear over her shoulder two-way radio and responding, she holstered her weapon
and headed toward the mouth of the alley.

Something—instinct, women’s intuition, sixth sense—whispered that the scene was “off.”
Maybe the intruder had escaped before the initial cops reached the convenience store.
The call had come over in over her radio at 9:32 p.m., and the officers had arrived
two minutes later, having been in the area. Her fingers had curled near the butt of
her service weapon as the tingle in her stomach increased. She turned, stared deeper
into the shadowed depths of the alley, but after a few moments, continued walking
toward the street.

That’s when the fire escape ladder had creaked. She whipped around and fire flashed
across her left hip, and the world had tipped into blackness.

Later, after the surgery that had pieced together the jigsaw puzzle her bone had been,
she’d found out the two teens who’d broken into the store had run up a back staircase,
hidden in an empty apartment, then tried to climb down the fire escape. They hadn’t
expected to see her standing almost beneath them.

Months later, the two boys landed in jail for breaking and entering and attempted
murder. And she’d been forced into an early retirement after she couldn’t pass the
annual physical fitness test with her compromised hip. She’d refused to ride a desk—she
hadn’t spent all those years training just to end up as a desk jockey pushing papers—so
she’d resigned and went about discovering a new purpose, since hers had been stolen
in a dark alley by a scared kid with an itchy trigger finger.

Ignoring “the voice” most cops possessed had stolen her dreams and altered her life
beyond recognition.

She wouldn’t make that mistake again.

Richard had been murdered. There was no doubt in her mind about that.

A knock came at her closed office door. Sniffing, she wiped a finger under her eyes
and batted away the sting of tears.

“Come in,” she called out, and the door opened, revealing her boss. “Hey, Nathan.”

“Morning, Leah.” He stepped inside. “Close the door?”

“No.” She shook her head. “What’s up?”

“Nothing important,” he said. He wore what she fondly labeled his slumming-it wear—well-fitting
sports coat, open-collared shirt, no tie, and tailored slacks.

She smiled, assuming he didn’t have any appointments scheduled or have outside meetings
planned; only on those light days did Nathan exchange his Armani for Ralph Lauren.

“I came by to check on you,” he said. “See how the investigation into Richard’s disappearance
is shaping up.”

She rounded the desk, organizing her thoughts. She could use a sounding board, and
the older PI was an ideal candidate—professional, objective, and blessed with an analytical
mind capable of processing information like a computer. If she’d missed anything,
or had erroneously come to the wrong conclusion, he would point out the inconsistencies.

“Actually,” she began, propping her good hip against the corner of the desk, “I’m
glad you stopped by. I’d like to go over some things I’ve discovered, if you’re willing.”

“Of course.” He settled into a chair. “Shoot.”

She listed the reasons she believed Richard might not have just vanished, but died
twenty years ago. She voiced her suspicions about the facts of Richard’s life in October
1992 that indicated he would not simply have walked away or committed suicide. When
she finished, Nathan stared straight ahead, elbows bolstered on the chair arms, fingers
clasped.

She waited.

“So you believe Richard is dead?” Nathan asked.

She slowly nodded. “Aside from what I’ve researched and discovered, I think I’ve probably
always…known.” She sighed, swept a hand through her hair. “As a girl, I wanted so
desperately for him to be alive, I ignored the little voice at the back of my head
whispering the truth and accepted that he’d just left. So I never thought of looking
for him or investigating his disappearance.”

“That makes sense,” David said. “You were a child. Don’t beat yourself up over it.”

“I know.” She shrugged. “It’s just.” She paused. Fiddled with a pen on her desk before
meeting his too-perceptive gaze. “Two times I’ve ignored my instincts—first with Richard,
and then in that alley. I’m not going to disregard them again.”

“I have to agree with you,” he murmured. “It does seem as if he’s dead. From what
I remember, Richard was popular, successful, and extremely well liked. From a fifteen-year-old’s
perspective, he had a great life. I can’t see him giving up a home in Weston and a
position in one of the most prestigious wealth-management firms in the state to live
off the grid.”

“Exactly.”

Nathan sighed and rubbed a hand across his smooth jaw. She should ask him what razors
he used to keep his jaw so clean-shaven. Gabriel seemed to have a permanent five o’clock
shadow. Not that she minded…

She groaned silently.
Get it together. Keep your mind on the case and off him
.

“Are you going to tell Catherine what you’ve found out?”

Richard’s mother, Catherine Pierce, was a matron in Boston society. Though it had
been twenty years ago, Leah remembered the woman’s affection for her son the few times
he’d brought her along when visiting the Bannon home. She also remembered Catherine’s
devastation when he’d disappeared. Leah didn’t relish the idea of being a source of
fresh pain—especially if the years of time had helped assuage her anguish. It would
be like tearing the scab off a wound and pouring peroxide in it.

