Heroes In Uniform (234 page)

“I used to come here every year with Marion. The weekend
after
Independence Day.” Marion hated crowds, yearned to travel to her grandfather’s homeland across the ocean to Ireland. She’d never got her wish. The tightness in Josie’s throat burned. “I… I didn’t come this year.”

Marion’s death had been too fresh—the guilt almost suffocating and she didn’t think it would ever go away. She glanced at her knapsack. Today was the first time she’d had the nerve to return and that was only because she’d had to, putting Lady Liberty and the memories off as long as she possibly could.

Now visions of all those childhood visits welled up inside and even six months on, the pain of losing the woman who’d taken the reins of Josie’s life when she’d had no one else was overwhelming. She knew deep down that it wasn’t Marsh’s fault Marion had been killed. It was hers. A sob rose up and she cupped her hand over her mouth so it didn’t escape.

She could feel Marsh’s gaze, feel the weight of understanding in those hazel depths. But he didn’t move to touch her. Didn’t try to help. This wasn’t something he could solve or fix. She had to get past it herself. The silent empathy in his eyes suggested he understood her pain, her need for penance and her inability to get past the guilt.

He pressed his lips together and shoved his hands in his pockets. Leaned forward and the pigeon flew away. After a couple of minutes silence, he asked, “Did Special Agent Walker get in touch this morning?”

“No.” She reached up to shake her hair out of the elastic band she’d tied it back with. The sea breeze immediately grabbed it and played.

“Maybe he hasn’t found anything yet.” Marsh’s jaw flexed.

Found anything… Like an old blonde corpse matching my mother’s description
. Mingled grief and guilt formed a kaleidoscope of torment that knotted her stomach. Knowing she was about to lose it, she grabbed her belongings and strode away, aware of one very solid body scrambling after her.

Marsh snagged her arm and spun her round to face him, “I don’t have time to chase you around. This isn’t a game!”

Trying to destroy the evidence of her tears, she blinked rapidly. But he must have spotted the wetness on her cheeks because suddenly every inch of her body was pressed to his, her face against the cool fabric of his shirt, inhaling the male scent of his cologne and the slight musk of sweat. She couldn’t breathe or see, but she craved comfort so badly it didn’t seem to matter.

“Jesus. I’m sorry. I keep forgetting this is your mother we’re talking about.”

Strong hands roamed her back, soothing and therapeutic. It felt good to lean on him. So damn good. And far too dangerous. Being alone was what she did. How she survived. The pain of being hurt and abandoned had cut deeper than any knife and she wasn’t sure how to deal with things any other way. She pushed back and sniffed inelegantly. She wiped her eyes and blew her nose.

“Wanna climb her?” she asked. She knew she’d surprised him. She’d surprised herself except she wanted to go up, to scatter Marion’s ashes on the wind, but this was one thing she couldn’t do alone.

He took her hand and squeezed. “I can’t. I have a flight to catch shortly. Anyway it’s closed today. Vince will stay with you tonight—”

“Okay. Great.” She slipped out of his grasp. “We’ll hang out. Catch a movie.” She kicked a stone, bit the inside of her cheek to stop herself saying anything more junior-high. All ten-foot-six, ex-Navy SEAL walked up behind him.

Marsh’s cell phone rang and she used the opportunity to head toward the ferry terminal. His hand snaked out and grabbed her before she’d gone two paces.

“Hayes,” he answered the phone. “When?” He paused for a second and Josie knew something bad had happened from the way his eyes sliced to her. “Yeah, she’s here. I’ll bring her right over.”

She felt the blood drain from her face. “Did they find my mother?”

Their eyes locked, his febrile bright. “No. There’s been another murder.”

* * *

Marsh negotiated traffic toward Federal Plaza, one hand gripping the wheel tight as he blasted the horn at a cabby trying to cut him off.

Josephine sat beside him, pale, tense, withdrawn.

“They have any leads?” Vince asked from the backseat.

“They wouldn’t tell me anything on the phone.” Tension rose within him triggering an ache in his jaw and a fear that ran all the way to his fingertips. And he had to go to freaking Savannah.

He glanced at Josephine’s stark profile.

