Paradox (FBI Thriller 22)

“Don’t worry. Senator Monroe is sleeping at Mom’s house for the duration, and so is one of his aides. Sean will never be alone.”

He closed down MAX and laid him on the bedside table, plugged into the charger next to their cell phones. “You know what I’m missing right now? Singing him his nightly country western song. He always wants another verse and he can’t ever stay awake for the last verse, even with his current favorite, ‘Elvis in the Chariot.’?” He kissed her forehead, her nose, her ear. “Well, at least my mom’s a happy camper. Do you think she’s singing to him now about Elvis waving for the chariot to swoop down and fetch him up?”

“She doesn’t have to go that far, she’s the goddess of freshly baked chocolate chip cookies.” She saw his smile, and for a moment, she felt one on her mouth as well, but soon it fell off. She felt her fear return, familiar to her now, always with her. Would he try again? When? Tonight Sean was safe, but what about tomorrow? Would he try to kidnap Sean from his day camp? Hard to imagine, everyone was alerted now.

They were both quiet a moment, then she whispered. “Octavia Ryan’s dead, and Sala’s got to be a mess. At least he’s staying with the chief. She’ll make sure he’s all right.”

Savich kept his voice calm, although he felt like hitting something. “I spoke briefly to Ty—Chief Christie. Concussion or not, I don’t think she’d have let Sala come back to Washington by himself. She’s a good woman, levelheaded, smart.” He remembered Detective Harry Anson in Seattle saying Ty was a bulldog. He knew to his gut now Anson was right. “Let it go for a little while, sweetheart. We should both try to let it go.”

But she was caught up in it. “Dillon, I still can’t get over that vision you had—the murderer coming back to the dock. And Sala hearing a girl’s mad laughter? Who was that? Maybe it’ll be her prints they found on that toilet paper rod.”

Savich wanted to distract her, distract himself. “All I can think about right now is getting you out of your tiger stripes.”

She tried to laugh and hiccupped.

“That’s a start.” He breathed in her light rose scent, saw a red curl work its way out of the high ponytail to curve around her face. His heart kicked up. She pulled the rubber band out of her hair and shook her head, ending up with a wild nimbus to halo her head. He couldn’t wait to run his fingers through the curls, feel them tickle his nose. She pushed him down on his back, leaned down to bite his neck, and kissed his chin. His mouth got the full treatment. He eased his hands beneath that tiger-striped top, loving the feel of her, but then his brain skipped again to the man who’d been in McGurk’s tent waving a chocolate bar at the children, the same man he knew had been in Sean’s bedroom Wednesday night. Turn it off, turn it off.

He felt her hair cascade over his face, her warm breath against his cheek. “You’re letting me down here, Dillon. I’m doing my part, giving you my all, but I can see your brain going a zillion miles an hour.” She tapped her fingers to his cheek. “Pay attention.” Her fingers glided over his belly, taking all the blood from his brain.

When his breathing finally calmed, Savich leaned up on his elbow, bent down, and kissed her mouth. He saw she was nearly out, and so he tucked her in close beside him, whispered against her cheek, “I wouldn’t be surprised if my mom tried to seduce Sean to the dark side. You know, promise to teach him how to drive, pay all his speeding tickets, to keep him with her.”

Sherlock mumbled something. He kissed her again and eased down beside her, her head on his shoulder. He heard her breathing even into sleep. He closed his eyes and quickly fell asleep himself.

He was walking into the master bedroom at Gatewood, only now it was a long, skinny room. He saw science fiction graffiti on the white walls, not people, but video game monsters. They writhed, their tentacles reached out to

him, trying to escape the wall to get to him, but he paid no attention, all his focus on the front window.

He looked out at an early morning patchwork fog over Lake Massey, though it didn’t really look like the lake. There were waves that pulsed and seemed to twist in on themselves, and he knew something scary was beneath the surface, something deadly, that gave no quarter. He saw a narrow raft glide out of the fog, a man standing on it, staring down at the pulsing waves, and he was smiling. He didn’t have an oar. The raft seemed to be moving on its own. It pulled in at a dock with parking slots all around it, and the man jumped out. He straightened, turned slowly, and looked up at Savich. He gave a rictus of a grin, pumped his fist, and yelled something, but Savich couldn’t make out the words. The man kept staring at him, that mad grin still on his face, and gave Savich a deep bow. Savich felt a sudden, bitter cold. Black shadows roiled out of the cold, coming closer and closer. He wanted to run, but he couldn’t move. Bony fingers slithered out of those shadows and stretched toward him, bone-white fingers that had come from the bottom of the lake. He heard an excited laugh—a girl’s laugh—high and vicious and manic, and the skeletal fingers reached for his throat, closed around his neck. He couldn’t move, couldn’t fight. In the distance he heard a girl shout, “Kill him! Kill him!”

