The Forsaken (15 page)

“Or perhaps a hard mattress and the cold, damp floor got to him. Thought he would’ve lasted more than a few hours, though, tell you the truth.”

“That’s weak, even for a skeptic like you.”

“Watch it!” the chief sternly warned.

Jude backed down.

“There isn’t anybody there. How in the name of St. Peter did he break out?”

Jude raised his hand, mocking respect. After seconds of being ignored, he chimed Victor’s name once more. “It’s him. Victor moved like a ghost, didn’t he? He was always three steps ahead of us because none of us could move like he could. He had abilities no ordinary human possesses. Why are you refusing to see that this wasn’t an escape? It was a kidnapping. My brother was taken.”

“By Victor?” Mike asked, starting to cave some.

“The body a few nights ago was left sucked dry. The way he liked them. Victor is back, in the city. And now he has my brother as leverage.”

Mike clapped his hands. “Bravo, Detective. Bravo. Now that you, in all of your wisdom, have seemingly cracked this ugly case, just what do you propose we do about it?”

Jude weighed the chief’s sarcastic intentions and frigid tone. It felt more like a threat. Mike was acting harsher, colder than usual. Maybe he’d always been this way, a part of him, anyway. But for some reason, Jude hadn’t fully noticed it before now. Suddenly, his thoughts began piecing together scenes, and he relived the last several hours at least a half dozen times. What he was left with was a notion he wasn’t fully prepared to accept.

“I get it,” Jude gasped. “Oh God, I get it. You must take me for a fool, Mike. Do you realize what you’ve done?” He paused, his mind collecting more data, each second moving information like ripples in a stream. “This wasn’t an accident at all, was it? You planned this all along, to see if I was right. To make sure.”

“Mike, what is he talking about?” Rachel pried.

Jude noticed the chief avoiding an answer while his neck twitched. He realigned his tie, taking another slow sip of his coffee. Jude’s suspicions were nearly confirmed. “Tell her. Tell her the truth,” he spat.

Mike glared. “You sure you want to open this here, now?”

“I’m right, aren’t I? I can’t believe you would do this.” The shock worked its way into Jude’s bloodstream. “You knew Kevin didn’t kill that hooker. You’ve known him for years, knew he didn’t have the stomach for premeditated murder. He was innocent. This whole time you knew and you locked him up anyway?”

“This is more complex than you make it seem! Every case is an equation. And it’s one we’re forced to solve any way we can.”

“Nobody
forced
your hand this time! I begged you, Mike. I begged you to give it some time, let me figure it out. I was on the right track with this, and you knew it too. But you wouldn’t admit it. And this, this is what you wanted. I thought I could trust you.”

“You can,” Mike said, accidentally tipping over his coffee mug. “This is a checkpoint. Now we have a reason to—”

“He’s my brother. He’s not a
reason
or
some worm on a hook.”

“He was safer in here than out on the streets. Victor murdered that girl and set him up, or so you said. I had to have proof before I could take the next step! Use your head!”

“You sacrificed my brother to a madman for some proof?”

“I did what I had to. Someone had to draw the big bad wolf out. I needed to make sure the wolf was still even alive. This line of work doesn’t give us a whole lot of room for blind faith. You know that better than anyone. I did what you couldn’t do, and all you can do is judge me? We were close.”

“Don’t feed me that crap!”

Rachel couldn’t take the screaming match any longer. “Chief, tell me this isn’t true.”

“I made a choice no one else could make. Your brother is your only weakness, kid. Your enemies know that. Now, as far as I’m concerned, you were headed in the right direction, and Victor has returned to stir up a whirlwind of bad news. Next time we won’t get caught with our pants down. We’ll be ready.”

“There is no ready. That scumbag walked right in and took Kevin!” Jude smacked the wall with his fist. “He’s like a ghost. How do you catch someone you can’t even see?”

Mike cracked his knuckles.

“I don’t know how he’s doing it, but Victor is way too advanced for our pre-school attempts. He’s powerful.”

“I’m sorry, Detective. I really am. But sometimes you need to do the unthinkable in order to ensure the greater good.”

“Whatever helps you sleep at night,” Jude said with a curse, storming out the door.

Mike buried his face in his hands. “May God forgive me.”

“You lied to him, and now he lost his brother.”

“We’ll get him back. I need a guilt trip from you like a bullet in the brain.” He lifted his head. “Foster didn’t even let me get to the best part.”

“Two blows at once would have been too much. More than he can handle.”

Mike grimaced. “But I know him. He’ll get over it, once he sees I made the necessary move. It was a gambit, but a man in my position didn’t have a whole lot to go on. He can’t judge me for doing my job.”

“Not sure he’ll see it that way,” Rachel said. “This one cut deep. You really know how to go in for the kill, don’t you?”

Mike shrugged. “Your father would’ve understood. These are war tactics. Emotions will only hold us back. We’re on the frontlines. Can I ask you to tell him Jerome White was offed?”

Rachel chewed one of her fingernails down to the nub. “Whatever. You know, I can’t say I’m sad. That street thug gave us hell the other day.”

“Yeah, and your partner nearly put him six feet under. Apparently, somebody didn’t think he did a good enough job.”

“Still can’t believe that in less than seventy-two hours the wind can change like this. I’ll let him know. But please, before you pull a move like this again, run it by me. Jude already has me blocked off. I need him to trust me.”

“He doesn’t trust anybody. Forget what he says.”

“You shouldn’t be so rough. His brother just got kidnapped.”

“We’ll get him back!” he yelled.

Rachel sighed and opened the office door, abandoning Mike. She wanted to believe him, but right now, such frail hope didn’t seem possible. She didn’t like these winds of change; she feared them.