“Come with me.” The suggestion was out of his mouth before he could stop it, but now he thought about it, it was a damn good idea.

She shook her head, blonde hair brushing her slender shoulders. Too slender to carry the weight of this monster.

“Your flight is in less than an hour.” Her voice was subdued. Sad. “If we’re ever going to stop this man I need to go through everything I can possibly think of with Agent Walker.”

Marsh bit down on what he was going to say. She could do all that tomorrow after she’d spent the night with him in Savannah—and that had nothing to do with sex and everything to do with keeping her alive.

But what if this bastard killed another woman in the meantime?

Marsh filled his lungs with a deep breath and tried to relax. He caught Vince’s dark stare in the mirror, read the unspoken pledge in his eyes. He nodded.

Working his shoulders to loosen the stiff muscles, he checked the time and knew he had to pull out all the stops if he was going to get to the airport on time. “Promise me one thing,” he spoke to Josephine.

The fragile look disappeared. Instead, suspicious eyes turned on him, reminding him she didn’t normally do promises.

“What?”

“After you’re done with Walker, go home with Vince and don’t leave his side for anything. And I mean
anything
.”

“Anything?” Josephine smirked with her trademark pissy attitude that Marsh finally figured out was a front to cover fear. “Showering will be fun, but I’m game if you are, big boy.”

He met Vince’s eyes in the mirror and recognized the determined glint in his wide smile.

“Sure thang, Missy, you think you can handle me, that is.” Vince put on a Southern twang that made Josephine scowl and then laugh.

She did have a sense of humor. She just tried to bury it.

Then they were there, Vince getting out and opening Josephine’s door, scanning the area even though Special Agent Sam Walker stood there glowering through the windshield. Marsh grabbed Josephine’s hand before she got out.

“Be careful.” He wanted to say something else, something meaningful but he didn’t know what. Instead he stared dumbly into wary blue eyes. “Please?”

She nodded, got out and slammed the door behind her. Marsh winced, grateful for solid German engineering.

Sam Walker stuck his head through the open window. “I need you inside too.”

Judging from the guy’s appearance, he’d had another rough night. Marsh glanced at the clock on the dash. “I can’t.” BAU saw more burnout than all the other fields, but if anybody could help catch this killer, it was those guys. “I have a job to do in Savannah. I’ll be back late tonight or tomorrow morning. You can schedule an appointment then.”

Ignoring Walker’s glare and shout, Marsh rolled up the window.
Jesus. What was wrong with the guy?
Was he back to being a suspect? Walker stepped back, turned to Josephine and smiled briefly at something she said.

Marsh pulled out and maneuvered the car through heavy traffic. Gritting his teeth, he ignored the anger, the ache and the desperation that crawled along every nerve fiber. He had a job to do. Vincent was more than capable of keeping her safe. The trouble was—he finally admitted to himself—he didn’t want anybody else getting too close to her and that bugged the hell out of him too.

His cell phone rang, a welcome distraction. Turning on the hands-free, he wove in and out of lanes, heading for the Manhattan Bridge. Did a full body cringe when a female voice announced the director was on the line.

Shit
.

“Marsh, what the hell are you doing?”

“Brett, good to hear from you—”

“This isn’t a social call.” Brett Lovine sounded harassed and pissed. Not a good combination for an FBI Director, though probably not an uncommon one.

“Then what can I do for you,
sir
?” The names they’d called each other as kids echoed through that short title. Enough to have Brett blowing deeply into the receiver.

“I am just off the phone after talking to Montgomery Able. You know him?”

“Ahhh—”

“Senator Brook Duvall’s lawyer,
Special Agent in Charge
Hayes.” Brett’s tone edged toward a sarcastic snarl.

Ahhh
. “Director, I have solid evidence connecting Pru Duvall to a stolen painting. I have to investigate the lead.” Checking his mirror, he changed lanes, roared onto the expressway and put his foot down. “Just because Brook is odds on favorite to win the party’s nomination is not a reason to back away from this. In fact, I’m doing him a favor by investigating the matter thoroughly.”

Brett snorted, but Marsh plowed on. “We have reason to believe Admiral Chambers’ stolen painting is actually a missing Vermeer that could be worth as much as fifty million dollars at auction and will cause an explosion in the art world when it’s revealed. Any hint of impropriety will sink Duvall like a stone.”