“Not yet,” she said. “While we both believe Richard is most likely dead, I don’t have
concrete proof. Before I go and tell a mother the son she adored is definitely gone,
I’d like irrefutable evidence. Hopefully, at the end of this I’ll have the proof.
But not yet.”

Nathan nodded in consent. “I understand your point.”

“Still,” she continued, rounding the desk and lifting her shoulder holster from the
back of her chair. She slipped the worn leather strap on, and the weight of the SIG
was a small, familiar comfort. “I’d planned to go and see Catherine regarding the
last few days before Richard vanished. See what she remembers.”

“
If
she remembers,” he amended.

Leah snorted and shrugged into her jacket. “Oh, no. Catherine Pierce may be in her
early eighties, but I doubt there is a single detail about her son she’s forgotten.”

“Let’s hope you’re right.” He rose from the chair.

“Yeah,” she muttered, imagining the different ways this interview could turn out.
“Me, too.”

“Are you headed to Weston now?”

Leah nodded. “Might as well. Hopefully today’s interview will go much better than
yesterday’s.”

“Yesterday?” Nathan frowned.

“Yes. I went to speak with Evelyn Sheldon, the woman Richard was seeing at the time
he disappeared and ended up finding a dead man at her house.”

Nathan started, shock slackening his handsome features. “A dead man?”

“You didn’t hear wrong.” She relayed the events leading up to her finding Darion Sheldon
stabbed to death on the kitchen floor of his and his wife’s home. Unlike her friends,
Nathan displayed no concern or displeasure about her entering the house or sweeping
it. At least one person had confidence in her training and ability.
That’s unfair,
her conscience scolded softly. Nathan didn’t consider her a little sister as Malachim,
Raphael, Chay, and Gabriel did. But logic didn’t prevent the ding her pride suffered.

Nathan whistled softly. “That poor woman. I suppose it’s more merciful you found him
rather than Mrs. Sheldon.”

The same thought had crossed Leah’s mind. Especially when Evelyn had eventually arrived,
almost catatonic. Chay’s face as he held his nearly unresponsive mother would forever
be emblazoned in Leah’s memory.

“Do the police have a theory about what happened?”

She shook her head. “Not as of yesterday evening. It’s still very early in the investigation,
but they believe the victim may have known his attacker, or at least felt comfortable
enough to allow him into the house. Neither the detectives nor I noticed signs of
forced entry on the front or back doors.” She crossed the few steps toward her open
office door. “As awful as the crime was, it could have been worse. From what I understand
from Evelyn’s son, Chay, his mother was supposed to have been there Saturday when
her husband was killed. She could have been there dead alongside him
.
Thank God she was out with a friend instead.”

Nathan fell into step beside her, cupped her elbow. “Yes, that is fortunate.”

“Chay would have been destroyed if—” She drew to a sharp halt as she spotted a man
standing in the office doorway. “Gabe,” she whispered, cursing the traitorous shiver
in her voice. Her belly quivered in pleasure even as she hated herself for the reaction
to his presence. Hell, would there ever come a time when her heart didn’t pummel her
chest at just a glimpse of his austere, beautiful face?

Eyes the color of a cloudless June sky bore into hers for a long second before shifting
to Nathan. If she hadn’t been examining every feature with a focus bordering on obsessive,
she would have missed the minute tightening of his bottom lip and the slight narrowing
of his eyes.

She frowned. What had irritated him? Who was she kidding? When was Gabriel
not
irritated? The emotion could be included in his stats: thirty-five years old, six
foot three inches, one hundred eighty-five pounds, brown hair, and temperament of
a PMSing woman smack in the middle of a Häagen-Dazs shortage.

“I hope I’m not interrupting.” His gaze dipped, and she was reminded of Nathan’s polite
clasp of her elbow. When Gabe’s gaze returned to hers, she knew the added layer of
ice hardening his eyes wasn’t a figment of her overworked imagination.

“No,” she said. And silently called herself all kinds of stupid as she edged to the
right, the movement dislodging Nathan’s hand. “Gabe, please meet Nathan Whelan, owner
of Whelan Investigations. Nathan, this is my friend, Gabriel Devlin.”

Nathan approached Gabriel, his hand extended. After a small hesitation, Gabriel accepted
the greeting, giving Nathan’s arm a quick pump.

“It’s a pleasure to meet you,” Nathan said smoothly. “I have to admit, I’m a huge
fan. I own every book in the Michael Rice series.”

Surprise flickered in Gabriel’s eyes.
Join the club
. She hadn’t been aware Nathan liked the phenomenally popular book series centered
on an embittered detective. The legal thrillers had skyrocketed Gabriel’s career into
the
New York Times
bestselling stratosphere.

“Thank you.” Gabriel inclined his head. “I appreciate that.”

“I, uh,” Nathan paused, and for the first time since knowing him, Leah witnessed discomfort
creep across his face, “I was sorry to hear about your family. I lost my mother around
the same time—it’s a painful experience no matter how much time has passed.”