“Don’t go.” His voice was diamond hard.
She rushed to the window and saw the black sedan pulling up in front of her house. It was the car she’d seen when she’d been running days ago. Getting into the car was akin to signing her death warrant. The Shark had come back to kill her. But she wasn’t ready to die and there had to be some way to save Hanna and herself. “I have to go. He’ll kill Hanna if I don’t. Don’t call the cops.”
“Riley, do not get in that car. Wait for me. I can be there in twenty minutes.”
“I don’t have twenty minutes. I don’t have one minute. I have to go now.”
“Damn it, Riley! Do not go!”
The anger and frustration in his voice nearly broke her heart. She didn’t want to do it this way. She didn’t. But there was no other play right now.
She hung up the phone, tossed it aside, and squaring her shoulders, walked out the front door, pulling it closed behind her. The windows were tinted and the passenger-side rear door popped open just a crack. She opened it, sat down on the rich leather seats, and stared at the dark partition dividing her from the front seat.
“Where’s Hanna?” she shouted.
“Close the door.” The calm voice came over the speakers.
“I’m not doing anything until you tell me who’s got my kid and where she is!” The more time she could delay, the more time Bowman had to find her.
“Shut the door or get out now. You’ve got ten seconds and then Hanna dies.”
Her options gone, she shut the door. “Where is she?”
“You’ll see her soon.” The car began to drive.
Bowman swung his legs over the side of his bed and clicked on a light. The echo of Riley’s voice, filled with fear and pain, ricocheted in his head. The sense of helplessness he’d felt when his wife was sick crept from the darkness as he reached for his jeans and a T-shirt and crossed the room to his computer. He wasn’t fighting a faceless disease this time but a psychopath whom he would find and destroy. And Riley was not a vulnerable runaway anymore. She was a smart woman and one of the best police officers he’d ever met. He was banking on the fact that she’d find a way to buy time.
He hit the “Return” button to bring up the screen and opened the tracking program. Riley was on the move and headed west fast.
He dialed Andrews, who answered on the second ring. “Check your monitor.”
“I’m looking at it now. Did Riley say where she was going?” Andrews asked.
“No. She called me and said the Shark has Hanna. She is now in a car sent by the Shark.”
“Have you called the cops?”
“I have a good idea what he’ll do if the cops roll up.”
“Do you need my help? I can be ready in five.”
Bowman rose and moved to the corner of his bedroom where he kept his gear. “Notify Shield and then suit up and follow the signal. I’m leaving now.”
“Consider it done.”
Though the windows in the car were tinted and Riley couldn’t see where they were driving, she’d been on the move thirty minutes, and judging by the feel of rolling land around them, she knew they’d headed west. At one point they’d slowed to cross what felt like train tracks.
She didn’t know her specific location but knew this area of the state was home to some rich horse farms. The car slowed and turned to the right, moving unhurriedly down what sounded like a gravel drive. When the car stopped she tensed, fingers curled into fists. Her door unlocked.
The driver said, “Ms. Tatum, he is waiting for you.”
“Who is he?”
“You need to exit the vehicle.”
Riley got out of the car and stared at the driver’s-side tinted window, which did not open. She knocked on the door and shouted, “Where are we?”
The window opened, but the stone-faced man did not look at her. “He is waiting for you. Go inside.” He gestured toward the house.
Riley stood at the top of a circular drive that curved in front of a three-story brick house complete with a porch that wrapped around the front. Twin large planters filled with bright-yellow flowers and trailing ivy stood on either side of the wide front door.
Wind whispered through the trees. Fine gravel crunched under her feet as she crossed to the front door. She was all alone. Exposed.
She climbed the steps and stopped at the door. As she raised her hand to lift a brass lion-head knocker, footsteps echoed on the other side. The door snapped open.
Standing before her was a smartly dressed older man with sharp green eyes and pale skin. Leaning on a cane, he was thin in a brittle kind of way but possessed a dynamic energy that made it impossible to ignore him. His suit was cut from a charcoal-gray cloth—handmade, judging by the quality—and his shirt was sewn from fine linen. The tie was Hermès.
“Welcome, Riley. I’ve been waiting for you.”
The sharp angles of the man’s face struck a familiar chord in her memory. “Mr. Duncan. I saw you on the news talking about your music festival.”
