The Bureau Killer, page 5
“I already am,” Mason admitted. “It’s not a matter of wanting to—or even feeling like I have to—but there’s something in the pit of my stomach urging me to continue. You know what it’s like, anyway. You’re as headstrong as I am.”
“But prettier.”
“Marginally.”
Evie shrugged. “Whatever. Look, I’ve heard you rattle on about yet another psychopath for some time. Do you think maybe I can give you the surprise yet?”
“I’m not in the mood,” Mason said, but by then she had grabbed his hand and was pulling him toward the door. Mason knew better than to argue, so he let her drag him through the hallway, past the living room, and toward the front door. When they were outside, Mason suspected she had done something crazy to the front of his house—given it a lick of paint with some hideous color or something along those lines—but then she kept on walking.
“Where are we going?”
“Stop being a baby,” she said and then stopped on the sidewalk around a hundred feet from his house. She waved a hand toward his gift, a proud smile propped on her face.
Mason stepped back, stunned. He was unsure if he was hallucinating or if this was some cruel joke she was playing, but there was innocence in her smile—kindness. Mason tried for words, but they fell short as he stepped forward and laid a hand on the warm metal of the hood.
“Where… why?”
“After I heard about Diane leaving you, and Amy… you know… I thought maybe you deserved a win. When I saw her parked on the side of the road, I waited for the owner to come back and negotiated a good price.”
Mason was blown away. He stumbled along the side of the black Shelby Mustang on unsure feet, gently running his fingers across the chrome lining. She was still in mint condition, unchanged from the last time he had seen her. It, he reminded himself as strong, positive emotions brewed inside his stomach. He looked back at Evie, who tossed him the keys. Mason caught them and licked his dry lips.
“This must have cost a fortune.”
“Like I said, I negotiated a good price.”
“How much?”
“Just a few bucks and a touch of blackmail.”
“But… I can’t accept this.”
“Yes you can,” Evie said, stepping closer. “You’re a single man now, and you deserve to reap the benefits of that. This is the best place to start. And besides, if you’re going to run around looking for another killer, you could use some hot wheels.”
Mason held the keys, still disbelieving. “You’re sure about this?”
“Positive.” Evie shrugged. “So long as you know I’m with you on this case.”
But Mason said nothing, only standing overwhelmed. Of course Evie could help him—as long as she kept her head down and could take care of herself, she could do anything she wanted to. And Mason wouldn’t even try to stop her. She was a Black, after all, which meant there wasn’t a force in this world that could stop her.
TWENTY-SIX
In exchange for her kindness, Mason had given Evie the Ford Explorer he no longer needed. She made a note to trade in her Fiat for this. It was a gift she hadn’t seen coming, already having decided he would probably just give it to his wife anyway.
Correction, she thought. Ex-wife.
After their stressful and work-themed reunion, they had each chosen a project and gone their separate ways. Evie’s role was to head inside Jacob Fray’s wife’s office and go to town on her computer. Mason had insisted she was able to do things he wasn’t, and she wasn’t going to argue with him on that. Even if it was wrong to be proud of it, Evie couldn’t help but take a little grace in her deep knowledge of a computer’s system.
Inside, the secretary had let her in easily enough. After a little persuasion and some mumbling about how she was technically unemployed now, she had let Evie in with the quick warning that the FBI were on their way to seize Fray’s possessions.
Evie thanked her and went inside, sitting at the laptop on the desk and cracking her knuckles. What most people saw as a computer, she saw as a vault. Where most people would simply pry it open and start typing, she first removed some techie gear from her own bag.
It was time to dig up some dirt on Mrs. Fray.
TWENTY-SEVEN
Mason did all he could to keep his head above water. Every move he made filled his head with thoughts of Diane with another man. Of MJ being raised by a stranger. It tried to weigh him down, tugging him closer to hell. But he wouldn’t let it. Right now he had a perfect case—a perfect distraction from his dismal life… even if it did wrack him with stress.
He reached Jacob Fray’s office around midday, parking the growling Mustang as close to the front door as he could get it. From his position behind the wheel, he saw Fray’s secretary pushing through the door with a large box in her arms. Mason rushed out to help her, taking the weight out of her weakening grip.
“I got it,” he said, thinking it was even heavier than it looked.
“Thanks,” the secretary said. “Had to get all my belongings out of the desk after the FBI took the rest. I’m officially unemployed, it seems.”
Mason nodded and followed the direction she walked in, crossing the parking lot with the box seemingly growing heavier by the second. It was okay though—with all his natural strength, he had held far heavier.
They got to her car, a perfectly clean and modern-looking Mazda, and the secretary ran to open the trunk. She barely kept her balance in those tall heels of hers. “Just throw it in there,” she said. “It was… Mr. Black, wasn’t it?”
“Mason is fine.”
“Then thank you, Mason. I’m Julia.” She shut the trunk and looked back at the building she was an employee of until today. Sadness lingered in her long gaze. “I’m going to miss this place. I’ve been working here for three years.”
