Derek didn’t know what the hell was wrong with him. It wasn’t like him to go all chest-beating, manly-man protective where a woman was concerned. Any woman. He honestly couldn’t remember ever feeling like this. When they’d been kids, he’d run interference between his kid sister and his mom and even between his older brother and Mommy Dearest a few times. But he’d done that more to piss off their mother than to protect either sibling.
For the past forty-five minutes, Claude Holland had done his best to engage Derek in conversation, but had soon realized keeping Derek’s mind off Maleah’s visit with Browning was an impossible task. Finally, the warden had settled down to business as usual, made a couple of phone calls, went over various paperwork, and drank three cups of coffee.
Derek decided he would give Maleah thirty more minutes and if she hadn’t returned to the warden’s office, he’d go get her. His gut told him that Browning had been playing her—playing them—and today’s interview would be a burnt run. No matter what happened, not even if Maleah retrieved some usable info from Browning, she was not going to return to this damn place for a repeat performance. This would be her final visit with the Carver. If he had to hogtie her and guard her night and day, he would. She’d have to understand. A guy could take only so much waiting and worrying.
When his phone rang, he paused mid-stride and checked caller ID. A knot formed in his stomach. He had already talked to Powell headquarters this morning, via Barbara Jean, whom he affectionately called BJ. This call was from Sanders.
“Yeah, what’s wrong?” Derek asked.
“There has been another copycat murder,” Sanders said.
Derek’s stomach knots tightened. “Who?”
“Saxon Chappelle’s young niece, Poppy. She was only sixteen.”
“When? Where?” Derek cursed under his breath. “Hell, I don’t suppose it matters, does it?”
“She was visiting Saxon’s mother in Savannah for the summer. Her grandmother found her in the backyard swimming pool this morning.”
“This was kill number six and we’re no closer to nabbing this guy than we were weeks ago.”
“Is Maleah with you?”
“No, she’s still in with Browning, doing her damnedest to get something out of him. Why?” Derek asked. “Do you want us to leave here and head straight for Savannah?”
“No, we are sending Holt Keinan to Savannah today. As we speak, Saxon Chappelle is over the Atlantic on the Powell jet, accompanying Meredith Sinclair to London. On his return, he will be taken directly to Savannah and Holt will meet him. Griffin still wants you and Maleah to return to Griffin’s Rest as soon as possible.”
“Can you tell me what’s going on?”
“You and Maleah are the only two employees, other than Luke Sentell, who are privy to all the information we have accumulated on the Copycat Carver, a man named Anthony Linden, and a mystery man who is calling himself Malcolm York. I believe Griffin wants the two of you included in a strategic planning session.”
“All right, then, as soon as Maleah finishes up here, we’ll go back through Vidalia, check out of our hotel, and head your way.”
“Very good. I will tell Griffin that we can expect you this evening.”
“Sanders?”
“Yes, sir?”
“How’s Griff?”
Several seconds of contemplative silence followed. And then Sanders replied, his voice a reflection of the man’s stoic personality, “You will be able to ask him yourself when you see him tonight.”
Without so much as a by-your-leave, Sanders ended their conversation. Well, what had he expected? He should have known better than to ask the man anything personal regarding Griffin Powell. Sanders guarded Griff’s privacy as strongly as he guarded his own.
They were both men with secrets. Dark, deadly secrets.
What had really happened on Amara sixteen years ago when Griff and his cohorts had killed Malcolm York? Derek knew only the basic facts—Griff had been kidnapped at twenty-two and held captive by a sadistic madman for four years before he, along with Sanders and Yvette, both also York’s prisoners, had revolted and killed York. The details Griff had given him had been, at best, sketchy, huge chunks of info not included. If Nic knew more about the events that took place on Amara, she had not shared them with Maleah, who seemed to know little more than he did.
“Has there been another copycat murder?” Claude Holland asked Derek.
He had forgotten that the warden was still in the room. “Yes, I’m afraid there has. This time, he’s killed a sixteen-year-old girl, the niece of one of our agents.”
“I’m so sorry,” the warden said. “Let’s hope that Ms. Perdue has some success in getting Jerome Browning to tell her everything he knows.”
“I don’t think Browning knows a goddamn thing,” Derek said. “But Maleah just won’t give up. She was damned and determined to give it one more try.”
Warden Holland shook his head sadly. “I hate to say it, but I agree with you, and I’m afraid Ms. Perdue is going to come away from this latest interview with little more than a few mental bruises.”