A sharp slap on his face, and another. His fingers grabbed Sherlock’s wrist. She shouted in his face, “Wake up, Dillon! Come on, that’s it. Everything’s okay. You were having a nightmare. That’s right, come back to me.” He let her wrist go, sucked in a breath, and the black shadows faded away. Though he couldn’t see Sherlock’s face in the dark, he knew she was close, knew she was real. He calmed himself, breathed in the soft, quiet air of their bedroom, and felt his heart begin to slow its mad gallop, felt himself settle. She was kissing his face, holding him close, and whispered against his cheek, “What happened? What did you dream?”

Savich turned his face into her palm, kissed her smooth skin. It was dark, deep in the night, so he told her all of it, his voice scratchy, as if he hadn’t spoken in a long time.

Telling her about it calmed him down. “Do you know, I heard the girl’s laugh. It sounded familiar, but I can’t remember.”

She kissed him again, stroked her hand over his face. “A dream like that—I’d scream the roof down. But Dillon, given what happened today, it makes sense you’d have a doozy of a nightmare, don’t you think?” She paused, cupped his face in her palm, studied him. “I think your mind is trying to fit the pieces together.”

Such faith she had in him. How could he fit any pieces together when he could barely breathe? He still felt the lingering fear, the sense of helplessness. He concentrated on her hands stroking him instead.

Sherlock wondered how the girl’s laugh in his nightmare could sound familiar to him. He’d figure it out, he usually did. She said, “Remember Tommy Raider’s face when he FaceTimed us earlier, waving that toilet paper rod? ‘We’ll know tomorrow if this goombah’s prints are in CODIS!’ Utter disbelief and joy at finding that gift from heaven. He laughed like a hyena. Can you imagine all that work, and you miss the TP? Talk about irony.”

Finally, Savich’s heart was steady again. He said against her temple, “He did sound like a hyena, didn’t he?”

She snuggled against him. “Sorry I had to slap you so hard.” Her words were mumbled, she was nearly back to sleep. Savich waited another couple of minutes, then eased away carefully so not to awaken her and took MAX to his study. He’d been checking Octavia’s cases in the public record before Sherlock had come out of the bathroom, a long and tedious job. Now he decided he didn’t want to wait for fingerprints, didn’t want to wait for the warrant for all of Octavia Ryan’s client files, even those that hadn’t made it to trial yet. Not when he knew Octavia Ryan’s former law firm would fight the warrant tooth and nail to keep her files private.

It was time to move justice along.

17

* * *

Savich made himself some tea and got to work. It took him less than a half hour to break through the firewall at Jacobson, Wile, & Corman in D.C. and access Octavia’s client files. He wondered if he should let them know how crappy their security was as he sipped his tea.

He methodically pulled up her former client files, concentrating on criminal cases. Fifteen minutes later, he stared at the familiar face of a young man Octavia Ryan had taken on as a pro bono case, Victor Nesser. She’d convinced a judge he wasn’t competent to stand trial, so he’d been sent to the Wharton Facility for treatment a year and a half before. Victor Nesser was an only child, American mother, Jordanian father, gifted computer hacker, still only twenty-three years old. Savich remembered that Victor was a mess at that time, uncommunicative, disinterested in everyone and everything around him. Had he even realized Octavia Ryan had convinced the judge the state couldn’t legally prosecute him until he was able to more fully grasp the charges? He’d loved a thirteen-year-old girl, Lissy Smiley, and Savich knew she’d seduced him, an eighteen-year-old boy, and bound him to her. He’d then been brought in by Lissy’s mother to drive the getaway car for the Gang of Four, as they were called. There was no doubt, though, that when Savich had been forced to kill Lissy, Victor had been a lost soul.

Victor Nesser fit the profile, but he should still be incarcerated. Savich brought up the patient database of the Central State Hospital, where he’d been transferred. Victor had escaped six weeks before. Law enforcement had been notified, notices had been sent out, but Savich hadn’t seen them nor had there been any mention of his escape in Octavia’s client files to indicate her former law firm had ever been notified. Victor had managed to disappear. Savich had no doubt Victor’s fingerprints would be on that toilet paper rod.

But who was the girl Sala had heard laughing? The teenager who was Victor’s soul mate, Lissy Smiley, was dead—Savich had shot her himself. Victor could have found another girlfriend since his escape, but Savich wouldn’t, couldn’t, believe it. He’d never forget Victor’s howl of agony when Savich had told him Lissy was dead.