He smiled. “I wasn’t sure if you’d caught the interview. We met formally that one time years ago. I know you don’t remember me, but I’ve been tracking your career for years.”
“Why are you doing this?”
He held out his hand, indicating she should enter. “This isn’t a conversation to be had on the front porch. You’re my guest, and I’d like to offer you a drink.”
“I don’t need a drink. In fact the last time I had one of your drinks, I didn’t wake up for seven days. Where’s Hanna?”
“She’s fine. Safely tucked away upstairs. But if you want to know more, you’ll have to come inside.”
Tension tightened Riley’s chest. She always identified her exits no matter where she was, but this house was so large she had no way of knowing how to escape. She stepped inside, and he slowly closed the door behind her with a click that echoed off a two-story-high foyer crowned with a massive crystal chandelier. A large staircase carpeted in red wound to a second-floor hallway that vanished somewhere in the mansion.
The foyer was carpeted with a handmade Indian rug and furnished with a round mahogany table, which displayed a crystal vase filled with red roses that perfumed the space with a soft scent.
She thought about the tracker in her arm and knew Bowman was paying attention. “No one notices street girls vanishing from multiple cities. And concerts draw girls, don’t they?”
“They do. And moving around has been helpful. As much as I would like to have stayed in New Orleans, I was a little too greedy twelve years ago and it almost ruined me.”
“I remember the concerts that summer. There must have been a half dozen.”
“It was a good gig. Kept me in town six weeks. But handling all those venues is stressful and I found I couldn’t resist setting up games.”
“How many games have you set up over the years?”
“I’ve lost count.”
“And none of the other players turned on you.”
“A man like me develops a knack for spotting people who enjoy killing. In all the years, I’ve had two issues, if that’s what you want to call them. The first was losing you and the second was Kevin. I thought I had the guy figured out, but it turns out he had no stomach or spine for mercy killing. He became too much of a liability.”
“Did he kill Vicky or did you?” She knew the answer but needed to keep him talking to give Bowman time. She needed any time she could squeeze from this madman.
“He killed her.” Duncan flexed his fingers and stared at them as if they’d betrayed him. “I wanted to kill her. I really did. My hands used to be so strong, and I could steal life with the twist of a cord. But my hands don’t work like they used to. See, I’m sick. I have heart disease. The simplest movements exhaust me. It won’t be long before I won’t have the breath to talk.”
His death wouldn’t be painful enough as far as she was concerned. And as much as she wanted to take joy in his suffering, her goal now was to get Hanna and
survive.
“You’ve won so much in your life,” she said. “Money, prestige, and I don’t know how many poker games. And now you’re losing to your own body.”
“Not having control is frustrating.” He smiled. “As you must know by now, I’m not a good loser. When I fell sick, it became a bit of an obsession.”
“Who did you lose to?” She wanted to know the name of the bastard who had risked her life on the turn of cards. “That’s bothered me most since all this began.”
“Someone you know.”
She’d crossed paths with so many over the years. “Who?”
Instead of answering, the Shark deflected. “Did you know the man who beat me won half a million dollars and you were allowed to go free? I was blown away. I’d never lost before.”
“It must have been a frustrating blow.”
“You can’t imagine.” He smiled as if he were talking to a kindred spirit. “I lost track of you right after the game, but never him. I followed his exploits over the last dozen years and was amused by his efforts to appear legitimate.”
“Appear?”
“He is an addict like me, and no matter how much he swears he’s gone legit, I know he hasn’t. I’ve heard about some of his private games. He’s always been one of the best, being most careful not to lose too much when the cards turn on him.”
“Are you talking about my stepfather, William Charles?”
His eyes sparked with amusement. “Good guess, but wrong.”
Her temper burned in her gut, but she refused to give it free rein. This bullshit guessing game would keep him talking.
“I even thought it might be Shield,” she said.
He chuckled. “He’s a true gambler at heart. The way he rolled the dice and left the FBI to start that company. And he was in New Orleans during the killings, wasn’t he?”
She’d thought her guess had been too wild to consider. “Is it Shield?”
“No.”
The only other gambler she knew in her life was Duke. But he didn’t even play lotto scratch cards. He even frowned on the coin game heads or tails.
The Shark tugged at his shirt cuff, adjusting the square gold cuff link. “When I became sick, I searched him out. He didn’t see me, but I saw him. And who should I see talking to him? You. I almost wept. It was as if it were all meant to be.”