As Rachel headed down the vacant hall, avoiding the glances of fellow officers, she felt something else twisting in her gut. It was the tension she knew might consume her after World War III began.

21

“KNOCK, KNOCK,” RACHEL SAID,
leaning against Jude’s desk. “You okay? If I were you, I think I’d be having a mental breakdown in the bathroom.”

Jude didn’t bother with an answer. Instead his eyes remained glued to the computer monitor, his stiff fingers stabbing the flimsy keyboard buttons. She wondered when he was going to blink.

“What are you looking at?”

All she saw him do was type and breathe. Type and breathe. She could almost hum to the tortured melody. “Mike crossed the line,” she said. “I get it. It wasn’t right what he did or how he did it. But I have to believe he had the right intentions.”

He shook his head, unmoved by her pathetic reasoning.

“Put yourself in his shoes. He misled us by skewing the truth, yes, but he also tried to bring down our killer. Now, we can’t just sit here and throw a pity party because the plan went to crap. That’s not going to bring Kevin back.”

Before Rachel was allowed to continue what she knew Jude would consider a rant, a short guy strolled into their area with a package. His sloppy style clashed with his attempt at a morning shave. Of course, he’d forgotten to remove the toilet paper patches from where he’d cut himself.

Nonchalantly, the stocky guy tilted his baseball cap with the FEDEX inscription stitched across the front in big, block letters, and said, “I’m looking for a Mr. Jude Foster. Hope I have the right building.”

“Who’s asking?” Jude coldly replied.

“I just work for the company, mister. It doesn’t have a return address.”

“Gimme the package.” Jude examined it, shook the inside contents around, and listened. Nothing out of the ordinary. He asked where to sign.

“Right here, below the fine print.” The deliveryman stood at roughly five feet, and he came off as someone lacking the typical ambition of a person his age. His quicksand composure betrayed him from the get-go. Plus, Rachel had seen Jude sizing the poor schlep up from the moment Earl—she finally noticed his name-tag—made his intrusion.

“Thanks, Mr. Foster,” Earl said. “Have a good day.”

“Right,” he replied as Earl exited.

Grabbing one of the numerous keys on his chain, Jude slashed the packaging tape. He warily peeked through the sliver before ripping the side off entirely. A small, crinkled page slipped out.

For all have sinned.

The letter
R
was nearly dry, but it was obvious it had been written in blood. He was still and confused. “Has there been another murder?”

Rachel caught a glimpse of the note and answered him. “That’s what I came over here to tell you. Didn’t get the chance.”

“Who died?”

“Jerome White,” she replied. “He was murdered last night at St. Mary’s. Killed in the exact same fashion as the first body. It’s our perp.”

“Why am I the last to know about this?”

“I wasn’t hiding anything from you, if that’s what you’re implying.”

“
He
should’ve told me.” Jude blinked rapidly, putting shattered thoughts together.

“Looks like White was telling the truth. Bet he worked for Victor. Who was it, I wonder, who went rogue and sent us on his trail?”

Jude’s fingers formed a fist, and he used his knuckles to hold his chin up. “We did bring him in for some questioning.”

“Maybe he squealed too much.”

“Victor wouldn’t know what he told us.”

“Unless there’s an informant in here,” Rachel offered.

“Looks like I’m not the only one with a set of conspiracy theories.”

She cracked a smile. “I want to be wrong. Maybe I
am
reaching a little.”

“Victor could’ve been afraid White would want to make a deal with us.”

“He couldn’t risk our puny, skidmark amigo selling out his location or the next move.”

“No, no,” Jude said, waving his now open palms. “Everything was too rehearsed. Like this was all supposed to happen exactly as it happened. White played his hand just as he was supposed to. My money says Victor changed the script during the last act.”

Rachel tried to suppress the grotesque image of Jerome White lying with his jaw slackened to the side and his forehead split open from the beating Jude had doled out. Worse was seeing Jude relish the violence. “You know, you tore up his face pretty good. Either way, I think it’s safe to say he got more than he bargained for with you.”

“He gets offed the same night he’s transferred to the hospital for medical attention? Victor wanted him out, so he tossed in a member of my old gang to turn my safety off and get me to let loose.”

“Guess I was wrong, then. Looks like you’re the one getting more than you bargained for.”

A sigh. “I can’t keep letting these things slip through the cracks. Victor’s not a stupid man, and I’ve been making moves like an amateur.”

She was shocked to see such vulnerability. “Victor? A man? Don’t you mean
ghost?
” Her disbelief stung like an arrow dipped in venom.

“You still don’t believe what I’ve said, do you? About Victor being the master orchestrator?”

“I think it’s possible he could play puppeteer with us and a few suspects.
That
I’ve seen before. But passing through walls and steel bars like some kind of spirit? That’s a whole different level of faith I’m not sure I’m ready to subscribe to.”

“My eyes don’t lie,” Jude returned. “You watched the same recording I did.”

“Sometimes our eyes play tricks on us, Jude, that’s all,” she said. “To be honest, there’s no telling for certain what we saw or didn’t see.”

“The chief’s a skeptic too.”

Rachel fumed. “I am not his clone.”

“Of course not. Were there any marks on the body?”

“Like a T-shaped tattoo beneath the skin? Same as the first victim?”

“Yeah. It looks kinda like a broken cross.”

“It’s the strangest thing,” Rachel said, recalling the snapshot her mind had made of the corpse.

“There’s no way to be sure how many more like this we can expect, but chances are, Victor’s just warming up.”

She pushed out a sigh with rolled eyes.

Jude glanced down at the note once more and typed it into an internet search engine. “Just like I thought.”

“What?”

“Have you ever read any of the Bible?”

“Not since Catholic middle school. Why?”

“Well, does this phrase mean anything to you?” Jude asked, handing her the shred of paper the FEDEX guy had delivered.