“Call home base, Deke. I can’t help you with this.” Kayla had shucked her heels and paced, cell phone in hand. “Do you understand that I have a dead plastic surgeon tied up in a BDSM club, another woman who nearly died in the locker room, and if I’m not careful I’ll have cops all over the place? The only reason I didn’t have to call an ambulance is Sarah Johns is a hell of a nurse, but we still don’t know what happened to the woman.”
“The woman was obviously a distraction,” Deke pointed out. “They wanted to get Madeline and MaeBe alone.”
“Yes, for what appears to be an assassination,” Kayla countered. “Who the fuck is this Jane Adams because she’s not who that background check said she is. Corporate drones don’t assassinate doctors in BDSM clubs.”
“Hey, baby, it’s going to be okay.” Josh moved in behind his wife, putting his hands on her shoulders. “I’ve gathered the board members in the men’s locker room and we’re going to talk about how to handle this. The last thing Bernie would have wanted was a scandal. He has…had three grandkids he adores, and he wouldn’t want them shoved into the middle of a true crime documentary. You know he always said if he died in this club, we were to find a way to move him.”
“He meant if he had a heart attack, Josh,” Kayla argued. “I don’t even know what killed him. I don’t know if moving the body might be dangerous.”
“We’ll figure it out,” Josh promised. “He wasn’t the only doctor in the club.”
“I’ll get the cameras for you, Deke.” Drake seemed to be the only one of them who wasn’t panicked. “As to what killed the good doctor, I suspect you’ll find it’s a fast-acting poison the Agency has been experimenting with. The poison is cyanide, but the delivery mechanism is what’s new. It’s a tiny needle the user wears on his or her hand, often hidden under a layer of foundation makeup so it’s hard to see. One prick and the poison is delivered to the victim’s system, often without the victim even feeling the pinch of the needle. I suspect she microdosed the woman in the locker room with just enough to make her sick.”
“He was completely vulnerable to her.” Kayla’s eyes shone with tears. “I’m going to kill that bitch, Josh. I know I promised…”
Josh wrapped his arms around her. “You’re going to do whatever you need to do, and let me and the others handle Bernie. I’m going to go meet with them right now and discuss how to ensure none of this disrupts Bernie’s family. You figure out why she wanted him dead.”
It was clear to Deke. Drake wasn’t the only one who could see a pattern. “She’s a former patient. Look, she’s clearly not the Jane Adams her background check shows. These Consortium operatives have to find ways to pass background checks. Even if all the paperwork is done perfectly, someone like MaeBe can figure out if it’s likely faked. She can do it by checking social media footprints and looking at the code on the paperwork. So what’s the best way to fake it?”
“To not fake it at all,” Kyle said, his mouth a flat line. “You take over someone else’s life. You find someone without much of a family, without many friends, and you become that person. The real Jane Adams is dead. Your doctor helped whoever the fuck is wearing her face.”
“Bernie wasn’t into anything criminal,” Josh argued. “He was one of the best plastic surgeons in LA. He worked on celebrities and models, not criminals.”
“He might not have known what he was doing.” Deke’s gut was in a knot. Maddie was at the mercy of this woman who seemed to have none.
“Did he specialize?” Drake asked.
“Nose jobs,” Kayla replied. “He was known as one of the best in the world when it came to nose jobs.”
“Jane has…had an interesting nose. It’s thin and slightly tilted up,” Drake remarked. “It would have taken a pro to get it right, and I would bet it was the first thing she had done. Your doctor was likely the last person to see her true face, and she had to get rid of him. This has been one long setup, and we didn’t see it coming.”
“Why take MaeBe and Maddie?” Kyle asked. “She killed the guy she wanted to kill. What’s the point of taking them?”
Drake’s eyes finally came up. “You know why.”
Deke didn’t have time to play Agency games. He’d put together a lot in his head in the last few moments. Sometimes dead didn’t stay dead. “Is Jane the woman you worked with? Is this about getting revenge?”
He needed to understand what Maddie was up against.
Kyle had paled. “No. No. I killed her. She’s dead.”