“Time does fly,” Mason said, following her stare. The building was blocky and white. He knew it was four floors, but it looked like only two from the outside. Modern architecture, he guessed. “What’s happened to Fray’s business?”
“It shut down shortly after the incident at his house.”
“Nobody came to claim their heritage?”
“No, but who would want to? It was really just me and him. Not much to claim.”
Mason turned back toward her. “Right. What exactly was it he did again?”
“It’s sort of hard to explain. Mostly a bit of legal work, but he had a tendency to do some accounting under the table. More than anything I was just there to keep his life in order. The name on the business registry is just a formality.”
“And the Feds?” Mason asked. “I heard he was one of them.”
Julia sighed. “He was. Right up until he quit and started his own business.”
Silence fell between them. Mason kept looking at her, waiting for her to spill more about the man who’d hired him. When she didn’t, he prodded at it a little. “You said the FBI took Fray’s belongings. What interest did they have in that?”
“Not sure. I think they just wanted any secrets he might have been hiding.”
“Do you think he was hiding any?”
Julia shook her head. No hesitation. “Not a thing. Except maybe for the other Fed guy.”
“What other Fed guy?”
“He used to come here looking for Jacob, and then they’d close the door to talk.”
“And this seems like he was hiding something… how?”
A shrug from Julia. “I guess you had to meet him. But there was something off about him. One quick look at him was enough to make you think something was wrong. Sometimes you can just read people, and he wasn’t… I don’t know. Something about him looked cruel.”
Mason knew exactly the kind of person she spoke of. He’d met many in his time, and usually that meant they had something useful to offer. “I don’t suppose you happened to get his name? Contact number? Address? Anything?”
“Nothing, I’m afraid,” Julia said. She fidgeted with the keys in her hands, staring down at them like they held the secrets of the universe. When she finally looked up, there was a splash of sympathy in her eyes. “If you want secrets on Fray, you’ll have to dig deep. All I know is he was a very secretive man, and he never told me anything.”
Figures, Mason thought.
All hope fled from his mind.
TWENTY-EIGHT
They had agreed to meet at the bar with the promise of sharing information, but Mason had nothing to share. He sat at the counter on a wonky stool, sinking another beer while the only other two customers played pool behind him. There was nothing but the quiet whisper of rock music and the smacking of pool balls to keep him company until she got there.
Evie arrived a little after eight. She stood in the doorway and scanned the bar, quickly finding him and hurrying over with a great smile on her lips. She ordered a beer from the bartender and slid cash across the counter without looking.
“What do you have?” Mason asked.
“You first. I want to save the best until last.”
Mason told her about Fray’s secretary and the involvement with the FBI. He relayed it word for word, as the conversation had been so dismally short it was near impossible to forget it. Evie listened intently, sipping the beer that was placed in front of her while rocking gently on the stool. It appeared hers wasn’t too stable, either.
“Julia didn’t tell you what this mystery man looked like?”
“She said he had a scar on his left cheek. That’s it.”
Evie’s grin widened then. She fidgeted with the bags at her feet and pulled out a laptop, then powered it on. The image of a man appeared on the screen. He had brown hair and dark, hollow eyes that were sunken in his gaunt face. The most noticeable trait, however, was the deep trench of a scar that ran from his left eye and trailed all the way down his cheek.
“It’s him,” Mason said, his spirits lifted. “It’s got to be.”
“Agreed,” Evie said. “And guess what.”
“What?”
“I have an address.”
Mason smiled. It suddenly felt as if his worries of Diane and Amy and MJ all melted away for the faintest flicker of a second. For the first time in months, something excited him enough to make him feel like everything wasn’t a total loss. He felt high, his body flooded with the kind of energy he hadn’t felt in years. It must have shown on his face, too, because Evie was far too quick to shut him down.
“Don’t get too excited,” she warned him, sipping her beer and closing the laptop. By then Mason was already off the stool and ready to leave, but her next words were enough to slaughter his excitement. “The guy’s with the FBI.”
TWENTY-NINE
The Educator waited in the shadows, doing all he could not to start laughing. They all thought they were so smart. He had heard them on the TV and radio, even stood among the crowds in simple disguises and listened as they made empty promises about stopping the terrorist.
But was he a terrorist? Was he really? The way he saw it, terrorists harmed helpless civilians in order to make a political point. They killed hundreds, if not thousands, of people in a single blow and then announced why they had done it.
The Educator’s methods were different. Sure, he had a point to make, but he wasn’t going to kill anyone who didn’t have it coming. There was some collateral damage—take the other tourists on the boats, for example—but that was simply unavoidable. It was so difficult to get everyone in their proper places that he often had no choice but to hurt a few extra. It was sad, he supposed, but he couldn’t let it hinder him.
At least tonight wasn’t like that. The bomb was inside the man’s house, tucked neatly under the staircase for the past hour. The victim’s wife and kid were out for the evening. The Educator didn’t know where or why, but it was irrelevant. All he gave a damn about was that the man he wanted was pulling into his driveway now, with no idea he was going to die.
Pitiful, the Educator thought.