He had been waiting for nearly six hours and was beginning to grow restless. When he had reported in after he left Savannah before daylight this morning, his employer had applauded him on a job well done, then instructed him to check into a hotel in Atlanta and remain there until he got in touch with him again.
“I am finalizing my plans and should have further instructions for you before noon Atlanta time.”
During the past few months while he had been carrying out the copycat murders, as soon as one kill had been accomplished, he had been given the information about the next victim. But not this time. Was the Copycat Carver’s reign of terror over?
Stripped naked, down to his bare skin, the real man revealed, he lay on the king-size bed in the four-star hotel and stared up at the ceiling. When on an assignment, he always wore disguises and only in moments of solitude such as this did he allow himself such indulgent freedom. Even with the expensive whores he bought for a few hours of pleasure, he didn’t remove his wig or colored contacts or, if using them, the fake mustache and beard. He kept his body in perfect condition, lean, muscled, healthy. He kept his head and chest shaved and since he was not an excessively hairy man, he had only a sprinkling of light brown hair on his arms and legs.
When his phone finally rang, he didn’t rush to answer it.
Let him wait.
He picked up between the fifth and sixth rings.
“Yes?”
“I’m afraid you’ve been compromised. Or should I say that Anthony Linden has been.”
“How did that happen?”
“Not to worry, not to worry. The leak will be plugged.”
“Give me a name and I will take care of it myself.”
“No, no, you’re too valuable to me where you are. Someone else can resolve that problem. I need you there in America to handle something extremely delicate for me.”
“Another kill?”
“Actually, no. I want you to pick up a guest for me and bring her with you when you return to London. There will be a private jet waiting for you in Nashville. You and my guest will be the only passengers.”
“Am I to bring her directly to you?”
“No, I have arranged for a lovely, private retreat where I want her guarded night and day.”
“You’re giving me a babysitting assignment?”
“I’m putting you in charge of a mission that will allow me to continue with my attack against the Powell Agency. Your job will be to deliver my guest safely to London. I wouldn’t trust anyone else with such an important task. As soon as she is delivered, another payment will be transferred to your bank account.”
“Half now and the other half once I deliver her.”
“If you prefer. I don’t quibble over unimportant details with people who have proven themselves to me the way you have.”
His employer gave him the necessary details, including the name of his “guest” and her present location.
“I’ll need twenty-four to forty-eight hours to put a plan into motion.”
“Very well, but I need this done in no more than forty-eight hours. If you can pick her up and deliver her by tomorrow morning, I’ll add a bonus to your payment.”
Chapter 27
Even if the general description that Browning had given her of the copycat matched that of Anthony Linden, former MI6 agent, there was no way they could be certain the two were the same person. So far, the information Browning had given her was pretty much useless, just as Derek had warned her it would be. If he was right about how little Browning actually knew, then she would be wasting her time if she continued playing his game.
But what if he actually does know something that will help us? What if I give up now and walk away? If I do that, I’ll never know for sure and I’ll always wonder if I could have done more to stop the copycat killer.
She had to stay a while longer. She couldn’t give up. Not yet. She had to keep trying. But at what cost?
Browning wanted to see her suffer. He wanted to stick the knife into her, figuratively speaking, and then twist it.
“Have you decided?” Browning asked. “Are you staying or going?”
His eyes all but sparkled with anticipation.
You son of a bitch!
“I’m staying,” she told him.
“Ah, that’s my girl. Just as I had hoped—a fighter to the bitter end.”
“I want a show of goodwill,” she told him. “I’ll make a statement and all you have to do is reply yes or no. Agreed?”
Smiling as if she had just handed him a get-out-of-jail-free card, he shrugged. “Maybe. If I agree and I give you this one thing, then you swear that you’ll answer all my questions, no matter what I ask?”
She hesitated, contemplating what he might ask her. But she knew she had to take the risk. “Yes, I’ll answer whatever you ask. But for every answer I give you, you give me one in return. Agreed?”
“Agreed. Now, the next move is yours, Maleah.”
“The copycat chose the Carver’s kills as the model for his murders because he wanted a connection between the killer he mimicked and a Powell agent,” Maleah said. “He chose you because you killed Noah Laborde, who had been my college boyfriend.”
Browning’s smile widened. “Yes, of course. Any idiot could have figured that out. But you needed to hear me confirm it, didn’t you?”
