Body Master (27 page)

He turned his attention back to the room. “I don’t see any signs of a struggle, although that’s debatable.”

Seneca nodded. “I’ll start at this end; you take that end. Maybe we’ll get lucky and find him passed out somewhere under this mess.”

An hour later, they’d finished working through the two- room apartment. No Bart, and no clues to where he might be. Max also realized they were back to square one again. How were they going to find Hager now?

“I’ll send the cleanup crew in to see if they can find anything we may have missed,” she said and stopped in front of him. She was noticeably exhausted.

“And we need to locate another XCEL informant.” Max wiped a smudge of dirt from her face. “Bart’s not alive, you know.”

“I know.”

She looked so vulnerable at that moment. He reached out and wrapped his arms around her to hold her tight. Her world, what she loved, was unraveling around her. He knew from personal experience that it was hell.

Then a thought struck him. “Can our techs follow the cell phone signal?”

Seneca leaned back and looked at him, renewed by a glimmer of hope. “They should at least be able pinpoint the location the last text message was sent from.”

“Then we have a shot,” he said, releasing her. “Let’s get out of here before we contract something deadly.”

Just as they stepped out of the apartment, Max noticed one of the neighbors peeking out her door. The old woman slammed the door shut when she saw him.

Seneca exchanged a look with him. “Nosy neighbors. My favorite kind.”

She walked up and knocked on the door while Max scouted the hallway. The apartment building was run-down and loud. Voices carried from floor to floor. A perfect setup for eavesdropping.

The woman opened the door, a chain stretched across the few inches. Max moved behind Seneca for a better look. She was in her sixties with white hair that stuck out in every direction. “What do you want?”

Seneca said, “I’m sorry to bother you, but we are looking for Bart. He lives next door.”

The woman glanced up at Max, and then back at Seneca. “Ain’t seen him lately.”

“When did you see him last?” Seneca asked.

The woman frowned. “Are you a cop?”

“Friends of Bart,” Max said.

She glared at him. “Not you,
her
.”

Seneca replied, “No, we’re friends. I haven’t heard from him in a while and I’m worried.”

She muttered, “I told him not to trust them.”

Seneca asked, “Trust who?”

The woman stared directly at Max. “The ones like him.”

Max froze. Could she see him?

Seneca gave a little laugh. “Like what?”

“Monsters,” the woman said, her eyes fixed on him. “They come and go all the time. I told Bart, one of these days, they gonna kill you. You ain’t like them.”

“Well, I’m not one of them,” Seneca said, evenly. “You can trust me.”

The woman looked at her and chewed on her lip. “He ain’t been home in two days. Don’t know where he is.”

Seneca nodded. “Thank you for your help.”

The woman flicked her gaze to Max and motioned for Seneca to move closer. Max heard her whisper, “Bart keeps all his good stuff in his mailbox.”

Seneca thanked her again. The woman gave Max a final dirty look and slammed the door shut. They walked down the stairs toward the front of the building where all the mailboxes were located.

“She could see me,” he said.

“Yes,” Seneca replied quietly. “I wonder how many more of us there are?”

I
diots.
It took every bit of Hager’s self-restraint not to throw his BlackBerry at Louie.

“Is there no one who can catch these two?” he asked the lone Shifter from the five he’d sent out to capture Dempsey and Thomas. Louie was in human form and battered. There were odd bumps under his clothing, and he could barely walk. Too bad. He got paid plenty for his injuries.

Louie rubbed his head. “You don’t understand. Max is good . . .”

“He’s no different than you,” Hager insisted. He stood and paced the perimeter of his cell, the only safe place he could live. And every day, it felt smaller and smaller. He was beginning to hate this planet and its humans. One day, he’d rectify both.

“But
she
isn’t,” Louie said. “She forced me to shift.”

Hager stopped dead in his tracks. “She
what
?”

“She put her hand on my head and said, ‘Shift,’ and
I did
. And let me tell you, it hurt like hell and I’m still not healed right.”

Hager frowned at the man. He was dead serious. “Did she use something? Technology? Drugs?”

Louie shook his head. “Nothing. Just her hand. I couldn’t stop it from happening. I couldn’t control the transformation. You can offer me all the money you want, but I’m not going after that woman again.”

Seneca Thomas could force Shifters to shift with her bare hands. Hager had never seen or heard of such a thing. It was unique and, therefore, valuable. In fact, he could use a woman and a weapon like that. All he had to do was convince her to work for him.

Or maybe it wasn’t
her
he had to convince.

“Go heal yourself,” Hager said. “And send Puck in on your way out.”

Louie nodded and left. Seconds later, Puck shuffled in.

“I want to talk to Max,” he said. “Make sure he gets a throw-away phone.”

Puck gave him a wary look. “You really think you can stop ’im with talking?”

Hager pulled on his jacket and stuffed the BlackBerry in the pocket. Every man had his price. Every situation could be turned to an advantage. “Yes, I do. It’s time.”

Puck screwed up his face. “Time for what?”

“Call in all the borough lords for a meeting. Set it up for tomorrow night.” He headed out of the wine cellar. “Tell them we’re arming.”

Puck asked, “Where are you goin’?”

Hager answered over his shoulder. “To see an old friend.”