He remained calm and still in the bushes, holding back his laughter once more. The man he wanted climbed out of the car and pressed a button on the fob. The car doors clunked as they locked, and the agent took long strides up the rest of the driveway while swinging keys around on his finger. He hummed as he went, not knowing it was the last sound he’d ever make.
The Educator waited. He watched, buried in the shadows. The device in his hands was small but heavy, and he pressed his thumb into the recessed groove of the button. His fingers shook, not with fear but with raw excitement at what was to come.
Finally, when the man was inside, the Educator pushed the button.
And the fireworks began.
THIRTY
Smoke billowed over the tops of the houses. Mason saw that long before he turned onto the correct street and found what looked like a protest. Fear and horror grasped his heart, squeezing hard as if to suffocate him while he drove the Mustang as close to the crowd as he could get.
Please don’t be what I think it is.
Mason stopped the car on the side of the road. As he got out and peered over the heads of the growing crowd, all he saw was the flashing lights of emergency services. He already had a feeling about what had happened, but he didn’t want to believe it.
It took less than a minute for Evie to arrive. She parked in the spot behind the Mustang and got out, her eyes more focused on Mason than the scene around her. She must have registered his doom-and-gloom expression and immediately thought the worst. Which was the right thing to do, he guessed.
“What happened?” she asked, rushing toward him.
“No idea. Let’s go find out.”
They squeezed through the crowd inch by inch. The closer they got, the more Mason lost his patience and began to shove harder. The way he saw it, these people were standing in the way of his investigation, which in turn killed his only distraction. Without this case, he was nothing but a single dad, his wife playing with a new friend while his only daughter lay in the ground. The thought horrified him so much that he pushed harder until he was at the front.
“Oh God,” Evie said, coming up beside him.
Mason had no words, however. His stomach felt hollow as he leaned on the police barrier for support. Farther along the street, their mystery man’s house had been reduced to rubble and smoke. Embers danced in the dusty pits where his home used to be. Firefighters moved around the scene like worker bees, all carrying out their purpose. Mason’s eyes drifted over to a small, huddled crowd of policemen. They were talking to men in suits, and he recognized two of them immediately: they were Hulls and Dunne.
“Hey!” an officer yelled as Mason crossed the barrier. “Hey, you’re not allowed—”
Mason didn’t give him the time of day. He was hurrying toward the police/FBI crowd, their heads all turning in his direction as the cop behind him raised his voice. He reached them in no time, and Special Agent Hulls told the cop to stand down. A quick glance told Mason that Evie was still stuck behind the barrier, being knocked around by nervous onlookers.
“What are you doing here?” Hulls asked.
“We got a lead on Jacob Fray that brought us here.”
“You’re too late, then, aren’t you?”
Mason turned toward whoever had said that and quickly discovered it was Detective Bill Harvey, ex-friend and colleague. Mason shook his head and turned back to Hulls. He had nothing to say to Bill now. “I need to know if you find anything.”
“Why?” Agent Dunne asked. “You’re a civilian.”
“A civilian who has stopped more killers than you ever will,” Mason snapped. “So do you want to fill me in on the details or just stand here measuring dicks? Because I assure you that’s not something you can win.”
“Get him out of here,” Dunne said quickly.
It took less than a second for Mason to feel rough hands on his shoulders. A second later, another pair clamped around him. The more he struggled, the harder they pulled, and Mason felt limitless fury swirl around his head as Bill and the Feds watched him get shooed away.
“You’ll regret this!” he yelled to Hulls. “You need my help!”
But then they all turned their backs on him, shutting him out completely as the two police officers escorted him back into the crowd. The FBI ignored him, the police officers left him at the barrier, and Bill Harvey didn’t even glance his way. All the while, Mason could only think about one daunting fact.
If he wanted to stop the Educator, he would have to do it without their help.
THIRTY-ONE
“I’m pissed off,” he said, storming into the house and tossing his keys onto the kitchen table. They slid off the other end and hit the floor, but by then Mason was already tearing off his trench coat and hurling it onto the back of a chair. “We’re one step behind at every turn.”
Evie swept in gently behind him, picking up the mess he made. Mason knew exactly what she was thinking: she intended to live here for a while, and he was making a mess of the kitchen that would be half hers for the foreseeable future.
“Calm down,” was all she said. “We’ll get him.”
“Yeah, but not before he kills more people.”
“If that’s what it takes, there’s nothing we can do about it.”
“Oh yeah? And you can live with that on your conscience, can you?”
They stared at each other in silence. Mason’s eyes burned with exhaustion, his head buzzing as he struggled to digest all the bad that had happened lately. And as he gaped at his sister—the helpful but painfully stubborn woman who was all he had left—he couldn’t help but stoke the fire and then turn the hot poker on her.
“What do you care, anyway?” he snapped.
“What the…? Of course I care. I’m here, aren’t I?”
“Right. Because you needed somewhere to stay, I’m guessing.”
Evie crossed her arms. Her face grew red. “Hey, don’t be an asshole. I’m on your team, remember. And if I were you, I’d count that as a blessing, because nobody else is.”