Yes, of course she had known. And yes, she had needed to hear him confirm it. But his confirmation of that fact didn’t necessarily confirm that Durham or Linden or whoever the hell the copycat was had shared this information with Browning. As he’d said, any idiot could have figured it out.
“Now, we get down to business.” She met his eager gaze, despising him, but determined to show no reluctance. “You’ve already told me you don’t know the copycat’s real name, and that you knew he wasn’t the real Albert Durham. Is that the truth?” When he opened his mouth to speak, she held up her hand in a Stop signal. “You also implied that you know why the copycat is killing people associated with the Powell Agency. I want you to tell me why. What’s his reason?”
“That’s really
the
question, isn’t it? The one you’ll pay any price to know.”
“You’re such a smart man, I’ll bet you already know the answer to your own question.”
“Do you trust me to tell you the truth?” he asked.
“No, of course I don’t trust you.”
Browning laughed. “You must have been a pretty little girl, all blond curls and pink cheeks. Did you smile a lot? Laugh a lot? Were you happy as a child?”
Those were not the questions she had expected him to ask, but she answered them all the same. “When my father was alive, I smiled and laughed a lot and I was very happy.”
“And after your father died? He did die, didn’t he?”
“Yes, he died when I was quite young.”
But how did you know?
“Poor little Maleah.”
She didn’t flinch and never broke eye contact.
“Was your mother as beautiful as you are?” Browning asked in a low, seductive tone.
“My mother was very beautiful.”
“Was she a good mother? Was she a good role model? Did you want to grow up to be just like her?”
“She was the best mother she knew how to be,” Maleah said honestly. “Why do you want to know these things about my mother?”
Browning slowly twisted his neck around and around, as if trying to loosen aching muscles. Then with his head down, his chin almost touching his chest, he rolled his eyes up and then lifted his head slowly.
In that moment, she realized she had said the wrong thing, that her reaction to his questions about her mother had triggered his curiosity. Unwittingly, she had played right into his hands.
“I want to know everything about you,” he told her. “And where better to start than learning about the woman who gave birth to you.”
Maleah did not like where this conversation was heading. Her gut instincts told her that somehow, someway, Jerome Browning knew things about her that he couldn’t possibly know.
Shake it off. All those doubts and fears and uncertainties. Browning doesn’t know anything about your personal life. He’s guessing. He’s smart. He picked up something in your reaction. The tone of your voice. A glint in your eye. An unconscious gesture of some type. Don’t give him any more ammunition to use against you.
“I loved my mother,” Maleah told him. “She was gentle and kind and sweet and—”
“And you swore you’d never be like her.”
She simply stared at Browning without responding and then quickly realized that her reaction had spoken for her. So far, in this stupid game, she was losing.
“Gentle, kind, sweet women tend to need a man around to take care of them,” Browning said. “Did you have a stepfather?”
Don’t go there. Please, don’t go there.
There was no way he could know anything about Nolan Reeves, her mother’s sadistic second husband.
“Yes, I had a stepfather.”
“Was he a good man?”
“No.”
“You disliked him?”
“Yes.”
“Hated him?”
“Yes.”
“Ah, Maleah, being worthy of your hatred must indeed be a sweet, sweet thing. I envy your stepfather. How wonderful it must have been having all that power over you when you were a helpless little girl.”
Her heartbeat accelerated, the sound of her racing pulse drumming inside her head.
Don’t give him one damn thing. Keep everything on an even keel. You can do this. You know you can.
“Did he rape you?” Browning asked, excitement in his voice.
Perspiration dampened her forehead and hands. She swallowed hard. “No, he never raped me.”
“Fondled you inappropriately?”
“No.”
“Ah, nothing sexual. That means he must have beaten you. There are men like that, sadistic men who enjoy inflicting pain.” Browning burst into laughter. “I’m going to tell you something that I’ve never told anyone else, not even Albert Durham, my so-called biographer. I didn’t want his kills to be exactly like mine, so I failed to mention that before I killed, I waited for a few seconds before I plunged the scalpel into the jugular because I needed to see the fear and agony in their eyes. Just for a moment.”
She sucked in a deep breath and released it slowly. “If I answer your last question, I’ll expect you to give me more than your rambling memories that mean nothing to me. I’m not interested in your kills, only in why the copycat is killing Powell agents and members of their families.”
“Then answer my question first. Did your stepfather beat you?”
“Yes.”
“Often?” He was practically licking his lips over the prospect of hearing the gory details.