In the apartment building entryway, Seneca sifted through the papers they’d retrieved from Bart’s mailbox. The building super was more than happy to hand over the keys after she offered him a month of Bart’s rent. She only hoped it was worth it. There were overdue bills, unpaid parking tickets, a bag of a white illegal drug, and an envelope with a hundred dollars in it. One man’s life, in a box.

Dempsey said, “This is his good stuff ?”

“It would appear so. I don’t see anything useful in here. No notes or contact information.” She sighed and slid the papers back into the mailbox.

“Wait a minute,” Dempsey said. “Give me the parking tickets.”

She eyed him as he studied them. “Feeling generous?”

“No,” he said, and waved the clutch of tickets. “But Bart has a car.”

It took her two phone calls and a few hours to track down Bart’s car. They located it in a NYPD impound lot. It was a quiet drive to the lot. Seneca concentrated on the fact that they had another chance to find something Bart may have left behind. Because one thing was clear: Bart hadn’t skipped town in his car.

Cars of all makes and models were lined up in the pound.

“Should we tell someone that Bart isn’t coming for his car?” Dempsey said.

Seneca shook her head. “We don’t know he’s not coming back. Maybe he got spooked and is on the run.”

They found Bart’s 1998 Buick LeSabre unlocked and full of trash. No surprise there. Seneca endured the stench from liquor flasks, food containers, urine, and vomit as she searched the interior and glove box. She stuffed a few scraps of paper she found in her pocket. Then she looked through the rearview mirror to find Dempsey staring at the trunk. “What’s wrong?”

“Pop the trunk,” he told her, and she obliged.

Over the top of the trunk, she saw him frowning. With great dread, she got out and walked around the back of the car.

Bart was wrapped in layers of plastic and stuffed in his own trunk.

Dempsey said, “I think it’s safe to tell them he won’t be picking up his car now.”

“Our crime scene unit said he’d been dead at least twenty-four hours,” Carl said. “Strangulation.”

Seneca was pacing Carl’s office at the newly relocated make-shift XCEL headquarters, her head down and face pale.

Max asked, “He had his wallet?”

“Yeah, looks like they just wanted the cell phone.”

“My informant,” she repeated for the third time as if she wasn’t even listening to them. “This is my fault.”

“Every informant takes that chance,” Carl told her, but she didn’t stop pacing. Max watched her. She was running on empty—no sleep, no food, no answers. He could do that, but then again, he wasn’t entirely human either.

“Did the trace come through for Bart’s text message?” Max asked.

“Just got it,” Carl said and slid a printout across the desk. “Times Square. Sorry.”

“Damn, damn,” Seneca said, stopping. “
Damn!
”

Max agreed. Chances were pretty slim that Hager was working out of Times Square. “Anything else?”

Carl sighed. “We found MacGregor’s body in a sewer drain near his house. I’m betting that Hager was involved.”

Seneca stopped and gaped at Carl, pain etched on her face. Then she covered her eyes with her hands. “This can’t be happening.”

“I’ve told our units to follow up every lead we get,” Carl said, giving Max an apologetic look. “I’ll call you if we find something promising.”

“Thanks.” Max stood up.

Seneca was beside herself. “We should talk to MacGregor’s neighbors.”

“No,” Max said, softly.

She blinked a bunch of times, her eyes red and tired. She needed sleep. “I’m not going to just sit here and wait for the fucking lead fairy to present us with clues.”

She
really
needed sleep. He nodded good-bye to Carl and took her by the arm. “I have a plan.”

That got her as far as one of XCEL’s surveillance vans. She slid into the passenger side, ready to rumble. “Where to?”

Max hitched his head to the rear of the van. “The cot in the back.”

As he expected, she didn’t like that. “That’s your plan? Are you kidding me?”

This wasn’t going to be easy. “You cannot function without sleep.”

“Watch me,” she said, crossing her arms.

Stubborn
woman. “Let me rephrase. You can’t operate safely without sleep.”

She frowned. “Are you afraid I’m going to put you at risk? I think we’re well past that.”

He decided to change tactics. What she needed was a challenge. Something a little dangerous to keep her interested. Max leaned closer and traced the V-neck of her shirt with his finger. “Tell you what. You give me ten minutes. You, me, and the cot.”

She narrowed her eyes, but there was a hint of the challenge he was hoping for. “And if I’m not asleep by then?”

He sighed. “Then we’ll go after bad guys everywhere.”

“I love it when you talk dirty,” she said, a slight smile curling her lips.

“All I have to do is mention guns. Now get in the back.”

He followed her through the equipment and weapons to a small cot normally used for sleeping and injured agents. Max lowered it while Seneca looked at it and then at him, not knowing what to do next.

“Relax,” he said.

Seneca raised an eyebrow. “If that’s your entire plan, then we may as well stop now.”

Max smiled. He’d spent most of the last few minutes working diligently on this plan. He wrapped his hands around her waist and kissed her. With his fingertips, he stroked her lightly from her breasts to her thighs. With every caress, her muscles relented and the tension subsided. It took a few minutes, but she finally wrapped her arms around his neck. He unsnapped and unzipped her jeans, and then whispered, “Sit.”

She moved to the middle of the cot, and he dropped to the floor in front of her. Her eyes followed him as he tugged her jeans off, and then loosened and unbuttoned her shirt.