The line went quiet.

Brett was obviously weighing the good publicity the FBI might garner if they recovered that painting, versus the bad karma associated with pissing off a potential future president.

“We both know Chambers is such a crazy old goat he might have given the thing away and changed his mind the next day,” Bret said slowly.

Marsh acknowledged the truth of that statement. “But he has photographic evidence the painting was in his collection and he reported it stolen to the FBI.”

His boss seemed to be listening. “I don’t want a word of this leaked to the media. Not one word. Understood?”

“Yes, sir.” Marsh smiled.
Nothing like getting your own way with one of the most powerful people in the western world.

“And what the hell are you doing involved in this serial killer fiasco in New York City?”

“The case involves a close personal friend of mine—”

“Yeah, I saw the photos.” Back to being his friend, Brett scoffed. “Just your type. Do us both a favor, screw her and get the hell out of that sit—”

“Or what? You’ll fire me?” Fury forged his tone.

“Maybe I will.”

“Do it.” Marsh cut the connection.

Heat poured from his body as a wave of adrenaline fed the rage that simmered like lava inside his brain. Suddenly his wool jacket was suffocating. He lowered the window and let the cold breeze whip around the interior of the car and flay his senses.

Brett had never questioned his professionalism before. He counted to ten as he contemplated turning the car around and heading back to Manhattan.

Controlling a coarse exhalation he took his foot off the accelerator and considered what had gone down. The all familiar stench of politics and power, poking meddling fingers into law and order, stirred up the murky water. It stank.

But Brett hadn’t fired him.

Yet
.

Until he did, Marsh was going to track down the thief of Admiral Chambers’ painting and hope like hell the evidence was compelling enough to stand up in a court of law—no matter who’d stolen the damn thing. And Josephine?

Brett’s words had struck a raw nerve. Picturing her clear defiant gaze made him pause at his over-the-top reaction to the Director of the FBI. Her distaste for authority was rubbing off. She’d had a bad effect on him from the moment he’d first met her—spitting nails at everything he represented. But he wasn’t quitting on her. Ever. He just didn’t quite know how to get her to trust him.

He pressed his foot to the metal and sped toward duty and the job.

Josephine was safe.

That was all that really mattered.

* * *

Nelson bent over the photographs on his desk. It had taken fifty bucks and some genius detective work to discover the ID of the latest chick to get sliced and diced by the Blade Hunter. Lynn Richards—the woman he’d snapped two nights ago attending an art gallery opening with SAC Marshall Hayes. Nelson couldn’t believe his luck.

The babble in the office was cacophonous. The atmosphere in the city starting to buzz with fear and paranoia and all of a sudden Nelson’s mundane dealings with death, drugs and despair were getting the sort of attention normally reserved for movie stars and pop icons.

“Landry!” His pre-menstrual bitch of an editor stood at the door to her office and yelled across the floor.

He looked up uneasily, unable to measure her mood by anything except the glint in her eye. “Yes, boss?”

“Got anything new on the latest Blade Hunter vic?”

“Yup. Everything from her parents being at a VIP dinner at the time of the murder, to her dating a fed.” He waved Saturday’s
NY News
at her and pointed out Lynn Richards’ picture. Sweat dripped down the side of his face because this story could put him back in the game.

“That’s the vic? You’re sure?” Stalking over to his desk she examined him with a distrustful expression. Her natural look.

“Yup.”

There was a pause that spread across the whole office, everyone holding their breath.

“Get me copy in fifteen minutes and I’ll hold the front page.”

He grinned. “No problem, boss.” Excitement hummed through him even as he started typing his piece.

“What about the other girl?” She pinned the other woman on the front of
The NY News
with a crimson nail.

Nelson shrugged. He hadn’t got anywhere with that yet. “I don’t know who she is. I’m working on it.”

“The fed?”

Gonna wish he’d never fucked with this particular reporter. “Not available for comment.”

Her finely plucked brows arched. “I have my own sources. I’ll see what I can find out.”

Her Last Chance: Chapter Nine

“Do you ever sleep, Agent Walker?” Josephine eyed the deep lines gridlocking the fed’s face.