“Sorry to disappoint you, but he beat me only once.”
“Only once?” Disappointment in his voice, Browning frowned.
“Yes, only once, but it was a severe beating. I had bruises and welts on my back and legs and buttocks and I could barely stand after he finished.”
There, you son of a bitch, are those details gruesome enough for you?
“Why only once? Did you mother intervene?”
“No.” Maleah stood her ground and stared the devil down. “And if you want any more answers, then I’ll need a few from you.”
Browning studied her as if trying to decide whether or not the pleasure he derived from tormenting her was worth the price she was asking.
“Durham and I actually played our own game,” Browning admitted. “He came to understand that he wasn’t dealing with an ordinary person, that I was his intellectual equal and therefore deserved his respect. Once I realized he was not the real Albert Durham, I demanded payment for my services.”
“You asked for a new lawyer and a female visitor . . . what else?”
“Information.”
“And he was willing to tell you whatever you wanted to know? I can’t believe—”
“No, of course not. But I didn’t ask for very much. We understood each other, so he was willing to give me what I required. He knew that the information I requested would in no way harm him. I asked him why he had chosen me. And he told me what I believed was the truth. After all, who was I going to tell?”
“And he explained why—because of your connection to Noah Laborde, who was the former boyfriend of a Powell agent.”
“Not in those exact words.”
Maleah glowered at Browning, her patience growing thin.
Stay calm. Pace yourself. Let him have all the time he needs.
“Explain,” Maleah said. “Give me his exact words.”
Browning ran his tongue over his teeth, licked his lips, and sighed dramatically. “I’m afraid that I don’t recall his exact words.”
“Then paraphrase.”
“He told me that he admired my work. I thanked him. I asked him why he had chosen me. He simply said, ‘You killed a man named Noah Laborde.’ I said yes. And when I told him that I didn’t understand the significance, he told me that I didn’t need to understand.”
“Did he ever mention the Powell Agency or Griffin Powell by name? Did he tell you or did you sense that he was a professional?”
“That’s two questions,” Browning reminded her. “Neither of which you’ve paid for, my dear.”
She nodded as dread spread through her like quicksilver, fast and poisonous, because she knew what was coming next.
“Why did your stepfather beat you only once?” Browning asked, the glint of anticipation sparkling in his eyes again.
Maleah knew she could lie to him, perhaps even convincingly, but she couldn’t fake the emotion that went along with lying. And it was an emotional reaction that Browning wanted from her.
Blood, sweat, and tears.
“Because my big brother made a bargain with our stepfather to take both his own beatings and mine.”
Browning’s eyes widened with exhilaration. “How noble and heroic of your brother. But you must have felt terribly guilty allowing someone else to take your punishment while you got off scot-free.”
Answer him, damn it. No, wait. Let him see how much his question affected you, how it brought back painful memories.
“What’s wrong, Maleah?”
“Nothing.”
That slight tremor in your voice was a nice touch. Browning had to know it was real and not faked.
“Then answer me.”
“I didn’t know . . .” Maleah admitted. “Not until years later. All I knew was that my stepfather never beat me again.”
“But you were afraid of him, weren’t you? Why was that?”
“You already know the answer. I’d think it would be obvious to you.”
“Ah, but I want to hear you say it . . . in your own words.”
“Yes, I was afraid of him, deathly afraid. Afraid for my mother and my brother and for myself. He was a cruel, heartless bastard.” With tears misting her eyes, she looked right at Browning. “He never beat me again, but he berated me every chance he got. Once a day and twice on Sunday.”
Browning chuckled. “It’s good to see you’re able to maintain a sense of humor about such a tragic childhood. That shows just how tough you are now, doesn’t it, Maleah? And you pride yourself on being tough, on being strong and in control.”
“Damn straight about that,” she told him, not trying to conceal the anger in her voice.
He wants emotion—I’ll give it to him.
She shot up out of her chair and looked down at him. “Did the copycat ever mention either the Powell Agency or Griffin Powell by name?”
Browning didn’t respond.
“Answer me, you goddamn, sadistic, lowlife son of a bitch. I paid for your answer and you’re going to give it to me.”
Angling his head sideways, he rolled his eyes upward and glanced at her. “What a delicious thing your anger and hatred is, my dear Maleah. I can’t tell you how much pleasure you’re giving me.”
“Tit for tat, Jerome. I give to you. You give to me. If you try to change the rules of the game now, I’m out of here so fast that—”